Do I need to have a naked slave woman shackled to my mana pool?

Hey there Path of Exile team!

I've heard a lot of great things about this game and decided to check it out. Though I've been gaming for decades, I'm also part of a demographic that's been growing substantially in recent years - female gamers.

As a woman, I appreciate when games are created with me in mind - not front and center necessarily, but somewhere on the horizon. I know that there are still more men than women playing games. What's more, I know that there are a range of women. Some won't be bothered by the naked slave woman, and others may even be turned on by that kinda thing.

But it'd be disingenuous to pretend that all women ought to be be comfortable with the degradation and enslavement of other women. And it makes me a little uncomfortable to look at a half-full mana bubble supported by that poor tortured soul. Every ability cast makes me feel somewhat complicit in her abuse. =(

Couldn't we just have mana bubbles? Or at least an option for plain mana bubbles?


Thanks for hearing me out! It's such an everpresent UI element that it's hard to just ignore. :)

Not to jump on you for expressing a feminist point of view, but have you been to Solaris level 3? At least the UI elements are aesthetically pleasing.

I don't care much about it either way, but I'd be curious to see what the players thought of a naked guy in UI to balance the girls. The male equivalent would be a slender, sexualized slave boy, and not a muscled brodude. Global chat would be hilarious.

Also, we need penises on the male statues.

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OnmyojiOmn wrote:

Also, we need penises on the male statues.

The boss one with the spear has one

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OnmyojiOmn wrote:

have you been to Solaris level 3? At least the UI elements are aesthetically pleasing.

No, I haven't played very far in the game yet. What happens in Solaris Level 3?

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Zifna wrote:

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OnmyojiOmn wrote:

have you been to Solaris level 3? At least the UI elements are aesthetically pleasing.

No, I haven't played very far in the game yet. What happens in Solaris Level 3?

Don't let anyone spoil it for you. I don't like being down there any longer than I have to.

I'm pretty sure all the male statues have penises and all the female statues have vaginas. I didn't even notice the naked slave chick on the mana thing though. I'll have to take a closer look now. But this is a mature game hence there being no chat filter. Also, boobs are cool. Works for Game of Thrones.

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Zifna wrote:

But it'd be disingenuous to pretend that all women ought to be be comfortable with the degradation and enslavement of other women.

It strikes me as a bit disingenuous for you to even write this. When has one of the developers even hinted at this? Perhaps I'm missing your point.

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Zifna wrote:

And it makes me a little uncomfortable to look at a half-full mana bubble supported by that poor tortured soul. Every ability cast makes me feel somewhat complicit in her abuse. =(

Couldn't we just have mana bubbles? Or at least an option for plain mana bubbles?

I support including the option, but I'm confused as to why you only mention the mana woman. They're both equally "naked", just facing in different directions.

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OnmyojiOmn wrote:

I don't care much about it either way, but I'd be curious to see what the players thought of a naked guy in UI to balance the girls. The male equivalent would be a slender, sexualized slave boy, and not a muscled brodude.

It would be Bioware forums all over again.

"I'm not homophobic, but..."

Hmm someone's made threads similar to things like this before and Ill write something similar to what I responded to them.

I personally didn't design the UI but I don't think whoever did had sexism and degradation of women in mind. I think it was just designed around medieval UI designs in other games where you have angels and mermaids and all that sorta thing hanging around the UI. Once you get to the end of act 3 you will see what they are kinda linked too. Though dont worry there are not just females involved. We have male nudity and stuff around in the game too. Like someone said before though if we stuck a slender good looking male up on one of the orbs we would never hear the end of the jokes.

I dunno im sure there was no offensive gesture intended in this UI design. Think of it like a pirate ship. If the pirate ship had a naked dude chained to the front of it everyone would laugh :P.

Anyways im pretty bad at this kind of thing because I tend not to look into things too much. My gf when she played didn't even notice the orbs for example. When I pointed them out her response was somewhere along the lines of : " Haha... boys."

As a male gamer, I would rather have an option to have handsome guys chained to your life and mana orbs than to see the chained girls removed. Just saying.

If the slave boys are cute enough, I... I might even toggle that option from time to time. Just for kicks.

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AzureFlash wrote:

As a male gamer, I would rather have an option to have handsome guys chained to your life and mana orbs than to see the chained girls removed. Just saying.

If the slave boys are cute enough, I... I might even toggle that option from time to time. Just for kicks.

Make sure he's that decapitated guy at the start of POE... the one the zombie got to first...