Stellar Blade’s viral NSFW Skin Suit will raise the game’s difficulty
After the mistaken release of a playable demo for Shift Up’s Stellar Blade on the PlayStation Store earlier this week, users were able to get a peek at some previously undisclosed details of the game. Among them, new outfits for Stellar Blade’s protagonist Eve, especially a revealing “Skin Suit,” quickly went viral. However, it seems that while easy on the eyes, the costume will come with a catch.
Shift Up, the developers of Goddess of Victory: Nikke have emphasized the importance they place on Eve’s appearance (particularly her back view) in Stellar Blade on several occasions, even going so far as to 3D body-capture a real-life model to achieve the ideal physique for her. Eve’s various elaborate costumes are also a big part of Stellar Blade, and several of the 30 promised outfits have been leaked in the recent demo accident.
Of particular interest is the costume titled Eve’s Skin Suit, which immediately went viral (and caused some controversy) for its “sexier than fully nude” design. One technical detail about this costume has been less talked about though – it will affect gameplay. While it was previously thought that Eve’s outfits in Stellar Blade would be purely cosmetic, it appears that the Skin Suit will be an exception, as its description in the demo warns that it will disable your Shield when equipped, essentially rendering you defenseless.
This suggest that playing Stellar Blade with the Skin Suit will equate to a hard/challenge mode, and the mechanic of “less clothes = more vulnerable” is reminiscent of the Self-destruct command in Nier: Automata, which rips 2B’s skirt off her body and drops her HP to 1. On that note, it remains to be seen if the Skin Suit will come with some kind of advantage gameplay-wise.
Stellar Blade is scheduled to launch on April 26 for the PS5. Pre-orders are currently open.
Fanservice has, and always will sell no matter what and will always result in popularity. The funny thing is a lot of Studios from the West forgot this, and a lot studios in Japan are compromised due to the West shaming them into compliance over it. I can only believe future Japanese designs and 3D designs can aim far higher than Stellar Blade on an artistic level and sense of fanservice, once Stellar Blade breaks through all the charts like Nier did.
Looks like the difficulty isn’t the only thing this game’s suits are going to raise. Hell, this game might single handedly be responsible for reversing the current trend of sexlessness and low birth rates in the US! It’ll will probably be responsible for being an entire generation’s first erection, inevitably forcing their future spouse to cosplay as the game’s protagonist at some point in the relationship.
Baldur’s Gate 3 allows full nudity for all the characters in the game. I’ve tried it. But trust me, it gets old quickly.