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Anyone who has been paying attention has seen that Sony pretty much owns all of the big localizers, except for Sentai. They own Funimation, which I think in turn owns Crunchyroll (not sure if that went through or not), and Aniplex.

You may have also noticed that in response to the metoo movement and our increasingly politically correct society, Sony hits Japanese game developers hard with censorship. Senran Kagura 7even has been indefinitely delayed and may never release because Sony forced them to heavily censor fan service, and many other Japanese titles have fallen victim to this censorship.

Now Playstation headquarters is in San Mateo California. Let's just say that the people in California have . . . interesting ways of thinking, and the people who work at Playstation and the way they do things reflects that. The company Sony however is still a Japanese company headquartered in Japan. Nevertheless, some people for whatever reason think that there is mass censorship of anime coming, just like what we are seeing in gaming.

What do you guys think? For those of us cultured weebs who like a little "plot" and "backstory" with our plot and backstory, do you think there is cause for concern?

{Mod edit}: I went ahead and changed the title to something that better represents the topic(s) of discussion in this thread. Also trimmed out some inflammatory/insulting posts. ~ Redbeard 101

I think that some good fanart can continue to be made while adjusting to changing attitudes. I am for progressive fanart in series where we can have all the adults having sex, where some are homosexual/bisexual, transgender, intersex and you have equality among the genders. With some understanding of real world trends/issues that can be commented on and clear when taken as something not okay in real life. I am talking about androgynous characters being sexy not as just a joke about, but the harem lead would be happy to be with trans girls like it is nothing, or an enby or a femboy, and people are just cute without worrying if something is gay.

I am talking about bisexual anime harems that has genderfluid characters with dicks and boobs everywhere, and the whole "straight" audience is going to question their sexuality and gender identity, because anime no longer shows them just the world they know but what it can be.

And I think that all starts with being able to question the way things have been done, that we don't need the same old bland anime lead accidentally tripping over and groping a woman's boob against her consent. Because you can even have a female character being in charge of their sexuality, with clearer lines of consent as being hot, and you don't need character to simultaneously be innocent pure ideals and prizes to be won that will do anything within the audience's fantasy.

I don't think it is something like #metoo holding back that sort of thing, but more conservative groups that think animation is just for kids, don't like sex positive stuff rather than ideals of purity, and take the inclusion of things like queer elements as an attack on their sexuality.

Given the way Japan is, I don't think we will see what you are describing any time soon. My post was more straightforward than what you are talking about. Some anime have lots of fanservice. I and many others like fanservice. Could Sony force censorship in some way to where we no longer regularly see anime booba? Japan has a very traditional culture when it comes to gender roles and the portrayal of human sexuality, and I think the antics of Sony will be something to be worried about long before any kind of progressive change happens there.

My input is that as a specific form of entertainment matures, it actually de-matures.
What I mean is that producers of that media need to pay progressively more attention to the most sensitive viewers - children. They are the standard by which everything is judged. The tricky thing is, there has always been anime for children; cleaner, more fun and educational, and little or no fan service (I think Crayon Shin-chan may be the exception, hahaha). But I think what is happening with mature or fan-oriented anime is that the market depends less and less on the dedicated fans or otaku due to the expansion in demand and exposure of those types of shows. The fans like you and me who like fanservice are being swallowed up by fans who don't appreciate the sense that those shows are pandering specifically to them, because now they no longer have to.

Besides, what is deemed good fanservice is highly subjective. I haven't seen a marked decrease in the number of cute guys and bulgy crotches.

@ Saber1213

But the change can happen, and I honestly think that there are a number of different avenues for how things will go. If we manage to have more things like Interspecies Reviewers, and Sony sees people react well to things that push an envelope and that these things are not against trends of progressive elements of #metoo that may be seen as problematic. We might move that way.

At the moment, I would say one current shift is that there is an explosive amount of shows, like too many. If we get the right kinds of shows, and things like shows for adult audiences become something more mainstream and a niche to itself, these shows might not need to be touched. Whether that is going to happen, I think the cynical view is that things will play safe, and the people that want some good fanservice will be split between those who blame the people who care about social justice and those who will blame conservative and traditionalist views. Sony would probably split the difference.

In my mind I am thinking of something like the gaming industry, where big studios do things that they think are big and safe, while the indy developers take the risk on the niche stuff that people are into. If we are lucky we might get the equivalent of anime Hideo Kojima who shows that boobs can be cool like PT horror, where Konami wanted to move away, and then you have Capcom creating Resident Evil 7 and 8. Where now everyone wants to be stepped on by a tall vampire lady.

Past wrote:

Besides, what is deemed good fanservice is highly subjective. I haven't seen a marked decrease in the number of cute guys and bulgy crotches.

I am kind of newly focused on elements of male presenting fanservice, but I am up for the kind that don't have to depend on more predatory dominating kind. Are things like bulgy crotches things we can expect? Perhaps I have been too embarrassed over my casual viewings to focus on them, and rely on looking up hentai images.

Would we say that creators are already more skittish of focusing on guys over gals?

Well the thinking was more along the lines of if you've got a guy that happens to have on tight pants, how do you animate that? More anatomically correct or less distracting? I mean why be limited to one-size fits all for female fans when that is certainly NOT the case for male fans?

Really sorry, but I am not quite sure what you are saying, where I am missing an insinuation. Are you saying that there there is varied boobs and not crotch bulges, or the opposite?

I was super in denial/closeted, so I stopped myself from looking until recently.

But thinking while writing this post ended up me searching until discovering the concept of something like male bikini armour.

Yeah to put it simply, I was attempting to express greater equal opportunity in the depiction and variety of physical attributes like penises and breasts (with more direct terminology as such). There are huge boob shows, why not giant cock shows (where obviously the thing isn't actually shown but clothing provides adequate censoring)? Actually this explanation has gone a bit beyond my original intent in this thread. Maybe you're aware of my love for otokonoko, and originally just seeing moe characters who were known to actually be boys was sufficient fanservice for me. But I was also immediately drawn to searching for fan artwork with more anatomically correct images than was available in official character merchandise or artbooks. Seeing their partially or uncensored penises and bulges was the ultimate in fanservice for me. I can try to empathize with your closeted feelings, but as a concept it's pretty alien to me.

@Saber1213 Yes I am in agreement that I went too off topic with this, I was out of line. I am very sorry. There is one thing I'm a bit skeptical with all this Demon Slayer hype though, that I've been wanting to mention. I live in China and Demon Slayer is insanely popular here. I don't have actual data on this but I am willing to bet China takes up a HUGE chunk of the international sales stats for both the manga and the film. The West (especially the U.S.) is being way over-represented in contributing to the success of that franchise.

@ Saber1213

I think the different sides can have some give and take, some sexy shows do not need to be independent of some diversity and awareness of social issues.

Animation or comics is held back in the west because it is still considered a kids medium, or otherwise immature, but we are having small changes. Avatar started to change opinions of more narrative focused series, and arguably recently the Castlevania series completed its run as an animated with blood, gore and a touch of sex. We just need some series that focus more on the sexy fanservice. Usually in terms of sexuality you either have objectification of likes towards Megan Fox where she was treated like a piece of meat, or purity culture of conservative groups saying you can't talk about sex.

I think it is called something like the Madonna-Whore Complex, where you get female characters who are treated as either a pure maiden, or a dirty slut. Japanese culture seems to have a different outlook, which at worst I might make a gesture at the popularity at female characters who don't want to actually be sexual but following a bit of accidental or intended following relent. The sort of thing where even the pure male protagonist accidentally lands on a female character by accident, and she screams but you know that she totally likes it. It is maybe within certain contexts kind of ironic then that within these sorts of series you will find the westerner characters, the blonde and blue eyed big boobed "bimbo", who will be the most sexually aggressive and or sexual than the Japanese characters. The inverse of where you find something like GTA where you had Princess Robot Bubblegum as a sort of hyper sexualised parody of anime. Both cultures think the other is more sexual(-ly liberated) than themselves.

There is going to be a happy medium in there somewhere, especially along in games where Japanese games let a character have a sexy outfit, and a Western game that allows your character to have at least implied sex. And it can be done without being just porn. Worst case is no sexy outfits and no at least implied sex. Again along games from Japan, we need more Bayonettas that are definitely sexual while in control of that sexuality.

I think that you are barking up some wrong trees to think that I don't understand the importance of fanservice to entertain. I am along the lines of thinking that it should be without the baggage of boring ideas of purity, although without things being straight up rape, but more for everyone. That is some bimbos, himbos, femboys and whatever the term is for sexy butch female characters.

Does Demon Slayer even have fanservice?

There is probably an interesting subject there in seeing why Demon Slayer might be popular in what markets. I only saw the TV series, and so far mostly only lukewarm on it outside of being a pretty looking series. I had my thoughts on the sister character mostly used as a mute prop that might appeal to audience senses of protecting family, rather than a well written character in her own right, if we are talking about series written just for entertainment rather than cheap trick for easy points.

I think as long as shows like Redo of Healer are being made, concerns about the disappearance of fan service are overblown. Although, in my admittedly hazy perception, it does seem like perhaps fewer fan service shows are being made. It'd be interesting if someone did a survey and found out if that perception is actually true. I suppose it's possible that the overall number of fan service titles has remained constant but because more anime is being produced relative to other years it may seem like fan service is declining.

DuskyPredator wrote:

Does Demon Slayer even have fanservice?

Let me expand on that a bit more with regards to China. The VAST majority of the fanbase here is an echo-chamber of the government's puritanical biases against that "quirky cartoon filth that comes out of Japan." If Demon Slayer is an attractively animated show that strived to refrain from a lot of sexual themes or imagery, that may explain its huge popularity in China.

So it could be the expansion of the Chinese market that could take part in having anime become more puritan than more of the West? There is places for that all broader age group stuff

For the market I exist in Australia, I would say anime has stayed very niche, especially anything of real fanservice. I did kind of laugh at seeing a store at a shopping centre that I think had ahegao styled face mask. But I kind of would have difficult getting a basic
anime community thoughts. I was aware that the distributer of Animelab was at least something in contrast continued to stream the like of Interspecies Reviewers, after the more American Funimation dropped it. Although of note it has only been about a decade that video games were allowed to be adult only rather than just banned.

I would like to think that geek culture has become more sex positive in general worldwide. Although I do think that there is something worth to what was said earlier about it maybe feeling like there has become less fanservice shows, since the amount of anime in general has just ballooned, especially after recovering from that period when covid made it drop down. I do though think that it has felt like some seasons have been totally bereft of good fanservice shows, while some have been amongst the raunchiest yet.

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