A previous article from the questionable Polygon has been accruing attention due to a respectable sentiment delivered by Samurai Shodown 2019 Producer Yasuyuki Oda, who mentioned that the female fighter’s designs were made sexier because that is what the fans wanted.

Polygon’s initial statement had them pointing out how the character designs in Samurai Shodown 2019 are sexier than the ones from the original games:

One thing that has stood out to some fans in the game’s pre-release promotion is that the female characters don’t all dress in modest attire like Nakoruru — and others — wore in the old days. While Nakoruru returns with her iconic look, series mainstay Charlotte, also known for dressing conservatively, returns with a revealing outfit showing her thighs, fan-favorite Shiki returns in her always-sexualized outfit that stands out more due to the new graphics engine, and newcomer Darli Dagger shows perhaps the most skin of any character in the series’ history. The team credits this to its attempt to appeal to new players who might not be familiar with the series, and points out that the approach also carries over to male fighters.

Producer Yasuyuki Oda’s admirable response on this topic:

“There are obviously going to be people that are critical about these types of things. But the fans really wanted characters like Shiki. They wanted characters like [male fighter] Yoshitora, you know? A very sexy playboy. So it might seem like it clashes with what we originally had in the early games, but each game is its own different iteration of a series. We decided that these are characters that people want, so we’re going to put them in the game.”

Another statement has Oda expressing surprise over the popularity of character Nakoruru despite her having modest attire:

Oda recalls being surprised that one of the series’ characters, Nakoruru, became a fan-favorite despite her modest, non-sexualized appearance. “A lot of characters at that time were popular because of their sexiness,” he says. “But Nakoruru doesn’t show a lot of skin.”

Though, Polygon naturally came under fire as they labeled the game’s characters as “oddly over-sexualized” with their tweet advertising the article: