Why I’m both intrigued and annoyed by Code of Princess

Before today, I hadn’t paid any attention to the upcoming Japanese 3DS title, Code of Princess, but as soon as this box art appeared, it immediately went on my radar.

Is that not a gorgeous illustration? Generally I don’t like very busy box art, but I love the colors and attention to detail in this one. Above all, the character designs have me very intrigued – though I am decidedly not in favor of the surprised female knight with bikini armor (more on that later). 
It’s always a little thrilling to learn about a game for the first time from its box art. There’s nothing more fun than browsing though a game store and coming across a title that looks interesting but you’ve never heard of, then rushing home to Google it as soon as possible. … What’s that? Yes, I am still living in 1999 and do not have internet on my phone. 
Of course, finding new boxart when you’re already browsing the internet is a different thing altogether, but no less fun. I’ve learned that Kinu Nishimura, the woman behind the illustrations of 9 Hours, 8 Persons, 9 Doors and the more recent Virtue’s Last Reward, was in charge of this gorgeous cover as well as the character designs for Code of Princess. No wonder I like them! 
I particularly like the pink haired lady in the middle.
Nothing quite like a swashbuckling guy with big pants and feathers in his hair.
But even with all these exciting character designs, I still manage to find something to gripe about. Brace yourself for my biggest beef with Code of Princess:

Where on earth do I start? Well, admittedly, her sword and cloak are both pretty amazing and display the kind of detail that I love, but my positive comments end there. Not only is she wearing less clothing than is physically possible, but Kinu decided her only armor would be in the form of gauntlets, which is pretty much worthless considering how little else she’s wearing. And, though the box art for the game features this lady, who is the main character Code of Princess, in a relatively active fighting stance, this official art, which has already been made into a resin figurine in Japan and is the most popular result when searching Google for Code of Princess images, is about as passive as it gets. She’s not only holding her sword in a pathetic excuse for a defensive pose, but she also has a frightened expression on her face, with her arm extended backward in a way that sexualizes her more by rendering her powerless, if that’s even possible. I hate to dwell on issues such as these, and of course I know Kinu Nishimura has done her fair share of “sexy” illustrations (999‘s Lotus, anyone?), but this image takes the cake for portraying a female main character in the worst possible light.

Well, now that I’ve gotten that off my chest… Is there anything else good I can say about this game? For those who aren’t familiar with it, Code of Princess is a 2D brawler that shares many similarities with Guardian Heroes. It also touts an extensive 4-player multiplayer mode, and I’ve got to say, even the gameplay looks pretty interesting:

Mark that one down in the books, folks: I said even the gameplay looks interesting!

About Anne

Also known as apricotsushi. Anne can be written with the kanji for apricot (杏), and sushi was the most quintessentially Japanese thing I could think of when I was 13, resulting in my goofy, albeit memorable, nickname.

12 thoughts on “Why I’m both intrigued and annoyed by Code of Princess”

  1. Yeah, that art is just embarrasing.

    I wish the Japanese developers would realise that aside from Idea Factory and Gust, the rest are better off not trying to do the otaku fanservice thing. They just don’t know how to pull it off without being offensive.

    (The Atelier games. THAT’S how you do fan service with style)

  2. Hi GamesAndBiz! Thanks for the comment 🙂

    It’s funny, though… Aside from bikini armor lady (I know she has a name, but I’ll be damned if I can remember it), there really isn’t any other fanservice to be had in Code of Princess. I really don’t know what they/Nino were thinking.

    It reminds me of Dragon Crown, but at least Dragon Crown sticks to its convictions and has a solid theme going on – here we have everything to bikini gal to the mace-wielding nun… It’s just a little bit too crazy, and not really in a good way. But that gripe aside, I do generally like the art style and look of the game.

    I do agree with you, if anyone knows fanservice, it’s Idea Factory and Gust! Though I think traditional fanservice-type stuff doesn’t really appeal to me… 😉

    Speaking of which, I saw you liked Hyperdimension Neptunia mk2! Good to hear (I’m actually really proud of myself for being able to write that title from memory, haha)

  3. That poor warrior woman. If she went out into battle like that her breast… plate… thing would not be keeping her in place long, I can only assume.

    Not to mention her lower wardrobe. I know I wouldn’t want to enter a fight with my clothes just sliding off down my legs. Actually, what on earth is keeping that up since apparently the belt’s not very tight.

    Well WHATEVER I guess. I have the urge to make a male version of this character now though. 😮

  4. Marcus – You’re so very right… I have absolutely no idea how ANY of it would stay on if she were to actually move. And she does move quite a bit in the gameplay video. Hah! I think that’s not a belt but in fact a blingin’ G-string?

    Oh, please do make a male version! We need more of those. In fact, that can be the protagonist for that game we were talking about 😉

    As for the game itself, what do you think? Are you at all interested?

  5. I think the Otaku genre can pretty much shut up shop now. We have breached the outer atmosphere, fanservice has been taken to its logical, raging extreme.

  6. I think I’ve either seen and played too many weird Japanese games over the years or I’ve become cynical/jaded — or both! — because this doesn’t bother me that much.

    Don’t get me wrong, I find the main character’s wardrobe (or lack there of) completely ridiculous, but it seems pretty par for the course at this point.

    Regardless, I think the overall game looks great, as does its box art. Hopefully someone will pick it up for Western release — although I’m not going to hold my breath…

  7. Alois – Well, I always thought fanservice was a bit odd… Then again, I’m kind of cool with fanservice aimed at women, mainly because there’s just so little of it… I never understood moe, for example, but it’s pretty amazing how that’s exploded in the last few years.

    As I mentioned in a previous comment, it’s very weird that the protagonist is the only overtly fanservice-y character, whereas the rest are pretty tame… I guess 😛

  8. Hey Bryan!

    Well, I may have seen my fair share of weird Japanese things (perhaps not as much as you 😉 ), but a scantily-clad woman with a shocked look on her face still gets my blood boiling every once in a while.

    If the game is 100% that sort of thing, I try to take it in stride, but in this case it seems so out of place that I just have to wonder why on earth they had to “ruin” an otherwise nice-looking game with an absurdly sexualized main character. That pink-haired skeleton girl isn’t much better, but at least her body markings make it harder to tell that she actually has a lot of skin showing, too… (and I don’t mind her pose in the official art nearly as much)

    Glad to hear you’re interested in the game, too! Have you ever tried Guardian Heroes? I hear even some of the same members from the team that did that are working on Code of Princess. I’m not big on brawlers but I do like the overall look of this one. I’m so superficial!

  9. Oh, I understand feeling the way you feel. It makes perfect sense.

    As for me having played Guardian Heroes: Yes! I’m not really into brawlers, either, but I couldn’t help but pick up that game back when I owned a Saturn simply because of the visuals. Also, I love Treasure.

    So, I’d definitely have to check this out, too, should it ever find its way to the States — which I’m not at all sure is going to happen at this point 🙁

  10. I’m one of those few people where I didn’t care that she was wearing barely any clothing in her art and that so many people use this as a means to completely judge this game in a way. I never have found Fan-service distracting in any way and this game is no exception. I’m not playing this to look at the almost naked girl, I’m playing this because it invokes the feeling of playing Guardian Heroes again! Never could see why so many people harp on that when the game itself is gonna be pretty cool….guess some people have to find something easy to target to make Otaku look bad (You excluded because you made a good point with the armor.)

  11. Motherplayer – Though I do think her character design is silly, I wouldn’t not play the game just because of that! Though I may not even get the chance to decide for myself, as I highly doubt it’ll get localized… Which is a real shame, it looks pretty fun 🙁

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