Penis tail, covered neckline and uncanny valley effect.
Skins are the best way to stand out in any game. Sometimes developers release skins and then regret it, because another drama is unfolding in social networks. In this compilation, we recall 5 skins that have been changed or removed from games.
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Lion from Playerunknown’s Battlegrounds
In PUBG battle royale, players are provided with tons of skins to make them stand out. In 2019, for the Halloween event, the developers released a Trick or Treat set with a sugar skull makeup, an Alice from Wonderland costume, a rocker, a pirate, a scarecrow, a lion and other sets. The lion costume consists of two parts: for the body and for the head.
However, the lion skin had a funny problem: when flying, the lion’s tail was between the legs of the character, and it looked like a penis. A very stretched comparison, but still. The developers eventually redesigned the skin, and all those who bought it were compensated for the cost.
Poppy from League of Legends
Riot releases tons of beautiful skins for League of Legends champions. There are more than 100 heroes in the game, many of them have 5-10 skins — everyone will find something to their liking. But sometimes artists get it wrong — that’s what happened to Poppy, the cute champion with long ears.
The Lollipoppy set features Poppy with a giant lollipop and chocolate bar. But the worst thing here is not an insult to the feelings of diabetics, but the expression on the face of the champion — as if she was copied from pictures with the effect of an ominous valley. This anxiety effect is triggered when people see something that mimics a human but is not human, such as robots or unrealistic prosthetic limbs. Everything ended well for Poppy — her skin was redrawn, but the sweets in the background are alarming…
Blitzcrank and Amumu from League of Legends
Another story from League of Legends is connected not with a disturbing picture, but with the laziness of artists. At least that’s how players felt about the Sewn Chaos Amumu and Blitzcrank champion skins when they were added to the game. Their dissatisfaction was also due to the fact that a bunch of skins are released for this couple, and other characters are deprived of attention.
Riot listened to the players and admitted that the quality of these sets was not up to the company’s standards. As a result, both skins were removed from the game, but it is unlikely that Amumu and Blitzcrank players will be upset by this — they have a huge selection of other cosmetics.
Skin and cards in Hearthstone
Blizzard often releases card nerfs that kill overpowered decks. In 2019, a long hand of nerfs got to the portraits — the standard skin of the mage Jaina was redrawn so that her cleavage was covered.
Six months later, the nerfs also reached the rest of the art, on which women were depicted too defiantly: the warlock’s Succubus was turned into a Fel Catcher, and the Mistress of Pain acquired more reliable armor. Rampaging Harpy and Keeper of Secrets did not have to redraw their clothes — they changed their pose in the pictures.
In this patch, Blizzard also redrawn the maps with violent scenes. The art that was still in WoW: TCG has lost its blood. The developers explained that the style of the old cards stood out from the general style of Hearthstone, so they «modernized» them.
Customizable skins from Fortnite
In the royal battle of Fortnite, there are often collabs with famous performers, actors, in general, with other universes. For example, it has skins from Naruto, and Dwayne Johnson took part in the in-game event. In 2021, 14 superhero skins were added to the game, which led to reddit dramas due to a bug.
These sets can be customized in colors. Youtubers found a customization exploit in which the player made the costume completely black or white. Because of this, the skin gave an unfair advantage: if you hide in a dark corner, the other player may not notice the black piece. Epic Games reacted almost immediately and banned the play with this set in ranked games, and then fixed the bug in the next patch.
Bonus: Mika from Street Fighter 5
The Japanese fighting game Street Fighter 5 has about 30 characters. Capcom didn’t care too much about underage players playing Street Fighter, so they drew prominent female characters. The heroine Rainbow Mika is no exception.
During the Evolution Championship Series, the largest fighting game tournament, Fuudo, an esportsman, changed the skin of Miki, and this did not go unnoticed by the audience. After the tournament, Fuudo explained that he had received a request from ESPN — Mika’s outfit was too revealing for broadcasts. But nothing has changed in the game, Capcom left Mika unchanged.
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