Bit of a weird question, I know, but I'm kinda stumped on this point and it's weird I've seen so little discussion of it online, so bear with me: So, one of the constraints I have on designing my world's fantasy races (keep in mind this is set in the modern world) is that all of them used to be human. You see, these creatures only came about through humans getting access to supernatural shapeshifting powers. When these fantasy races show up, it's because everyone on earth was offered a new randomized body as that fantasy race and after the week they had to choose which to keep, a minority kept the new body. This means, among other things, that they all have to conform to human standards of beauty, because (at least with the first generation) they don't magically get their own new standards of beauty upon transforming, and very, very few people would willingly turn into something that wouldn't attract a mate. All of the creatures I create, if I want it to be at all believable that more than a miniscule minority of people became them, have to be things a human could look at and believably go "yeah, I'd hit that". But this brought up an interesting question as I was designing them: how should I design a fantasy race so that it has attractive men? I don't mean that in the sense of "what makes guys sexy", I've been able to get a pretty good idea of that on my own. No, I mean more along the lines of: "What is the male equivalent of a catgirl?" We've seen endless examples of female fantasy creatures with exotic nonhuman characteristics designed specifically to make them more attractive to men, from elf ears, to animal ears, to tails, to weird eyes, to those anime girls with wings where a tramp stamp would be, but it's the strangest thing, I can't seem to find much discussion at all about what nonhuman features you could add to the male form to make them hotter. And you see, the first two races I introduce are basically the "gateway races", intended to ease humanity into the concept of turning themselves into nonhumans, and so they're the least bizarre looking and the most conventionally attractive by human standards (though still capable of having unattractive members, I'm talking more about the upper ceiling). Of the two, there's a speed-based one and a strength-based one. The speed-based race is more traditionally feminine in appearance, the strength-based race more traditionally masculine. The men of the former are the pretty straightforward concept of pretty-boys, so no issues making them believably attractive, they're attractive in the same way elves are. But I want to be more creative with the males of the strength-based one since I designed the appearance of the speed-based one primarily with the females in mind, so it's only fair. So I'm trying to figure out what sorts of "this clearly isn't human" features I could add to the men of a strength-based fantasy race that would enhance, rather than detract from, their appearance. Now obviously this isn't hugely as important in a purely textual medium, but I still want to keep this in mind enough that when I describe them, it would be believable that women react to them positively. The features I'm set on are that they have four arms (all mounted on the shoulders), skintones of bronze, silver and gold (though that can be altered via othe magic available to humanity) and red, blue or green hair that can, if they let it, grow into really long and wild manes. As for what else I could add on or what to tweak... I've got nothing, and I could really use some advice. Got any?
Glad I checked then. I've been visualizing the women of the race as a sort of tethering point, and nothing seemed overly off from a fantasy setting, definitely not traditionally feminine but still conceivably good-looking from a tomboyish, amazon perspective. Especially since those who thought the skin was weird could get that changed back to normal skintones via other magic and the hair could be colored and cut too (it's just the hair CAN get really long). ...Is it the arms? I really, really want the arms, it's what most of the cool stuff I can do with them comes from.
It's mostly the arms. The skin color and the mane is a problem, too, but mostly the arms. I'm unclear on this supershoulder thing. Can you clarify?
Basically, I was hung up on how exactly to add another set of arms onto them so they could use them in combat without them basically tripping over their own arms (the main character winds up turning into a strategist and the setting gets pseudo-apocalyptic later), and I came up he idea to rig each of the shoulders on these arms to an extra joint that lets them move them, together, as if they were one arm, while still being able to move independently. Due to weird magic stuff allowing structurally unsound designs, this supershoulder is pretty much the same size as a normal shoulder, even a bit smaller, it just has two arms with their own shoulders coming off of it. The point is that both pairs of arms come from the shoulders rather than coming off the lower torso or back or anything. Edit: Found an example. I realize this isn't exactly helping my case, but keep in mind that in this case they're normal arms and not the fleshy webbed tentacle things on this guy, but it's a good approximation of where these two arms per shoulder would be on the body:
Well in western society (and pretty much many other societies, I suppose), men have more socially ingrained leeway to what makes them attractive. A big hulking brute that isn't downright butt ugly would be received as attractive based on their physical size and power. See: Generic new age 'not ugly' orcs or something for examples of this.
I can only go off of visually appealing because I have no desire to have a physical mate. You also have to bear in mind that there are some very weird things I find visually appealing in a person. You can blame my place in several communities, or because I'm an oddball. The mane: Attractive. Manes (lion-like, horse-like, etc.) are something that I would consider appealing particularly if they're decorated (braided, drawn back, etc.). Arms coming from the same shoulder: The picture you showed shows something that could be attractive, but I would personally prefer something set up a bit like Elzar from Futurama. Skintone: I prefer paler ones and I think silver might be able to work out for you. Ears (pointed ears, cat ears, etc.) might also help the attractive level and maybe even a tail; I've seen it occur in yaoi-type scenarios and I know some people consider them attractive. Honestly, I'm of the mind that something along the lines of the Beast (cartoon) is attractive and I know many women who also find Beast highly attractive.
The guy in the picture doesn't have the jewelry-colored skin and carnival-colored hair, which helps. I still couldn't go with "attractive", but it's better than the word picture was.
Okay then, wipe the slate clean, forget these guys entirely, what would be your answer to the fundamental question of what exotic, non-human features you feel would improve a man's looks?
I'm not quite sure what I would want, personally, but it did occur to me that various versions of the "beast" in "Beauty and the Beast" are presumably regarded as attractive to a non-trivial subset of female viewers. There's the Disney version, of course, both the live-action and the animated, where he's hulking and slightly hunchbacked and has elements of both a lion and something with horns. Then there was the 1987 TV series with Linda Hamilton and Ron Perlman.
Thanks for the feedback. I'd just like to make a few general clarifications before responding to individual pieces of feedback: * The only features I'm entirely invested in are the arms and the different skin and hair color (though not specifically the shades). The arms are the primary feature I really think I can have fun doing stuff with in terms of fight scenes, though I am prepared to implement them in the least visually odd way I can, and if anyone has an idea for a place to put them that would be just as useful but even hotter (though not in a way that wouldn't be able to be taken seriously, obviously), I'm all ears. As for the skin color... * All of the races have non-human, exotic skintones, because since each person's new body as each of these races is totally genetically randomized (to increase the chances there people who like their new body way better, and also so transgender people have the opportunity to be biologically, physically the sex they identify with), and so I want them to have their own range of skintones and facial features so that when people decide to transform into these creatures, there's no bizarre awkwardness with suddenly resembling a completely different pre-existing ethnic group. Again, though, if there'd be a non-human color you feel would work better, feel free to voice your opinion on that. Now then... I've heard things to this effect from others too. And I figured just settling for the race being talls and with big-but-not-ridiculous muscles it would probably be a safe bet, but I was hoping I could do something a bit more interesting that wouldn't detract from their impressiveness on a battlefield. Another person I asked for advice suggested that it's a fool's errand for a man to even attempt something like this, because women aren't anywhere near as visually oriented as men when it comes to sexual attraction (hence the stereotype of the "porn versus romance novels" thing), and that the reason I didn't find a lot of talk about it is because there isn't a lot of interest in the subject. They concluded by saying that "the male of the species cannot answer this question and a woman's response will make little sense to you". Of course I figured I'd go for a second opinion. I mean, like, I believe it, but I don't think I could ever even hope to begin to comprehend it or learn from that. And moreover I don't think there would be that many guys who would be willing to change that drastically until the more dire and desperate situations come up later in the story. Yeah, I've seen them, I guess I meant more in the masculine direction, since nearly all catboys I've seen lean towards the slimmer, softer-featured, swimmer-build-at-most type of guy, which is already covered by the speed-based race. Am I mistaken?
Both iterations of the Thundercats series imagined "catboys" as yoked muscle-hotties. The females of the species in that world were the ones with the slimmer, sleeker, more elegant lines of the fast cats, the guys are in the realm of the big lion, tiger, brute force cats.
My advice, honestly, look up furry art on Deviant Art. Some of the art work is really good, and a lot of their fans make images of furries from both genders that are pretty attractive.
I want to toss my two cents into this one! The most common forms of female pornography, statistically--at least last I read-- involve four major male protagonists: vampires, werewolves, pirates, and surgeons (go figure). The commonality between these fantasies is that they are men with a monster in them--men who have integrated their shadow self, as Jung would say. They are men who can become monstrous when necessary, men who can choose to become dangerous, because if a person is not able to be dangerous, they're useless and get taken advantage of. Think of a rabbit--it can't do anything but sit and hope not to be noticed. Think of nocturnal mammals, rodents and burrowing creatures. They hide, they cower, they're so low on the dominance heirarchy that rather then try to assert themselves, they would rather hide. Now think of a damn lion. Mufasa. A creature that KNOWS that they're dangerous, and because of it, can play a fair game with people around them because if the game gets unfair they have TEETH. That's a man. The male equivalent of a catgirl is Edward Cullen, as painful as it is to say it. If you want a select group of men to transform into beautiful versions of a fantasy race, go through Wikipedia's article of apex predators, choose some features, and adapt them in ways that allow the character in question to assert their position in the dominance hierarchy.
Look closely at stuff like X-men (all the way back to old school), Underworld (morphing from beast back to men, there's a moment of beauty, before they put the scowl back on their faces), certainly Babylon 5 (totally shakespearian awsome), even the Hogwarts forest ilk had to have features that would charm the audience. Antiquity knows this concept well, look at satyrs, centaurs, some forms with muscular wings. I understand you want to go as abstract as popsicle, but perhaps the shoulders look alluringly Olympian until lovemaking, when seperating them lends extra touch and wins ecstacy, or, in combat. Combinations of looks and a magic scent that acts like a love potion, hypnosis, mind-meld? How about some morphing ability that turns him into her mental ideal man? I recall that flic where the guy drops into the world with humanoids that have four arms, and they keep him a pet, until he kicks ass and saves them - dammid - can't think of the Title! Anyway, they are uguly dudes, but you can observe the shoulders move, and make attractive adjustments? I think it was Piers Anthony who wrote hybrid creature fantasy series that went on like a decades dynasty? I'd love to see the idea work.
Whoa!! Just saw this - hold on... I submit that you certainly can develop an understanding of a females ideals and needs, otherwise humans would not still exist. Things are a lot different now than everyone thinks. Raw insight is offered in what females post to each other all over the web, especially for multi-partner and clique relationships. Females now share raw fantasies openly, occasionally graphic(ly?), and honestly. It's definitely out there, as are women who have sexually graphic visual orientation. I have no sophistication when using the web, so I just had to blunder through EVERYTHING, from the artfully exquisite, to the disgusting. Both produced by women, for women, and involving women and men. Take a more sophisticated (than me) look at real women's expressions on the interwebs, in their own vibe. They talk about their world, it's fascinating... Oh yeah, have you read any of those novels? Wow. We are way outgunned daddy-o...
I wouldn't put it quite that way. For me, it's not that visuals don't matter--for example, it's not that I would never stare at a picture--but they matter as part of a package that includes personality, and for me the personality is far, fare more important than conventional attractiveness. Tom Selleck as Magnum, PI? Meh. Peter Falk as Columbo? Oh, yes. (Yes, yes, I'm back in the 'eighties or possibly the 'seventies. I'm not instantly coming up with a modern example because un-pretty men seem to be less well represented these days. On White Collar, I find Peter Burke infinitely more attractive than Neal Caffrey, despite the fact that I think he's probably regarded as less conventionally attractive, but they're both pretty.)
Yeah, it sounded way too absolute and hopeless for me to give up right there, hence why I asked elsewhere. Thanks
One note: The men, by your premise, want an appearance that women would find attractive. But this means they'd choose an appearance that THEY THINK women would find attractive. So if you think that women would enjoy the metal-colored skin and primary-colored hair and extra arms, maybe the men would think so too. They might find that they're really ultra wrong, but nevertheless, this isn't necessarily about what women find attractive, but what men think women would find attractive.
Maybe that would be interesting and likely if the men themselves were designing the race, but their origin is an unknown entity responsible for giving humans a lot of other abilities too. While it might be amusing to a degree to play with male perceptions of what women find hot, or lampshade that nigh omnipresent fantasy race design convention of refusing to give the race ugly women no matter how ugly the men are... I think I'd rather just take the opportunity my premise offers to the logical conclusion and give the design of both sexes an equal emphasis on staying attractive to humans. Little reason not to, and honestly it's only fair. As for the skin, as I said, I can't actually give them or any of the other races normal human skintones because that would throw awkward political baggage into the genetic randomization thing. Are there any non-human skin colors you'd find better, or do you just personally find any non-human skintone weird?
Well, I would find some organic color more plausible than metallic skin. Sage green? Butter yellow? Gray? I think it’s a mistake to ignore fur.
