There's no shortage of labels to toss at Bayonetta. But to go back to the importance of a work's origins and true intent, only one is necessary: She's a witch. Why do her legs make up approximately 110 percent of her body? Why is she sporting clothes woven from her own hair? Why do said clothes regularly fly off, leaving her near naked? Some assume these all point to marketability, to drawing men to the game with crude T&A. The actual answer? Because she's a witch. In a 2009 post to Platinum Games' development blog, character designer Mari Shimazaki (Shimako) detailed the driving elements of Bayonetta's design. "When we started Bayonetta," she said, "our director, Hideki Kamiya, asked me to design a character with three traits: 1) A Female Lead; 2) A Modern Witch; 3) She Uses Four Guns." (You may notice an absence of 'huge breasts' and the like from the design checklist.) "Since Bayonetta is a Witch," Shimazaki continued, "her 'theme color' had to be black! The other special part of her design is the long hair wrapping around her body. The hair gathered around Bayonetta's sleeves accentuates the movements of her limbs." The post refers to Bayonetta's iconic hair as "the source of her power," and describes the special attacks involving it, which strip the witch bare, as moments of excitementcuriously, not blatant T&A, as many have called them. Oh, and the glasses? A "sense of mystery and intelligence." Shimazaki's Bayonetta 2 post follows a similar pattern, declaring the witch's sequel theme to be "Solid," and her appearance intentionally more masculine. Speaking with Destructoid, Platinum's Yusuke Hashimoto said Bayonetta's concept was simply "a witch who came back to life in the present," and also stated that only a woman could have designed her. Maybeand let's just throw this out theresex appeal wasn't the driving factor after all?
A freelance games writer, you say? Typically battling his current RPG addiction and ceaseless perfectionism? A fan of horror but too big a sissy to play for more than a couple of hours? Spends far too much time on JRPGs and gets way too angry with card games?
Well that doesn't sound anything like me.
