Maybe, and this is just spitballing here... Maybe don't be deliberately provocative and inflammatory in a subject that is already very heated? I get that you want to make the argument "its int he bio so case closed" which is fine to make. But all that other stuff around your argument? Not only is it not necessary, it's likely to just make people feel insulted and make things get more heated.

Your unnecessary and condescending sarcasm aside, you should be equally aware the Bridget's pronouns are still listed as male in the Japanese bios, the bios elsewhere go out of their way to avoid pronoun use, and there are multiple endings.

Also regarding the other people who have replied- It seems to me that you're not even entertaining the ideas put forward by others in this thread, or if you are, you're intentionally misinterpreting them, or interpreting them in the worst possible light. Calling me or anyone else a transphobe is unnecessary, and yet more ad hominem.

Don't you all think it's even slightly ambiguous? Can't you take a step back and examine it without thinking it as an argument to be won?

@Polarisbow, the specific example referenced in this thread alone is Gwyndolin, not Astolfo or chihiro. That's only a few posts above you.

Also, we don't know what is or isn't canon in strive. So talking about bad endings and good endings is difficult, but as other people have already pointed out, wouldn't the devs have rewarded players with such a cool and important revelation for playing at the highest level of skill? Like how Samus gets revealed as a girl for playing as fast as possible?

@Sleepyhead No one seemed to mind nearly this much when Testament came out as neuter, so I don't think it's fair to say that.

Edit: typo

You know, being obviously snide and confrontational isn't a good way to win hearts and minds. Toxicity isn't appropriate just because you feel you're on the "just" side.



How many tournaments have you won?




I'm not comfortable with changing decades of established lore to appease a vocal minority (not transgender people; terminally online people).



If they don't like it the way it is, that's on them, not GG.



If it doesn't matter, why change it?



You do understand that indiscriminately labelling anyone that doesn't agree with you as an "ist" or a "phobe" lost most of its power years ago?



It is bad representation, unless you want to say that a child groomed by his cultish parents to identify as the opposite gender from a young age is good representation?



I don't care if they introduce a transgender character. Introduce a hundred of them if you want. No one threw a hissy fit when Valkyria Chronicles 4 had a transgender/non-binary character.



That's just a lame appeal to authority.



That's an awful reason to change an established story. Bringing back Tony Stark would make hundreds of millions of people happy, but we don't do it.



Yet you want your most famous representative to be taken away?



Of course, I forgot that Western localizations of character bios are well known as the definitive take on Japanese characters.

He is still referred to as a boy in the original.

Eh, whatever dude you keep fighting for your femboy rights that are under threat by the trans "authority". I'll be happy for other people and share in their joy by appreciating cute fan art and memes. Enjoy your epic victory against my weak argument

You're sending very mixed messages with your posts and I can't help but feel you aren't, and maybe weren't ever arguing in good faith. First you popped in here to go on about headcanons which is fair enough but doesn't contribute, then you spent a bit acting as if people are concern trolling about the really questionable nature of bridget's history (I thought you didn't care about the lore?) but also that it's more important to own the people in power than remain true to characters?

And now you're being passive aggressive and pretending not to care about this, mocking people who do

what are you trying to do here?

Get people angry so they get in trouble probably. It's an old fallback for any controversial topic.

In regards to the "you can just open the game and see their pronouns" argument: It works the other way if you open older games with bridget no?

I mean... yeah? That's why it's... character development?

Well, at first I wanted to make a joke to poke fun but after giving it some thought I wanted to give my genuine opinion because some aspects of people's arguments didn't sit well with me. After realising my words fell on deaf ears and was being hit with stupid retorts like trying to "appeal to authority" I just kinda felt like it wasn't worth the effort to keep arguing because nothing will change so I went back to sarcasm. Not the best way to go but it's better than dragging the farse out.

I've gone to other image boorus to see how they're discussing it, and they've had this conversation for longer than we've been having it- but many of the same points are being made elsewhere. If we interpret Bridget's statement in the normal mode ending in a vacuum, then maybe Bridget is trans. But add in context, otokonoko culture in Japan making regular use of "I'm a girl" as a casual, playful joke (very cute btw), and the fact that Japanese versions of the bio have no use of female pronouns leave it all very much in question.

There was also a point made on danbooru that while Bridget now has an androgyne symbol on the headplate, the fact that it's pointing up denotes masculinity, but I can't locate anything to back this up, so grain of salt maybe!



I'm happy to have you give your input, since as a fellow user it's only right- but that said you were retreading ground already covered elsewhere. There was an anon in one of the image discussions who put it best in that everything about this is far more ambiguous than we seem to realize.

Edit: Also, if we're going to think about ease of use for people who regularly hop between sites then it might be good to reach out to other boorus to see what they rule.

Are you even aware that the line Bridget uses (in one ending) that is the entire support for the entire transgender argument has Bridget saying "That's right, I'm a a girl~" with the male symbol included with the word 'girl'?

It's literally a Japanese femboy joke. This is no different from the handful of journalists that insisted Samus was trans a few years ago because a developer joked she was a newhalf.

I say this as a plain old white dude: there's no reason for effort. The origin of the arguments against this are crusty male channers who only believe in a gender binary and don't like when girls have agency. Anyone else using those arguments only serves to give these sad children more legitimacy, and so it's best not to further muddy the waters.

People in fandom who have lives are either reacting to this neutrally or positively. I'm sure quite a few of them also realize that even if there were good faith arguments to be had, it's coming down to writing in a fighting game.

Why is your race, age or sex important?



Neither of you has arguments. Just bitterness and and ad hominem attacks because there are people who won't play along with a journalist-pushed effort to redefine an existing character to please you.



You're admitting you have no case, and just to not engage because that is fruitless.



"It's just a silly fighting game, guys... Just stop taking it seriously and let us have our way already!!!"

You're making a lot of rude assumptions about a lot of people, what those people believe, and how fulfilling their lives are.

Why should I zip my lips just because you claim some bigot is getting excited that I'm trying to ensure that the we thoroughly examine this topic, instead of just accepting something that someone else told me?

Why do you care so much if it's just writing in a fighting game? The longer this goes on, the more disingenuous some of you are acting. :/

Why would I entertain misinformation?


It's very much *not* ambiguous, it's very obvious.


I don't know who that is, thus I brought up other femboys I do know.


Again, people are now only questioning the canon of Strive's endings *after* one of the characters comes out as trans. Curious!


Can't win the hearts of people wo were never open to begin with. The only 'side' I'm on is the facts.


Oh, I bet you thought this was some sort of smart own. No, I've never won a single tournament, because there are no locals around me, I don't have good internet (Thanks to being an Aussie on Wifi), I suck ass and I play for fun. Not everyone into fighting games wants to win EVO.


But no lore from the past was changed. This is new lore from the creator of GG himself, Daisuke.


Bridget is easily one of the most non important characters in GG lore. Even now, she's still pretty unimportant in the grand scheme. Her discovering she is trans is only important to *her* story, not GG's, which is perfectly fine.


Then maybe don't deny a trans character's existence and you won't be called that label.


There it is everyone! Completely wrong information about Bridget's backstory! If Bridget's parents were cultish, they would've exiled her as a baby or worse, kill her. They didn't want to do that, so that's why they raised her as a girl. The grooming also makes no sense because even after being raised as a girl, she spent a good portion of her life as a male, to prove the superstition wrong. It's only after she's done it that she realizes that it brought her no happiness, leading her on her Strive story of self discovery and finding that she is trans. Her parents had nothing to do with it, in fact, she's afraid of telling them this, which is why she goes to Ky about how he *came out* as a Gear. Gee, I wonder what the metaphor is?


You mean Astolfo. Bridget was just one of the oldest. The choice of 'take away' implies this is some hostile takeover and not... The character undergoing an evolution.


Funny that the Japanese arcade mode for Bridget is the same as in English.


There is no male symbol when she says she's a girl in English and Japanese.


This is not even remotely the same.


Where the hell is journalists coming from? Everyone knows they suck, but they aren't apart of this, unless you're implying Western gaming journalists kidnapped Daisuke to hijack Strive and make Bridget trans or some other nonsense.


Clearly you're not trying to 'thoroughly examine' this topic because if you did you would see the heavy handed 'this character is trans' writing all over Strive Bridget.

Not sure if this will sway your opinion, but when asked about Bridget in a lore interview for Famitsu last year, Ishiwatari said she was a well-known bounty hunter, did great contributions to her village and family and was trying to understand her true self. www.famitsu.com/news/202110/28237580.html

So everyone there will see Bridget as a man, since that was the point of all her effort as a bounty hunter. Going back and saying she's trans could spark the superstition again, since Bridget would be a girl at heart and the twins thing could be valid.

That's why I'll say it again, if the author only wanted an otokonoko, he could have kept Bridget the same, tone down some jokes and everything would be fine.

If even that isn't enough to convince you guys that the author wants to shake things up then I give up.