r/TopCharacterTropes • u/mp3help • 18d ago

miscellaneous [Interesting Trope] Attempts at fanservice/virality that failed not because they were hated, but because nobody noticed them or cared at all.

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1) Hoopy the Hoop, Portal (2007) When you defeat GLaDOS and her room is destroyed at the end of the game, debris rains down in the final cutscene, including a big metal hoop that bounces around a bit. Developer Erik Wolpaw said the team dubbed it "Hoopy the Hoop" and expected it to become the big meme of Portal. Of course, none of the fans paid much attention to the hoop since "The Cake is a Lie" became the biggest meme of the game, and overall one of the biggest video game memes of all time.

2) Burgh, Pokemon Black and White (2010) When designing Burgh, developer Yusuke Ohmura said Gamefreak had many of their female employees give input on his design to create their ideal handsome man. However, as someone who's been in the Pokemon fandom for almost 3 decades, in the 15+ years since Pokemon Black and White released, I have personally never seen any fans swoon over Burgh, or even mention him in general. If anything, characters like N and Colress are far more well-known within the fandom as the most handsome and beloved male characters of Pokemon Gen 5.

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962

u/scrimspirals 18d ago

Aoi Asahina (Danganronpa). one of the producers openly said she was his favorite and expected her to be more popular, but she ended up way less popular than characters the team didnt expect to take off.

395

u/sleepy_koko 18d ago

On the flip side, Miu Iruma was designed to be unlikable and hated but ended up as one of the most popular

270

u/Unlucky_Log4951 18d ago

If this was true, they should have not made her such a cutie. I guarantee her ratings would drop if she was ugly. Or fat.

27

u/MarcosLuisP97 18d ago

They learned nothing from Celeste.

9

u/peajam101 16d ago

These are weebs we're talking about, they probably do consider her fat

187

u/Sgt_Lt_Captain 18d ago

They made an even more vulgar version of everyone's least favorite character from the previous game unfortunately they made her a conventionally attractive woman so it didnt work

97

u/nerdwarp112 18d ago

I also think the fact that she’s a huge coward who backs down after any pushback makes her less annoying than if she were just smug the whole time.

23

u/CheetahDog 18d ago

I think the biggest difference is that Miu's lines are just wayyyy funnier lol

And she's also a huge loser so it's funny when people rip back into her lmao

23

u/DuelaDent52 18d ago

It helps for me that she’s voiced by Wendee Lee and I love her in everything.

51

u/Timekeeper98 18d ago

Are the Japanese ignorant of the modern craze for people wanting crazy evil women to absolutely ruin them? I feel like that would be a society prime for that kind of character.

26

u/tylerjehenna 18d ago

Given who the most popular female wrestler in Japan is right now, the general public certainly is not

5

u/[deleted] 18d ago

[deleted]

2

u/nyamemeow 18d ago

2

u/tylerjehenna 18d ago

She's nowhere near as popular in Japan as she is in the west

1

u/nyamemeow 18d ago

fair enough, i just wanted to post this :D

2

u/tylerjehenna 18d ago

Thats not even the most egregious one lol. One of them was "Oklahoma Steamer"

1

u/nyamemeow 18d ago

dear god

1

u/tylerjehenna 18d ago

Saya Kamitani, top heel of Stardom

18

u/NIGHT_DOZOR 18d ago

They could never make me hate Miu!

15

u/Algorechan 18d ago

Miu clears, she also's intuitively correct almost all the time for all the wrong reasons

8

u/MToucan60 18d ago

designed to be unlikable and hated

EXPECTED to be disliked, not DESIGNED to be disliked.

268

u/Nekrotix12 18d ago

I still think she has a decent following at least. I love her relationship with Sakura.

142

u/JBR_4025 18d ago

Problem is that she’s from a game where the cast is an assortment of barely functioning weirdos that are more memorable than her (like the strict rule obsessed guy and his definitively not boyfriend bike gang leader, a femboy science Wizard, the average redditor, a murderous girlfailure, Akuma but as a woman and a normal guy that accidentally ended in this mess due to bad luck. Also an evil teddy bear who is the face of the franchise and is hilarious and you will quote everything he says)

27

u/Cessnaporsche01 18d ago

Can't tell if "the average redditor" is referring to Hifumi or Byakuya

28

u/JBR_4025 18d ago

Both.

21

u/RandomFactUser 18d ago

Hifumi is the median redditor
Togami is the mean redditor

10

u/JBR_4025 17d ago

Togami is also the one browsing alpha male/sigma grindset subreddits and is a moderator for half of them

2

u/JancariusSeiryujinn 13d ago

He only browsed them to say 'Pathetic. Naegi, explain it to them' on every thread.

4

u/Konatokun 16d ago

and in that cast, she's the average joe, her only quality (outside of being the regular airhead female character) is that she's an athletic person.

Comparing that with a serial killer, a terrorist, a detective and even a unlucky guy... she seems pretty mid.

107

u/feral2021energies 18d ago

Aoi had the misfortune of being up next the GOATs Sakura and Kyoko and the delightful Celeste, and I will die on the hill of these girls being amazing.

I love Aoi but girl is fighting for a spot in top 3 when these three are her contestants.

41

u/NoLegs02 18d ago

You mention those three (and they are great and popular, don't get me wrong), and DON'T mention that sensation that is Junko Enoshima?

https://giphy.com/gifs/H96TeujuM4X7caDesB

1

u/artheo4w 17d ago

not the person you're replying to but i personally did not care for junko lol i much liked mukuro for that matter, and she didn't even matter until later in the game (and only officially appeared as herself in the anime). and i much prefer monokuma over her, and she is the one controlling monokuma.

some may even say she's quite overused or overrated

1

u/NoLegs02 17d ago

Whatever your opininion of her, she remains the most popular character in the franchise (I personally loved her in Danganronpa 1). The only character that even arguably rivals her is Nagito.

19

u/DuelaDent52 18d ago

I’m basic as heck, I adored Aoi.

36

u/EiraPun 18d ago

Oddly, Aoi is one of my favourites from the first game. I defintely liked her more than Kyoko or Toko as far as female cast was concerned. Sayaka was kinda boring, Celeste was scummy (likeable, but scummy), Junko is batshit insane.

Sakura and Mukuro are pretty good tho, although as far as Mukuro is concerned, all her characterization more so comes from out-of-game materials like IF, Zero, and DR3. She's in my top five in the series, but if we're talking exclusively the first game, then yeah, Aoi was kinda my favourite of the female half of the cast.

10

u/DuelaDent52 18d ago edited 17d ago

I don’t think there’s any weak links in the first game’s cast, everyone’s cool enough that any one of them is probably someone’s favourite.

3

u/deafinitelyadouche 18d ago

Aoi also has Chiwa Saito, Cassandra Lee Morris and Felecia Angelle voicing her, and I will never not simp for them. ♥

-2

u/NIGHT_DOZOR 18d ago

Whew, thinking about it, the DR1 female cast was pretty lacking in terms of writing. Well, not only the women, actually...

4

u/LongjumpingSector687 18d ago

Danganronpa started as a parody of common anime tropes

6

u/DuelaDent52 18d ago

Not gonna lie, it did throw me for a loop that Maizono, the childhood friend clearly coded as the main love interest, was the first to die. Though I remember reading they did that because her and Kuwata were the first characters to be properly designed and the springboards around which everyone else was based on, so they killed them off first because they were sick of them.

-1

u/NIGHT_DOZOR 18d ago

Yes, so?

2

u/LongjumpingSector687 18d ago

Point being they weren’t going for in depth characters, just characters based off tropes.

0

u/NIGHT_DOZOR 18d ago

They're deconstruction of anime tropes, genius.

8

u/FuzzySlippers48 18d ago

In regard to her lack of popularity, just look at the side content (series wide spoilers):

Makoto was in DR2 and UDG

Kyoko was in DR2 and had her own spin-off novel

Byakuya was in UDG and had a spin-off novel

Toko was the dueteragonist of UDG, and for many players, salvaged her reputation

Even Yasuhiro was a co-protagonist in Ultra Despair Hagakure

Aoi? Aside from having a brother who had, like, 5 minutes of screentime in UDG before dying, she had zero mention whatsoever until Danganronpa 3 came out.

11

u/happilyevil321 18d ago

I think is because she was boring. I don't think she did much during the Game except in the Sakura trial. Meanwhile You had much more interesting characters i'm both looks and personality around.

2

u/DuelaDent52 18d ago

YOU’RE BORING MURRAY AOI IS THE BEST GIRL

6

u/freshlybakedcaked 18d ago

If it makes that producer feel any better, she’s the first person I think of when I hear the name Aoi

4

u/Boccs 18d ago

I mean she's absolutely my favorite part of the cast. She reminded me a lot of a girl I dated in high school and I have a Type.

5

u/RileyKohaku 18d ago

She was carried by Cassandra Lee Morris’ VA work but I still prefer Kyoko

2

u/WhyTheHellnaut 18d ago

Oh she's popular as hell, the only thing is that she's in a game with the most fierce competition for the most popular character.

5

u/MartyrOfDespair 18d ago

Not helped by a certain character being the ultimate cosplay bait. Guinness World Record Holder irl, and even has popped up in numerous reality TV shows being cosplayed by contestants.

4

u/LongjumpingSector687 18d ago

Aoi was the most real in the predicament they were in tbh. I think most people would be in a neverending emotional rollercoaster if that happened to them.

1

u/Box-Chan-11037 12d ago

She was my favorite at least

0

u/Kangarou 18d ago

She's cool, but she also tries to get everyone killed, including herself. So I can see where the fans might not want to like her.

8

u/plucky-possum 18d ago

Nah, her (largely justified) crash out was the best thing about her. Outside of that, she was just kind of boring.

0

u/JohnDragonball 18d ago

Aoi's unpopular? As someone who's only played the first game she's my 2nd favorite character lmao