Ryza, the poster character of Koei Tecmo’s popular Atelier series, has become a hot topic on 5ch’s Hardware/Industry (Geha) board after her thighs were drawn even thicker in the latest artwork and the official AI chat service. Some in the thread pushed back with comments like “too thick, it’s gross,” while others defended it as “just part of the character’s identity,” drawing comparisons to 2B from NieR: Automata as another case where the character design alone carries all the popularity. Many also pointed out the contradiction of marketing such a risqué body type while heavily censoring expression within the AI chat itself, with some posts tying this back to the poor performance of the follow-up title, Yumia.
What people said
1AnonymousOct 4, 2026 16:55
Can't fit into hot pants anymore?
4AnonymousOct 4, 2026 16:59
These look like the legs of someone with a medical condition lol
16AnonymousOct 4, 2026 17:14
Re: #4
Oh?
Is that discrimination against Black women?
82AnonymousOct 4, 2026 20:14
Re: #4
I was about to post the exact same thing and got beaten to it lol
8AnonymousOct 4, 2026 17:04
This is the "overdid it so much she's just fat now" problem, like Rikka from Gridman
26AnonymousOct 4, 2026 17:34
Re: #8
That one's the fault of her short legs
9AnonymousOct 4, 2026 17:04
"Legs are just for show — the bigwigs just don't get it…" (riffing on the famous Mobile Suit Gundam line)
10AnonymousOct 4, 2026 17:06
I was wondering why she's straddling what looked like half an apple, but looking closer it's actually a ball — still, the texture on that ball looks off, doesn't it?
11AnonymousOct 4, 2026 17:08
Theory: she's the reincarnation of "Necrosis Guy," that famous poster from 10 years ago who showed off his gangrenous leg
12AnonymousOct 4, 2026 17:11
This is genuinely gross
She's basically some kind of yokai or monster at this point
13AnonymousOct 4, 2026 17:12
She's obviously meant to be the sexy character no matter how you slice it,
but you're not allowed to do anything lewd with her in the AI chat?
That really doesn't sit right.
14AnonymousOct 4, 2026 17:13
Is this even supposed to be sexy?
She looks more like a speed skater
22AnonymousOct 4, 2026 17:26
Ryza's really just about the body at this point, so people are getting tired of it
24AnonymousOct 4, 2026 17:29
Is the "Dolphin Wave" move actually popular? (her signature special attack)
25AnonymousOct 4, 2026 17:31
Weird breasts are common enough in this genre, but weird legs are rare
28AnonymousOct 4, 2026 17:37
She's really settling into her role as the cash-cow for ecchi chats
32AnonymousOct 4, 2026 17:44
And this is from the same AI chat service that bans lewd content
honestly, that's hilarious
33AnonymousOct 4, 2026 17:45
A character with zero distinguishing features probably wouldn't have sold,
so in a way this was the right call
37AnonymousOct 4, 2026 17:47
Re: #33
Same deal as 2B
sells purely on character design, to the point the actual game gets in the way
35AnonymousOct 4, 2026 17:47
At this point even where her left leg attaches to her body looks wrong
36AnonymousOct 4, 2026 17:47
She became the symbol of the whole franchise
and basically sealed the fate of the "Pay-to-Win Alchemist" release (a pun on "alchemist," the series' usual subtitle, swapped for "microtransactions")
38AnonymousOct 4, 2026 17:48
Re: #1
What's going on in the second picture lol
her thighs are thicker than her butt
39AnonymousOct 4, 2026 17:49
I feel like I see a lot of art that looks nice at a glance but has a completely broken skeleton underneath
41AnonymousOct 4, 2026 17:51
This is the Atelier thread where the fans who let everything slide for the fan service are now furious they got suckered into buying a crappy game
like, you're the ones who spoiled the devs rotten — the fact they lost their know-how is on you
42AnonymousOct 4, 2026 17:58
Even back in the day there were guys who got turned on by Robot Poncotts characters (a late-'90s kids' robot-battling toy/anime franchise)
I guess turning that kind of extreme body-part-deformation fetishism into moe art just widened the audience for it
43AnonymousOct 4, 2026 17:59
There's that joke about guys who only ever train their upper body
she's the lower-body version of that
46AnonymousOct 4, 2026 18:02
The fact that they keep milking this one character over and over really tells you how badly Yumia went, and that's rough
47AnonymousOct 4, 2026 18:08
Yumia itself isn't bad
the mistake was calling a gacha game a numbered mainline entry
49AnonymousOct 4, 2026 18:10
Poor Resleriana and Yumia, the new kids don't even get a say in this
50AnonymousOct 4, 2026 18:18
The original Ryza had the best balance
now they're trying so hard to make her fap material that it's backfiring
51AnonymousOct 4, 2026 18:19
They should make an Atelier game about a homunculus who eats materials and grows or shrinks specific body parts accordingly
that way they'd cover every fetish out there
52AnonymousOct 4, 2026 18:19
I can't be friends with people who are into this kind of thing
no matter how you look at it, she's a monster
53AnonymousOct 4, 2026 18:20
They sell her on sex appeal but then censor the AI version of Ryza to death — I don't get it
54AnonymousOct 4, 2026 18:30
Too thick, it's gross
just make Ryza 4 already
though personally I prefer Yumia
63AnonymousOct 4, 2026 18:47
I mean, even back in game 3's CG model her thighs were already bigger than her head
once the devs get carried away thinking "this is what gets attention," this is just where it ends up
88AnonymousOct 4, 2026 20:59
Re: #63
In game 1 she's just plain fat. She got a bit taller in the sequels and ended up looking more normal
recent art and figures are all based on her game-3 look regardless of outfit
the AI version uses the game-3 design too
68AnonymousOct 4, 2026 19:11
Ever since the Gridman character got dragged online for being drawn too exaggerated and everyone started holding back, Ryza's basically the only one left carrying the torch for absurd-thigh characters
91AnonymousOct 4, 2026 21:38
Re: #68
Meanwhile her boyfriend's legs look like twigs even in pants
90AnonymousOct 4, 2026 21:37
She's not even cute at all, so why is she popular?
94AnonymousOct 4, 2026 21:52
Re: #90
Probably because people aren't into ugly girls the way you are
Background and Key Points of This Discussion
Ryza, the poster character of the Atelier series, has drawn attention for her thigh-emphasized design ever since the very first game, and that tendency has only grown stronger with each sequel. This time, the spark was that her proportions were exaggerated even further in the official AI chat service and new artwork. In the thread, some drew a parallel with NieR: Automata’s 2B — another case where the character design alone drives popularity while the actual game tends to get somewhat overshadowed. Others pointed out that marketing such a risqué body type while strictly censoring expression within the AI chat exposes a gap between the publisher’s marketing approach and user expectations, a discussion that, combined with talk of the struggling follow-up title Yumia, brought renewed attention to the series’ ongoing over-reliance on its characters.
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