Late on May 26, there was a sudden update to Wuthering Waves that players were made aware of thanks to a passing banner across the top of their screens. Within that update, the devs at KURO GAMES decided to nix Scar's original costume design, and a lot of players know why.
I played through the first introduction to Scar earlier in the day on May 26, 2024, and he still had his bodysuit design. This was a rather sleek design that reminded me of the old Gundam suits from so many of the popular Gundam anime and manga series.
However, it became quickly known that players in China didn't like the outfit because of the design on Scar's pelvic area. This thick, black stripe made a lot of players in CN create memes about the design, saying that it looked like an "onigiri" ("rice ball" in Japanese).
Since then, the phrase "onigiri manko" has been tossed around in relation to Scar's original design — this translates as "rice ball p*ssy", which can be seen as a vulgar term for female genitals, while the word "omanko" is the affectionate version. A quick search about Scar's original design will show you numerous videos, Twitter posts, and Reddit comments that use the term.
There were definitely other ways that the devs could have adjusted this design because the bodysuit suited Scar pretty well. Players in various Reddit forums, including this one, have been discussing the change for hours.
Personally, I'd have gotten rid of the chaps (and kept the buckles) to make his look even more like a Gundam suit or flight suit. It suited him, and the black line could have been extended upwards so that it wasn't so... Obviously placed. Scar would have matched his female companion much better with these changes.
The new design of Scar's pants is very plain. It looks like a rush job without much thought behind it. The character designers at KURO GAMES should have been prouder of their design and looked at some of the positive attention that Scar was getting as opposed to the negative attention. Memes aren't always a bag thing, and many players liked Scar's design.
There's even a subset of players that liked the idea that Scar could have been trans because of the original design of his model, and a petition was started to restore his original design.
Want to read more news about Wuthering Waves at Pro Game Guides? Try You’ll soon be able to skip story content in Wuthering Waves or Wuthering Waves devs promise to fix bad localization and performance – info on future patches, known bugs & other improvements.
