>>52349869>This tells us that their design is nowhere as good.Newbies latch out on it because -- at this stage -- they are too afraid to look at something like Braixen/Delphox because it is considered "furry", so they go for the most human-looking design to avoid being "too weird".
I would argue against this. For one the ralts line is strongly tied to the furry identity of Pokémon, and this is most likely because Gen 4 tied it with Lopunny, thanks to PMD, and by extension with Lucario. I would argue that perception of Pokémon as animal characters washes away most of the so-called "furry shame" and we see this made manifest in things like smash or pass with Lopunny, Gardevoir and Braixen/Delphox being among the most popular Pokémon. By contrast most of the ones you mention are on the lower end, especially Gothielle and Machamp, and in the case of Hatterene there is a severe lack of sexualizition which shows that being considered furry is much less of an issue when it comes to Pokémon attractiveness especially considering Pokémon perception as fantasy animals.. I would argue that Machamp, Gothielle are too goofy and human-like given the context of Pokémon and in the case of hatterene lacking wide furry appeal hence why they score low in smash or pass and/or have low sexualization.
I would instead say that what makes Gardevoir special is that it was a popular humanoid design along with Blaziken and Lucario, which unlike Mr. Mime and Jynx, were very well recieved on top of being the first conventional attractive design. What also really helped it was being tied with Lopunny in Gen 4 which gave it access to the subculture that is the primary producer of Pokémon porn. This is why Tsareena, Meloetta, Hatterene lack porn material despite having good smash percents and Gardevoir receiving the 2nd highest amount of porn per month. That doesn't extend to them, they're all in the double digits in porn growth, because they're not part of the core Pokémon group.
