Soul Calibur: Seong Mi-Na

For my redesign, I wanted to consider the character of Seong Mi-Na; though her design is not one of the worst ones in Soul Calibur, Still, her promo art also uses poses that most male heroes would never be seen in, and her outfits aren't exactly the most practical for fighting.

 Her description from the Soul Calibur Wiki is:


"Mi-na had always been surrounded by weapons, many of which she learned to use quite well, even surpassing her father with the wol-do. However, her looks led the local boys to kiss her and call her more than a striking girl, an image supported by her father who wanted her to settle down and marry a suitor, preferably Hwang Seong-gyeong, whom Han-myeong had personally wanted to adopt into the family. Facing increasing incursions from Japanese raiders, a coast guard was quickly formed and led by Yi Soon Shin, her father's childhood friend, with Mi-na desperate to join in the ranks; but she was barred from joining on account of her gender."

I feel like, from her history, this could make Seong Mi-na less inclined to dress femininely, or at least dress so that she would receive less male attention. I want to explore more traditional martial arts wear from South Korea, where she is from, in the late 16th century which is where the game is set. I want to keep her recognisable though and parts of her outfit intact so that I am not ust creating a new character loosely based off of her.

She is also supposed to be 5"4 and 106lbs - which is completely not what her promotional art suggests in the slightest, I don't think that 106lbs is realistic at all, even for her height, not with the muscle she would have from wielding a halberd and fighting. This is something I will have to consider when thinking about her body type.

A few notes about Korean clothing in the Joseon dynasty:

"In the 16th century, garments were generously oversized rather than tailored to individuals, apparently because an abundance of fabric was a way of displaying one's wealth and status."

"t was in the 17th century that clothes became tailored to their wearers. Upper garments shrank, and clothes took on a more practical aspect using only the necessary amount of fabric. Some scholars say this was brought about by the economic squeeze the country suffered during the successive invasions by Japanese forces under Hideyoshi Toyotomi in the 1590s and the Manchu Qing Empire in 1637."

I couldn't find as many pages as I wanted to on Korean warrior wear - a lot were out of context or spanning many centuries, so I thought that I would have a quick look as some of the other Korean characters from Soul Calibur.

The other Korean characters take less influence from traditional Korean wear than expected, which means that I could under a few less limits if I go more for making sure that Seong Mi-Na's redesign fits the game more than having complete historical accuracy.

I think I will focus on thinking about making her outfit more practical and less feminine and exploring more action poses so that she is portrayed more as a hero character and less of a 'token sexy female' character if I choose to redesign her.