FirstPerson Shooter’s Fave Genderbent And Crossplay Cosplays of 2019
For a while I was prepared to drop the category crossplay from this list, because, despite my explanation in last year’s post, I wasn’t sure people accepted my idea that it could be based solely on appearance and not involve assuming the gender of the person wearing the cosplay.
But after looking at some costumes I wouldn’t be able to include this year I decided that I would keep it in as a category, and continue with the previous definition. Those definitions are, as they appeared last year: For both categories, I am going on character appearance. So, if you are a hairy -chested, bearded person, and wear a straight-up skirt-and-bustier Wonder Woman costume, I am calling that crossplay. That isn’t to say the person wearing the costume identifies as male, just that the appearance is of a male portraying a female.
That applies to genderbending as well. If you take the costume of a male character, and alter it to present traditionally female features such as breast cleavage, it is genderbending the character — whatever the gender identity of the person wearing it is.
However, it is sometime tough to define which category the cosplay falls into. Sometimes it is perfectly clear, as in Cosplays by Fenpai‘s sexy genderbent Deku or Jeremy of World’s End Design as a male-clothing version of Alice from Alice: Madness Returns. But is strictlycosplay‘s version of Brigitte from Overwatch genderbent or crossplay? The character wears pretty much that exact outfit. Also is dolphinsensei crossplaying Luffy (the character wears exactly that open vest with a bare chest) or is it genderbending because you can see the side of female appearing breasts? And what category does Ryuu Lavitz‘s Beast Boy fit? Again, the cosplay is exactly as the character wears it in some versions, but clearly cut to accommodate breasts, not hide them under chest binding.
After all that, I have decided I will continue to call the category Genderbent and Crossplay, but — like gender — which definition the cosplay fits is entirely up to the person.
Like the Fave Odd, Obscure and Mashup gallery posted a few days ago, this year I have included photos taken by other photographers. In this case that includes Jake of Zephyrlynk Productions and Dave of evildirtydave.
We now use Smugmug to present cosplay photo galleries and will post all photos there, with a link to each gallery in its own gallery article. This will allow us to give you higher resolution images to download — still for free.
To view the entire gallery, just click on the image below. If you are pictured in any of our galleries, feel free to download the images and use them non-commercially on social media, with appropriate credit.
