Okay for this to make sense, I need you to understand what a "babygirl" is. A babygirl is, as writer and narrative designer Alexa Ray Corriea explained in her 2025 Game Developers Conference talk, a character that everyone can agree is "a little bit traumatized," but secure in their masculinity, attractive, sensitive, and vulnerable, but not weak. He's probably over the age of 25, and may have "soft reasons to make hard decisions." Corriea's example was Clive from Final Fantasy XVI.
Still with me? Good, let's talk about a "meow meow." A meow meow refers to a villainous or morally grey character who fans are inspired to "care for or comfort" amid all the terrible things happening to them. Do not confuse a meow meow with a "woobie," as a woobie refers to a more heroic character you might want to just give a big hug. If that one's confusing, think about the difference between Waluigi (meow meow) and Luigi (woobie).
Oh no, there are so many phrases left to cover. A "girl failure" is a female character who seems to have their life together but absolutely does not (Misato Katsuragi from Neon Genesis Evangelion). Then there's the handsome older male characters you'd say are a "daddy" or "zaddy," and last but absolutely not least there's the handsome-but-well-meaning "himbo." These words all describe a new genre of character tropes defined by fans and popularized on platforms like Tumblr and Ao3.
Why should developers care about these magnificent words? Well let's get down to brass tacks. It's common knowledge that if you want players to give a shit about your game's story, you need strong characters. But after 40 or so years of great narrative games, a lot of the classic tropes have been well-worn out and we all get a bit exhausted when a narrative director pulls out his copy of Joseph Campbell's The Hero's Journey again.
Corriea's argument is that these fandom phrases are the secret to juicing up your game. How? Some of it's about the data—and some of it's about freeing your creativity from a box of shame.
