The character models.  IMO, they've only ever been pretty good.  Not talking armors or outfits, which obviously can change.  Though I will say that all the pandering people complained about with Pyra has absolutely nothing on Sharla's entire wardrobe :P

Yeah the series has never had qualms about showing off the female form, half the armours for those characters show cleavage ffs. Which, as far as sales go, probably helps more than it hurts.

Well with Sharla it was EVERY armor.  Including - quite hilariously - the heaviest heavy armor in the game :P

Hey, sex sells. Especially in Japan.

Actually, according to recent studies, sex doesn't really seem to sell all that well in marketing :P

And given tje state of the console game industry in Japan despite it's tendancy for the scantily clad and suspiciously well endowed, I don't know how well that second claim holds up either :P

Simple, the scantily clad ladies have migrated to handhelds and taken Japanese gamers with them. :P

The Vita is quite dead, 3DS well bellow DS, and sales on software are also down.  But I think the issue in Japan is lack of ambition in many, many games.  Not asking for EA/Activision/Ubi level excess.  But if more games at least aimed for Dragon Quest XI levels of ambition - high but not preposterous - things would be better.  Fact is, a lot of games over there play it safe and feel made on a thin budget.  It's hard to sell a $300 or $400 piece of hardware with that.  

I wasn't being serious, but joking aside, if Nintendo can just sort out supply I think Switch can revitalize Japan's gaming ecosystem somewhat by being both portable and capable of handling full fat experiences that would otherwise be stranded on PS4.