You raise some excellent points, and it may take a little effort to work around the potential problems… but I think it’ll be worth it. Especially since the fashion sense of the NPCs our MCs meet will likely be quite different than the fashion sense we as players have! A tee-shirt and jeans may be common casual wear for players, but in the far future of a sci-fi world, wearing that outfit may be like wearing a medieval cloak and tunic in the modern world. Terribly outdated!
Moving on to your specific thoughts…
it feels limiting and “pidgeon holing”.
I may have misunderstood where the plot is going, but right now it feels like we’re either a mercenary or career criminal, taking something of a forced vacation thanks to some nanovenom-coated weapons. Assuming I’ve guessed correctly, we’ll be going on “missions” at some point in the near future. Clearly, we should have an outfit for sitting in our apartment and/or lounging around whatever passes for our base… but we should also be choosing new “disguise” outfits at the start of each mission we accept.
And even if I’ve guessed wrong, giving us opportunities to change our outfits regularly helps expand our limits and relieve the pigeonholing.
my idea of street punk might be completely different to someone else’s.
Yes! Exactly! If you describe the outfit by which articles of clothing it actually contains, a player may wrongly assume it falls into a different category, then be surprised when NPCs don’t treat their MC the way they expected. For example, if black leather and chrome chains are haute couture in the future, an MC who wears them into a seedy dive bar not only will fail to blend in, they’ll attract all kinds of unwanted attention—perhaps even an attempted mugging or kidnapping! Likewise, if loosely-fitted cotton clothes in bright colors are street punk fashion in the future, trying to wear them somewhere classy will bring the security guards down on the MC’s head!
what if someone wants to be a mix between punk and office worker
It might be a little more difficult to code, but you could probably use concatenation to combine a primary and secondary choice into something like “office drone, but with a hint of punk”. Or, to make it simpler, maybe choose an outfit that falls into one category exclusively… but allow the player to choose an accessory or two from a different category.
I’m beginning to think less is more.
Sadly, this is probably true. As much fun as dress-up games can be, I don’t think it really fits what you’re aiming for to add a complete one here.
