As a kid I assumed no one knew how old these two were because they were mysterious ninjas, but it turns out Tecmo just redacted their ages in the English translation for obvious reasons. It's funny they went with this route instead of just bumping both characters up to 18 years old. I guess Tomonobu Itagaki refused to tamper with the sanctity of his precious DOA canon 
spoiler
I'm sad to report the PS2 version of DOA2 seems to be one of those early PS2 games that's interlaced to hell and back and will look like a jagged mess no matter how much you upscale it in PCSX2 
I mean like I said in my reply to the parent, I just dont process Marie Rose as a child lmao. I'm always blindsided when I see this discourse.
Yeah I didnt process original Ashley as a child either, and in that case I was right because she was always canonically 20 lmao. I do prefer the remake changes though.
I do agree that theres a trend worth noting I guess, that the coomer stuff was originally characters that looked like Kasumi and now is characters that looke like Marie Rose. I just... wouldnt have noticed it that way because my brain doesnt process her that way. Namco is probably intentionally baiting for that though. I just didnt think of it. So it confuses me. Subjective experiances I guess.
Yeah. Guess I'm losing the macro implications in the jungle of my micro experience with it.
underage on paper characters who look and act older was so kids could relate to the characters, idk what's behind the loli thing, 4000 year old dragon is a pretty old meme, feedback loops in marketing somewhat explain the proliferation but not the root social causes.
yeah i meant like shonen anime main characters
My friend, what are you talking about? Have you seen the main female characters in shonen anime? Almost all of them are significantly sexually objectified. My Hero, Fairy Tale, One Piece, you name it.