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Early designs for video game protagonists

Dingens

Member
The original "Monado - beginning of the world" Shulk and Fiora designs (taken straight from the trailer):
monad_schulk1hj4r.jpg

monado_shulk2uqjil.jpg

monado_fiorav3jmi.jpg
 

zoukka

Member
Nah, we need more realistic characterizations of women and less sexist ones designed to get people off.

So realism and sexism are the opposites now? And from what I've seen the game (Horizon) is pretty fantastical. The final design seems to fit the game fine but it's not bad if people like the concepts (which look great!). Some of you seem take this opinion as a personal insult. I for example don't care for "realistic" human characters in games, I think Aloy is boring and those Assassins creed characters without the hood are hilariously bland to me.

So I prefer the stylized concepts all the while understanding that they were honed and iterated for the better (the final game that sold well!), it's just not an art style for me.
 

Crossing Eden

Hello, my name is Yves Guillemot, Vivendi S.A.'s Employee of the Month!
It's also been seriously immersion-breaking in some of the settings they've been in. I like the hood and I get that, from a marketing perspective, it's a powerful image with a lot of recognition value but there are some settings/periods where it really doesn't work and I wish they wouldn't force it into them. Maybe the Assassin order of that period could still use it for ritualistic purposes (like when they're meeting up in secret) but in a game that's supposed to be about blending in and being an assassin I expect the protagonist's character design to not stick out like a sore thumb whenever you're in a crowd. Some (but only some) of the outfits in Syndicate were a good step in the right direction regarding this issue IMO.
Pretty sure the in-universe explanation for this is that the assassins only wear them when out on missions or inside their hideout but otherwise wear normal clothing during their normal jobs and such. and since the animus is so selective it only recreates the memories that occurred while the ancestor was out on missions. Like how Giovanni was a banker.
 

wandering

Banned
Pretty sure the in-universe explanation for this is that the assassins only wear them when out on missions or inside their hideout but otherwise wear normal clothing during their normal jobs and such. and since the animus is so selective it only recreates the memories that occurred while the ancestor was out on missions. Like how Giovanni was a banker.

Yeah but if you're on a mission it behooves you to not, you know, look like an assassin.
 

Savitar

Member
There is one Lara Croft picture I haven't seen yet featured here, only saw it once ever in a game magazine. It was a preview pic of the box art with Lara only she was actually anime ish a bit, it was before the first game came out.
 

Crossing Eden

Hello, my name is Yves Guillemot, Vivendi S.A.'s Employee of the Month!
Yeah but if you're on a mission it behooves you to not, you know, look like an assassin.
I'm pretty sure looking like an assassin is literally the point. "Hide in plain sight" ofc. They're like the antithetical to Hitman as a lot of the time they want the templars to know that they were the ones who's doing the stabby stabby. It tends to lead to a nice sense of paranoia and fear.
 

Dmonzy

Member
So realism and sexism are the opposites now? And from what I've seen the game (Horizon) is pretty fantastical. The final design seems to fit the game fine but it's not bad if people like the concepts (which look great!). Some of you seem take this opinion as a personal insult. I for example don't care for "realistic" human characters in games, I think Aloy is boring and those Assassins creed characters without the hood are hilariously bland to me.

So I prefer the stylized concepts all the while understanding that they were honed and iterated for the better (the final game that sold well!), it's just not an art style for me.
Not necessarily opposites of course, but it's common in the game industry. The kind of female character that a lot of people in this thread want are certainly sexist and shallow to an unrealistic degree.

I'm not suggesting the original concept art for Aloy is bad, or that stylization in general is bad. In fact the concept art is a lot better than many other games. I'm more so addressing the few people in this thread giving disgusting reasons for why they think the final concept sucks.

Is the early Aloy design now sexist?

Nope. But a few of the people in this thread are.
 

Morrigan Stark

Arrogant Smirk
Not necessarily opposites of course, but it's common in the game industry. The kind of female character that a lot of people in this thread want are certainly sexist and shallow to an unrealistic degree.

I'm not suggesting the original concept art for Aloy is bad, or that stylization in general is bad. In fact the concept art is a lot better than many other games. I'm more so addressing the few people in this thread giving disgusting reasons for why they think the final concept sucks.



Nope. But some of the people in this thread are.

This.

Aloy's early designs aren't sexist, but the reactions for why many prefer it over the new one certainly are.

There's a big difference between preferring one because it's more stylised or cartoony, and preferring it because thinking more realistic women are "manly"...
 

Not

Banned
"I have been jaded by years of female protagonists designed solely to get my cock going and can't fap to Aloy's merely averagely gorgeous face. They fucked up big time."

I cannot for the life of me comprehend the audacity of some people.

haha
 

Not

Banned
It's not that Aloy is ugly, it that she looks blaaaand.

I just disagree so much. Her face was the opposite of the bland copy-and-paste sexy female character we always get

I think that's one of the reasons I liked her so much and she felt real. Actual distinct features.
 

Llyrwenne

Unconfirmed Member
Uh what? There's nothing wrong with someone who was hoping for that.
In the big WRPGs I know with relationship systems, you either play as a mostly player-made character making your own decisions (Mass Effect / Dragon Age) or as... basically just Geralt (...The Witcher), where him being a ladies-man is part of his character.

In Horizon, you don't play a self-created character and the story is propelled by Aloy's choices, not your's. Aloy is not pursuing romantic relationships because she is dealing with other stuff right now. She clearly wasn't interested in what romantic interest was shown towards her, at least for now. And that's absolutely fine. That's part of her character.

People should accept that as part of her character and move on instead of obsessing over the inability to force her to love / fuck someone. It absolutely has no place in this entry of this franchise with this character during this story.

To add to that, romance options here would also would also mean that there would be people projecting their own wishes / prejudices onto Aloy. For example: "Aloy is a strong woman, so she must like girls!".

Having players project their own fantasies onto Aloy in this way takes agency away from her as a character.

Is there a place for romantic / sexual relationships in a female-led game? Absolutely! I'd love to see that and see it done well. But I see absolutely no reason to have it in this specific story with this specific character. I think there could be room for romance in the next Horizon, but even then I'd still not see the point in or need for player choice in that.

But I feel like this is going pretty far off-topic for this thread, so I guess we should continue in the thread I saw specifically about this some while ago or via PM if you feel like this merits further discussion.
 

BigEmil

Junior Member
Early HZD Aloy designs are much better

It doesn't always have to go for super realisticness in damn videogamez
 

Maiar_m

Member
I...I "dislike" Alloy's design for the same reason I'm not enjoying Horizon as much as I thought I would: it's too realistic not to be distracting. She looks beautiful (and more my "style" than the teenage Pixar Alloy), but her facial animations are so blatantly artificial and somehow uncanny, which makes the whole effort more distracting than anything. Same goes for that game's world. Every little thing is so freaking detailed I'm scared of a moving blade of grass. Horizon made me realise I prefer a stylised artstyle (regardless of character design) for reasons not actually related to graphics but purely for gameplay comfort.

My eyes are retro. :( I understand the wariness some people have when the current Alloy design is criticized, there's however more than one reason to not be 100% enthusiastic about it. A cartoonish approach (of the same strong, raised-in-the-wilds Alloy) would have personally been the sweet spot to alleviate the uncanny valley feeling the game gives me.
 
So all videogame girls are represented by the entire cast of DoA?


I've seen better attempts to recreate the generic thirty year old dude protagonist pic for female characters tbh.
 

Crossing Eden

Hello, my name is Yves Guillemot, Vivendi S.A.'s Employee of the Month!
Early HZD Aloy designs are much better

It doesn't always have to go for super realisticness in damn videogamez
Guerilla's workflow was always specifically aimed to push what's possible with the medium in terms of rendering so why would they deviate from that and not take advantage of breakthroughs in tech that they didn't have before like facial scanning?

So all videogame girls are represented by the entire cast of DoA?


I've seen better attempts to recreate the generic thirty year old dude protagonist pic for female characters tbh.
It's more the fact that you can find so many examples of women in this medium with incredibly similar facial features in the same way that you can find a shit ton of gruff and/or brunette white men with beards.

That male collage is bad since it contains many classic characters that are far from bland.
Faces tho. A character's face can in theory be bland if it's just yet another example of well worn tropes. Like if even half of those designs were changed to be a different ethnicity literally nothing of value would be lost from the whole design itself.
 

zoukka

Member
Only Snake stands out IMO.

Snake, Drake, Chris and Dead Rising guy are great designs. And many of the lesser known characters in that pic fit the games they are in no matter generic they might be, many game series AIM at being generic and not specific or stylized. They are usually not my cup of tea mind you.
 
It's more the fact that you can find so many examples of women in this medium with incredibly similar facial features in the same way that you can find a shit ton of gruff and/or brunette white men with beards.

Is there a similar collage that isn't all from a single game and from a series that is known and criticized for plastic same faces? I've heard of female characters having a narrow range of body types, but never faces before
 

zoukka

Member
Faces tho. A character's face can in theory be bland if it's just yet another example of well worn tropes. Like if even half of those designs were changed to be a different ethnicity literally nothing of value would be lost from the whole design itself.

Except when you know their ethnicity matters to the story, or their design has been consistent for decades...
 

Crossing Eden

Hello, my name is Yves Guillemot, Vivendi S.A.'s Employee of the Month!
Is there a similar collage that isn't all from a single game and from a series that is known and criticized for plastic same faces? I've heard of female characters having a narrow range of body types, but never faces before
No because not enough people care about the representation of women in the gaming industry. :| The criticism about narrow body types extends to the face types as well. Hence the reason why you have instances where people unironically say that Aloy has chubby cheeks. Or even that in 2017 the industry is in a state where even a leisurely walk through the city would lead to several instances where you see a face shaped like Aloy's and yet in 2017 of all things it's unique. :|

Except when you know their ethnicity matters to the story, or their design has been consistent for decades...
Genuinely how many of those characters have ethnicities that matter to their story? And to such an effect that it wouldn't at the very least be more interesting to explore something other than that ethnicity.
 

Willenium

Member
Oh wow those Bayonetta design slayed my whole existance.
If we get a Bayo 3 I would love if she appeared in different looks, but then again that wouldn't really be marketable to the same people that just wanna stare at her curves in her regular tight outfit.

Also I always have to think of these early designs for Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney

concept%20sketches.png

i respect that "she's got giant cans" has been a character trait for Mia from the beginning.

I really liked the early press stuff for Persona 5 where the MC looked a little bit... crazier
Persona-5-All-Out-Attack-Protagonist-Prerelease.png

Made me think that we were going to get a main character with an actual personality!
 

B.K.

Member
Saw a bunch of FFIX stuff earlier in this thread, which reminds me...

I remember in the late 90s seeing some concept art on either a video game website or magazine that was labeled as something that leaked from Square and could be Final Fantasy IX. I don't know if it was legit or not, but if it was legit it seems clear it wasn't FF9.

The concept was something about people living underground and I remember the art style being not tooo far off what we eventually got. Similarly exaggerated, but I'm pretty sure there were mole people involved. Anyone remember this? I also could be misremembering because it was like 18-19 years ago and I was like 10 years old.

These?

http://archive.thegia.com/news/n990315b.html

http://archive.thegia.com/news/n990524a.html

http://archive.thegia.com/psx/ff9/ff9art1a.html
 

Crossing Eden

Hello, my name is Yves Guillemot, Vivendi S.A.'s Employee of the Month!
Little known fact is that NT at the very start of DmC's development started off desgining Dante with a red coat and the white hair albeit with the modern fuckboi twist
but Capcom told them to push his design away from that so they experimented quite a bit:

tumblr_mgozang7O51rblqwco4_1280.png

tumblr_mm9ecemQ2A1re9fe1o3_1280.jpg


I listed the ones I liked in a previous post.

Besides this has gone so much off-topic once again.
Literally had to F5 your name to find that post my bad.
 
Little known fact is that NT at the very start of DmC's development started off desgining Dante with a red coat and the white hair albeit with the modern fuckboi twist
but Capcom told them to push his design away from that so they experimented quite a bit:

tumblr_mgozang7O51rblqwco4_1280.png

tumblr_mm9ecemQ2A1re9fe1o3_1280.jpg



Literally had to F5 your name to find that post my bad.

So at no point did he ever not look terrible. I guess the Jason Statham w/ hair one looked sort of cool I guess
 
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