Art Challenge: NPC Poses + NPC Dress = Lots of NPCs

[Wombat]

I'd like to have a player sprite pose list that can be put in groups of 5. Artists can craft the way the NPCs are dressed and xml can be used to apply the attire to the NPC. These unique poses would also help get beginning art developers involved and get work into the game quickly. All of the request poses are face forward (south facing).

I'd like a male adult, female adult, male child, female child...a total of 20 poses. All poses are to be as "naked" as the current sprites or more modestly covered, but not get in the way of being able to apply various types of armor, clothing, equipment, hair styles and so on.

Each pose would have its own attire directory, so artists can make for just one pose rather than build entire sets.

[Meemxes]

Good idea.

Probably don't need both male and female children. More generally, maybe skip different sexes for basic poses and defer sex/gender to the dress. This could save a lot of work. What do you think?

This seems like an important project and I prefer to stick with tangential stuff for now. But if no one else picks it up I may be able to do it later this summer (June or July 2011).

[Crush]

Good idea.

Probably don't need both male and female children. More generally, maybe skip different sexes for basic poses and defer sex/gender to the dress. This could save a lot of work. What do you think?

Gender-less children: yes.
Gender-less adults: no.

Men and women do not only have a different body structure but also a different body language.

[Meemxes]

Ok, but in the interest of PC-ness I'll only make poses for both sexes. In my world, some men cry and ladies too stumble out of bars and violently puke all over the sidewalk.

Here's a quick start. (A female version would include hips and breasts.)

[Meemxes]

So far...

(Right is standing male player for comparison)

NPC poses draft 01.png (4.47 KiB) Viewed 5166 times

[Crush]

In my world, some men cry and ladies too stumble out of bars and violently puke all over the sidewalk.

Sure they do, but they don't look the same while they do so.

[lien]

thinker Pose
if we use more this system for NPC: we can also introduce other race (skeleton, demon ect...) as other servers have done already.


Lien ...

[Meemxes]

if we use more this system for NPC: we can also introduce other race (skeleton, demon ect...) as other servers have done already.

I agree. The base player defines the norm. So big feet are those bigger than the player's, and so forth. Understanding that makes our work a lot easier and more consistent.

In my world, some men cry and ladies too stumble out of bars and violently puke all over the sidewalk.

Sure they do, but they don't look the same while they do so.

I should apologize. I intended my comment to explain why I'm doing/not doing things in a way that was brief, to the point, and playful. But I see that I failed on the last two counts and sounded snarky. I can see how it looked like my comment about crying/vomiting looked like it applied generally when I intended it to be a caricature of my role in the design process. "My world" was supposed to refer to how I see my role, not how I think everyone's world should be, although I see how it looked like the latter. To clarify, my goal is to ensure that others in the development process have maximal freedom when it comes to choices about gender. Those choices are unavoidable when it comes to NPCs. I'm happy that developers have done a pretty good job making them so far and I hope they continue to do so. Maybe it's excessive of me to make all poses for both sexes, but I'm willing to take that risk to maximize developers' options. I don't expect all gender/pose/dress combinations to be used. But I don't want to make those choices in place of content developers now or down the road. Gender politics are tricky and I intend to avoid them as much as possible.

[lien]

other one

Lien ...

[pateame]

I like your way of concept Meemxes, also great work lien!. New content ideas makes me happy
After watching old NPC stuff, now I remember savannah-man NPC, wich have a nice pose and idle animation.

Great idea to have a player sprite pose, but also face expressions sprites could be used to create more mixes by separated.
With a face expression sheet, we could generate "unisex" actions, as blink or eye movement.
Taking all those elements (face expression+pose+attire) there's more chances to get new NPCs from the same pose, for example:

EDIT: Here's another 5 poses more for savannah-man to get some capoeira

[Matt]

OMG someone remembered savannah-man

Is any of this savannah stuff ingame btw?
If not, shame on you!

( I bet Irus train isnt ingame too, but that fool forbid it if I remember correctly! What happened to the ship btw?)

[i]

OMG someone remembered savannah-man :)

Is any of this savannah stuff ingame btw?
If not, shame on you!

( I bet Irus train isnt ingame too, but that fool forbid it if I remember correctly! What happened to the ship btw?)

Ship is still WIP.

[Merlin]

OMG someone remembered savannah-man

Is any of this savannah stuff ingame btw?
If not, shame on you!

( I bet Irus train isnt ingame too, but that fool forbid it if I remember correctly! What happened to the ship btw?)

No savannah yet. I don't think we ever figured on a place to put one even thou I'm sure it's in the grand plan. I do happen to have I's train around. I think there's someone who was going to make some new dessert maps once I finish the remake. Perhaps I'll add that and the nomad set in with the remake and suggest they get used. XD

[Meemxes]

Courtesy of skipy: http://forums.themanaworld.org/viewtopi ... &start=120
The current player sheets are there. There are lots of useful poses and parts.

Great idea to have a player sprite pose, but also face expressions sprites could be used to create more mixes by separated.
With a face expression sheet, we could generate "unisex" actions, as blink or eye movement.
Taking all those elements (face expression+pose+attire) there's more chances to get new NPCs from the same pose, for example:
(Attire + Expression + Pose)

Yeah, then we'll really get a bang for our brush! (Sorry, I couldn't resist the pun. ) Seriously, though, I'm a fan. After your suggestion I was going to say that we modularize the whole head and not just the face. But your illustration makes me think that you're one step ahead of me. Anyway even if we don't make the head a separate entity, at least we should keep a collection of heads somewhere so we can switch them out.

Looking at what you did with savannah man, it seems like you've thought about modularizing more than just the face/head. Your example really shows how far you can go with just a few pieces. I see lien's style allowed you to do that more effectively than mine.

I think remaking the body to match the pose helps make each NPC a different person, thus making the game characters more diverse and interesting. Then again, you've illustrated that making an NPC more like it's the player doing that pose (as lien did) yields exponential growth in the number of NPC poses with a bit of extra work. Lots of poses can also make the game more interesting. I'm leaning towards my technique because I think it'll pay off more in the long run, but I admit I'm now confused about what we're supposed to be doing.

Perhaps someone of authority can clear up this issue. We're supposed to make 5 poses based on the player. Does that mean that we should basically put the player in different poses with different expressions, as lien did? Or does it mean that we should remake the body as necessary to fit the pose, like I did?

[enchilado]

All these poses look rather nice, although your first one, Meemxes, seems to have very strange muscle bulges on its right leg and left arm. And all of them seem (I must admit I didn't open each one in an image editor) to have considerably more anti-aliasing than is necessary.