New directions for the costume creator?
By
Airborne_Ninja,
Posted on: 2010-02-01 13:53 in CoH and CoV General Discussions
im scared.
Quote:
While you do have a point, it has been my experience that people tend to read the first post or at most the first page and respond to something from there, so I can't say whether we've driven people away or not. I do think we're about done, however, so you can have your thread back. No more disruptions, I promise.
|
Originally Posted by Mr_Hellcat
*puts a hand on my hips and waggles the finger of my free hand at the two of you.. taps a foot for good measure*
If the two of you aren't going to be able to play nice in this thread and instead make it into a personal conversation, then you should take it to PMs. While seeing new posts in this thread is good to keep the thread alive, I can't help but wonder if your massive walls of text and insular discussion isn't driving people away from reading or posting in the thread. |
Quote:
|
Originally Posted by Arcanaville
Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.
|
Having tried COs trial version, this is my opinion;
Pro's:
-Options. Lots of. Some of them good. I like the sheer ammount of *decent* armour and tech equipment they had. Along with the holsters band back details. Honest to god back details!
-Stances. Not tons, but it was nice to switch them around a bit. Just switching from Heroic to Average on the female model made me think a bit more of it.
-Muscle tone slider. I did like this a lot. Not *all* of my characters are meant to be totally ripped. My Vanguard affiliated sniper is tough, but he's not built like Bruce Lee. It looks horrible. The muscle slider was a nice little touch.
Assymetry: That was nice. More uniqeness = a good thing.
Cons;
-Layout. Oh. God. The. Rats. Whoever laid out the CO costume creator was...different, shall we say? It hurt my eyes, offended my brain, and bamboozled my sensibilities. Ours is, frankly, superior. The layout in CoX is simple and easy to use. This enough chalked up a whole row of Con points on its own.
-Style. This one is pure opinion here. I hate the graphics style. I really do. It just doesn't do it for me.
Thats just the CC. I didn't like CO as a whole from what I saw, is all I will say. But there are things that would work really well over here if adapted to look as good as the rest of the CityOf stuff.
...No more club-feet boots! I hate the old boots with a passion! >_<
Quote:
|
Originally Posted by Zwillinger
GG, I would tell you that "I am killing you with my mind", but I couldn't find an emoticon to properly express my sentiment.
|
Quote:
|
Originally Posted by Captain_Photon
NOTE: The Incarnate System is basically farming for IOs on a larger scale, and with more obtrusive lore.
 |
Quote:
Ah, yes, the other thing I wish we could steal. Let me explain what this does in a bit more detail, because it's not obvious.|
Originally Posted by Techbot Alpha
-Muscle tone slider. I did like this a lot. Not *all* of my characters are meant to be totally ripped. My Vanguard affiliated sniper is tough, but he's not built like Bruce Lee. It looks horrible. The muscle slider was a nice little touch.
|
Champions Online has a skin texture that's barely a texture and more a flat colour, but laid over this is a pretty high-res bump map of a ripped, muscular body. The "muscle" slider does not alter the body's geometry in any way, shape or form, it merely changes how pronounced this bump map is. Full left on the slider gives you smooth skin, full right gives you inhumanly ripped skin. Interestingly, the belly button is also tied into this bump map, so if you don't want to be very ripped, you'll have to make do without one. Sorry.
This ties into something I've always wanted to see in City of Heroes, and that's a selection of base skin textures. As we all know, the bulk of our "with skin" options are already as simple as a colour mask over a "naked" body, so technically speaking, they should apply over ripped skin just as easily as over the skin we have. They won't apply well over highly-detailed textures, though, as it'd be like slapping a pattern over Tech Wired - it looks painted.
But, yes, the Muscle slider is a very good idea and I enjoyed toying with it.
Quote:
|
Originally Posted by Arcanaville
Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.
|
One thing that CO has that I like that I wish we had here is the undo and redo feature. I'm glad that we can now save costumes, but there have been so many times that I've made a costume and didn't save it and had to figure out what I had done earlier.
More patterns would even be good. We only have one magic pattern, still? I don't even like it wrapping about the rear. A magic pattern that goes up the side of the body, like Tribal or Isles, would be nice.
I think they just need to get rid of those two female heads that are ultra-high contrast, really bright and ugly as sin. What's the story about those? 
Oh, and a male face with an epicanthic fold that doesn't look distinctly Asian. There's a couple female faces under "Asian" that can pass as indigenous Americans (especially Pacific/Far northerners and South American natives) but none of the male faces can really pass as anything other than Asian.
Quote:
A lot of the items in the costume inventory can be used for a mystical character, but I agree that there isn't a lot of patterns that are magical. Though I'm not big on mystical themes, every now and then, I like to make a witch or sorcerer. Jay did such a wonderful job on some of the models that are in the magical booster pack. I wished that some of the textures used on the mods were patterns as well. The same goes for the ninja booster pack's fire texture on the robes and tunics.
|
Originally Posted by Gaming_Glen
More patterns would even be good. We only have one magic pattern, still? I don't even like it wrapping about the rear. A magic pattern that goes up the side of the body, like Tribal or Isles, would be nice.
|
Quote:
The worst part is that some of these faces are actually pretty good, but they don't match the rest of the skin on the body, so they are completely useless. Pity, really, and very unprofessional.
|
Originally Posted by Jophiel
I think they just need to get rid of those two female heads that are ultra-high contrast, really bright and ugly as sin. What's the story about those?
|
Quote:
|
Originally Posted by Arcanaville
Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.
|
Quote:
There are a lot of things about Champions Online that's pretty damn nice. Their character creator is one of them.|
Originally Posted by dbuter
I'd like them to steal the Champs Online character creator. That was a thing of beauty.
|
I'd certainly like to see something similar for this game.
I'll be one of those that agrees with CO's costume creator in MANY aspects. Allow me to break them down:
1. City of Heroes
- The facial selection means that we get to have more than a single face, which provides a VAST number of improved possibilities.
- We not only can select the texture of our costumes, but the overlaying mesh of graphics and/or augmentation for the texture-specific meshes.
- Our creator receives many FREE updates, rather than having +60% of all updates purchasable in an e-currency store.
- We allow a high amount of weapon customization, and have at least 85% of our costume pieces clearly labeled and categorized.
- Our power customization is simply awesome; most powersets have the ability to be very detailed. While this isn't ALWAYS the case, it's very nice to have.
2. Champions Online
- Their facial construction, when dealing with dimensions of the face, is hard to compete with in many aspects. The selection of only one face limits this, however.
- While they may not have as many texture/mesh combinations as we do, Champions uses shading to make their textures come to life and appear more realistic.
- The ability to customize things like eyes really stuck out to me; these little details make HUGE impacts; just like the Walk power, or shadows.
- The simple choice to allow asymmetrical costumes. I'll never forget how much fun I had making someone who was half-white and angelic and half-black with a demonic theme.
- Things like having swords, sheaths, guns mounted on your back and thensome was just incredible. I renewed my subscription just to test them out.
And now for the negatives:
1. City of Heroes
- Let's face it; this is a veteran MMO that's been on the market for nearly 6 years, and it's just now getting a graphical update. Adding things like a better polygon count might be too little too late.
- There are no available backpacks, leg/shin guards, (extensive) asymmetrical gear, and thensome. It makes the creator feel a bit limited.
- There are a total of 2 color choices; Primary and Secondary. Upgrading to CO's choice of having 4 would give a much better experience for me.
- Many pieces are held back from the players due to thematic concerns and clipping issues. I can understand hesitation, but I think the community would have a lot of fun.
- We still use mittens and slippers. I understand BAB's concern for those running low-tier computers, but there comes a point where you need to bite the bullet to appease the majority.
2. Champions Online
- There's only 1 face! Yes, there are a number of different 'styles' to wear your face, like 'Guant' or 'Chubby', or even 'Stern', but I only see these polar certainties; you're either Rambo, Obese, or Ancient.
- Some things are just so very blown out of proportion that it becomes ridiculous; Gundam-like costumes make me wonder if this game was just made so players could have the ability to plagiarize.
- While there are a lot of great costume pieces, they are greatness surrounded by sub-par, and mediocrity. I look at some pieces and want to laugh at anyone who could find a use for them.
- I'm a fan of giving things to players with tons of freedom, but even that was stretched with the amount of clipping issues seen abroad.
- The 'C-Store'. Never have I been so furious with a company than the C-Store, whose only goal seems to be to nickel-and-dime the playerbase at every corner. "We got new costumes! Buy 'em now!"
I know it's was bad there for a minute, huh?! I don't want to drive people away! I promise to play nice!