Image Designer Archive

I've noted a disturbing trend in SWG. Too many characters look exactly the same. Most people play humans and almost nobody makes an overweight character. I play a Wookie and even among us it's difficult to tell us apart just by looking at us. I don't think that the problem is the appearance of the characters people choose, I think it's that they don't have enough options available to them.

This is where the great Image Designers should come in to their own! In the real world we have plastic surgeons that can make us look any way we please, even change our gender! so why not in SWG?. Surely in an age of blasters, deathstars, and hyperdrives these things are possible.

If I want an avatar that looks exactly like me, then that should be possible (with an IDs help). If my Twilek wants 4 tentacles, he should have them (for the right price). And if I want a fireball orange Wookie (which I do!) then I should be able to fork over a big chunk of dough and get it done.

Simply put, I don't think it would be un-SW to allow people to look as they choose. They should just require an IDs help to make it happen outside the confines of the character builder.

Duh!! Most Image designers would be happy if they could just fix the hair bug,,let alone all the issues that you raise. Its not like we arent expressing our views ,,we just dont make the priority list.

On a more serious note,,,you will find lots of threads with wonderful ideas and discussion regarding the relative merits of each idea,,,only problem is ,,,very few meaningful changes have actually happened,,,and maybe not for a long time,,

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FishWan wrote:

IDs have a ton of hairstyles that never get used because, frankly, they're stupid. (Like the Alabama Prom Queen haircut.)

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I disagree that, if given all possible modifications to choose from,player characters would still mainly choose to look the same (even if this could meanplayers switching to a newuniformity of appearance).

I think that when most people the watch the movies or read the books identify with different characters or creatures. Not everyone imagines themselves as Luke, Leia, or Darth Maul. Certainly we all have different personalities and that is largely reflected our appearance and the in the clotheswe wear, I'm saying that I'm just not satisfied with the choices at hand yet.

So, if IDs were given what they should have always had like more options than are available in the character creation menus,charging for services rendered based on difficulty,AND possibly a skill tree just for exotic customizations (ie plastic surgery), we would all have the chance to look just as we would like. Afterall we play this game for tens and hundreds of hours, shouldn't we at least be satisfied with what our avatars look like?

I'm not sure that the same-ness of many characters in the game is a disturbing trend. Play FFO lately? Star Wars Galaxies has an excellent spectrum of customizations.

The trouble is, it doesn't matter how many features you give people, there are certain constants. They want to look good.

The definition of what looks "good" given our abilities is pretty narrow and most people end up fitting into that category eventually. "I don't like my nose, it's too big, make me look handsome. I'm too fat, make me thin. I'm not muscly enough, give me all the muscles you can. I'm too short, I hate having to look up at people, make me as tall as possible. Oh, and I want the cool new haircut." I actually changed a client's nose because other players in the cantina made fun of his video-game nose!

IDs have a ton of hairstyles that never get used because, frankly, they're stupid. (Like the Alabama Prom Queen haircut.) They can make people a wide range of heights and weights -- but people generally don't use them. They can give women a variety of chest sizes -- but do any of our clients pick the small end of the range?

Let me put it this way. If we suddenly had the ability to give humans pitch-black skin, red facial tattoos, red eyes, and even more muscles than now, and sinister eyebrows and a deadly expression -- the ultimate UBER LEET design --tomorrow half the men on each server would have it.

Definitely, I agree we need more content. More colors, more styles, more features, more abilities, more customization. I would dearly love to see some of the content based on the player's actual, you know, stats. Someone with max health can become thinner than someone without. Someone with max strength should get a wider range of muscle choices.Because everyone has stats for different purposes, and characters use stats in different ways, this would be a way to create more variety.

Unfortunately, players howled in Beta that they wouldn't be able to make their architect-droid-engineer character look like Sylvester Stallone. And Sony caved.

Now everyone looks the same. Go figure.

Escia

Macnider123123, people don't choose to look the same. They choose to conform. They want to look acceptable -- and at the risk of generalizing about computer gamers, perhaps some of them are 5'1" 260 lb geeks with acne and glasses who want the opportunity to play a 6'6" human with washboard abs.

Deny if you wish that people don't choose to look the same; they are choosing to look acceptable, which means most of them end up looking the same. Case in point: most female players I have run across (those who play female 'toons) want theirtorso to be big, but not too big. They want to be thin, but not too thin. Hence, sameness.

Of course, you always have the person who wants to play a short, balding, fat master dancer named Bulgy McFattybutt, or the Wookiee who wants to look like anything except Chewbacca (and ends up being black and white and called Oreo Wookiee). Or the human who wears a black duster and black clothes and is named Neo. You've seen these players on your server, I can almost guarantee it. Even in trying to be unique, they end up the same.

Yes, it would be nice if we had a ton more customization features -- like distance between eyes, size of head, shape of chin, shape of nose, shape of mouth, arm length, shoulder width, hip width, etc. Somehow I seriously doubt that this would generate variety.

Escia

The reason for this has already been metioned: People do not WANT to look different! Everyone wants to be "perfect" so you don't get short overweight characters or females that have smaller breasts. Why? Because, according to a lot of people, that is not desirable.

I recently made a Ninja-looking human female (one-handed sword) on another server and I was waiting in a cantina for some friends. This Image Designer (I don't remember her name) comes up to me and tells me "Ew, you need a makeover." I had made my character look very asian with dark eyes, small build (included breasts), the hairstyle that is pulled up with a clip and black hair. She also had very neutral coloured makeup. I was rather curious to see what this twi'lek thought looked good. She tries to give me long hair, bright red lipstick, blond hair, and some ugly purple-y colour for eyeshadow. I denied all of them and she then questioned why I wanted to look bad. This coming from a twi'lek who is obviously colourblind.

I got a little off track. Anyway!

The point I'm trying to make is, it's not the lack of options.. it's the lack of people wanting their characters to look different!

What I would like to see:

1. The ability to change Twi'lek eyebrows without having to type a bunch of stuff.

2. More hairstyles including lekku patterns and Zabrak horn patterns.

3. The ability to give people scars on their body.

4. (This is way out but I think it would be neat) The ability to give someone a temporary black eye.

5. The ability to give anyone in the game a tattoo on their arms and/or legs!!

No, you're not, but Fishwan isn't off the mark with her comments either. I am FAR less than perfect in real life. With this game, I have the ability to be the drop dead model type I wish I was IRL. For some of us, maybe THAT is our roleplaying.

Don't get me wrong... I am not saying I don't want more options. I doubt you'll ever find an image designer who would say "we have FAR too many options, we need to cut down on some of our content!" We are always in desperate need (and want!) of more stuff. But there will always be people who want to go for a more traditional look, and I believe they will probably always outnumber those who want to be shockingly different.

I must disagree. As a master, i've done the following changes (or similar, i don't remember them all)

1) Turned a white generi-male into a desert crawler: Dark skin, braids, black hair

2) Made a white blonde a black woman

3) Turned a bothan into something akin to yoda (everything sort of wrinkles)

4) Made a wookie look likea stick figure with fur

Those are a few. While many people do want the pre-fabricated look, there are others who want to be different, and succede.