Character Portraits

[coyotecraft]

You see more Jrpgs these days trading in full-motion scenes for visual novel puppet shows. But I feel like they adopted design elements without considering a fundamental difference between a JRPG and a SIM.

In a SIM, you are experiencing everything from the character's POV. So it's natural for the character portraits to look at you when communicating. It's more immersive that way.
But Jrpgs are more voyeuristic in nature. So characters talking to each other, but staring at the camera, subtly breaks the 4th wall.

 

[Juan J. Sánchez]

Agreed.

 

[StrawberrySmiles]

Unless it's Neptunia. They always break the forth wall. :P

The idea of doing portraits intimidate me because I lack digital art skills. Then you gotta decide if you want portraits or busts, or what. In a 2D top-down game busts might be cool so you can see the expressions and details of the character.

Though if your sprites have a lot of animation, then you just need a portrait to convey their facial expression I'm sure. XD

 

[coyotecraft]

I guess it depends on how you're using portraits. If it's just identifying the speaker or if it's part of the stage. Sometimes it's both.

I guess, in defense of Agarest War (which has plenty of flaws already) there are moments were it slips into Dating Sim territory and the Front facing portraits are appropriate.

 

[Nathaniel3W]

Enter the thread necromancer!

Hey everyone, I'm going through some of the threads that I missed in the last several months. Just to get your thoughts here, what's the difference between this...

...and this?

Both games feature an overhead third-person camera, one in 3D isometric, and the other in traditional 3/4 perspective. Both have smallish sprite characters moving around the map. But the portraits that appear during dialog scenes are quite different. Do you think both are acceptable?

Neither version shows the characters looking into the camera, as you might find in a dating sim or visual novel. Is that the main issue?

I use a straight-on perspective for my portraits, and I've been told it looks awkward. I think I have to stick with it for a few reasons, but I'm hoping it's not that bad.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=neaR6m1p9c8
(I tried setting the start point at 1m12s on that video, but it's not working. Check 1m12s to see a good example of my game's dialog.)

 

[Xhukari]

The first example image totally works. The second does not work at all, in my opinion. The character looks great in the second don't get me wrong, but it clashes with the aesthetic of the game its in. While the top image feels entirely cohesive. When it comes to your portraits, I have to agree with the comment about it being awkward. I think you could meet an in-between of the front on and the more side-on of the example images, just avoid the dead-on front look. I think it brings out this uncanny valley reaction to it? Like they feel a bit like mannequins in a way.

I also feel the portraits suffer from the same thing as I mentioned about the second image with the aesthetic clash; the rest of the game feels more rustic, with the painterly, brushed aesthetic. Then you have this (albeit nice looking) anime-ish, exaggerated features, flatter blocks of colour in the portraits. Could be losing some details in Youtube's video compression, I'm not sure.