Do You Think They Changed Some Characters Too Much?

[TheWill]

27 minutes ago, Kaminari said:

I don't get why people are okay with the inclusion of dark-skinned characters but ONLY it it's an entirely new character. What character development was there for Boey or Gray even was there in the first place? A few lines of dialogue from a game in the early nineties that never left japan? I can't possibly imagine you were so attached to the writing of the original gaiden's portrayal of them (or lack of) that it really matters that much. 

Like, if IS was like, yeah Gray is no longer a playable character. Here's Alm's new friend, Ched. He has the portrait that Gray has now in echoes. His growths are incredibly similar to Gray's. He's a new character. People would just be mad Gray got removed.

If you add too many characters, people will also think you're messing with the original too much. Or the balance of the game will be messed up. Its just waaaay easier to edit existing characters that had nothing to their name besides like one piece of official art.

Personally, I just like seeing a variety of characters because it makes the cast more memorable to me.

Inclusion of characters does not alter the identity of already existing characters, regardless of how little characterisation or identity they may have had. Some of the designs (Mae, Python, Saber, Valbur) all keep the few iconic traits of the original designs and still look great. I have said I liked the overall cast as well, they're much more memorable now. 

[GAIDENBRO]

18 hours ago, SlipperySlippy said:

 

Also there's no proof towards the choices being purely aesthetic and fitting the characters better. I'd personally venture to bet they just wanted a more diverse cast for the sake of diversity, not addressing any particular racial outcry. Similarly, Faye was likely only created for gender diversity at the start of the game and not having an all-male cast until Silque (although that's still relatively early in, so that could be debated). Similar to your claim however, it's only conjecture. 

It fits with Gray's "heart over face" or something like that in what he says in Gaiden with how he looks soooo. Boey looks fine black he looked like a utter dweeb with literally every design he had. Now he looks not only more mature but simply better and is well balanced for whatever twists and turns Boey turns out to be. Atlas looks good too really. He has big muscles to represent his strength > all he had going on. 3 black people won't kill you. Plus it isn't for "diversity" it's to give the characters more personality, depth and life. Leon is now gay, feminine and has feelings for Valbar who doesn't return them but Leon accepts that and is okay with romance in the future (He'll probably even get with the opposite sex too making him not completely gay but that's speculation). It doesn't step out of line with his Gaiden counterpart and gives him more depth and personality than just "I'll follow Valbar recruit me!". Python and Forsyth are kinda like a Cain and Abel duo now in Echoes since they have an entire conversation together in a memory segment besides supports. Clive is more important in the plot where a ton more centers around him etc. It's pretty faithful to everything Gaiden contributed: some minor changes like the blacks isn't really that big of a deal. Silque can talk with JESSE. Echoes is breathing life and I can take a minor change to a reused design like Atlas.

 

16 hours ago, SlipperySlippy said:

Inclusion of characters does not alter the identity of already existing characters, regardless of how little characterisation or identity they may have had. Some of the designs (Mae, Python, Saber, Valbur) all keep the few iconic traits of the original designs and still look great. I have said I liked the overall cast as well, they're much more memorable now. 

Same

 

On 2017/3/29 at 2:31 PM, Hero of the Fire Emblems said:

Alright now that Catria's design dropped... I regret to say my opinion was changed

im now extremely worried about what Sieg's design will be and how far removed it will be from 11 and 12, the games Echoes specifically has continuity with....... I feel like a line was crossed with the Whitewings, Catria looks more like Cleopatra now =L

Zeke looks fine lol. Exactly how you would imagine him to be.

 

On 2017/3/24 at 3:13 PM, Lord of Gabriel Knight said:

I don't have any issue with the clothing or armor, the issue I have is with changing the identifying features of the characters, namely the hair style and color. There are subtle enough differences in the original art that this talented artist could have made them look very distinct while still keeping the characters true to their original design. Like she did with Alm and Celica. Even though their clothes changed, you know it's still them because their defining features are still the same. New Cliff looks so different from the old, they might as well be separate characters. Shadow Dragon's artist took the equally drab and boring designs from FE1 and made them unique and appealing while still keeping true to the individual aspects of the characters. And there's no reason this artist couldn't do the same. Hell, I did it myself!

      

They aren't the most unique designs, but Grey still looks like the sprite from Gaiden, while still looking distinct from both Robin and Cliff.

Gray looking how he does in Echoes makes sense to what he says. "Beauty in the heart over the face" or something like that. He's not as appealing in the looks apart compared to someone like Jesse and even Tobin. It makes so much sense why he would say that now. Echoes did justice to the characters a lot. 

 

 

Plus Kliff, Tobin and Gray still manage to look plain in comparison to the rest of the cast. Keeping consistency with their Gaiden forms on how they failed to stick out especially in Gaiden.

Edited April 6, 2017 by GAIDENBRO

[Lord of Gabriel Knight]

9 hours ago, GAIDENBRO said:

Gray looking how he does in Echoes makes sense to what he says. "Beauty in the heart over the face" or something like that. He's not as appealing in the looks apart compared to someone like Jesse and even Tobin. It makes so much sense why he would say that now. Echoes did justice to the characters a lot. 

Plus Kliff, Tobin and Gray still manage to look plain in comparison to the rest of the cast. Keeping consistency with their Gaiden forms on how they failed to stick out especially in Gaiden.

That's irrelevant. They still changed, which I don't agree with.

Edited April 6, 2017 by Lord of Gabriel Knight

[Thor Odinson]

Some perspective from a former character designer of a formerly relatively well-known romhack before college happened and it died:

Earlier on in its lifecycle (and when I was a much shittier artist and spriter) I did a lot of very generic-looking simplistic designs akin to what gaiden designs (and FE6 fighters, even. boring. nondescript) because I followed what a lot of existing FE has done. This created designs that honestly do not stand out well from each other. If I treated every single one of those base designs as some kind of "signature look" I'd be fucked, because they're a constant source of irritation, as the artist, to see the bad choices I made earlier on translate to a restriction I have to follow in any later iterations, even though I have significantly better design abilities and art skills now. 

And maybe someone liked that old design. That doesn't matter to me. I don't want to put out a product that, honestly, restricts my ability to create the best damn looking characters I could because I made a mistake 5 (or someone else did, 20) years ago. I don't honestly give a shit if like, 5 people might like the old design and might cry about it. It looks bad and it needs to go.

And as an artist I would feel very restricted if I had to force myself to integrate a bit of the features of each of the older designs--which aren't even self consistent, there's like two sets of them that look different but similarly nondescript bar very few exceptions. And probably would have created a much worse set of designs. And probably be really resentful about it. If I had the same source material to work with, I likely would've done the same thing.

[Vince777]

12 hours ago, Nanima said:

If you want an exampel of a character who was explicitly coded as (stereotypically) black ethnicity (from a a Japanese perspective) you need look no further than.. Devdan. 

I looked to see if there were more positive examples and wondered what is your take on Flavia and Basilio?

I'm not sure if they're made to actually be of a "black ethnicity" but they certainly are made to look to be of a different ethnicity. 

Edited April 6, 2017 by Vince777

[GAIDENBRO]

3 hours ago, Lord of Gabriel Knight said:

That's irrelevant. They still changed, which I don't agree with.

With how plain Gaiden was change was unavoidable. You'll just have to deal with it.

[Lord of Gabriel Knight]

On 4/6/2017 at 5:59 PM, GAIDENBRO said:

With how plain Gaiden was change was unavoidable. You'll just have to deal with it.

Well obviously, but this thread is asking people's opinions about it, so take your attitude somewhere else.

Edited April 11, 2017 by Lord of Gabriel Knight

[Tuvy]

I only have one problem 

Spoiler

WHY IS HE NOT PURPLE!

[maybe]

1 hour ago, Tuvy said:

I only have one problem 

  Hide contents

WHY IS HE NOT PURPLE!

because the other soldier is red

think about it

[Tuvy]

23 minutes ago, unique said:

because the other soldier is red

think about it

GOD DAMMIT

THEY DON'T EVEN HAVE SUPPORT CONVO'S!

Edited April 13, 2017 by Tuvy

[Topaz Light]

Nah... Well, I guess, in terms of the sheer amount by which they were changed, then sure, maybe, but I honestly think the newer designs are better and more memorable than the older ones, for the most part. They did make some decisions I personally wouldn't have, such as making Tobin the lanky brown-haired white guy when I would've picked Kliff, but the designs themselves are pretty good.

[TheWill]

On 07/04/2017 at 2:52 AM, Thor Odinson said:

And maybe someone liked that old design. That doesn't matter to me. I don't want to put out a product that, honestly, restricts my ability to create the best damn looking characters I could because I made a mistake 5 (or someone else did, 20) years ago. I don't honestly give a shit if like, 5 people might like the old design and might cry about it. It looks bad and it needs to go.

 

That's just how work as an artist goes. If they decided to remake one of the SNES games, they should have restrictions on their work so as to not change Ayra from this black-haired swordswoman to a pink haired ditsy sword wielder. People are being more lenient because:

#1. The new designs are better

#2. Not many people cared about Gaiden

But if the same occurred to characters in FE4 (who of which most have lacklustre designs), where their designs changed beyond just their armour, there would be outrage. 

[Tamanoir]

20 minutes ago, SlipperySlippy said:

That's just how work as an artist goes. If they decided to remake one of the SNES games, they should have restrictions on their work so as to not change Ayra from this black-haired swordswoman to a pink haired ditsy sword wielder. People are being more lenient because:

#1. The new designs are better

#2. Not many people cared about Gaiden

But if the same occurred to characters in FE4 (who of which most have lacklustre designs), where their designs changed beyond just their armour, there would be outrage. 

#3. They didn't even had a consistent design. Once again, Boey. Why does no one complain about his green hair version (the "official one" if you go by Awakening.? It looks Nothing like his original, or anything. It's just Merric's vain, stupid cousin. If people wanted to complain about looks, now would have been the good time (but see #2. No one cared.)

I personnaly think that his new look is closer to what boey is than his green hair version. I don't even hate that design or anything. It's just that if this is have been an acceptable redesign for years, then, anything is.

They weren't even coherent with the ancient games, with the Pegasi sister's hair colour.

[TheWill]

Just now, Tamanoir said:

#3. They didn't even had a consistent design. Once again, Boey. Why does no one complain about his green hair version (the "official one" if you go by Awakening.? It looks Nothing like his original, or anything. It's just Merric's vain, stupid cousin. If people wanted to complain about looks, now would have been the good time (but see #2. No one cared.)

I personnaly think that his new look is closer to what boey is than his green hair version. I don't even hate that design or anything. It's just that if this is have been an acceptable redesign for years, then, anything is.

They weren't even coherent with the ancient games, with the Pegasi sister's hair colour.

I don't know why people use consistency as an excuse to exclude the radical design changes for the minority. Most of the redesigns actually do maintain character traits present in their initial design. The ones that are even brought into question are the ones that changed everything about the initial character designs (Boey, Kliff, Deen, Atlas, Forscyth).

As for Boey, it's obvious which design he's meant to be. 'The Comlpete' artbook and the mugs present in Gaiden are very consistent with one another. 

[Thor Odinson]

It's their IP. They're allowed to do radical redesigns if they want to. As I am allowed to radically redesign anyone the fuck I want in Dream of Five without regard to whatever the players feelings are, so is whoever Nintendo hires for their IP. I know there's a few characters in DoF where I looked at their mug, said "man they look like a bland ass piece of bread, I'm just gonna do whatever the fuck I want" because I fucking own this shit. When I do redesigns for FE characters I don't like the clothes or something, yes, I still need to follow the official designs for recognizability, because they aren't my characters. If I change something, as an outsider, then it would be not that character anymore. If Nintendo/IS decides on the change, or approves of a change officially because it looks better or someone up there just got tired of the old design? Their IP, their right.

I did actual contract work as an artist and understand that artists have limitations. Usually in style and the set of things I have to design by. It doesn't include "wow this shitty design someone else drew 20 years ago that sucks that totally gets in the way of my radical new redesign" that the art directors themselves are probably also tired of, and the execs are probably like, "what the fuck is this shit anyway". Like if I ran nintendo and the art for a game I'm remaking that came out 20 years ago had designs that look like a 5 year old drew them, hell yeah make them radically different.

I mean that is the point of the remake they're at least allowed to change some things they did wrong

Edited April 15, 2017 by Thor Odinson

[Tamanoir]

37 minutes ago, Thor Odinson said:

It's their IP. They're allowed to do radical redesigns if they want to. As I am allowed to radically redesign anyone the fuck I want in Dream of Five without regard to whatever the players feelings are, so is whoever Nintendo hires for their IP. I know there's a few characters in DoF where I looked at their mug, said "man they look like a bland ass piece of bread, I'm just gonna do whatever the fuck I want" because I fucking own this shit. When I do redesigns for FE characters I don't like the clothes or something, yes, I still need to follow the official designs for recognizability, because they aren't my characters. If I change something, as an outsider, then it would be not that character anymore. If Nintendo/IS decides on the change, or approves of a change officially because it looks better or someone up there just got tired of the old design? Their IP, their right.

I did actual contract work as an artist and understand that artists have limitations. Usually in style and the set of things I have to design by. It doesn't include "wow this shitty design someone else drew 20 years ago that sucks that totally gets in the way of my radical new redesign" that the art directors themselves are probably also tired of, and the execs are probably like, "what the fuck is this shit anyway". Like if I ran nintendo and the art for a game I'm remaking that came out 20 years ago had designs that look like a 5 year old drew them, hell yeah make them radically different.

I mean that is the point of the remake they're at least allowed to change some things they did wrong

That's similar to what they're doing with the story actually. It had basically no story, so they felt it OK to add things (even new characters), and complete the world more.

Let's be honnest, Gaiden is basically a blank state, so they could do whatever they want. Like they did with the bosses portrait. It was palette swap with zero personality, so they radically changed some of them (like with Nuibaba, who was just Tatara's long lost cousin.) The game gets the Hair colour of its main character wrong, so clearly they didn't cared that much about consistency back then. So changing it now is free game.

 

[bufkus]

On 4/5/2017 at 7:37 PM, SlipperySlippy said:

The nature of altering characters ethnic or skin colour is inherently controversial, but no I am not annoyed. I do however think it was completely unnecessary and in some cases such as L in the upcoming Death Note live-action, just downright silly. Similarly, if it was originally a dark-skinned character changed to be white, the outcry would be detrimental, yet the other the other way is considered acceptable. Diversity for the sake of diversity isn't a particularly positive (or negative) thing. If they wanted to add dark-skinned characters, I think adding new characters rather than altering old ones is the better alternative. 

This is just stupid. Do you realize that the only reason characters all looked pale in the original was likely due to hardware restrictions? And it's not like Boey is a main character or anything. They've drastically changed the looks of everyone. Quite frankly you'd have to be incredibly racist to be upset over a MINOR character becoming dark skinned in a complete overhaul.

[TheWerdna]

Can't judge personalities, but at least in terms of visual design the quite drastic changes are a good thing IMO. To echo most others here, limitations at the time made most characters very samey in terms of appearence. Making everyone look more varied and unique is a much needed change/

[TheWill]

12 hours ago, bufkus said:

This is just stupid. Do you realize that the only reason characters all looked pale in the original was likely due to hardware restrictions? And it's not like Boey is a main character or anything. They've drastically changed the looks of everyone. Quite frankly you'd have to be incredibly racist to be upset over a MINOR character becoming dark skinned in a complete overhaul.

Whilst I personally don't care what you may think or have the impression of me, it's absolutely disgusting labelling someone as a racist because they don't conform to your views. No, they haven't drastically changed the look of everyone. A lot of characters still maintain their iconic traits. Also saying that hardware limitations was the reason they didn't include different skin coloured characters is incredibly misinformed. 

I'd have the exact same reaction if they changed an originally black character to be white -- they shouldn't! In any form of media. 

 

[Lord of Gabriel Knight]

13 hours ago, bufkus said:

This is just stupid. Do you realize that the only reason characters all looked pale in the original was likely due to hardware restrictions? And it's not like Boey is a main character or anything. They've drastically changed the looks of everyone. Quite frankly you'd have to be incredibly racist to be upset over a MINOR character becoming dark skinned in a complete overhaul.

Um, are you stupid? There are plenty of characters who are black on the NES. And accusing people of being racist over something trivial like this is ignorant and insulting. Know what you're talking about before saying accusing anyone of being racist.

[TheWill]

On 15/04/2017 at 11:33 PM, Thor Odinson said:

It's their IP. They're allowed to do radical redesigns if they want to. As I am allowed to radically redesign anyone the fuck I want in Dream of Five without regard to whatever the players feelings are, so is whoever Nintendo hires for their IP.

Yes, you can radically redesign any character. That doesn't mean you should. As a former character designer, you should know the importance of maintaining iconic character traits when redesigning characters. You don't see Dante suddenly change from his iconic white hair and red clothing in between Devil May Cry games. If you wanted to redesign Renair, it's pretty obvious she should maintain her traits as an independent, female, red-haired soldier. Sure, her armour, hairstyle and the like might change, but if you change her too radically, for example, to an Asian shinto priest or a bald curate, then yes, I would disapprove and voice my complaints of that change as a fan. That doesn't at all mean you have to conform to the complaints, as you said it's yours and you have every right, but people also have every right to voice their complaints.

On 15/04/2017 at 11:33 PM, Thor Odinson said:

When I do redesigns for FE characters I don't like the clothes or something, yes, I still need to follow the official designs for recognizability, because they aren't my characters. If I change something, as an outsider, then it would be not that character anymore. If Nintendo/IS decides on the change, or approves of a change officially because it looks better or someone up there just got tired of the old design? Their IP, their right.

Yes, there's no one arguing otherwise.

 

[Thor Odinson]

You have a right to complain and not like it, sure, but as an IP owner, if I can't redesign my own goddamn IP/OC exactly the way I want to then what's the point anyway, and will honestly find those complaints irritating at best. 

Honestly if Renair didn't have to work with the constraints of her battle animation, which is a lot harder to make than portraits, I'd have redesigned her long ago. Before DoF died I had drastic plans to change Driscoll's design--because his original design was made out of the inexperience of a much younger me and the outcome was some boring, generic fighter design. I don't find any bit of his character "iconic". A mistake I made when I was a teenager shouldn't be suddenly "iconic" now. 

And Hidari didn't really change to the point of recognizability the ones with actually "iconic" and recognizable designs, anyway, Alm and Celica are very much recognizable, Whitewings are whitewings, Saber still has his eyepatch, and Zeke looks exactly like Camus and Sirius. All she changed was some potato sacks that all looked basically the same. I would categorize these as the same case as my beef with Driscoll--honestly uninspired designs in desperate need of a complete makeover, and better for it.

Edited May 10, 2017 by Thor Odinson

[TheWill]

Just now, Thor Odinson said:

You have a right to complain and not like it, sure, but as an IP owner, if I can't redesign my own goddamn IP/OC exactly the way I want to then what's the point anyway, and will honestly find those complaints irritating at best. 

Honestly if Renair didn't have to work with the constraints of her battle animation, which is a lot harder to make than portraits, I'd have redesigned her long ago.

I think it's a matter of perspective. I personally disagree that complaints are irritating at all, if you have a set design for a character that people begin to like, you're at risk of alienating them. I don't disagree that creators have every right to redesign a character any way they want, but I think voices of discernment are quite valid. As a fan of Dante from the original DMC series or Chris Redfield from the earlier Resident Evil games, I absolutely think they're redesigns in DmC and Resident Evil 7 were pretty awful. Whils I think Boey, Deen and Leon are all much worse cases than Redfield (in terms of design liberties taken), I do think the new designs are better. But, at the same time I recognize from the perspective of someone who has enjoyed iconic game characters get overhauled and lost their character identity completely, that this change isn't completely positive. .

[Thor Odinson]

I would also argue that game leads and major character have a much bigger claim to "iconic" than characters that barely have lines and personalities. In the example I gave, granted I probably wouldn't have drastically changed Renair anyway (probably would've just given her a more practical outfit if battle sprites weren't so time consuming), but Driscoll, like Boey and co, have a much smaller story presence, personality development and I can't really categorize anything of theirs as "iconic" in comparison to leads like Alm and Celica, which is closer to the case with Dante.

Edited May 10, 2017 by Thor Odinson

[Lord of Gabriel Knight]

16 minutes ago, Thor Odinson said:

I don't find any bit of his character "iconic". A mistake I made when I was a teenager shouldn't be suddenly "iconic" now. 

The thing is, when you release something to the public, it gains an identity to the public. It might be separate from what you originally decided. It's not up to the artist to decide how people react his or her art. So while you may not consider a design iconic, it definitely can be seen as iconic by your viewers. And if you work for a company that aims to gain a fanbase and keep them over a long period of time so they can buy products, drastically changing a characters design can impact that negatively. When DMC came out, there was a huge outcry from how different it was from Devil May Cry. That old show Felicity? When she changed her hairstyle, people stopped watching it (why they cared is beyond me), so it definitely can happen.

Edited May 10, 2017 by Lord of Gabriel Knight