Pioneer dev forum

Hey, first time posting here.
I found out about this game recently, so I tried it. The first thing I found was that the faces were butt-fugly. That may leave a bad first impression on players.
I looked in the files and saw that the face generator is pretty easy to mess with. So I started drawing up some new parts to see how it would work.

Let me know what you think.

Please visit my tumblr for more examples of my art and game development (or other stupid things): mrdaco.tumblr.com



I've achieved a nice workflow for these facial additions. I've divided my planned work into four very doable releases that can be installed and considered complete by itself.
With each new release it will simply be more complete. Could always use more variety.

TO DO LIST FOR RELEASE 1:
-More female hair
-Some clothing/armor
-A couple more accessories
-Add one more of every facial feature for good measure.

TO DO LIST FOR RELEASE 2:
-Second race
-More clothing/armor
-More accessories

TO DO LIST FOR RELEASE 3:
-Third race
-More clothing/armor
-More accessories

TO DO LIST FOR FINAL RELEASE:
-One more of every facial feature
-A bit more clothing and accessories
-Backgrounds
-As many extra hairstyles and eyes as I can add.

Definitely continue. :)
I was planning to go for a more painted look, but I'm not fixated on that, especially because of time constraints.
I don't mind cartoony look, favoring it actually. (ubless it's not too cartoony).
Maybe a bit less heavy lines would be more favorable.
Actually the looseness of your self-portrait on your page is closer to what I had in my mind.

I thought about trying a painterly look as well. But like you said, it takes a while per part. Plus, it makes it tougher to make the pieces match up. Gotta do clothing, accessories, female, other races... lotsa work. Even as thrown-together as the existing assets are, I still have to give kudos for the effort required to put it all together.

What do you mean by the looseness?

It's sure quite a work.
For looseness, mostly about the line quality, and less of closed lines with more variation on line weight on that little portrait. Less strict way of handling anatomy.

I accidentally used the wrong thickness (too thick) on the head parts and the hair. I used greater care with the thickness on the facial features. I may try redoing the head parts and hair because of that mistake.
If the head shape and hair had better lines I think it would look better.

I agree.
Anyway, thank you for your interest in Pioneer. :)

These are looking great.

If you need any changes in the way the layout of parts is done (positioning, draw order) let me know. Its pretty easy to change the code.

Thumbs up!

Some parts could be tinted dynamically to allow more variation, and less manual work. Hairs, eyes, etc.

Also, note for programmers, now that we have rendertargets they can be used in composing a face texture.

Thanks for the feedback!
I redid the head shapes. Lines are still thick, but at least it's consistent with the rest of the pieces. Also redoing hair.

My first milestone will be to complete the caucasian male parts, and a handful of clothing options.
Then I might upload what I have.
Female would be invisible though. Might have to add a placeholder female.

Just to be sure, what are races 1 and 2 meant to be, assuming 0 is caucasian/white?

DaCo wrote:Thanks for the feedback!
Just to be sure, what are races 1 and 2 meant to be, assuming 0 is caucasian/white?

1 is tanned caucasian and 2 is more tanned caucasian :) They don't have any fixed meaning, so you can make it anything you want since the art is fully replaced.

The folders can also be removed, or new folders added and the facegen will detect it as long as it's called race_number.