Why do people prefer the old ugly models instead of SOGA?

Sakura wrote:

I'm afraid you listed those backwards. The SOGA one is butt ugly. The other one is less ugly. Surprisingly not everyone is skilled at making attractive characters. There's no shame in that. It takes practice and so forth. I don't think I would think the SOGA one was attractive even if I spent all of New Years Eve drinking in excess.

Cusashorn wrote:

AMEN! Actually if they had true anime type character designs I might like them. Well depending on the style: overly neotenized or more realistic.

I'm not sure what vat of toxic waste SOGA models were brewed in. Scary mouths, spines, legs, waists, botox injected faces... Well in the females. Males... hmmm well who needs male models anyway?

Sakura wrote:

I know a lot of women that look similar to the original woodelf models. I tell them they look like elves even.

The only person I knew that looked anything like SOGA isn't healthy and abuses certain substances and is seeking professional help. Which is a good thing.

Chayna wrote:

I wish the SOGA versions of my characters didn't look like they were about to rip your face off.

Sapphirius wrote:

I just watched Resident Evil: Extinction and some how your comment brought it all together for me!

Chayna wrote:

That's the problem though IMO, elves aren't human, but the original models are nothing more than humans with pointy ears, elves are suposed to be slender in comparison, not the same frame as a human, now I will say that the SOGA legs with no armor on are far to skinny, but the rest of them looks like what I would picture an elf looking like.
It's an odd thing I noticed to with everything humanoid looking, people will complain when a humaniod character is unrealisticaly skinny (for a human) but they never complain when a different humaniod race is unrealisticaly large (for a human), like Ogre's, people never complain that they are to big, for some reason people seem to get that Orge's aren't human and don't have the same frames and build, but they don't get it for elves.

Actually, Elysara, the only people I know who look like SOE-model elves are teenagers. Every single full-grown adult woman I know looks similar to the SOE-model human females. The SOE-model elven females look like they've undergone extreme corset training and have had breast implants. Give the human model a bigger rear end and slightly wider hips, and then you've got me standing there. Make the human model a little more stout, and then you've got one of my best friends. Make the human model thinner or a little wider but still exactly the same shape, and then you've got a number of ladies at my church where I teach Sunday school.
The SOGA model are just flat out unnatural and unhealthy looking. If this picture doesn't illustrate the innumerable problems I have with SOGA, then I don't know what does. SOGA Sapphy looks disjointed and bulemic. Her elbow bends in two different places. Her arms and legs are way too skinny and placed wrong on her body. Her head... my goodness, that's some bad whiplash. I won't even get into the position of her eyebrows on her forehead, but I'm calling Sesame Street to tell Bert that he has a twin sister.

Elysara@Mistmoore wrote:

Maybe it's because elves are often portrayed (in mythos as well as literature) as incredibly beautiful to humans.

In order for them to BE beautiful to humans, they must have the proportions that are considered ideal to us humans. Part of their beauty is a touch of the exotic, but not so much that they no longer qualify as beautiful to us.

Thus large eyes, delicate features, slender limbs, elegantly swept up ears, are all touches that add to their exotic appeal.

However the misaligned necks, anorexic limbs, and overarched backs detract from the beauty, (to some people, including me), and thus do not fit with the stereotype of the elf being ultra beautiful to humans.


- Katsi

Sapphirius wrote:

Okay, I nearly spewed milk all over my monitor this morning. Thanks.

Elysara@Mistmoore wrote:

Elves are normally called humaoids, and like it has been said before, everyone imagines beautiful humanoids with pointy ears if they think about elves. At least i doubt that you would imagine Pinocchio. Sorry, but your EQ2-Players image really looks as if that model is just build from some matches or paper-clips.

Streppoch@Guk wrote:

Sorry. When you have kids and live in a rural community where modern cable is a myth, yeah... Not a whole lot of good stuff to watch on the idiot-tube except PBS and soap-operas. I'm not into melodrama.

apperntly inbreeding seems to be populer in soga births

Streppoch@Guk wrote:

I think the reason people keep calling them "anime" is that they were said to have been designed in order to appeal to the Oriental markets. Frankly, I'm not sure how they appeal to ANY market, but that's just me.
/sarcasm ON
If they were anime, their eyes would take up half of their faces, & their hair would spike out all over the place in various wierd configurations that magikally, naturally never need "styling". Their chins would all be variations of short & spikey, & the female models would all wear impossibly short skirts that somehow manage to remain "chaste" anyway. Finally, all of the models would look like they stopped aging at 16, except for a very few that are allowed to be "aged".
O, yea, & they would all look entirely Caucasian, regardless of their supposed ethnicity. & whenever they talk, their mouths would encompass the rest of the face that their eyes aren't taking up, & they'd grunt, groan, moan, & otherwise vocalize at every single movement.
/sarcasm OFF

Flaye@Mistmoore wrote:

Not necessarily. Manga & Anime is not just a single style. You can talk to anyone who really loves either or both and find that out. Many Japanese artists are inspired by traditional styles and artists: i.e. Arthur Rackham, Kay Nielson (both popular illustrators from the late 19th and early 20th century), art nouveau, pre-Raphaelites, etc. Who were, in turn, inspired by Asian pen and ink art & illustration techniques, not to mention Sequential Art.

Arthur Rackham and many of the other early 19th century illustrators directly inspired Tolkein and several other fantasy artists of that century, who, in turn, inspired others. Modern fantasy artists have gone back and forth between more realistic illustration techniques (Michael Whelan, Boris & Judy Vallejo, Elwood, etc.) or techniques that are more traditional (fairy tale type illustration, for instance) such as Kinuko Y. Craft. Many of our more modern ideas of what Fantasy should look like came from the Brothers Hildebrandt or Brian Froud. Meanwhile, artists such as Alan Lee have a style that harks back to the illustrative styles of artist like Arthur Rackham ... who inspired Japanese artists like Amano (See Final Fantasy concept artist).

The "Anime" style most people are familiar with is the very bright, very flat, very much intended for grade school audience shows that get brought to the states and shown non-stop on the Family Channel or Cartoon Network at 4 p.m. Mon- Fri. Or they look at the popular "How to Draw Anime" series. They see what kids like. The problem is, Anime is taken from manga and manga is usually 1,000 times more detailed and beautiful than the animations. While, traditionally, anime stylings have huge eyes, small mouths, and wierd hair colors ... those aspects were inspired by Disney. " />

In games that are inspired by anime, a lot of the game styles are heading toward the more realistic. And most of the stories are about very young people. If you look at the current Final Fantasy movies and games, while they do, indeed, look like anime in certain aspects, their models also look like they could step out of the screen into your living room. God, I wish Sephiroth (in a non-stabbity format) would decide to visit. *grin* SOGA models don't look like that. And SOGA doesn't look like a lot of the more "Rendered Cartoon" style anime games that are out there either. It looks more like a knock off of a Korean game ... and then, it seems to be a very bad cousin of Lineage, which has absolutely gorgeous graphics ... whether you like their art style or not.

What I see is not that SOGA is "Anime", but that SOGA is badly done. People thinking of fantasy who see Boris Vallejo, Hildebrandt, or Elwood, think of the Original Models. People who see Kinuko Y. Craft, Rackham, or Alan Lee think something closer to SOGA.

However, neither SOGA nor Original is anywhere near as well put together as the character models in WoW, Lineage, GuildWars, SWG, FF11, or a lot of other games I could name in terms of the way the characters blend with each other or their game world. I am hoping that the skeleton revamp is not just a skeleton revamp, but also some work on skinning and sliders, stylizations, and integration into the game world. I don't think anyone would really disagree on that.

And, honestly, I wonder if SOGA is badly done b/c of the artists who created those models, or b/c they had to work with an original skeletal system not created for those models. It is noticeable that all the original models have wide, round hips, and that SOGA models have legs that are too far apart and set oddly on their bodies. It's the same skeleton. And the armor for the original models is the same for the SOGA models, who, having smaller frames, obviously won't fit as well into the armor. Had the artists created their own skeletons, I imagine the models' bodies would look far better. In the Original models, the jaw lines of a lot of the male characters is not just Lantern, it's shelf like, creating strange permutations of the facial structures of dark and high elves. Just one of many of my complaints there. The hair styles definitely look like something out of 1966 ... or Star Trek. And who wears a tiara and a beehive all day long? Of course, that could just be the result of heavy influence of certain modern fantasy artists ...


((Yes, it was long, but I had a lot of thoughts after reading all those pages. " /> ))

Erithe wrote:

Actually, I diasgree. First, I think SOE model characters blend in very well with their environments. Those that do stand out usually do so because of how they dress (pastel rainbow colored clowns). Second, if our models ever got close to looking anything like WOW's, I'd walk away from this game for good. No, thank you. I don't want WOW. Addressing in terms of the way they blend in with each other or the game world, please see my second sentence. It's the SOGA models that don't blend in very well. SOE models blend in just fine. Skinning.... Hmmm. No, I think the skinning for SOE models is just fine. I don't want that to change. More sliders... Just what do you want to slide? Aside from selecting your body type and bust size, almost everything is set on sliders already. You want all this for integration into the game world? Again, please see my second sentence. I think SOE models looked perfectly integrated in the world of Norrath.

Sapphirius wrote:

I do have to say that one of the things that originally drew me to GuildWars was the costume design. Not so much the characterization customization (that sounds like a Schoolhouse Rock song), because I think EQ 2's is superior in that respect. But the outfits were fabulous and I'd love to see something comparable here.

Of course, I don't play GW now because, well...it's GUILDwars and I tend to prefer soloing.

Now Sapph,

As much as I am an advocate of the original models, you have to admit, they still have issues. Males in particular have HUGE issues in their desirability and you can't just speak about one gender without the other when speaking about the models (I made that mistake when we were all discussing how disgustingly skinny the SOGA females are).

Not to mention even some female races suffer because of skinning. Barbarian females in particular come to mind here.

Wood Elf males look old in texture even though they are an immortalish race. They also have huge, pronounced nostrils which are, to put plainly, ugly as sin. They all have piggy noses.

High Elf and Dark Elf males all have pinched noses no matter how wide you try and set the nose. They are also very thin lipped and you can't seem, no matter how thick/big you make their lips, to alleviate that.

Dark Elf males have sunken in cheeks and that can't be fixed with sliders either.

Humans and Half Elf males, although the best looking male original models IMO, are very... blank. No other way of describing it really, their faces just look blank, devoid of character.

Female original models...

Barbarian females are just puktastic. I've only seen one person who made a half way decent looking Barbarian female and that was a friend of mine. Their sliders go TOO far in some instances, like for the lips (OMG have you seen max full lipped Barbarian females? /shudder). It's like they took the Ogre female's facial model, gave it a different skin and called it a Barbarian.

Wood Elf females have a chin that is too pronounced no matter what you set the sliders to. It's the one thing about the Wood Elf females I despise, that hooked forward chin. They are meant to be beautiful and elegant, not have witchy-poo chins.

Gnomes.... Ok, don't get me started on Gnomes cuz IMO, they are just wrong wrong wrong in ALL respects but at least they don't have the SOGAs Jimmy Durante nose.

All the other non-monster related models I feel are ok with the exception of Dark Elves should be able to have black black skin and Half Elves should be able to have ashen black skin. And of course, new hairstyles without the copious amounts of lard to set it in place couldn't go amiss either.



I LOVE Original models over SOGA models, but I'll not pretend they don't need improvements. I'll continue to hope this skeleton revamp will come with all the bells and whistles necessary for me to actually have the character looks I ALWAYS wanted for my models, but I won't set my expectations too high as I would rather be blown away than let down.

Sapphirius wrote:

I wasn't at alll saying that EQ2 should look like a different game's models. That would rather defeat the purpose. However, to have well made models that complimented one another and the game world -is- something that EQ2 desperately needs. As was mentioned just above, all the models have issues. And I completely disagree that they look "perfectly integrated". Several of the models, no matter which type you choose, are just ... ugly.

***

Personally, I have issues with both model types. Mainly that I don't like the body proportions of the Original models. Sliders should allow people to change their body proportions, rather than just height. And, if nothing else, allow us to have boobs that don't look like they've never seen a corset or bra? Please? I like the happy, perky look on the SOGA for that exact reason. gosh darnit. Why the heck does one have to suffer from bad boobs in a freaking fantasy game?

I was happy with SOGA when it came out for the following reason ... I thought the faces were prettier. *shrug* I like a more beautiful look for my High Elf. The character was more delicate in proportion and the face I chose was a little less common than the Original (Though, except for the boob thing, the Original model was not at all bad for her )). I only use SOGA for dark elf, wood elf, and high elf males or females. Or humans. I go back and forth with half elves. It depends on the race. Erudites are Original model. Gnomes are Original model. Halflings ... erm ... I can't decide, they both look awful. I like ogres in SOGA. Trolls are freaky no matter what you do to them.

All my characters are Male Dark Elves and because of that i always use SOGA. I just hate the look of the dark elves with the original settings.
But i have to admit that i only use SOGA with the male dark elves, the rest of the races look better with the original look.

default models have personality
while the SOGA models don't, they are all barbie dolls with unrealistic proportions.

I have to admit I've used them before but have recently changed now that they've added more detailed hair styles to the old models... however, some of the races of the old models are ugly like High Elf males. I HATE they're look and can't do anything to change there weird chinese alien like look. So I set those to SOGA still.

Now that I think of it. there are features of SOGA that I like and features of the old models that I like... each on there own are ugly in one way or another...

So it would be nice if they combined these things...

like personality of the default ones
the unattached hair of the soga
the unattached ears of the soga
the more real proportions of the deafault one..

etc..

for the time being I'll have some SOGA on while on other races OFF.