Hi all! I’m an artist and I’ve been thinking about making a themed next gen character pack to release on the asset store. I have a base human character model made and I have a good pipeline but I need ideas for what kind of characters to make. So… what kind of characters would you like to see the most? (If you don’t like any of these and have a better idea feel free to post it!)
Some of my ideas so far:
Zombies (generic human zombies)
Zombie survivors/Regular people
Mutant zombie-type characters (similar to Bioshock/Dead Space)
Post apocalyptic survivors/bandits (similar to Fallout 3)
Fantasy/RPG warriors (knights, assassins; similar to Oblivion/Assassin’s Creed)
Medieval villagers
Sci-fi soldiers (similar to Gears of War, Halo, etc.)
Sci-fi humanoid aliens
Modern soldiers (Modern Warfare 2, etc.)
Modern law enforcement (police, SWAT, etc.)
In terms of quality my goal is for the characters to be current gen quality (Xbox 360/PS3 quality). They would also have a reasonable polygon count since they’d be using normal maps to add detail. I’m also thinking about possibly making extra low-poly versions of the characters aimed at mobile systems but I’m not sure yet.
Since making such characters requires a significant time investment I want to make sure I’m appealing to the largest audience possible
Oh and for those who like eye-candy, here are a few characters I made some time ago (both in-game screenshots in Unity free): EDIT: These characters are NOT part of the pack since I haven’t yet decided on what the pack will be about. These are merely to demonstrate the minimum quality I’m aiming for.
When you make the characters, please give multiple base textures, and multiple hair models (we can turn them on and off as needed), and make the armor separate meshes so we can turn the various pieces on and off also. This greatly increases the value for many of us.
I think those “old” characters would look great in a game where they suited the style. I don’t quite understand how it could be more effective to make generic characters for the Asset Store - would many people really want to use generic characters in a game? Enough to make it more profitable than simply collaborating on a single game?
As a developer, I wouldn’t want to use the same models as another game. I’d want the models to suit my game’s style.
As a player, I would rather play a game with cool stylized skeletons (like in your picture above) than boring anatomically-correct ones. But if I saw the same stylized characters in multiple games, I’d be confused - “is this a sequel???”
If producing models is what you want to do, wouldn’t TurboSquid will give you a much larger audience. I imagine many people that buy stuff from TurboSquid just need the model for a single image or a small commercial video, rather than a commercial game. Few of those buyers would come looking on the Unity Asset store (they can’t even see your models online, only from within the Unity Editor).
I’m very sorry, but it’s not the quality of AAA class art, so please remove that from your post title.
It’s not that it is bad or anything, it’s just not AAA.
@ Jaimi
Those are good ideas. I was already planning on including different wigs and texture variations (depending on the characters of course) but having multiple armor pieces is definitely a good idea. It would give customization options
@ Warwick Allison
You’re right the characters in the images are very stylized. I originally made them for two separate demos I’d made for myself. These won’t be released, I suppose I should clarify that in the OP, that these are merely examples of some of my previous work (to give an idea for the minimum quality to help people know the context of my question).
I agree with you that as a developer ideally you’d want to hire an artist to make a unique and stylized character for your game but not everybody can afford an artist and I’m sure some people around here could use a current gen character or two, even if it’s just for a demo or protoype.
@ saymoo
The characters in the pictures aren’t part of the pack, they are simply older examples of my work. Either way I don’t see why I should change the title since whether they’re AAA or not is irrelevant to the topic (since they’re not part of the pack). Besides, whether they’re AAA or not is subjective anyways.
As I said in the OP I haven’t decided what the character pack will be about, all I’m asking for is ideas.
The point of showing these characters was just to give a rough idea of the minimum quality I will be aiming for (in case it has any relevance on the votes). As I said, calling a character AAA is subjective so may I ask what kind of quality would you consider to be AAA?
I’ve edited the OP to state that the characters in the pictures are NOT planned to be part of the pack.
@hippocoder
You do realize that the mouth creature is your backup, don’t you? As in ally? It is there to eat the corpses of the creatures you kill so you don’t slip on the blood and guts and die while not able to shoot at the oversized, rabies infected, mutant, zombie dog that is hurling it self at you at a constant speed of 0.5 miles per day… Shoot that thing at your own risk…
@Jingle
Best example I can give you, Ninety Nine Nights. If you are gonna do knights and fantasy characters, that is what I would love to see. I am not a 360 fan at all. I have only played on my 360 twice since I got it nearly 2 years ago but when I saw the intro video on that I sat up and took notice. The way the models moved and the way the various armor parts moved to show they are loose pieces… I absolutely loved it… So if you could leave the base mesh just as it is and just create lots of lots of interchangeable body armor I would be most excited indeed.
10 completely different shoulder pads, 10 completely unique arm guards, 10 standalone rigid upper body pieces with a variety of say 10 add-ons like wings or banner poles or a parrot. You haven’t even done the legs or shoes yet and each of them could have optional attachments… The variety… Bare chest with only a tattoo, one shoulder pad with a half meter long horn protruding from that and a parrot on the other shoulder… Awesome. Next to him the half sized squirt with every single armor piece he could find and an attachment to each part. His brother next to him who couldn’t afford the helmet and the little sister who wears the adult male chest armor as a dress…
Customizability… I would love to see that… Should also be relatively more simple to do since they are rigid objects. Just limit the animation’s ranges to prevent really ugly protrudings and you should be fine…
@ MrDude
Seems like you’re not the only one who wants customizability so if I go that route I’ll definitely do my best to add options for that (seems like the fantasy/rpg warriors have the most votes so far too).
there is actually one guy on TS and The3DStudio who has this whole collection of knights, both male, female, grunts and royalty in this exact style. He sells them for $50 a pop but they are in Max format so useless to me. They are also not animated or even weighted.
He sells them as separate models but if you look at the screenshots you can clearly see that he used the same base mesh and just changed the armour. If you need inspiration look at what he achieved. His stuff is absolutely lovely… except useless to non Windows folk. Also, his models are considerably low poly compared to the stuff on N3 I mentioned in my previous post. But seriously, though, low poly as it might be, I have so often stared at it and considered asking the staff to convert those models for me… even bought one at one point… but hell, what a mission to get it functional. Still not functional, to be honest… Now if you could create a kit that would allow me to build my own, custom characters… yee haw! Happy days! And if you do them current-gen to boot!?! Wow!
In case I ever miss the updates to this thread, if you have a mailing list, please put me on it ;D
@ MrDude
Do you have a link to that seller? I wouldn’t mind seeing what kind of quality he/she has…
Given that fantasy/rpg warriors have the most votes so far that’s what I will probably be doing first. I wouldn’t expect anything any time soon, however early tests are looking quite promising
I’m just going to come out and say it before someone else does.
Could you please make sure to include:
At least…
5 unique character models
10 different kinds of armor meshes for each character, and they all should be unique
10 different textures for each armor mesh
10 different textures for each character model
Normal maps that are accurate for each texture
high and low poly versions of each character
a skeleton that allows for full facial animation
And keep the character pack under $25. Otherwise it’s a rip off.
Sorry… I’m just posting this so someone else who is actually serious about the above requirements won’t come here and post it.
I’m just curious if people actually buy character packs like this. Is it worth the effort to create them? If you do the characters for practice sure. If you want to make money I’m very doubtful if it is good business.
Make a box, slap a pine texture on it and say “Crate”. Burn the texture and save after each burn and call it a “Crate pack” and I guarantee yu someone will buy it…
If you re use humanoids for other games it will show and I don’t think that will work out well. However animals: horses, dogs or any other type of generic animal could be used over a larger range of games. Be it a sci fi game or a fantasy or a cowboy game it will work in many games. I wouldn’t notice if the same horse is used in Red dead redemption aswell as in oblivion. Just my 2 cents
And if you do them current-gen to boot!?! Wow!