I'll go with " How to create SoulCalibourish chara design?" then
The best one probably :D
Ok,let's go
To create something stylistically fitting,is all about understand the creative process behind yet existing official character and then apply it for yours.
Trying to summarize it a list of design factors that must be considered can be
-cultural/origin ispiration, basically chose a solid figure of some specific tradition
random example: i want do a central african character and i chose to make him as a proud tribal warrior, a fearless hunter, a wise shaman.
As life long fan of SF and of classic first chapters of SC i love that way, as i said about clichè the real challenge is turn something apparently banal into something with a soul,and when you achieve it you get char like Mitsu or Sieg,huge pillars of SC. They take a visual ROLE in addition of theyr uniqueness as character
-Or i can chose to break the rule above to make things a lil bit more unexpected,but to keep it cool you don't erase the cultural/etnic base, on the contrary if you want do it, do it to give him more keys of read
(example see Othello from Shakespeare,he was a black dude,but he's in Venice as venetian army officier. So etnically you make him african,but his costume is italian/european renaissance based. As you see here mix don't mean use it as excuse to don't give a fuck about cultural/etnic etc base,but on the contrary allow you to put two different ones. Othello sound good potential SC char, good job William :D)
-From first point,the ROLE. Best thing your side-cast can do under design perspective is try to understand wich roles or typical strong figure you can see work well in SC,but for a reason or another is not in the official cast. Few examples?
Tradition/culture
SC don't have characters from that huge culture/geographic area called middle-east.
Think about it,the cast is ALL about extreme west(basically almost all european western nations) characters and extreme east(Japan,China,Korea) characters... but for some strange reason,nothing(technically Astaroth,but fucking camon,he's just a "monster") about who live in the middle of them. From that area you can get huge amout of inspiration about what they wear,how theyr armors are,what weapons they use,which are theyr typical figures.
Whatching actual SC cast i favor a persian captain guard of the sultan's palace over another european armored knight with two hands huge sword. The first can just jump in straight and take a solid role,and then you have that persian guard face to face against a japanese samurai,they sound equally legit. The second... eh,good chance he's just here to live under Sieg's shadow (or under Nightmare's if he's a badass dark knight wannabe).
Obvious,is'nt limited to nationality,it was an example.
Just to say,SC never got uber violent screaming battlefield warrior female char(the closer ones are Hilde and maybe Sophi,and still are too beautiful,delicate looking and feminine). Or another one, SC never had a fat (classic figure of fight games) character,aside the generic berseker back in SC2
See,is'nt about a specific sector,is about find something visually strong that still is'nt used by SC cast
-But... but... fuck you Gatsu, is not like the game allow me to create styles,i must use the existing ones,is obvious similar roles happen!
I agree fatty padawan,let's see how to deal with that bitch :D
The thing is: ok, i'm going to do an european(even german,ha!) male zweinhander user, fuck you Sieg!
How you make it work,without give the instant impression of "look,is poor men's Sieg" ?
First,let's give a look at Sieg's visual most iconic features: he's a long hairs blond knight with gray steel full armor and army green as usual support colour pattern. Yet avoid as possible these features can be a good start
From here, i must act like if Sieg not exist? On the contrary, keep him next to your creation,play on the similarity to create some figure that can coexist wit it.
Examples? I may want to create Sieg's master,who teach him to use that big sword. In that way big age difference and visual features (where Sieg is the classic cool looking hero, his master can be the classic massive full of scars eye-patched gray hairs moustached veteran dog of the battlefield) can give me powerfull chara design difference, but at the same time the similarity of theyr style(since they was master and apprentice) work as connection and help my design instead work against it. Same if the contrary,if as example i want create a kid that is learning the giant ass sword style from Sieg. Or if i really want put him around the same age because i hate olds and kids, let's play on the specular/opposite design, go for the rival-nemesis or one very alternative look... but in that case take an eye on the entire cast,if your idea of nemesis is about "Ha! it will be a dark knight" as yet said you left Sieg's shadow only to fall under Night's one (and face it, no matter what, your CaS will look ever pussy if he start a demonic badassery contest with Night)
-Details. SC officials are fucking full of details. Somebody will say to like the simple line, but truth is,even when officials got relatively simple design, theyr stuff is quality stuff.
Average poor CaS pieces + chose on purpose most boring monocromatic ones = anonymous level go over 9o00
Lucky for us with SC5 stickers and editable 3D objects this will become only a sad remembrance of the past, but keep in mind... when you're able to make peoples forget that's a CaS,you win teh CaS black belt
Another thing,official characters GAINED the right of keep it simple if they want. When a design is well recognized,then it have options that a starting unknow one don't have.
Example: Ryu get an alt where he's without top gi. Just headband, karate pants and black belt. The world go on "wooo uber badass, great alt!!!!" mode.
Yours(or mine) char do the same, world reaction is "u loser buy a fucking jacket whut teh fuck is dat shit",and i will be with them throwing stones and dog shit :D
Chose with attention your pieces,at least one or two of them must have some uniqueness factor that give a strong viasual impact
-Use what the game offer to you. I'm not talking about pieces.
Look, actual officials design have an additional advantage over yours: they got weapons and stages designed for them.
Mitsu is Mitsu also because SC gived him a katana to be a fucking samurai, Voldo is the money pit wierdo guardian also because SC gived him a money pit where do his wierd stuff. Actually you obviously can't create weapons or stages that fit with your design,but you can ever do the reverse process and base your design to fit with a certain weapon and stage,it give very nice reults. Keep ever an eye on alt weapons, the best are the ones that give a total different tradition to certain styles... good example Mitsu, he ever got a european looking broadsword(and the one of SCV is AWESOME) and a middle-east one (Shamshir). These are totally unused concepts that wait just to born
-try to understand how SC design is balanced between realistic and fantasy (wich is'nt the fantasy of elves and LOTR/random anime stuff), it influence all, from design to colours
-try to find an use for pieces that usually get never used, if you do a good work implementing it in you chara design,your char may be very unique looking even just thanks to it
-research reference pics with google, A LOT
-a lot of other stuff but as now seem enough wall text imho :D
