Soul Calibur VI: General discussion

[Spartan_Avenger]

This is very true, but you know what, despite me not liking the lifeless art style.

The 2d art translates to the 3d renders in 6 pretty well.
Going by the character select screen anyways

Actually you're right, the models in this game do a better job of translating the 2D art to 3D so far. SC4-5 were the worst in that regard I think.

 

[Fatal_Exodus]

For some reason everyone in SCIV had such pallid skin tones, dark circles around their eyes, and hideous facial and muscle contours. Thankfully it doesn't look that way in VI.

 

[Spartan_Avenger]

I think the only issue I have with the game's models/graphics right now is the inconsistency. You see something like this:

and think wow. The detail in Sophie's model here is unreal (pardon the pun) and her facial expression is just wow.

Then you see something like this:

and think ????

 

[Pyrrus]

isnt the bottom one her old face lol

 

[Zael]

It's a fact that concept art is usually always poorly translated to 3D model, but I don't think it makes sense to ask the 2D artist to also model the 3D models.

It is a pretty annoying problem though. 2D art always looks so bad ass... and then there's the lackluster 3D model.

It's a bit inconsistent though. Talim for instance looks decent in-game (size scaling issues notwithstanding), cute as a button in the story mode art, and like a bug-eyed alien still trying to adjust to this human thing in her official art.

Maybe Kawano is just more in his element drawing adult characters. Taki by contrast looks absolutely amazing in your avatar.

 

[Spartan_Avenger]

isnt the bottom one her old face lol

Nah, both from the pre-E3 build.

 

[Apoc Revolution]

 

[I_Love_Aogami]

She looks excited for SCVI.

 

[Kai_lombax]

Preserving anime aesthetics and adding more realistic skin textures are not necessarily mutually excluding goals though:

Eh, honestly I hated where they went with the character face modeling in 4 and 5, mainly with the Asian characters. Taki doesn't look Japanese to me even in SCVI. Xianghua doesn't look Chinese to me neither and same with Seung Mi-na with her Korean ethnicity. They all look Eurasian and I just don't like that as it take away the true diversity the characters had back then with SC3 being the peak of the art direction in my opinion and I wish they kept going with it like how we saw in the promotion art for that game.

Spoiler

(I know this is from SCI but I just loved how his face looked in this promo)

That being said I will say that the male faces didn't suffer as much as the female faces but they still left a lot to be desired.

Hmm... I feel sc4 had it done best. Textures, and artstyle was good.
I just want characters to look alive and like their respective country and ethnicity lol

Nah I definitely don't agree. I will agree that the metal and clothing textures were great but the hair was too shiny to the point of looking plastic in comparison to Soul Calibur 3's hair texture and yeah, was not a fan of most of the heavier anime face designs and this goes towards SC5 as well, it's just something that I accepted but don't necessarily like lol

4 was terrible visually. The lighting was completely off. And Cas ruined the outfits.

Oh man, some of the CAS outfits looked so half-baked when it came to the player costumes like Setsuka's Frilled Skirt (Floor length and flowy on her while lower calf and penciled in on CAS) or Hilde's Princess Dress. Just left a lot to be desired.

Textures were the best, metal looked like metal, skin looked like skin and rugi looked remotely Asian

Again, I agree with you that the metal and textures (on the clothes for the official characters) looked quite good but I personally didn't like Mitsurugi's face in the game, he looked better in the previous games I think.

LOL She looks excited yet terrifying haha That's some pokerface she's got lol

I think the only issue I have with the game's models/graphics right now is the inconsistency. You see something like this:

and think wow. The detail in Sophie's model here is unreal (pardon the pun) and her facial expression is just wow.

Then you see something like this:

and think ????

Sophitia's face is an unfortunate one, especially seeing where they could've went after seeing her SCIII promo face.

 

[Apoc Revolution]

She looks excited for SCVI.

LOL She looks excited yet terrifying haha That's some pokerface she's got lol

Ha, I know. Her good friend Pyrrha is also very excited:

Surely we have already reached the pinnacle when it comes to 3D graphics.

 

[Maedhros]

I despise you. -_-

 

[HackNslash]

Having an animesque art style and still expecting the 3D models to look somewhat realistic? Not gonna happen.

SC should have done what Tekken did from the beginning and ditched the 2D concept art for 3D rendered models so no one would have any outlandish expectations for what the models are supposed to look like in-game.

Alternatively, sculpt the 3D models to look more like the concept art and we’d have some sort of animesque fighter on our hands.

I don’t think they should ditch the concept art but do more to keep an eye on the projects theme.

It’s part of the aesthetic as old age art is apart of history (the only visual representation we have of a period in time)

They just need to tidy it up a bit.

 

[Fatal_Exodus]

I don’t think they should ditch the concept art but do more to keep an eye on the projects theme.

It’s part of the aesthetic as old age art is apart of history (the only visual representation we have of a period in time)

They just need to tidy it up a bit.

One of the best games in recent years that faithfully and lovingly does the transition from 2D to 3D well is Ni no Kuni (which happens to be a Namco Bandai game, at that). If SC did a better job at doing the transition from 2D to 3D, then the game would surely age well, though I think (Nightmare and some others withstanding) Xianghua might be one of the only ones right now that looks near accurate to their 2D art.

 

[T.Rex]

 

[UKStormDragon]

The best 3D character Models/Animations are done by the same person who created them. If someone else does the work it will never bee 100% accurate to what the creator imagined. And if you are good at drawing and concept art getting into 3D isnt a huge step. I mean it isnt realistic in huge companies but it would produce better results.

This is entirely inaccurate. Very brief summary, I can elaborate if need be.

1. Concept art and 3D models are very different fields. The entire field of 3D art is split into its own sub fields. First, learning the software is in itself a pain in the ass. Learning proper topology and edge flow in itself is one of the massive roadblocks that come from modelling characters. Depending on the process that is used, be it High Poly Sculpts, with texture bakes onto low poly retopos or from base "high" poly characters from the start. There are people that are great at doing 2D art but are crap at visualizing or creating interesting imagery and character designs.

2. Surfacing the character (Textures and materials) is its own layer of a pain if you aren't use to how it works, as now a days you don't get hand painted textures. Especially in unreal, where you're doing a lot of combinations of textures with algorithmic nodes that are being used to get the display that you want.

3. Rigging. Understanding proper joint placement, hierarchy, translation into the game engine. Unreal will give you a massive headache if you don't rig properly. Weight painting. All the fancy joints that you want to get procedural or dynamic movement out of that can either be done in engine or in software and exported. The amount of times I've seen exceptional 2D artists go into 3d modelling, manage to get a grasp on that and then collapse at this step is a large number.

4. Animation. ALMOST EVERY PERSON THAT HAS ONLY DRAWN CANNOT ANIMATE. They are extremely different fields. "Drawing" (for lack of a better word at the moment) relates to detail in the individual image, where as animation relates to the overall movement of the sequence. There are some things that are connected, but there are also large separations.

5. The concept artist is not always the person who creates the character. They provide lots of different ideas of what the character could look like that is then passed on and iterated on until it matches the vision of the game. The animations for the game, especially for a fighting game are directly tied to game balance as well.

Basically, what you're saying is that the game designer who designed the character should concept it, model, rig and animate, then implement the character in its entirety, which realistically will not work because of the split in skill between many of the different disciplines. Add in sfx and VA and programming for each of the moves and you might as well have them do the entire game alone.

I understand what you're saying, and sometimes yes, people will have to take on multiple roles and work across different fields in smaller studios. But, there are large drops in quality that in some cases aren't evident because they use tricks such as camera placement in order to make details a lot less noticeable.

It's similar to programming. You can have an engine programmer, a tools programmer, a graphics programmer and a gameplay programmer, and both can technically do each others jobs but each one requires a different set of skills. Engine programmers at the fore front need to know how to properly manage memory and data, where that's not something that's as much of a focus for a gameplay or tools programmer. Graphics programmers need to have an eye for visual details where as an engine programmer might not.

Tl;dr: Most people don't have the skills, and cross specializing while possible still requires time and depending on the difficult of the task, support and help in order to speed up learning.

Source: My job as a game developer and I teach this stuff.

Quick edit: I apologize if came off a bit aggressive. The amount of times I see comments like these ends up frustrating me a ton.

 

[Blackout]

How quick are we to forget how every character in SCIV looked like a pig. Does nobody remember horseface Cassandra?

Are you really going to tell me Rugi looks bad in IV? Hell I don't even see Cassandra as fugly as you're making her out to be.

 

[Fatal_Exodus]

Are you really going to tell me Rugi looks bad in IV? Hell I don't even see Cassandra as fugly as you're making her out to be.

Uh, she looks anemic.

 

[Spartan_Avenger]

Are you really going to tell me Rugi looks bad in IV? Hell I don't even see Cassandra as fugly as you're making her out to be.

Best Mitsurugi has EVER looked.

Mitsu and Ivy had the best models in 4. Everyone else looked like slightly altered clones of each other while Taki looked like a white woman.

 

[Blackout]

Uh, she looks anemic.

So it's her skin tone that's the problem? It's also exclusive to this type of render since nearly everyone looks paler under those specifically.

Everyone else looked like slightly altered clones of each other while Taki looked like a white woman.

Yes, I can definitely see the resemblance between Zasalamel and Cervantes.......

 

[Spartan_Avenger]

So it's her skin tone that's the problem? It's also exclusive to this type of render since nearly everyone looks paler under those specifically.

Yes, I can definitely see the resemblance between Zasalamel and Cervantes.......

Whoops, should've said almost everyone else.