Everyone is too pretty

[wanderer]

A minor criticism of the look of the game is that the characters are all young and pretty. There is one fat machinist. I understand the guards, but the lords, ladies, cooks and priests could be older, fatter, etc.

[chakkman]

I always found that the Doom 3 models all look a certain way, and pretty same-ish. Dunno how big of a modification you can do with them.

[peter_spy]

If you know a e.g. a Witcher 2 character artist, we'd love to have someone like that on TDM team

[ERH+]

Just wait till someone will retexture zombie with it's animations into old crippled man . "Zombies coming! Oh wait it is only grandma Lydia...". Old people asylum with non hostile zombie, repeating same lines and short stories like broken gramophone- how cosy idea for a mission location.

Edited April 2, 2018 by ERH+

[Springheel]

A minor criticism of the look of the game is that the characters are all young and pretty.

 

 

Pretty? You haven't taken a close look at the faces, I take it.

[Aosys]

Didn't Bob Necro post some alternate old/undead skins awhile back?

 

http://forums.thedarkmod.com/topic/17200-the-necrobobicon/

[wanderer]

I think characters like these would add to the ambience.

 

https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/memoryalpha/images/1/1c/Post_atomic_horror_jury.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20120714202731&path-prefix=en

[Springheel]

I think characters like these would add to the ambience.

 

https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/memoryalpha/images/1/1c/Post_atomic_horror_jury.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20120714202731&path-prefix=en

 

Hey, if you know someone who is willing to model, texture, and rig them, you won't hear any objections.

[Sotha]

Pretty? You haven't taken a close look at the faces, I take it.

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.

[Bienie]

I certainly agree that there should be the option to put fat lords and ladies in missions. But aside from them I don't think it makes sense to have any fat people, in fact I don't get that fat machinist at all. There are already some old guys available in the game with gray hair and haggard faces. No older women though.

What I think is most needed is grime, gunk, trash and dirt, and with that the ability to make NPCs look the part with ragged clothing and dirty faces. There is a pauper skin with ragged clothes but maybe there should be an in between since the next step up is basically a respectable member of society.

Might be something to look into further... I'm not even sure what skills are needed for changing current models etc.

[chakkman]

I think characters like these would add to the ambience.

 

https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/memoryalpha/images/1/1c/Post_atomic_horror_jury.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20120714202731&path-prefix=en

 

Dark Mod needs more peasants.

[chakkman]

Is there a site where you can see the models available in Dark Mod, or are those just viewable in the Dark Radiant editor?

[peter_spy]

I'm not even sure what skills are needed for changing current models etc.

 

A fuckton of skills, from modeling and anatomy to rigging/skinning etc. Usually that's a job for more than one person. And to do old/fat people, it takes more than swapping textures or changing sliders. Actually all TDM characters could use a little revamp, as they are looking outdated, especially when put in new environments, better models, textures etc. But a character artist is a rare thing to have in projects like this.

Edited April 3, 2018 by Judith

[Destined]

Is there a site where you can see the models available in Dark Mod, or are those just viewable in the Dark Radiant editor?

 

The AI heads are all listed (with pictures) on the Wiki.

[Springheel]

 

A fuckton of skills, from modeling and anatomy to rigging/skinning etc. Usually that's a job for more than one person. And to do old/fat people, it takes more than swapping textures or changing sliders. Actually all TDM characters could use a little revamp, as they are looking outdated, especially when put in new environments, better models, textures etc. But a character artist is a rare thing to have in projects like this.

 

Yes, this is very true. I was just mentioning the other day that many of our character models and animations (or at least a number of the ones I made) are making me cringe. Unfortunately standards keep improving, and we don't have anyone with both the will and the necessary skillsets to make that kind of improvement.

 

I've even been looking around to see if there are other open source projects like ours we could use assets from, but haven't found anything.

 

The AI heads are all listed (with pictures) on the Wiki.

 

 

That list is quite out of date. Using DR is the easiest method.

[chakkman]

Thanks. After looking through those, i'd also want to refrain from calling those "pretty".

[Oktokolo]

Looks like the bigger problem (regarding head models at least) is the male : female ratio of 68 : 3

The builders and guard certainly don't have women in their ranks. And i am not a SJW...

But would like to be able to blackjack more diverse females in missions.

Edited April 3, 2018 by Abusimplea

[Arcturus]

[kano]

You could crank out fat characters or whatever you desire with Makehuman. They come rigged and all. Of course making good textures would still be a challenge.

[Springheel]

You could crank out fat characters or whatever you desire with Makehuman. They come rigged and all. Of course making good textures would still be a challenge.

 

You'd have to either have a suite of custom animations to go with that rig, or rig the model to our existing skeleton. Neither is a trivial amount of work.

[Petike the Taffer]

I certainly agree that there should be the option to put fat lords and ladies in missions. But aside from them I don't think it makes sense to have any fat people, in fact I don't get that fat machinist at all. There are already some old guys available in the game with gray hair and haggard faces. No older women though.

What I think is most needed is grime, gunk, trash and dirt, and with that the ability to make NPCs look the part with ragged clothing and dirty faces. There is a pauper skin with ragged clothes but maybe there should be an in between since the next step up is basically a respectable member of society.

Might be something to look into further... I'm not even sure what skills are needed for changing current models etc.

 

I'd slightly disagree on the grubiness part. Medieval people weren't cavemen in torn rags. While it makes sense for paupers and beggars to be wearing very coarse and rudimentary clothing, often clothing worn to the point of falling apart, most people will try to take care of their clothing, even the poorer peasants and townsmen.

 

What will be seen, though, is the wear and tear on the clothing, especially among those who work for a living. Clothes should have signs of being stitched back together in places, or otherwise routinely mended, even the colourful or richer clothing of non-nobles should look like it has been washed many times. With the washing methods of the time, not all grime can escape the clothes (they had nothing as aggressive or thorough as modern chemical washing products), so clothes will certainly look quite worn after a number of years. Shoes and footwear will show similar signs of use.

 

On the other hand, one difference is that clothing and footwear "back in the old days" was built to last. Though many of the materials might not have been as comfy as our modern textiles and fabrics and so on, most clothing and shoes or boots were made to sturdily withstand years and even decades of abuse. Especially footwear. I bet it wasn't unheard of to keep using a good pair of shoes or boots for 20 and maybe even more years.

 

A lot of people, commoners and noblemen alike, would have their faces and bodies affected by the rougher living standards and especially by the weaker healthcare of the time. Many illnesses that couldn't be dealt with via established methods or medical practices would affect the appearance of people's skin. Cities were prosperous, but had a much higher probability of polution and epidemic outbreaks, due to issues with sanitation, safe drinking water, or more crowded quarters and streets. In rural areas, you had a less comfortable life than in a wealthy, well-built city, but you were out on the fresh air and on the sun a lot more, and there was a higher probability you'd have more safe sources of drinking water nearby. I wouldn't be surprised if many peasants had somewhat better skin than city dwellers, due to that more outdoorsy lifestyle. Given that they also worked a lot on a regular basis (it differed depending on the country, but there was a clear seasonal and weekly schedule virtually everywhere), they probably didn't have much time to put on too much weight either.

 

Though some wealthier peasants with more surplus food probably got a bit fatty, I doubt anyone outside the most spoilt parts of the really wealthy nobility and clergy ever faced obesity. Infamously, Elizabeth I was probably one of the first Europeans, monarchs or not, to have her teeth go completely rotten from overly frequent sugar consumption. If you're a ruler and you can afford to have this exotic and pricy thing imported from abroad, why not gorge on it ? A frequent feature of the late-medieval and Renaissance period was that townsmen and noblemen often liked to publicly brag about their wealth. "See that fancy clothing/tapisery/sword/contraption/meal ? I can afford it !"

 

Let's also not forget that even though peasants often kept swine herds or flocks of sheep with tens of animals, or even over a hundred of them, they usually didn't butcher and eat too many of them. The animals were mostly raised and fattened to be donated or be sold for profit. It's no surprise that they reserved pork mostly for holidays and celebrations, while the commonest meat on the table was often fish, occassionally some lamb and beef. The situation with poultry was very similar. Though a chicken, duck or goose was occassionally roast or cooked, people kept poultry mainly for egg production or as "cash animals", to be sold at a market. In most countries of Europe, regular poultry consumption didn't really take off until around the mid 20th century.

 

Noblemen who took active part in warfare for much of their lives would have loads of lasting scars and injuries. I once read about a wealthy Hungarian nobleman, a middle-aged man, who lived and loyally fought during the early rule of Sigismund of Luxembourg. The amount of injuries accumulated by that (no doubt brave, but unlucky) guy was absolutely horrendous, almost to the point of absurdity. I'm betting he had little interest in anyone doing a portrait of him later in life, even so much as a simple sketch...

Edited October 17, 2018 by Petike the Taffer

[Leather]

This might be off-topic, but: Are there any guides for making e.g. furniture, specifically for TDM? I'd love to actually contribute, but I don't know how, or where to even begin.

[Petike the Taffer]

This might be off-topic, but: Are there any guides for making e.g. furniture, specifically for TDM? I'd love to actually contribute, but I don't know how, or where to even begin.

 

Depends on your level of skills. I'll admit that I'm still rubbish at making even a simple 3D model, because it takes a lot of time to learn (and it's not helped by every bloody piece of model-making software having a seemingly different control scheme ).

 

There is a thread where people nominate poor textures and another one where they nominated or suggested what sort of props we still need in the game, for the sake of variety. A lot of new props or modular scenery pieces have been added in recent major TDM updates (in the last 2-3 years), so there might not be that much of the necessary stuff missing. I suppose you could always make custom models for use in your or other people's missions, and some of the best might eventually get accepted into the game.

 

The Art Assets subforum is definitely the best place to ask about this whole topic. IIRC, some people have released addon model packs there, in addition to other stuff. One of the pinned threads there is about tools and software, so you might want to ask about tutorials there. When I did some very amateur work in Wings3D and Blender, I simply read online tutorials.

[Leather]

Thanks, my fellow countryman. I have a lot of free time on my hands, and I thought to myself: I should do something new instead of mindlessly playing new games, which I enjoy less and less. Might as well make stuff for my new fav game, or at least give it a try.