Development > Artwork

Non-Anthropomorphic Taman, Shgaar and Ortnok?

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Flying Steel:
"Humanoid" aliens are kind of cheesy looking and not especially realistic, at least when you have more than one (in this case three) from entirely different origins, imo. I thought I saw one of the lead devs say something to a similar effect a ways back while lurking on these forums.

So my question for those in charge is, would you prefer content representing truly alien but practical morphologies over greys, dinosaur men and space orks if the content was available to you?

BTAxis:
I think that's hard. Any "normal" alien unit has to be able to carry and use the alien weaponry, and any model has to fit in the 1x1 box. That limits the amount of alien-ness you can put in. Plus, humanoid shapes have the advantage that existing animations can be used for them, and animations are even harder to come by than models.

And, well, we already have UFOPaedia articles and autopsy images for the existing aliens, so we're probably not going to replace them in any event.

Flying Steel:

--- Quote from: BTAxis on June 20, 2010, 01:34:58 am ---I think that's hard. Any "normal" alien unit has to be able to carry and use the alien weaponry, and any model has to fit in the 1x1 box. That limits the amount of alien-ness you can put in.
--- End quote ---

True that grasping and wielding weapons requires either hands or tentacles, but there's still things you can do with those for some variations.

Fitting aliens into a 1x1x1 box isn't hard, the blood spider is already an example of this. Fitting them in a 1x1x2 can be done using a number of nonhumanoid but upright forms. Like a mantis form, bird/dinosaur form, cobra/hydralisk form, a floater-with-hanging tentacles jellyfish (or zerg overlord) form, etc.

The shagar (or whatever it's called) is almost an example of this, and its tail looks like it even might violate the 1x1 boundary a bit.


--- Quote ---Plus, humanoid shapes have the advantage that existing animations can be used for them, and animations are even harder to come by than models.

And, well, we already have UFOPaedia articles and autopsy images for the existing aliens, so we're probably not going to replace them in any event.
--- End quote ---

That's why I ask this with the assumption that you are provided full content of similar or superior technical quality, for each replaced design- model, textures, animations and research depictions. (The UFOpedia articles would remain the same for every sentence not including words like "humanoid" or "anthropomorphic").

I want to know if you folks would be game for something like this, if content availability/quality was not an issue and the designs fit as well as or better your theme of 'realistic sci-fi-horror'?

BTAxis:

--- Quote from: Flying Steel on June 20, 2010, 03:31:31 am ---I want to know if you folks would be game for something like this, if content availability/quality was not an issue and the designs fit as well as or better your theme of 'realistic sci-fi-horror'?

--- End quote ---

In principle yes, though we'll probably want to retain the Taman especially because of its similarities to the "grey" type alien.

BTAxis:
Oh, also, most normal aliens should come in unarmoured and armoured varieties. Not all of them need apply though (a floating alien wouldn't need a jump armour). There will be such a thing as inherent armour, so for the singleplayer balancing it is not such a big deal, but the player is going to have to get the alien armours from somewhere, and there is also multiplayer to consider.

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