Quote:

Original post by Wavinator As a player you won't be able to play a male unless I create a rogue colony somewhere, which I'm not sure works with the theme here.

I must wonder why not.

Narratively, a male who by some freak accident finds himself in control of a ship, works for me. Mix in aliens to provide the male with the tools and knowledge he requires to surpass his limitations, conflict with orthodox females sent from the homeworld to offer trials, and the eventual realisation of the equal dignity of all minded beings as the reward, and you have a classic hero's journey.

Quote:

Original post by Mayrel Quote: Original post by Wavinator As a player you won't be able to play a male unless I create a rogue colony somewhere, which I'm not sure works with the theme here. I must wonder why not. Narratively, a male who by some freak accident finds himself in control of a ship, works for me. Mix in aliens to provide the male with the tools and knowledge he requires to surpass his limitations, conflict with orthodox females sent from the homeworld to offer trials, and the eventual realisation of the equal dignity of all minded beings as the reward, and you have a classic hero's journey.

Yeah, I wonder why not too. I think it would be really fun to play a male, especially if you were the leader of the harem or some kind of prime specimen that the females would fight to possess. I can easily imagine myself starting as a male just graduating from 'finishing school' or arriving at the age when one must leave one's mother's harem and taking out a 'marriage contract' to act as a support character from someone playing a female. I would be able to avoid fighting myself because the 'female' would do it, and I could instead focus on playing decorate-the-harem and doing crafting to support my queen, maybe managing the NPCs who were the other harem males. Or a harem could functon as a guild, with the queen as the guild leader, a few of her 'daughters' as the officers, and the harem males as the members.

Quote:

Original post by ahw The fact that you are doing fiction means that it would be prefereable IMHO that you stick to some basic rules that are used in comics and animation. As SnS points out, using cliches allow you to convey the big strokes of a personality. Dialogues can then allow you to surprise the player, or add finer details. Just like in the best animation movies, the bad guys might _look_ like bad guys, but turn out to be rather nice people, or have plausible motives. No need to shy away from using cliches "just because" :) As long as you dont go into the "let's take fantasy races and put them in space", I really dont see the problem. Use things like "square jaw means strong willpower" or "low brow means low intelligence", even if it seems insulting or politically incorrect, it is something that we are used to. It's up to you then to play on this to surprise or teach a thing or two about tolerance.

Wav - this essentially answers the questions you asked me about about appearance, but I'll add a little to it. First, the appearance cliche's don't have no relation to reality - for example, humans with higher testosterone levels tend to have square jaws, and bigger muscles and act aggressive - the appearance does correlate with the behavior. With facial expression, people have what's called a characteristic facial expression, the expression that is most often on their face, and this correlates strongly with their temperament - grumpy people frown, alert people have slightly wider, brighter eyes, anxious people have strained-looking eyes and tend to chew on their lip, etc.

You may be writing about aliens, but you have to remember that your audience is human, they are going to be looking for human facial expressions, postures, and other social clues. Giving your aliens different facial expressions might be more realistic, but it handcap's your audience's ability to empathize with your characters. Like Ahw said, these are basic rules used universally in comics and animation - your characters, whether they're aliens or animals or inanimate objects, have to express themselves in human ways or they won't be sympathetic because your human audience will not be able to pick up on visual clues to their emotions.

This is why I had to totally re-design what the aliens in my novel look like when I was considering doing it as a graphic novel - my original design was more scientific, logical, and alien, but they definitely didn't look kissable or cuddly, and so someone looking at drawings of them wouldn't have understood why any of the characters was attracted to any other character. Plus the beaks made it really hard to draw them with any recognizable facial expression, and with their crests all the same shape and color it was difficult to tell the characters apart. So I re-designed them, and they're less good as realistic aliens but a hell of a lot better as characters, and for a storyteller that's what's important.

Quote:

Original post by sunandshadow they're less good as realistic aliens but a hell of a lot better as characters, and for a storyteller that's what's important.

Ah ! I couldn't have put it any better :)
It's like Chris Crawford was writing in his book on Game Design : it would be nice if game designers made games about _people_ and _characters_ rather than about things and place...

Quote:

Original post by Wavinator I'm serious, if I put a velociraptor into this game they're going to be Buddhist monk vegetarians! Defying the stereotypes may disasterously fail, but there's no point in doing this game if I fall a step away from the Star Trek "aliens with funny noses" mentality.

If you made Velociraptor-like aliens be vegetarians, you would have to explain why they evolved their teeth and their ability to pounce on enemies. Sharp teeth may have evolved to eat tree bark, but attacking an unsuspecting foe is not a self-defence mechanism. Making the Kovaunn look like velociraptors with wings may be useful. Maybe change what the head looks like, if you don't want them to be menacing. Strong legs look strong, but a head with sharp teeth and other such features looks downright menacing.

Quote:

Original post by Wavinator I have to ask what would your personal experience be if you A) had to interact with creatures that did not fit the traditional feature mold (spread worldwide now by Disney, methinks) B) got a chance to play them What setbacks or blocks would you experience? And what, short of altering the character's physical appearance, would warm you to them? I suspect that when people start interacting as humans (a known quantity) over and over with races that violate stereotypes they will either reject the depiction (claiming bad art quality) or get used to it, just as with E.T. or as you mentioned, Yoda.

I would love to play this game, but you have to understand that alot of people haven't read these science fiction books that we love. You can have stereotype-breaking aliens, but if you do, you have to let the person playing the game know what to expect.

In my experience, when a story features aliens that look violent, either:

1. They are violent,


2. They aren't violent, and their appearance is a joke, or


3. They aren't violent, but many characters who haven't seen them before assume they are.

I think number 3 is important. Generally, things that look violent are violent. That's because evolution has caused us to see things that are violent as violent-looking.

When we see something new that has features that resemble things that evolution has told us are violent, we see them as violent.

What is important here is that a character that is familiar with a peaceful but aggressive looking alien race will not think that alien race looks aggressive. The player does not have the luxury of having been brought up in the world in which the game is set.

In an RPG, the player should see the world the way his or her character would see the world, not the way the player would see the world if the player were actually there. If the character would think that an alien looked friendly, the player should think the same when he or she sees the alien.

This also relates to facial expressions. A human who's never seen a Kragarnian Flabblehop would rightly be confused by its facial expressions (assuming it has a face). On the other hand, if you're playing a Kragarnian Flabblehop, the facial expressions should make sense, whilst a human's body language would be unreadable.

Quote:

Original post by Wavinator males have been bred for obedience to such an extent that they are now uncomfortable without female guidance in most manners of life.

Hmm, this reminds me of humans [smile] Did you ever consider using every alien race to criticize a different aspect of human civilization? I think this could be a selling point for many people.

Quote:

Original post by CoffeeMug Hmm, this reminds me of humans [smile] Did you ever consider using every alien race to criticize a different aspect of human civilization? I think this could be a selling point for many people.

Well, to be honest, this is a strong interior motivation, but I wasn't going to mention it because some see it as artistically self-righteous.

First, the Kovaunn take on a meme not so difficult to criticize but still worthy of criticizing, and that is "females are weak."

But the maybe more controversial meme to take on is "females can be victimizers" which is a role culturally reserved for males.

Then there is the moral concept of what constitutes fairness, which takes on the idea of reparations and justice, a global theme. Are the females right in subjugating the males since they were once subjugated? What of newborn males, are they automatically guilty?

The most important area I'd like players to be able to examine, through gameplay, is the unregulated capitalist / libertarian idea of ultimate responsibility. What would it be like to live in a dog-eat-dog world where everything that happens to you is your fault?

How games promote the handling of conflict is something that's important to me, but I don't like having one answer, but rather multiple races that let you explore multiple possibilities.

Quote:

Original post by Nathaniel Hammen If you made Velociraptor-like aliens be vegetarians, you would have to explain why they evolved their teeth and their ability to pounce on enemies. Sharp teeth may have evolved to eat tree bark, but attacking an unsuspecting foe is not a self-defence mechanism. Making the Kovaunn look like velociraptors with wings may be useful. Maybe change what the head looks like, if you don't want them to be menacing. Strong legs look strong, but a head with sharp teeth and other such features looks downright menacing.

[smile] Yes, but what you forget is that a race is only subject to a given appearance so long as they live under the rule of nature. Once they live under the rule of technology, they can have any appearance, part of which could be as atavistic as the human appendix. Now as you mention, I think you should take care to map features to functions while they're in nature, but once free of it, you can never be sure if a feature is cultural, fashion-related or some other type of modification. This becomes more true the more tech the race has.

Quote:

Original post by Wavinator I would love to play this game, but you have to understand that alot of people haven't read these science fiction books that we love. You can have stereotype-breaking aliens, but if you do, you have to let the person playing the game know what to expect.

It may be that I should be very worried about this, but I keep going back to introduction and exposure. There was a time when you and I both had no concept of weird aliens, and then something happened. Whatever that something was happened in such a way that we didn't reject the idea.

I think since games give you the choice to engage or disengage with these new and strange ideas that the level of exposure and acceptance will become customized to each individual player. Maybe one decides that those tripedal Ceticians I've posted about that vent gas are just too disgusting, and decides to avoid them despite all the help they can be. Maybe another finds the physical features of the Kovaunn to be harmless and learns the hard way that they are a brutal species.

Shocks to your conceptual system can be very refreshing so long as you can control the level at which you are challenged.

(I hope, anyway. :P)

Quote:

Original post by Mayrel Generally, things that look violent are violent. That's because evolution has caused us to see things that are violent as violent-looking.

I'm not sure I totally agree here. Yes, if something has sharp hard enameled protrusions on its hands, head or in its mouth, it's functionally likely there for attack (occassionally for defense). But take the difference between a rat and a mouse. Both are vermin, but mice get more of a pass culturally because a snub nose happens to coincide with infant features. Both rat and mouse can be destructive, can bite and can spread disease, but one's pretty enough to make it as a mascot for a multibillion dollar theme park chain. (Can you imagine 'Mickey Rat' being as popular?)

Quote:

What is important here is that a character that is familiar with a peaceful but aggressive looking alien race will not think that alien race looks aggressive. The player does not have the luxury of having been brought up in the world in which the game is set. In an RPG, the player should see the world the way his or her character would see the world, not the way the player would see the world if the player were actually there. If the character would think that an alien looked friendly, the player should think the same when he or she sees the alien.

Rather than relying on visual stereotypes and clues, I think the best way to handle this is through learning and repeat exposure. Otherwise, to immerse the player, you'll have to use stereotypes.

Quote:

This also relates to facial expressions. A human who's never seen a Kragarnian Flabblehop would rightly be confused by its facial expressions (assuming it has a face). On the other hand, if you're playing a Kragarnian Flabblehop, the facial expressions should make sense, whilst a human's body language would be unreadable.

I like the idea in principle, but it would take alot more graphics work than I have the resources for to remove a human's cultural cues from the game. For instance, making a posture of two hands together holding some device pointing at you unknown and unthreatening would take nothing less than graphically changing how the alien player received symbols. That's not visually possible using a common set of art and models.