Character Creation (Future Developements?)

[Richard. UK]

Karl

First Step
Just out of interest you know character creations, looking further into the future, would it be possible to say display a visual model of the character you are going to look like in a little window with a little mock up terrain underlying it.

Second
From this character customization, only minor really, nothing to go into too major. But with any character model.bmp, there is editable typical features such as hair colour, eye colour??, face?? and possbly naked type?? (with no armour). If one model.bmp was say a human, edit this many times to say have hair colour red in one and black in another, same for body types and facial features.

Thirdly
I'm no wizz at programming as such yet , but i'm sure it would be possible in some way to make a user created character in the sense that the server stores server speific data which could be asking what hair colour, face, skin tone has this user chosen for that character ID? or even a database...(i wish i new what I was talking about! , well I sort of do).

Fourth
From this users could visually see what they are creating in a little window and just clikc a little arrow to cycle through the different options in regards to their race selection, because obviously you would not want to have a human clothing (Naked) looking like say a lizard or orc (Naked) for example.


I personally think this is a major step forward into entising not only existing and older players of xenimus, but also a newer market of gamers, who like to customize character features also. I know that is one asepct of xenimus which I found a little annoying - but thats my thoughts!

I wonder what your thoughts are guys!...I'm so extatic about this menu...Nobody actually knows the real importance , it is biiig


Richard

[Karl G.]

First: yes, that's fairly easy to do; however, if you check the timeline, I've moved animated meshes back by three weeks to make way for gameplay (since you can play the game as a cube, I think that's more important than having an animated character that doesn't do anything...)

Second and Third: These customization features are doable. The only real restraint is the amount of time it takes to create the customizations: things like hair color and skin tone aren't difficult to do individually, but once you start combining more and more features, you multiply the number of textures required. For example, a naked human with 1 type requires 1 texture: add three hair colors, that's three textures; add five skin tones, thats 15 textures (one for each hair color/skin tone pair); add tattoos or scars, or facial features...you get the point. Yes, it's possible. It's something to think about for the future. However, my logic here is the same as for pushing animated mesh integration back: it's more useful to have playable, balanced, fun game-play than be able to give your player earrings.

Fourth: Isn't this the same as 1?

[Ratiotile]

An interesting approach would be to have the game come with only the default textures, but allow players to create their own content and share with other players. The server wouldn't even have to host the player content, the clients would be able to transfer the textures peer-to-peer, saving on bandwidth. Of course, to keep control on what textures are allowed, new textures must be sent to server and approved by the administrators. A hash of the texture can then be calculated, and the server would store a database of approved hashes. clients would need to check with the server before letting the player use a new texture. Once a texture is approved, it does not need to be stored on the server anymore, as the transfer occurs directly from client to client.

[Karl G.]

I really like this idea. It's definitely a post-alpha feature, but I think it would be worth implementing.