Katawa Shoujo Forums

DESU wrote:Horribly sketchy. The old sprites were definitely better then these new rough sketches. If the artists were able to make something that looked so nice in the first place, why did they replace it with these sprites that look like colored rough drafts?

There may be those who like the new sprites, but to those who are looking for something that is apparently supposed to be very good, these sketchy sprites are going to stick out like a sore thumb.

Emi's old sprites also stuck out when compared to the other characters. Especially things like her tie, her hair, and certain details on her uniform. They were either too simple, or they did not match the style of the other characters. Emi's new sprites have brought her style closer to that of the other heroines. The problem now, is quality. It's nothing that cleanup can't fix. The problem is mostly in her eyes, and certain rough details. Just look at Shizune's finished sprites to get an idea of how clean Emi's should turn out.

I've weighed in enough on this issue regarding my hatred of these (and Yuuko's) sprites (largely on the blog, though, which is now gone-ish), so instead of reiterating my previous posts yet again, I'll repeat other people's statements. The general reactions I got from showing screenshots of Emi's first scene to people who'd never played the game were along the lines of "Why does the one in the center look so different/sketchy/dumb" (all), "She's wearing way too much eyeliner" (mainly 1 and 3), "What the fuck is growing out of her arms" (mainly 2, right bicep), and, from one person who's played some VNs before, "Her mouth and chin are almost as ugly as Minori's" (mainly 2, somewhat 3).

Before you ask, no, I didn't lead 'em in any way with my questions; I just sent 'em screenshots and asked "Middle girl, opinion, nao".

(I also got a "By the way, is the burnt girl dancing? Or trying, anyway?" to #2. Funny what people notice when they're looking at screenshots out of context; that pose does look pretty stupid, but I never noticed while playing because Hanako, as usual, is not exactly front-and-center in that scene.)

For fairness' sake, I should mention that I...didn't get overwhelmingly negative reactions to #4. That's...a plus, I guess.

EternalLurker wrote:"Her mouth and chin are almost as ugly as Minori's" (mainly 2, somewhat 3).

Aww, now that's just uncalled for.

Yeah, I think they're terrible but Minori's on a whole different tier of misshapenness. That particular quote's verbatim, though. >_>

# 2 is horrendous. When her eyes are open it looks... better.

Now, I know others have said already, but I'm going to go ahead and say it anyway. I EXTREMELY dislike Emi's new sprites. They simply DO NOT FIT.

"Don't fit?", you might be asking yourself. Yes, that's correct. Emi's sprites do not fit anymore. See how she just doesn't look right compared to Lilly or Hanako there anymore? Yeah, we all see it, don't we? (Unless you're Lilly, of course) Some of us might like her new sprites, and that's fine and dandy, but, that doesn't change the fact that Emi doesn't fit anymore. Again, lets say that again. Whether you like Emi's new sprites or not doesn't matter. She does not fit anymore.

"Okay, okay, we get it. She doesn't fit anymore. Yeesh. What's your point?" WHY I'M GLAD YOU ASKED. You see, there's this thing that artists and designers and programmers all use when they're creating artwork or a dress or whatnot. It's called a theme.

"A theme?" Yes, a theme. You see, as I said earlier, whether you wish for these new sprites to be shipped off to the sun to be obliterated or wish for them to be perfectly stored within a museum for generations to come to acknowledge, you have to keep the game's theme going. Emi's (and Yuuko's) new sprites deviate from this theme. That makes it unappealing to most. It makes the work seem unfinished or sloppy. Heck, sometimes it's enough to just make it look like a cut and paste job that a 10 year old did to pass his 4th grade project.

"Well, I wouldn't go that fa-" DON'T YOU EVEN! Now, I know this is simply my opinion here and everything, but when Emi's old sprites were in Act1, it just seemed right. It seemed 'complete', so to say. (Haha, calling Act1 complete without the other acts. Haha...) Even if it did make Emi seem a bit too short, or a bit too childish, or whatever other reasons the designers gave, it had that sense of completion. Well, whatever. Again, it's my opinion. I'm sure quite a few others share my viewpoint as well, though.

"So, what was the point of leading us up to that...?" I'm...not too sure. I was just kinda putting my thoughts down as I went. Didn't really plan that out....

"..." Yeah..

tl;dr: Emi's (and Yuuko's) new sprites deviate from the overall theme and feel of KS and should either A) Be tidied up to resemble the rest of the cast and crew or B) Return to the old sprites.

The problem with the sprites (not of the quality, but of the solution to that already established problem) is this:

1. The devs already have a lot of work to do, and they are taking a very "If it isn't broken, don't fix it" approach to the new emi sprites. They don't want to go back and edit the sprites they've already gone out of their way to recreate and reincorporate. Continuing from that,

2. A lot of the discontent about the sprites is written off as "Oh, they just prefer the "shitty loli sprites" of the first one, or else, "They are being nit-pickers", or else "They don't like change." While there are indeed quite a few people who fall into these camps, this does not change the fact that there is a legitimate and distinct difference in the quality of the sprites on a wholly objective level (In before >Opinion >Objective. I mean the worksmanship or however you want to put it).

Granted, the rest of the games sprites aren't 100% meshed with each other (There have been some comments on how Rin's sprites look somewhat odd compared to, say, Lilly's sprites.) That's to be expected with any medium in which art is done piecemeal by different artists with different styles. It's not really any surprise that the devs loathe the majority of their fanbase, and write off the bulk of said fanbase's likes and dislikes as stupid deviant-art-reminiscint anime-lover weeaboo whatever the fucks, and they can't really be faulted like that, because there are a lot of people like that on the forums, unfortunately.

This doesn't change the fact that there are still legitimate problems with Emi's sprites. I doubt anybody looks forward to fixing them. I don't think the artists are jumping at the chance to stop drawing massive dongs to fix up the spots where Moekki went crazy with the pen tool, and I highly doubt Delta is shitting himself with glee at the chance to recode things. Even so, it might be worth it.

Csihar wrote:

EternalLurker wrote:"Her mouth and chin are almost as ugly as Minori's" (mainly 2, somewhat 3).

Aww, now that's just uncalled for.

Basically true, though. Hookchin is hooked.

When I first saw the new Emi sprites in the Blog, I wasn't very happy about them, but now that I have replayed the game with the new sprites, and seen old and new next to each other, I vastly prefer the new sprites.
That KS will be a VN without any obvious Lolli-Character is an added bonus.

The only thing that bothers me about the new sprites is the 'sketchy' style. :/

Mirage_GSM wrote:That KS will be a VN without any obvious Lolli-Character is an added bonus.

Not my loli!
As Hitler would say, a girl with a delicious flat chest is needed. Then again, I don't remember her actual bust size changing at all.(Don't judge me. )

neumanproductions wrote:

Mirage_GSM wrote:That KS will be a VN without any obvious Lolli-Character is an added bonus.

Not my loli!
As Hitler would say, a girl with a delicious flat chest is needed. Then again, I don't remember her actual bust size changing at all.(Don't judge me. )

I think her chest looks even smaller relative to the size of the new sprites.


But that might just be me.

Since when has bust size been an indicator of lolliness?
OK, I suppose it is an indicator, but only because most lollis are prepubescent. There are grown women with small bust sizes, and they are not considered lollis.
Emi is supposed to be 18 years old and now she looks the part. (The old Emi always reminded me a bit of Chiyo-chan.)

Personally, I think the quality of the character design is more important than the quality and consistency of the art. The worst thing they could do short of actively shittying up the art is to revert to the old sprites, not least because they'd be settling for an inferior character design in lieu of actually improving the art, and it's really shortsighted to suggest that the game would be better off if they reverted to the old design.

In retrospect, it's possible that the only real reason I like the sketchy art style (despite the apparent clash with the current sprite "theme") is because it's been used for what I think is an attractive character design, especially compared to the old design. It may be that the best thing to do is to redesign the sprites from scratch (again) to get rid of the sketchiness. I have my doubts, though -- will the art team have the time, skill, and motivation to recreate moekki's character design in an art style consistent with the other sprite sets? And if so, would the "improved" art retain the qualities that make the current character design attractive, or would they be played down for the sake of consistency?

The KS devs believe that they are their own worst critics, which may be hard for many of us to accept as fact given the sharp criticism often directed toward KS. But if they are half as critical of the Emi sprites as the average KS player then they should already be fully aware of what is wrong and have a plan to fix it, even if that plan will take time to execute. As to what that plan is, we'll know when they're ready to let us know. Personally, I don't think that they'd be able to live up to moekki's character design if they decide to remake the sprites from scratch (again), but I hope that if they try they prove me wrong. Hell, they've already proven scores of people wrong and I'd just be one more.

Caesius wrote:In retrospect, it's possible that the only real reason I like the sketchy art style (despite the apparent clash with the current sprite "theme") is because it's been used for what I think is an attractive character design, especially compared to the old design. It may be that the best thing to do is to redesign the sprites from scratch (again) to get rid of the sketchiness. I have my doubts, though -- will the art team have the time, skill, and motivation to recreate moekki's character design in an art style consistent with the other sprite sets? And if so, would the "improved" art retain the qualities that make the current character design attractive, or would they be played down for the sake of consistency?

In my opinion, they ought to just keep the design she now has, and clean up the sprites. No offense, but you speak as if it's not possible to clean up the sketchy details on the sprites. The only way to go is to completely redo them. Which may change the design. If they just cleaned up the sprites, it would silence the majority of the critics. There is a reason you don't see nearly as many posts complaining about Yuuko's new sprites: It's not that there is anything wrong with them, from a technical standpoint. They are just different. With Emi, there is both.