Avatar appearance

StrikesBrain

One feature that was largely lacking in UL was the variety in avatars.  Actually I find that a problem in a lot of games.  It's just sort of awkward when you walk into a room of clones with a few pallete swaps.

My little brother had purchased City of Heroes.  I must say one thing that I found truely aweinspiring was the sheer freedom they had on the avatar creation.  Someone calculated millions of distinct appearances were possible under that system.  Lyra need not go that far in Reclamation, yet it would add largely to the game if everyone looked a tad more unique.

I know, that people have said, "Well, that's what character descriptions are for."  In all honesty, it just isn't the same.  Games like underlight take the user out of the realm of more simple games, like MUD's and into a visual world.  True, a lot of things are text based, but I've always found it a little awkward to be sifting through 5 descriptions when I enter a room and I don't remember how the people look.  Sometimes I'd read a description from several people on entering a room, and forget who looked like what and how I should make remarks.  Not to mention you don't get too many compliments for a snazzy suit, and usually not until someone spends a full minute staring at you and digesting your description.

That's the other gripe, descriptions can be overly time consuming when you got multiple people in the room.  Lets say you got 5 people in a room, and they did some rather detailed descriptions, forcing you to dedicate 30 seconds to each to fully figure them out.  You end up spending 2.5 minutes upon entering the room figuring out if anyone looks especailly wierd.

Now, with more detailed avatars, you could tell RIGHT off the bat who looks freaky and who doesn't, who's the big fat guy and who's the the little kid.  And not only that, not every lady'll have to showcase her legs to the world.

I personally would suggest basically being able to set up the lower and upper body and head at least, and accomodating for a few odd looking avatars, becaue if UL has told us anything, people like to look very weird, I've seen wing descriptions, spikey people, dark people, scaley people, and a spider.

It's like they say, a picture is worth a thousand words.

Of course, descriptions should NOT be removed entirely, they can then be used to cover any of those minor details that they couldn't get with the description, but at the very least, every single one of those lazy people who doesn't fill in a description will not have to of a vague description in my head.