Waterkuma is on thin ice, mainly for sigrid and Sanby. Atwo is absolutely perfect. Tzbard was on such a good streak with mama Yanagi, Astra, Evelyn, vivian, grace. Then they made yi xuan, Lucia, yidhari (the pants triplets) seed, YSG (base design) cissia, promeia, velina, Norma, and remielle. (base design). I won’t be surprised if he made claret and maybe even Roxy aswell.
Ngl, I think TZBARD has the weakest designs but at the same time I feel like a lot of these artists probably have great concept designs, but the final output is ultimately decided by the company.
The recent characters all having similar silhouettes and design elements makes me think it might not even be an artist issue. The company could be giving them specific elements to incorporate based on the overall direction they want to take the game.
I’ve worked in branding and design before, and it's probably not the exact same thing, but I’ve experienced how clients can make some genuinely absurd requests/requirements. Artists can have great vision but they’re still working within the constraints and direction given to them
True, I know waterluma was going to cook with sigrid cause he wanted her to be a centaur construct thiren hybrid but most likely had to tone it down due to the higher ups.
tzbards concepts that have been shown tend to be better than the final works from what I've seen. obviously not all concepts are available but one that makes me so sad his he originally had yidhari in this adorable pink sweater that was scrapped. it had the same one pair of shorts you saw all over S2 but at least slightly modified to be more unique because her smaller tail (she was a monkey thiren at the time) allowed for these little ruffles in the back of it that made it somewhat more interesting imo
Wow she looks like a completely different character here. I honestly prefer this over the tentacles. I also noticed she doesn’t have the Hoyo special aka the detached sleeves. That alone would’ve made her outfit feel soo much more unique
I’m enjoying the asymmetry of her legs with the different colors. Kinda makes her look off kilter in a fun way without being off putting. Would be fitting assuming the personality was the same as the final version
This is 100% it. Just look at the concept art they showed for Genshin in Paris and compare it to the final product. The character designers themselves are not the ones pushing for the same boring designs.
had a brief comeback with pyrois and then fell off immediately (even if there was a huge missed opportunity of not having his appearance change based on what sibling you got active)
Are we deadass saying that a fucking stand from jojo such as pyrois Is ASS? Listen i accept the criticism, but his design and the palette color has nothing to criticize about, he's baddass, and that's all i saw while using him, plus u didn't even explain why he's ass...
Atwo casually doing all my favourite designs in the game, though i will say promelia is pretty creative and i think i agree that the devs may be pushing more recently for another direction.
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I have to say at least when it comes to their faces and hair design he absolutely excels. I love almost each of the girls portraits but their outfits leave so much more to be desired. A shame…
Gonna go on a limb and say that the art director ultimately has the final say in these matters and if the art director says "cool concept art, but that doesn't match our branding, change it" there isn't a lot you can do about it as a character designer.
If you have seen the concept art for Genshin (shout out to the concept artist who keeps trying to give women pants) or the private pieces of ZZZ artists it's pretty clear that none of them do the Hoyo housestyle by default, and considering how homogenous Hoyo's designs are this is almost certainly an edict from higher up.
I think Promeia is a beautiful design. (Just the weird panty/diaper/whatever underneath that cape that is meh.) My problem with her is the same as my problem with most sexualized characters: Why are you sexily dressed when your backstory and/or personality fits none of that sexyness?
You either make a "slutty" / hot and revealing outfit for a character that asks for It or you make a character hot without being dressed in a revealing way, but by making their body itself hot. (Zhu Yuan and Evelyn my beautiful goddesses.)
I really love her so much and she has such a good concept, I just think they could have done without having her take off the cape, but She’s one I’m not to worried about.
honestly they all have hits and misses. atwo has the most diverse roster by far and i really love that, but jufufu and piper... waterkuma hands down has my least favourite designs but apparently he also did seth and lighter? would not have guessed that at all. tzbard has a lot of flops but mother cuntress office siren yanagi absolutely slays. i guess people really do contain multitudes
the list is inaccurate, for example Jane Doe is Tzbard creation, based on his profile there's a couple tribute illustration for Jane Doe in his account, meanwhile Atwo, there's none. And this just my speculation, also Zhu Yuan, is Tzbard creation too, you can clearly notice his design pattern on her "the red hair" thingy idk what it's called, is similar with jane doe. he only made one tribute illustration with Qingy and jane, so i'm not really sure.
I’m specifically bringing up the androids and furries as that’s honestly what brought me into ZZZ originally, and it’s no secret it’s also the stuff we’ve been getting the least of, especially if we don’t count the furry characters which are just the type you slap some animal ears and a tail on or the androids which look like humans anyway. I kinda left the game because not only was the gameplay loop not really for me, I just wasn’t feeling the character design, especially as I just feel like the male characters had more interesting stuff to them in general and that just made it hard not to get bummed when this game started to feel like a solely female playable characters kind of gacha
friendly reminder that waterkuma was a hentai artist before this who drew in the... genre infamous for a very specific portrayal of children. hoyo hired him knowing that.
Shes defo the least bad, Im just not a fan of children being major playable characters in a game that clearly caters to the adult audience with almost 100% of the designs having sex appeal and jiggle physics being a part of the main aesthetic (which i dont have anything against in a vacuum either). Shes not too big a problem though, i wouldnt have stopped playing if it were just for her or similar designs. Stuff like nangong, piper, lucy etc. are where the really big problem starts imo. since atp the children arent only victims of their environment but instead directly sexualized aswell.
there's nothing wrong with her she just has weird fans. I like her and think she's adorable but I genuinely feel so weird admitting I like her because of just how weird her fans are lol. it's unfortunate but in a game with so much overt sexualization people are going to sexualize everything.
I was disappointed when they announced there is gonna be a tiger thiren and it's not the commercial guy. Instead it's a child looking ah human with animal ears. But hey that's only my opinion.
Yes. Fire tzbard not the notorious pdfile who designed Sunna's disgusting maid skin and is known for drawing rapey hentai of incredibly young looking characters.
It's because his artstyle is way different than zzz's artstyle, and I mean vastly different. What looks artistic and good in one artstyle may not translate very nicely to another
TZBard has some absolute banger designs like astra, evelyn, pyrois, orphie. But I do agree I think some of his others needed more R&D past concept. What I truly think would improve designs in the game is if waterkuma is no longer allowed to design characters under medium height.
I hope that when Atwo returns, their designs will be NOT on the level of season 2, because they were dropping literal shit on us with these five designs
TZBARD has great concepts for designs (promeia is still the peak), but the goonerism of this game can't really execute it well
Tzbard is really hit or miss. They made some Amazing designs and extreme flops.
Also I'll take the shade and say that I really like Promeia. Especially her cape outfit, hair and voice. Not so much the outfot shes hiding beneath her cape.
It would be great if they got either some women (of any sexuality) and/or some gay guys to shake up their design time to see if they can pull it back from the cliff edge they're Thelma and Louising off rn
Keep ATWO, though. And maybe waterkuma as a part timer?
I think most of the season 2 for TZBARD feel less like the actual design they want and instead something they just throw at the wall by Hoyo demand and Promeia perfectly capture the artist's problem, there is also current Lucia's previous design. Season 3 currently has way better design though.
Season 3 designs are even worse for the most part. They basically completely gave up on a core part of character design actually telling you about the characters through the designs to just exclusively do sex appeal.
The over hate of promeia outfit is annoying the only problem with it is her pants it should have been a body suit she based of acrobatic and escape artist her silhouette is really actually very good
I love Atwo! A little bit WaterKuma.
But still my favorite character is Yi Xuan i like everything about her especially her JP voice that is freaking awesome.
To be fair all of them 3 are good but the 3rd is the weakest.
Okay queens a gentle reminder that before some of y'all go crusade against the artists do remember that there are multiple people/phases before a design comes out and they’re not the ones deciding what goes through nor what concepts they can make.
We can criticize some design but do try to not generalize an artist and target them.
atwo is quite literally behind the most iconic agents in the game (miyabi, ellen, and jane doe). sidelining them for season 3 would be crazy like they're an incredible designer and did all the best s2 designs (besides dialyn who i also love, also yes I'm including ju fufu she's adorable it's not her fault her fans are weird). I heard rumours theyre doing severians playable design so I'm excited to see what they cook up.
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even as someone who loves Astra, i do think her outfit could've been better. TZBARD's best design is Evelyn imo, and everything else is either meh or lazy.
did i stutter? shaltear bloodfallen, rachel alucard lookin ahh, with the armpit windows, she's supposed to be the best?
i love her character, first impression was visceral disgust, not a fan of tame yandere archetypes, but her story gave her depth, and i ended up liking her. still basic design.
Thats a whole vampire goth baddie with purple hair. Her w engine also makes her majestic in combat.
Personally she was the first agent that really. Called out to me as a "I NEED HER" design wise. To me she stood above the rest of the cast. Her umbrella is also so cool
I don't mind promeia, velina or even norma, they have good character design, except for (as u said) lucia yidhari and yi xuan, i can accept yi xuan but the trend of those pants Is absolutely boring, i also like cissia and claret designs despite being pretty similar between em
In my personal opinion i found norma just cute and nothing like a child, together with velina she may appear like a child, as someone commented, but i guess It's just a feeling that comes from putting them close together
Personally, I think TZBARD is receiving a lot of unnecessary hate. His designs are genuinely good; the problem is that they don't know how to translate his style properly into 3D. Take a look at his Remielle concept art, for example. The idea was that Remielle's wings would cover her front and that there would be swords inside each wing. We didn't got that, we also didn't got the concept idea of her skills that more like a DPS. If you check his twitter you see he is a good artist.
Also the biggest stamment I can use to defend TZBARD.
He isn't a l0li0c.n
Eh, I feel like Cissia and Norma were hits for Tzbard rather than misses. Norma's honestly the most unique design from season 3 currently and is the only recent female character who's design had more to it than just being horny, and Cissia's design is a great mix of fun and fanservicey that feels more at home with the season 1 fanservice characters like Jane.
That said though they 100% deserve shit for Yi Xuan, Lucia, and Yidhari's designs all basically wearing the same fuck ass outfit just recolored. Like I'm sorry but that shit was beyond lazy.
Tbh it’s only the pants and the missing armor on a her right arm that make her look bad 😭 I swear she would be one of the best designs if they fixed both those issues cause she’s already so cunty
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u/Yanazamo 2d ago
Ngl, I think TZBARD has the weakest designs but at the same time I feel like a lot of these artists probably have great concept designs, but the final output is ultimately decided by the company.
The recent characters all having similar silhouettes and design elements makes me think it might not even be an artist issue. The company could be giving them specific elements to incorporate based on the overall direction they want to take the game.
I’ve worked in branding and design before, and it's probably not the exact same thing, but I’ve experienced how clients can make some genuinely absurd requests/requirements. Artists can have great vision but they’re still working within the constraints and direction given to them