Graphical avatars (split from accessibility of interface)

[Piscator]

Maybe some items could be simply left out until a solution is found. Or maybe it could be arranged that certain categories of items are not displayed if an item of a certain other category is worn. So for example socks are not shown when (ideally only full length) trousers are worn. Not a perfect solution but it might work.

[joo]

The z-order could be specified in each image file. Somewhere in the filename, maybe, or in the metadata.

[Snake_byte]

I like this idea... I've always Rp'd being naked when I have no clothes in Cantr as many others I run into see it the same way. There's no mention of sexual organs - first - a little inapropriate - Second - reproduction is Asexual. Still I'm wondering if other things that won't show there can be Rp'd: scars, hair colour, eye colour, body dimensions, ect and how will it affect other players views (especially Noobs). As this is in my opinion a BIG part of Cantr

[SekoETC]

Hair, eye and skin colors wouldn't be too difficult to add to the avatars, but if we want to have thin, fat, short and tall people, that would require making a vast amount of new images unless vector graphics would also be used in the game, and at the moment the plan is to save graphics as png, as far as I know. The graphics are drawn in Flash so if we later decide to scale or distort them, it won't be too difficult. Also currently Cantrians technically weigh 60 kilos each even if some people might rp them bigger or smaller, so until the weight is actually affected by how much people eat, I wouldn't support any built-in indicator of body weight as it could be misleading.

[Andu]

How is it going with the project?

[SekoETC]

I hadn't been working on it since I started school, but today I drew oilskin pants and edited all the older pants a bit. I used to have the texture on a masked layer but that required altering the mask every time I altered the outline, and that was too time-consuming, so now I'm just going to drop the masked layer and fill the outlines with bitmap. Originally I used the mask thing so that I could change the material with action script (there was a movie clip with all the textures in their own frames) but it's more simple to just copy the outline to a new frame if I'm going to recycle it for another item (for example the cotton, hemp and suit trousers use the same outline).

[Voltenion]

Why is this accepted? Clothes have descriptions already, I don't understand the need for this.

[SekoETC]

If someone is wearing a lot of clothes, few people have actually time to read all the descriptions, they might just take a glance at it. When using graphics, people can absorb more information with a single glance. But as with many interface changes, there will most likely be an option to turn it off.

[Yaddy1]

I've always thought something like this was necessary and even considered submitting a proposal on editable appearance paragraphs. Now I don't have to!

[Voltenion]

If someone is wearing a lot of clothes, few people have actually time to read all the descriptions, they might just take a glance at it. When using graphics, people can absorb more information with a single glance. But as with many interface changes, there will most likely be an option to turn it off.

Alright I get it now. I've actually memorized most of the common clothes so I only "waste time" reading the rarer clothes description.

[chase02]

This could be used directly in CSS positioning, if the images are to be composited on the client-side, or to order a list of components when buidling a server-side image using PHP or what have you.

I love you joo. I'm doing exactly this in another game I have in development. CSS with z-index is such an elegant solution. Now I don't have to go to the effort of typing it all out here.

[joo]

<3 joo and CSS

[Hanter]

For me it´s very bad idea. If you want people know how your char look like you should describe him. It´s the point of cantr.

[EchoMan]

So why wake an 7 month dead thread to life if you don't like the idea?

[Doug R.]

Maybe because 7 months ago, custom descriptions didn't exist. It seems a decent enough reason to revisit the topic.