Avatar change, We can change ports, what about avatars? Options

[Ordule Ryuu]

We can change pictures anywhere, but avatars only in dreams? this is a little unfair i think. We should be able to change avatars if we have a look we want to keep permanantly, not saying it has to be free though.

[Leticia]

The idea of customized avatars has been brought up before; the majority view seems to be that at this point, it's not technically feasible, though your results may vary.  Here are some bullet points about it, in an effort to capsulate the conversation down.  No incivility is meant; I'm merely repeating past arguments on the discussion.

The cost for a portrait space is largely based on the time needed to manually review and approve portraits.  A portrait is one image.  An avatar is 20.  If this is logically extended, a feasible cost is 200: 20 * 10.  This MAY be a feasible cost, considering the costs of other for-life avatars, and considering the fact that people could duplicate existing avatars (like dragons) if it was cheaper.

The special avatars are often quite annoying; they're huge, they eclipse people behind wings and towering bodies.  A personalized avatar could be even worse.

An avatar is seen as soon as someone walks on your screen.  A portrait is seen only when you click someone.  So if I click RandomFurre who has a portrait space, I see it after it loads; depending on the portrait, it takes a few moments.  Again, an avatar is larger - a single avatar, of dragon/griffin/phoenix size is around 130-150kb.  This takes me about a minute to download on my connection.  Worse, I have no control over the initiation of this download; someone walks on my screen, I lag.  Two or three or four people walk on my screen, I really lag.  Some suggestions to alleviate this have been to make the avatar only download when you click on someone.  This somewhat defeats the purpose of having such an avatar, and is still considerably larger than a portrait.

There have, however, been alternate suggestions that may fill some of the same needs.

For instance, a system in which people can set a 'secondary avatar' which is a patch, identified by a name.  Anyone else who had the same patch installed and identified by the same name would see them as that.  Anyone else would see them as the default species.  So, for instance, if someone wanted to use my mage robes for felines, and had it named Leticia-FelineMageRobes.fsh, anyone else with the same patch (or a different patch, named the same thing!) would see it.  There would be some adjusting to come up with names for existing patches that are public, but I think things would work out.

At any rate, you CAN patch avatars on the main maps, you're just limited to the existing species and you change everyone else that looks like the patched avatar too... but that's all dreams do, either.

[Caecus]

Custom avatars would be chaos, not to mention furcadia would quickly turn into badly-sprited-anime-cadia.



This post has been edited by Caecus: Jan 27 2004, 01:39 PM

[Ridia]

*clings to the default avatars* RIDI LIKE! D=

[Caecus]

I still argue for more avatars to choose from and more portraits to choose from without needing a patch or custom portrait space.

[Guest_Jin Kiuchi_*]

Realistically Customizable avatars are only feasible in a 3D system environment, with a huge inventory "Paper Doll" mix and match parts, which takes a huge amount of space, and usually results in the need for a "Pay" service.

[Guest_FS Freya_*]

I had this same problem. Well, it was a problem then.
It was when... *gasp* I WAS A PATCHING NEWBIE. Anyways, I actually put my patch files in the defaults folder, and then wondered why no one was seeing my dream patch. How stupid is THAT? Anyways, if you want to 'change' your avatar or anything, modify your defaults. Of course, only you'll be able to see 'em, but...

[Bahamut]

Hey. I have an idea. How about, there be an option in your Settings that defaults to Off called "DOWNLOAD NEW AVATARS." For those of us that aren't backwoods folk with 56K connections, we can turn this on and get near-instant new Avatars on screen. But since that is a crapload of bandwidth, you better make it expensive if it is done like that. Also, institute an image saying "Avatar loading.." that can display overtop of someone who walks onscreen, but hasn't yet had their avatar loaded. Also, so bandwidth isn't eaten needlessly, have an additional option reading "Only load avatars if they remain onscreen for X seconds." And specify. That way, all your Allergia Island Hall buddies who do nothing but sit around all day can have theirs loaded and always seen, whereas Some smacky running by quickly won't get the "Avatar loading..." image over their character, and won't waste my d*** bandwidth with their badly drawn artwork.

... Sorry, I'm more drunk than Hugin is.

[Talzhemir]

1.  A GOOD MOOD

DEP is not responsible for the general mood furres are in but it's to our advantage to try to put you all in the best mood we can.  The look of the game has a lot to do with how you're treated.

When someone arrives in Furcadia, an effort is made to put them in a good mood.  They're exposed to colors that tend to make people happy, for example.  This is one reason that I don't favor DEP offering a wide variety of "skins", and instead, encourage patching Dream interfaces instead.

When we made a changeover from a lighter warm reddish pink to the cooler dark blue, conversations became noticeably less suggestive on main maps.  Wierd, huh?   (Want to make your Dream sexy?  Try a dark red velvet Marbled.pcx.)

(Players of early online games that put avatars in a gritty grimy rundown un-colorful environment (there was a version of Dragonspires that looked kind of "cannibal heavy metal" for example) made patrons uncomfortable and put them in a mood to abuse each other even before anything had begun.  Castle Infinity was completely the opposite; it was so bright and cheerful and full of bouncy a-capella music that it was almost addictive just for that!)

My control over the art is a partial thing, but, for the above reasons, I wouldn't give total control of it up.  In addition to paying the rent, portraits not being free helps keep Furcadia furry.


2. FURREALITY

I'm against patching individuals' avatars in Furcadia because that gives more main-map control away than I want to.  Furcadia is, first and foremost... furries.  I've got nothing against walking teapots or stormclouds, but we're advertising ourselves as  a "furry" place, and, by Mickey, that's what patrons are gonna get.

I'm grateful that Furcadia players tend to upload mostly furry animal portraits.  Every so often, though, there are some non-furry ones.  As long as they're not R-rated, we just smile, and say Thank you VERY much.

Having custom walkabouts on the main maps would be much more disruptive, though.  I say this because the games I've seen that permitted it (for example, http://www.thepalace.com/) were chaotic and "twinky."  By that, I mean, the avatars that people tended to choose were as extremely god-like  as they could find, and sometimes they weren't a character, they were just a big picture of a
face.

I don't think there's anything inherently wrong with an anything-goes kind of game like that but if done on Furcadia, it would have severely hurt the potential for Strict RP.

(While they're an almost tiny minority, Strict RPers tend to also be the furres who give the most of themselves.  I strongly want to give them something back if we can.)

I'm thinking of someday doing a Furcadia type game-- but on an anime theme instead, with definite hyoomans.  When?  Dunno.


3. DOWNLOADS:  THE DREADED N-SQUARED OVERHEAD PROBLEM

Bear in mind that Furcadia runs on ONE machine.  Every portrait being viewed for the first time is being spewed out the same byte spiggot.  A portrait is 10K.  A small avatar such as the bunny is about 82K.

Viewing a portrait doesn't affect what you see when you move around the little scenery window.  It takes a fast machine just a blink but a player on a slower connection (say dial-up) would be frozen for around 4 seconds each time a new walkabout was downloaded.

Now imagine what would happen to them if they walked into a Dream where 5 furres with custom walkabouts are standing there.

Bear in mind that, as this furre had to get 5 new downloads, at some point, all of those 5 also got sent copies of each other.

(If the number of furres is 5, then the number of downloads total is 5 to the second power, or, 25.  N to the second power, or N-Squared.  This is the dreaded N-Squared Overhead problem, where the resources needed for things you trade this way can skyrocket out of control fairly fast!)

When you buy a Port, you're partly paying for some DEP person to peek at it and okay it.  But a bit of your moolah also went to defray the future bandwidth sapped by every time someone had to download it to look at it.


4. MUTUALNESS

For those who had limited bandwidth, I didn't think toggling Custom Walkabouts to "OFF" was a good idea.  It solves the freezing problem but Furcadia is meant to have  "mutualness",  meaning, we all see the same thing.  You could patch all your avatars to be fruits with big eyes and big feet but you have to go fairly out of your way to accomplish it.  

Knowing that we are seeing the same thing brings a sense of unity with others in our virtual space.  Experiencing different things drives us apart like a wall or wedge.

I wouldn't favor letting furres see the custom avatars but letting others turn them off.  It kicks mutualness in the 'nads. Some furres seeing furres, and others seeing a giant talking apple, is confusing.

When someone turns their Music or Sound FX off, Mutuality has just been kicked in the shins.  We didn't like adding it but we did see the point and we added the buttons.


5.  HAVING MORE AVATARS TO CHOOSE FROM, PERIOD

I love adding new critters.  Lots of folks are especially comfortable only in a certain Type.  Like, some people are "cats".  (They just know they are.)  If Furcadia didn't have cats, they wouldn't play at all!

But Furcadia has so few Races because every new Race adds considerably to the size of the download. Every second longer it goes is a moment in which the download might fail. If that happens, the downloader is more than 50% likely to give up on Furcadia forever.

The ones we have were chosen by going over FurryMUCK data. We cover 95% of FurryMUCK's population. If the Internet itself changes such that bandwidth is MUCH higher for even the slowest users, then we can consider adding others.

The very next Avatar to be added is going to be the Squirrel (stretchable for Skunks because of the floofy tail).  After that, the list is topped by Cows, Deer, and Bugges.

(Although I normally appreciate input, your suggestion for what to add next will probably fall on deaf ears until all of the above are completed and added.      )

[Caecus]

I can't see how little 2d sprites that are basically only .gif's since furc only supports 256 colors can be so massive.  I don't care much about avatars, but I'd like to see more species specific portraits.



This post has been edited by Caecus: Feb 2 2004, 02:53 PM

[Null Flux]

Then urge people to spend the $20 it costs to 1) buy a portrait, and then 2) get a good artist to draw the species-specific portrait.

I got one of me as a ferret done by Shippouchan. And it's awesome.



This post has been edited by Null Flux: Feb 2 2004, 03:55 PM

[Caecus]

Thank you Captain Obvious.

I could spend $0 on the portrait space, write a good description about the character, and not pay a cent to any artist.

What I MEANT is I think it's a way to add more variety to furc without adding more avatars.  I could care less if it happens or not.



This post has been edited by Caecus: Feb 2 2004, 06:15 PM

[Null Flux]

No need to get so testy.

[Axis]

to Talz:

Squirrels are next? wouldn't they be considered part of the weasel/musteline avatar?

I thought it was gonna be Bears (Ursarine), some people i know aren't using furc due to the lack of bears.

Don't forget, if you make a new avatar, you'll probably need a new prime for the Dragonlands folk.



This post has been edited by Axis: Feb 5 2004, 10:26 AM

[Cave]

What I'd like to see is the mustie remade to appear more, well, mustaline. The stout, baggy appearence suits a badger but I always think of ferrets, minks, otters, weasels etc. as being slender, graceful creatures. If this shape were applied it would encompass squirrels quite easily, leaving the next space free to be used for an ursine avatar which seems to be more popular than squirrels anyway.

[Axis]

well look at the pic of Danival in the patches link and the dragonlands pages. She's a musteline.

[Youlanda]

Squirrels are next. The mesh is already being made. It looks quite nice so far.

[Axis]

Who died and made you Talzhemir?

[Amelinda]

i just think the Squirrels look allot like..Rodents and mustelines.
a long time ago we where thinking about sheeps.. pinguins -bears-
but i thought maybe a Certain lizard would be nice, we dont have any free lizard type of Race.

[Youlanda]

Who died and made you Talzhemir?

Gee. I live 20 minutes away from The Furcadia House (where Emerald Flame, Felorin, and some other staff members live), they're just right down the road. Guess what I got to see last week?

PS: Talzhemir wasn't working on the avatar (at least not when I visited, as Talz doesn't live there), DEP's 3D animator was.