Style Evaluation (Formerly: Non-Sonic Sprites)

[Deebs]

In regards to the Mario sprite-

1. This is a multi-person project. The Mario sprite you are currently critiquing is very, very little like the original Mario sprite I had made for the project*. It's gone through a lot of revisions by multiple people to get to the form it is now- the point being that I am trying to make here is that there is no 'you' involved here and at this point it would be difficult to pinpoint who contributed to each 'fault'- so please refrain from saying 'you' to me on a good majority of the sprites shown on the site, as I'm not the one behind all of them- a good deal, yes, but I personally dislike receiving critique aimed specifically at me for something of which I am not responsible for**. I would also appreciate in the future that critique would avoid phrasing such as "'there's a thing called 'hip bones'." This is, in my opinion, unnecessarily catty and there are just as easy, more civil ways of explaining the exact same concept. Saying "The legs are far too 'V' like and don't show the hip structure well enough" is just as illuminating without also being condescending. While I understand in some cases a condescending attitude can bring results to some and that some may easily brush off such behavior as simply being a cute behavioral quirk, I am telling you now that it will not be helpful in the long run here and I am requesting that in future critiques and communications that this behavior be knocked off.
   *Which was terrible, and thus was completely discarded before coming to the current sprite. The current is actually much better than what I had personally made and I will not claim anything to the contrary. I will also not claim that the current sprite is perfect, thus my asking for people to have a look over and fix what they see off.
   **With the understanding that I am responsible for saying "yeah, that's good enough to be put up"- though I will speak that my personal judgement is not very good, and is part of the reason why these projects rely quite a bit on outside input both for contributions and for critique.
   
2. THAT OUT OF THE WAY- I'm all for simplifying things and proportioning things better. Thus asking for 'face lifts'- there's been a big push in this project recently with getting things updated for better accuracy, so I thank you for your critiques and pointers on various portions of Mario's anatomy. I'd like him to look as much like 'himself' as we can get. As someone who does not play or work with Mario related material often, my ability to tell what's a good looking 'Mario' is not as refined as those that have grown up with the little guy, so having the opinions and critique on the subject is very helpful. Because of my lack of education on the matter of Mario, I don't know entirely for sure if your improvements are more accurate or not. My personal thoughts (being uneducated in the matter as I have said) is that his head seems just a touch too squat in the fix ups. I think the facial profile on the right side looks generally better, though, with it's shorter width. I also think that the body on the right looks proportionally better, though I admit that my first instinct on seeing it was "he looks really fat". The more I look over it however the more 'right' it feels. Mario is famous for his rotundness after all, eh? Overall, I like the right one better but I would like some minor portions of the left version integrated into it, if possible. For instance, I would prefer that the cuff of his glove be more distinct as it is in the left. Other than that...
   
3. I would prefer the shininess restored to the sprite. Yes, I realize that Mario is not wearing a latex suit, but that is part of the visual style. The way I think of it, each sprite in this style is like a tiny plastic figurine- not outrageously shiny, but just the small occasional dot of highlight for a more three dimensional feel. All the other sprites have this level of shininess to them, so excluding Mario will cause him to stand out awkwardly among them and look quite bland, despite the strength and skill of the sprite. So I ask, even if you see it as a step back, to please keep that aspect.
   

I would really love to see a merging of the two modified sprites together, as well as hear more opinions from the matter from everyone.

Thank you for the critique, and I hope you'll continue to be able to help out!

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I saw that you had Yoshi there, and IMO I felt he could had used a touch-up, not sure if I am able to, but here is what I came up with:

I really like the head on that Yoshi, especially considering how much I struggled to get it 'right' on my own go. I think you did a fantastic job on that, but I'd love to hear more thoughts from those more educated on the Mario series about it too.
I'm not sure on the body however- I think it's the arms throwing me off. If I could see the armless base, that would really help me figure out if my issue is with the arms or not.

Other than that, please try to keep to 16 colours in your pallets if you can, but I think this is a pretty great job!