Changing the Base Skin: Giving the Tournament Robot a Face

[Korby]

Two pretty exciting ideas have been mulling around in the devteam for a while now. Both of them will be covered in two topics made in this forum so that you can provide your feedback on them.
The first of them was creating a skin for the Tournament Robot* to serve as the new base skin.
The new base skin had to be simple, small, preferably use large blotches of blue and cyan for ease of weapon identification, and, of course, look good.
Eventually, we arrived upon this.


Introducing Maestro, the Tournament Robot. The word maestro often refers to conductors, and we felt this was a good fit for a personification of the player.
The design itself is heavily inspired by the design of NormNavi from the Battle Network series; aside from looking fairly cool, it was a fairly decent idea for what would end up being used for what can often be the most commonly seen skin.

Now, you might be wondering why there's two sets there;
I'm split on which color scheme to use if we go forward with this idea. On the one hand, the first palette has more cyan and will be more readable weapon-wise; on the other hand, the second palette looks better. If you're in favor of Maestro, which palette do you prefer?

*This statement isn't...quite true. The original idea was three skins for Maestro. A Male, a Female, and an Other skin. The one you see above is what was originally the "other" design. While I was originally in favor of this idea, I have recently come to the conclusion that including three skins for an original character might bother some people, so we went with other version as it honestly looked the coolest. Do you think it'd be worth it to add the other two versions in?
You can see their tentative designs here.

Finally, if you're in favor of this idea but you don't like the execution, you are more than welcome to take a shot at designing Maestro yourself!

[Rui]

I love the concept of a player robot and having it be based off the NormNavi (along with creating a unique classic design) sounds really awesome. Can't wait to see this in game!

I can see why just an Other skin would be enough but at the same time having a male and female one sounds also nice for the sake of the neither of them becoming stale, since the player has the option of three rather than just one. Only critique I can give is that the female's pose in the tentative design feels a bit more... flamboyant than it should be? Doesn't feel as neutral as the male one but that could be just me.

EDIT:

Made a few simple changes to the tentative design.



Male one is fine so I left it as is, while I added a bit of the light blue on Female's chest armor and nerfed the heels (or what I'm assuming were heels?) to provide more semblance between the two. Fighting with heels also sounds like a pain and didn't feel as fitting for a fighting robot.

[Orange juice :l]

Why change what's currently in-place? MM8BDM has always paid heed to staying loyal to the classic series (when at all possible) and as such Megaman seems like the logical choice for "main character", especially versus what, as far as I can tell, is an original character. Mega's got logical reason to be the player character (Dr. Light's tournament entry) and nobody would second-guess him using all the weapons available.

Of course, this brings up the issue of Megaman being relegated to the ubiquitous "Default"/"Anonymous"/"Custom-Not-Downloaded" character whereas he should be a legitimate choice as being the flagship character lends him a lot of popularity. To this end I would suggest the default being Sniper Joe and you are suggested to change to Megaman (or whatever skin is desired) during the player setup tutorial (I don't know what it currently is comprised of as I only did it back when it was just a popup of the control bind menu. If there isn't a guiding hand to skin/name changing and its impact on multiplayer, I would suggest that). Sniper Joe definitely gives off a more mass-produced or generic feel to me that would fit him better.

Finally, why would I want to play as Maestro? Assume I'm John Averageplayer- I grew up playing as Megaman and fighting Cutman, Woodman, Magnetman, etc. etc. so clearly my desire is to play as one of them. The skin looks nice and all but simply put I don't think the idea of a "generic default" character is needed when skins/characters like Megaman and Sniper Joe are present. This is, of course, assuming Megaman doesn't become a plot character that can't be logically tied to the player.

[Gumballtoid]

I'll admit I'm not crazy about the idea of a new character just for the base skin, either. I definitely want to see the base skin changed to Sniper Joe on account of the mass-produced, blank slate feel OJ pointed out, but personifying the shoes intended to be filled by the player seems kind of farfetched. That's what Mega Man was made for, after all.

...Though I have to admit, basing him off of the Normal Navi was definitely a step in the right direction. If this is in fact the route you go, you're doing it right.

I'd still prefer Sniper Joe, though.

[Watzup7856]

In all honesty I don't like the idea of an "avatar" default skin. I'd rather Megaman still be the default skin, since it feels like your playing the main character and not a generic NPC looking dude.

EDIT: Although it might be this reason that new players have better reason to switch to a skin that's not the default one

[Kapus]

This is, of course, assuming Megaman doesn't become a plot character that can't be logically tied to the player.

Doesn't Mega Man already show up (along with Bass) fighting alongside you in the MM&B campaign?

I'm completely indifferent to the idea. I don't think this is needed at all, but if it were added, I don't really think that he/she/it needs to be given a name. Players name themselves in the game, and if this character is meant to be a default stand in for the player, it should probably remain nameless. Then again, to appear in the skin selection, it would need to have a name. I dunno. From the point of view of a person new to the game, I feel like seeing Maestro along with the rest of the robot masters in the skin list would come off more like a random OC then a player avatar. Maybe just have him be named "Default"?


On the subject of genders, I'm again not too swayed in any favor, but I do like variety and the different takes on the character's design seems neat. +1 for the variations I guess.

[Korby]

As a quick note, Maestro's name wouldn't actually appear anywhere in game unless we give him a bot.
The default skin is always named "base," and he won't be referred to by name in the campaign. That'll continue being the player's name.
Really, the only reason we gave him a name was so we could have something to call him other than tournament robot internally.

[Ceridran]

I've always liked the idea of creating a default, blank slate character! I would always jabber on about how a mass produced robot like Sniper Joe or some other unique character should take the role of the base skin, though I never made an effort to push for it. I also think it'd make Megaman feel more important, somehow..

+1 to a gender-neutral appearance.

[Hallan Parva]

Why change what's currently in-place? MM8BDM has always paid heed to staying loyal to the classic series (when at all possible) and as such Megaman seems like the logical choice for "main character", especially versus what, as far as I can tell, is an original character.

I'd rather Megaman still be the default skin, since it feels like your playing the main character and not a generic NPC looking dude.

yeah sure alright but here's why you're wrong


Throughout the entire game, it's made painfully clear that the main character is not Mega Man, that Mega Man is off doing his own thing somewhere and you're just some tournament robot who keeps getting lucky. Then when the MM&B chapter finally rolls around, you get to partner up with the legendary Blue Bomber himself, alongside the unexpected ally Bass. It makes perfect sense to have a generic-looking design for the tournament robot, to strengthen the game's storyline as well as to give 8-Bit Deathmatch more personality as a game. This living, breathing behemoth of a project has been steadily growing and evolving for over five years, and it's about due time that the game got a little more extra flavor as its own thing.

Following up on that, I'm also in full agreement with the addition of the male and female skins as well. It would be wonderful to see some more diversity in online games, and also help restore the Blue Bomber to his former glory instead of the current "oh great another Mega Man" feeling.

[Superjustinbros]

Indifferent with this idea; I'll just put it at that for the most part.

[Thunderono]

Afaik, the Tournament Robot was already an OC.  As Roll herself points out, your appearance as Mega Man, Sniper Joe or any other character is simply display overtop of a previously undefined face.  Considering Wily's reprogramming of the robot masters, it's safe to assume that every enemy you face in the single player campaign is the real deal; Spark Man is the actual Spark Man, Hard Man the real deal, and even Sniper Joe.  It's pointed out through dialogue and the Mega Man 6 ending that you play as a robot designed by Dr. Light to fight in the tournament while Mega Man does mega stuff.  With all this in mind, giving the Tournament Robot a real design only adds to the character.  I'm all for the default skin being Maestro, but I'm mostly indifferent on the variants.

That said, which version would be the actual default, should the three variants be added?  Would it be other, or is there some way to change that based on the gender chosen?

[Korby]

Unfortunately, there's no way to change a skin based on your gender.
Assuming we go with other for the default, the other two would be added as Base-M and Base-F.

[Orange juice :l]

Bear in mind that even if there is a new generic character, how many people are going to use it? The moment a new player strolls into the skin wardrobe they're going to browse the huge variety of skins and pick their favorite (even if you haven't played a Megaman game you're probably going to be drawn to someone or other, such as the guy with his head on fire, the walking log with a funny name, or the walking metal log with the funnier name). This is the ONLY time they will ever see Maestro (unless they dig up the chase command, and even then, Maestro looks super generic from the back) if they stick to single player, so it'll be nothing more than a quick "wat" versus a quick chuckle at "you're fresh off the assembly line so you just look like a Joe". Korby seems to be making the point that Maestro is supposed to be low-key and even unnamed- nothing more than a graphic for the person behind the keyboard- but if we introduce this new robot, that demands an introduction (otherwise we'd be hand-waving this sketchy guy while people wonder "is that guy from the X series or something? Should I be checking the readme?"), making him into a whole character that erodes the idea of the player being the competitor, and you are instead controlling Maestro. Joe as a temporary start with a hurried introduction to the skin wardrobe is much more immersive as YOU are picking who YOUR favorite character is, and hell, if you're up against that same character as a bot that only goes to show that you're the player, one and the same as the protagonist, using that robot master as a skin.

[Ceridran]

you're gonna see maestro all the time when people are using custom skins

[Orange juice :l]

And in that case, regardless of your skin, the whole idea of immersion in the plot goes out the window. So now that we're playing multiplayer, do we want to see Maestro everywhere or Sniper Joe everywhere? Personally I think the latter makes far more sense both from a lore and immersion standpoint.