Improve a Sonic character's design with subtle changes

[JingleBoy]

I came upon this thread on ResetEra called: Improve a character's design with subtle changes

In this thread the OP mentions modern Sonic's treads on his shoes and provided a photoshopped version that looks a lot better

Original:

ResetEra edit:

 

I genuinely hate modern sonic's soles so much now. They look really bad but would look so good with this minor change and it got me thinking - what other Sonic characters could be improved with just a tiny update to their design?

[Biggs]

Huh. White soles are a thing I didn't even know I wanted. It looks so much better.

[StaticMania]

Grey Soles are more positive for my different opinion.

[DabigRG]

The first two characters that come to mind are Marine and Zavok. One is actually a more obvious minor change compared to the other.

41 minutes ago, StaticMania said:

Grey Soles are more positive for my different opinion.

Yeah, both the socks(?) and soles being bright white doesn't look right.

[Razule]

Give Sonic a scarf

[Diogenes]

Just give him a little spike. Just a little loose spike tucked back there, for some pleasing asymmetry and increased pointiness.

[Biggs]

4 minutes ago, Diogenes said:

Just give him a little spike. Just a little loose spike tucked back there, for some pleasing asymmetry and increased pointiness.

Where is the original from? Is it an official render?

[Skull Leader]

 

 

Personally I'd change the way that the neck portion of Amy's dress looks so that it slightly covers her muzzle, something that I find to make her design look more cute. Similar with Tails, I think that just a bit of slightly curled hair on the back of his neck adds to his design, making the character look even more innocent.

Besides that, all characters having Nendoroid-like proportions would add charm to them all. Closest thing to this were those renders used for the mobile game Sonic Runners.

[Tarnish]

Here's one: get rid of those damn side-mouths on characters, they are just plain ugly on everything that isn't just a static picture.

[Skull Leader]

12 minutes ago, Tarnish said:

Here's one: get rid of those damn side-mouths on characters, they are just plain ugly on everything that isn't just a static picture.

I personally think that some characters like Sonic, Knuckles or Shadow kind of look ugly with the middle mouth.

IMO the side mouth adds personality to their design, though we also have characters with their moth placed in the middle, who often happen to be either the more younger members of the cast or the more innocent, like Amy, Tails, Cream, Big, etc.

If I were to pick, I'd give everyone a sidemouth, but depending on their particular personality, it would be placed either close to the middle area or more away from it.

[Mountaindewandsprite]

Maybe make Knuckles snout longer so he'd look somewhat closer to an echidna and shorten Sonic's nose. Hedgehogs have long snouts, not long noses. And maybe shorten Sonic's quills, too. They make him look more like a porcupine than a hedgehog.

[superman43]

1 hour ago, Skull Leader said:

I personally think that some characters like Sonic, Knuckles or Shadow kind of look ugly with the middle mouth.

IMO the side mouth adds personality to their design, though we also have characters with their moth placed in the middle, who often happen to be either the more younger members of the cast or the more innocent, like Amy, Tails, Cream, Big, etc.

If I were to pick, I'd give everyone a sidemouth, but depending on their particular personality, it would be placed either close to the middle area or more away from it.

I agree with one exception - Sonic Heroes/Shadow the Hedgehog in-game cutscenes. For Sonic and Shadow also 06.

[DabigRG]

Just now, superman43 said:

I agree with one exception - Sonic Heroes/Shadow the Hedgehog in-game cutscenes.

Hm...true. Though they could've been a touch less rectangular.

[Tarnish]

6 hours ago, Skull Leader said:

I personally think that some characters like Sonic, Knuckles or Shadow kind of look ugly with the middle mouth.

IMO the side mouth adds personality to their design, though we also have characters with their moth placed in the middle, who often happen to be either the more younger members of the cast or the more innocent, like Amy, Tails, Cream, Big, etc.

If I were to pick, I'd give everyone a sidemouth, but depending on their particular personality, it would be placed either close to the middle area or more away from it.

Watching any character with a side mouth talk in a cutscene is alone to hate that game for me. It's the most stupid looking thing I can imagine. For certain occasions it's fine, like when a character is grinning, but when talking..that's actaully horrible to watch. The Sonic Adventure 1 mouth movement is less disturbing.

Anyway, one other thing I would definitely change is Sonic shoes. With Sonic Adventure 2 introducing those awesome Soap shoes, I think they should have kept that as his standard shoes, as part of the continued evolution of his design. Or at the very least give his standard shoes a new sole design. Having all this high tech avaiable and yet using that super bland and uncreative, uninteresting design is just embarassing if you ask me.



After having these, going back to that primitive crap..have a little creativity for gods sake, SEGA.

You could say "well, no need to overdesign things". To that, I say "Well, we don't need to see every strand on their gloves, yet we have that...".

[DabigRG]

13 minutes ago, Tarnish said:

Watching any character with a side mouth talk in a cutscene is alone to hate that game for me.

Priorities of the upmost, ladies and gents.

And what an oddly fitting name.

[Tarnish]

4 minutes ago, DabigRG said:

Priorities of the upmost, ladies and gents.

And what an oddly fitting name.

Well to be frank, they haven't made a game I liked since they opted using a side mouth. And it definitely makes it hard to like a story based game where everytime the character opens their mouth, you cringe.

[Diogenes]

16 minutes ago, Tarnish said:

Anyway, one other thing I would definitely change is Sonic shoes. With Sonic Adventure 2 introducing those awesome Soap shoes, I think they should have kept that as his standard shoes, as part of the continued evolution of his design. Or at the very least give his standard shoes a new sole design. Having all this high tech avaiable and yet using that super bland and uncreative, uninteresting design is just embarassing if you ask me.

I don't think it makes much sense to give him shoes with more details than the rest of him put together.

[Tarnish]

3 minutes ago, Diogenes said:

I don't think it makes much sense to give him shoes with more details than the rest of him put together.

Well no if you're fine with bland design.

[DabigRG]

6 minutes ago, Diogenes said:

I don't think it makes much sense to give him shoes with more details than the rest of him put together.

Isn't that basically Knuckles, Shadow, and Silver?

[Blacklightning]

Just now, Tarnish said:

Well no if you're fine with bland design.

I don't think you're seeing the point - the problem is that the amount of detail isn't uniform across the model. We're talking about a cartoon hedgehog who's solid blue with a few tan highlights, and then everything from the ankles down only is intricately modelled and textured for some reason. You've still got a """bland""" model with shoes that stick out like a sore thumb. If you're going to add detail to a model then it should be across the board.

Hell, that being said, there's nothing wrong with a simplistic design anyway, especially if it's still the same artstyle across the board.

2 minutes ago, DabigRG said:

Isn't that basically Knuckles, Shadow, and Silver?

I don't think I'd go that far. About all that stands out for me is that Knux has lego studs on his shoes, but other than that they're largely just simple colours and patterns, same as Sonic's.

[Diogenes]

5 minutes ago, DabigRG said:

Isn't that basically Knuckles, Shadow, and Silver?

Nah, theirs are a bit more complicated than Sonic's, but they're not nearly as overdesigned as the Soap shoes were.

[Your Vest Friend]

I have some that I just would prefer aesthetically.

1. Give Espio a scarf. He's already supposed to be a hammy and OTT ninja, why not throw in one of the most common accessories there is? Also brings him up to par with his colleagues in terms of accessorising. 

2. Give Vector/Vector and Espio fingerless gloves. If glovelessness represents a closer connection to nature by Sonic coding (Sticks in the games, Mighty's Archie design by the end had a similar ethos), it could work for them. Vector to show his wild side, Espio to show his affinity for nature as shown with his ninja arts. Granted, at that point fingerless gloves may push both designs to the limit in terms of detailing since they both already have plenty. 

I suppose it'd technically make more sense for Knuckles but having giant hulking fists is supposed to be his thing, you probably don't want extraneous detail breaking that design. 

 

[DabigRG]

2 hours ago, Blacklightning said:

I don't think I'd go that far. About all that stands out for me is that Knux has lego studs on his shoes, but other than that they're largely just simple colours and patterns, same as Sonic's.

 

2 hours ago, Diogenes said:

Nah, theirs are a bit more complicated than Sonic's, but they're not nearly as overdesigned as the Soap shoes were.

I still mainly meant how their shoes do indeed have more detail and color variation then the rest of them do--even the primarily two-toned and somewhat pastiche Shadow.

But fair enough.

2 hours ago, VEDJ-F said:

 

1. Give Espio a scarf. He's already supposed to be a hammy and OTT ninja, why not throw in one of the most common accessories there is? Also brings him up to par with his colleagues in terms of accessorising. 

 

That is actually a very good point. Though it may somewhat obscure his random heart-shaped stomach.

Maybe it would also help balance his near monochromatic-inducing Modern shoes.

2 hours ago, VEDJ-F said:

2. Give Vector/Vector and Espio fingerless gloves. If glovelessness represents a closer connection to nature by Sonic coding (Sticks in the games, Mighty's Archie design by the end had a similar ethos), it could work for them. Vector to show his wild side, Espio to show his affinity for nature as shown with his ninja arts. Granted, at that point fingerless gloves may push both designs to the limit in terms of detailing since they both already have plenty. 

 

Eh, Espio maybe. Vector, I'm not entirely sure.

2 hours ago, VEDJ-F said:

 

I suppose it'd technically make more sense for Knuckles but having giant hulking fists is supposed to be his thing, you probably don't want extraneous detail breaking that design. 

 

Yeah, that would really look right. 

Plus, I never really took Knuckles as necessarily being wild per say.

[StaticMania]

10 hours ago, Skull Leader said:

 

 

Personally I'd change the way that the neck portion of Amy's dress looks so that it slightly covers her muzzle, something that I find to make her design look more cute. Similar with Tails, I think that just a bit of slightly curled hair on the back of his neck adds to his design, making the character look even more innocent.

Besides that, all characters having Nendoroid-like proportions would add charm to them all. Closest thing to this were those renders used for the mobile game Sonic Runners.

In Tails' case, that's already a thing in the Classic design.

Even Western-ized Tails in America Land got has this detail. For some reason this isn't a consistent detail anymore and it was hard to find.

[Red]

Neo-Classic Tails removes the extra fluff from the back of his head. I have no idea why. It bothers me though because it feels like they're over-simplifying the designs.