50 replies to this topic

[Grendel408]

DifferentFish, on 19 March 2013 - 07:37 AM, said:

I finally got around to fixing my biggest pet peeve (at least visually) about MWO. This is by far the most complex texture I've ever done, and the first time I tried a design crossing multiple UV shells (the dragon.) I'm really pleased with the results.

Nice work dude... don't let some critics scare you away from doing what you enjoy while the current paint scheme for YLW is mostly from lore/canon... I like your personal touch on it, very well done

[Bishop Steiner]

Grendel408, on 16 April 2014 - 12:41 PM, said:

Nice work dude... don't let some critics scare you away from doing what you enjoy while the current paint scheme for YLW is mostly from lore/canon... I like your personal touch on it, very well done

I don't think anyone was criticizing his work.

Some just feel that people getting butthurt over cultural authenticity on a giant space stompy robot from a fictional universe set 1000 years in the future, is a little silly.

The quality of his skin is awesome.

[Mahws]

I'm not really sure you grasp just how much of an issue the Imperial Japanese Navy flag is. It's a literal equivalent of the {Godwin's Law} Swastika in several Asian countries (and for good reason too, Nanking massacre, etc) and in a few, like South Korea, it's illegal to have it appear in media/on products.

The stupidity of putting that flag on a mech with a Chinese name isn't even close to being the biggest issue. Nor is the fact that the MWO design isn't even lore accurate. The issue is that the paint job is completely needlessly offensive to a not insignificant potential market for the game.

That being said, wanting cultural authenticity on a giant space stompy robot from a fictional universe set 1000 years in the future doesn't mean you're butt-hurt, it means you like your fiction to be interesting. 'All Asia is the same' is a boring old trope that should have died out decades ago.



Edit:
Case in point, apparently that word is so problematic that they won't even let you use it on the forum, yet there's apparently no issue stamping a symbol that's just as offensive to a lot of people all over an in game art asset.

Edited by Mahws, 16 April 2014 - 04:10 PM.

[NocturnalBeast]

Your artwork is excellent, however, although the rising sun symbol is highly offensive to many Asian people today (and rightly so), the sun symbol on the Solaris Mech symbolized the stable that the mech came from and nothing more. Also, in the fictional far future of the Battletech universe, the camo pattern on the Yen Lo Wang is not an offensive symbol. Honestly though, PGI already removed the rear-facing lasers and the melee claw, so why not change the camo, or at least offer an alternate camo to anyone who owns a Yen Lo Wang and is offended by it's current camo?

[Lyoto Machida]

Great skin redesign.

Mahws, on 16 April 2014 - 04:07 PM, said:

I'm not really sure you grasp just how much of an issue the Imperial Japanese Navy flag is. It's a literal equivalent of the {Godwin's Law} Swastika in several Asian countries (and for good reason too, Nanking massacre, etc) and in a few, like South Korea, it's illegal to have it appear in media/on products.

The stupidity of putting that flag on a mech with a Chinese name isn't even close to being the biggest issue. Nor is the fact that the MWO design isn't even lore accurate. The issue is that the paint job is completely needlessly offensive to a not insignificant potential market for the game.

That being said, wanting cultural authenticity on a giant space stompy robot from a fictional universe set 1000 years in the future doesn't mean you're butt-hurt, it means you like your fiction to be interesting. 'All Asia is the same' is a boring old trope that should have died out decades ago.



Edit:
Case in point, apparently that word is so problematic that they won't even let you use it on the forum, yet there's apparently no issue stamping a symbol that's just as offensive to a lot of people all over an in game art asset.

Ed Steele, on 16 April 2014 - 04:22 PM, said:

Your artwork is excellent, however, although the rising sun symbol is highly offensive to many Asian people today (and rightly so), the sun symbol on the Solaris Mech symbolized the stable that the mech came from and nothing more. Also, in the fictional far future of the Battletech universe, the camo pattern on the Yen Lo Wang is not an offensive symbol. Honestly though, PGI already removed the rear-facing lasers and the melee claw, so why not change the camo, or at least offer an alternate camo to anyone who owns a Yen Lo Wang and is offended by it's current camo?

This is an issue today, even in a sport like MMA. Georges St-Pierre (one of the most politically correct fighters to ever walk this planet) and his sponsor Hayabusa caught some flack recently over his rising sun gi after a Korean fighter brought it up, so they agreed to discontinue it:

http://sports.yahoo....04367--mma.html

I wonder if South Koreans would even play this game though...seems they have way more polished games over there.




Evidently some people in Asia still feel very strongly about this:

[Craig Steele]

See I'm not so sure on this one.

I get the (quite rightly) sensitivity of the issue of using symbology associated with some pretty terrible atrocities, but how long is long enough?

The Swastika for example has its origins back in the early middle ages and had very different meanings to the implications we (mostly) assign to it today.

It's not implausible that in 1,000 years time, people will have forgiven the sins of their fathers and that the symbology does not recur in a different meaning / context more benevolent than some historical usages.

But for the moment and in living memory, it is a sensitive issue for many people which we should all empathise with.

EDIT: Having said that, the skin in it's own right (symbology aside) looks pretty good.

Edited by Craig Steele, 16 April 2014 - 05:17 PM.

[Mahws]

Ed Steele, on 16 April 2014 - 04:22 PM, said:

Your artwork is excellent, however, although the rising sun symbol is highly offensive to many Asian people today (and rightly so), the sun symbol on the Solaris Mech symbolized the stable that the mech came from and nothing more.

The problem is that the MW:O version is not the lore version. The lore version looks like this:


Thinner lines, not connected to the central circle, far more lines and the central circle is center aligned rather than offset to the left.

It looks similair to the rising sun, but there's a big difference to 'looks similar to' as it is in the lore and 'identical to' as it is in MW:O.


Edit:

Craig Steele, on 16 April 2014 - 05:16 PM, said:

It's not implausible that in 1,000 years time, people will have forgiven the sins of their fathers and that the symbology does not recur in a different meaning / context more benevolent than some historical usages.

Even if the MW:O version was lore accurate I'm not sure that argument really matters. The game is made by people living now, and played by people living now.

Edited by Mahws, 16 April 2014 - 05:23 PM.

[Grendel408]

Can we all go back to talking about the cool "re-design" the guy did and the game in general versus real-world issues that only get dragged out so much it's eventually pointless to debate? He voiced his opinion a little and this all starts? Is everyone a politician all of a sudden? "Fan Creations" (btw... I still think the redesign looks cool... stock version too canon/lore aside)

[Twilight Fenrir]

shad0w4life, on 16 April 2014 - 06:28 AM, said:

Don't forget that to some cultures, mainly China and South Korea, the Rising Sun flag is a symbol like the Swastika for Israel :/

Plus the whole fact the history of the YLW has Liao at then end of the owners names....I always wondered if he was Confused.


Very badass paintjob though!

I just started a topic about this same thing, not realizing it had already been discussed...

Maybe that's the secret of the odd lore though... Yen Lo Wang, The God of Death/The Underworld... The Japanese commited genocide against the Chinese, several times... Seems like an apt symbol to use for the God of Death.... Now that you make me think about it...

[masCh]

That looks brilliant.

Come on PGI, start a community-driven program.

Let artists like DifferentFish design textures, sell it in Store, and give him 50% of all earnings.
You can't build every 3D model yourselves - its not efficient use of your resources.

You'll see your game grow further than you anticipated!

[Donnerkeil666]

Whether canon or not, it looks really great, would buy it!!! Keep it up.