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Artist/Character Designer for FE Switch


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Just realized a problem with Kozaki's Awakening artwork that I don't think has been mentioned.

Many of his ladies have the same pose!

Maribelle, Olivia, Lissa, Sully, Tiki, Cherche, Tharja, and Flavia all use a left-facing standing pose, often showing off a lot of back, in their official art. Nowi, Panne, and Aversa loosely share a different one as well. 

For Fates, the back-heavy pose is gone, but Sakura, Felicia, Hinoka, and Elise share a similar dynamic pose. Azura and Female Corrin share their own dynamic pose, which you may or may not argue is a variant of the one I described before for Fates females.

Admittedly there is only so many ways you can contort the human body and it is only the official art, but it seems lazy here. I might be biased though.

Edited by Interdimensional Observer
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1 hour ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

Just realized a problem with Kozaki's Awakening artwork that I don't think has been mentioned.

Many of his ladies have the same pose!

Maribelle, Olivia, Lissa, Sully, Tiki, Cherche, Tharja, and Flavia all use a left-facing standing pose, often showing off a lot of back, in their official art. Nowi, Panne, and Aversa loosely share a different one as well. 

For Fates, the back-heavy pose is gone, but Sakura, Felicia, Hinoka, and Elise share a similar dynamic pose. Azura and Female Corrin share their own dynamic pose, which you may or may not argue is a variant of the one I described before for Fates females.

Admittedly there is only so many ways you can contort the human body and it is only the official art, but it seems lazy here. I might be biased though.

Oh I never noticed that OoO Especially for Tiki and Olivia...

But then as a game art student (and chara designer student) I kind of understand that, the concept art is made to show the character's visual, so the pose cannot be too complicated or with strong perspective (like Aversa), and the way many of them are static (no fighting pose) feels like an art direction (compared to his work on No More Heroes for exemple). Fates already has more dynamic poses, but we'll have to see all the artworks in the artbook to compare :)

Anyways, I may be bieased because I really like his artstyle XD

I'd like him to come back again for the next game, but I wouldn't mind if it was an other artist as long as the style isn't too manga. His artstyle, with mostly small eyes and good proportions, are what made me think of Fire Emblem as a special game, but when I played PoR my first thought was "ah, yes that's a tactical JRPG".

I really like Hidari's artstyle, but I grew up with him as the Ateliers' artist, so his drawings give me a really "peacefull" vibe, and it kinda prevented me from getting into Echoes serious war tone :/ The "rustic" feel however was good to represent a remake of an old game, and it would be great too have him again on a new remake.

 

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6 minutes ago, FuranSuwa said:

His artstyle, with mostly small eyes and good proportions, are what made me think of Fire Emblem as a special game, but when I played PoR my first thought was "ah, yes that's a tactical JRPG".

I think different styles make different tradeoffs regarding "JRPG/Animeness". The excessive backside on Cherche, Micaiah oversized eyes. A style can be more anime than others, and a style can be less or not really much at all. 

And about the eyes, doing a flip through the Awakening stuff and PoR, PoR isn't that bad on this despite the Kita critiques here. Men tend to have good eye size, as does mature women. Rolf and Tormod- youths, Ike- the main character, and many of the females- perhaps out of a certain cute appeal- do, but the rest are fine. Insofar as I can tell what is oversized eyes.

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4 hours ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

Just realized a problem with Kozaki's Awakening artwork that I don't think has been mentioned.

Many of his ladies have the same pose!

Maribelle, Olivia, Lissa, Sully, Tiki, Cherche, Tharja, and Flavia all use a left-facing standing pose, often showing off a lot of back, in their official art. Nowi, Panne, and Aversa loosely share a different one as well. 

For Fates, the back-heavy pose is gone, but Sakura, Felicia, Hinoka, and Elise share a similar dynamic pose. Azura and Female Corrin share their own dynamic pose, which you may or may not argue is a variant of the one I described before for Fates females.

Admittedly there is only so many ways you can contort the human body and it is only the official art, but it seems lazy here. I might be biased though.

The reason for that probably isn't Kozaki so much as the art director telling Kozaki to draw the ladies in more static poses so their full body is viewed. So for the sake of fanservice, and Kozaki worked with it the best he could. You can tell the difference in that same link you posted if you compare the female poses to the male ones, where the males have much more dynamic poses and aren't just facing the same way. All of the portraits show the units personality to an extent, but yeah there is an obvious bias.

Edited by YingofDarkness
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with all this talk about "anime eyes" I feel like I should say something. To be quite frank I prefer the big "anime" eyes. Why? because it allows for characters to be a lot more expressive and I guess cute to an extent. It's one of the main reasons why I prefer a more stylized cartoony or anime art style over a more photo realistic one. More on topic. I know this will probably never happen but maybe we could kubo on this. I mean say what you will about bleach's story but damn can that guy draw. Again it'll probably never happen but a guy can dream(though if we got kishimoto my life would just be complete but it's never going to happen) or hell the mangaka behind beserk would be fun time.

Edited by Otts486
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18 minutes ago, YingofDarkness said:

The reason for that probably isn't Kozaki so much as the art director telling Kozaki to draw the ladies in more static poses so their full body is viewed. So for the sake of fanservice, and Kozaki worked with it the best he could. You can tell the difference in that same link you posted if you compare the female poses to the male ones, where the males have much more dynamic poses and aren't just facing the same way. All of the portraits show the units personality to an extent, but yeah there is an obvious bias.

I don't think that that is up to the art director, at most I think the director would have just OKed the art but not explicitly described or decided on general composition of the official artwork, just said OK when kozaki put the pictures on his desk rather than say change the pose, it would still be a kozaki problem if that is the case as he himself should have caught this during rough sketches.

 

 

Also on a more general note, we do need to note the difference between character designer and artist, unless the artist is credited under design as well as artist it is not ok to give them credit or yell at them for good or bad character design, awakening would have had crap character and class design independently of Kozaki, and radiant dawn would have had the same good class and character design regardless of kita's involvement. I had this problem myself at one time trying to act like kita could have made fates look good (I would have been very disappointed).

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Even though I haven't liked Kozaki's work in FE, yeah. Anybody's art would have looked bad with the direction and designs he was given. 

Edited by Slumber
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Okay, now we know that it's rather unlikely for Hidari to be the artist for the next game. He is apparently doing the illustrations for the Record of Lodoss War 30th anniversary project, and I'm guessing that that will have taken up all his time.

Spoiler

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1 hour ago, Calico said:

Okay, now we know that it's rather unlikely for Hidari to be the artist for the next game. He is apparently doing the illustrations for the Record of Lodoss War 30th anniversary project, and I'm guessing that that will have taken up all his time.

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interesting so I guess it really is up in the air as to who the next designer could be as I doubt kozaki's returning cause he's already done the designs for 2 and half games. 

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On 4/14/2018 at 4:59 AM, Otts486 said:

interesting so I guess it really is up in the air as to who the next designer could be as I doubt kozaki's returning cause he's already done the designs for 2 and half games. 

 

Honestly, Kozaki would be beyond disappointing after Hidari of all people. 

I'd prefer if they just took one of the popular artists from FEH at this rate. 

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i'd love to see kita working for fe16 as the main character designer, but it's very unlikely

since they hired a lot of "famous" artist for xenoblade 2, i can see it happen for fe16: i mean, they could call a famous artist (like, i don't know, roberto ferrari) and make him the main character designer of the game

i honestly don't want kozaki back, i'm tired of him; i'd like to see an artist who's completely new for the series

Edited by Yexin
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Obviously it should be Butch Hartman!

I say bring back the character designers from Shadows of Valentia, Hidari and Akio. It's visually appealing while still being tasteful all the same.

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  • 4 weeks later...

I like Kozaki's style, but i prefer variation, if Hidari comes back that would be great, his designs are some of my favorites in the franchise (Alm).

If they get someone else i would love to see Akihiro Yamada; or Akihiko Yoshida, i'm in love with his art, from characters to background, though i don't know if he works outside of Square Enix. Kimiko Fujisaka is great too, and if they want something crazy then Tomomi Sasaki.

Dream scenario would be Kentaro Miura.

 

 

 

 

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im a little torn on kozaki personally, I dislike how he does his fire emblem work, And i personally feel that a lot of the ingame portraits at the very least kinda suck to an extent but i doubt thats necessarily his fault, but i love his work on no more heroes which has a lot more personality to it. If he's allowed or told to give it a bit more pomp this time around id be okay with him returning I guess, hell a fire emblem with a closer style to his no more heroes work would be pretty interesting with heavier shadows and the like, though not the design sensibilities from no more heroes...

Still, Id prefer a new artist just to keep things fresh (my dream scenerio is the whoever did the official art for sacred stones, that shit is fantastic!!) 

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I get the feeling that Mayo will be the artist for the next FE game. Recently, I've noticed how active Mayo has been as an artist for FE, toting many cipher cards and Heroes characters (and he didn't repeat a character. He may have created an alt, but hasn't had the same character IIRC). He has had 7 Heroes characters, 36 cards. and 58 printings. Quite a lot for a non-game artist. Granted, there's other artists with a lot of contributions, but Mayo really sticks out to me. Plus, he's had characters from all over the series, so he's probably fairly comfortable with the majority of the games. He's also drawn the original characters Randel, the mask girl (Nieve or something), Alice, and I think Valjean but don't quote me on Valjean.

His style may be too pastel/youthful for FE though.

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3 hours ago, Dandy Druid said:

I get the feeling that Mayo will be the artist for the next FE game. Recently, I've noticed how active Mayo has been as an artist for FE, toting many cipher cards and Heroes characters (and he didn't repeat a character. He may have created an alt, but hasn't had the same character IIRC). He has had 7 Heroes characters, 36 cards. and 58 printings. Quite a lot for a non-game artist. Granted, there's other artists with a lot of contributions, but Mayo really sticks out to me. Plus, he's had characters from all over the series, so he's probably fairly comfortable with the majority of the games. He's also drawn the original characters Randel, the mask girl (Nieve or something), Alice, and I think Valjean but don't quote me on Valjean.

His style may be too pastel/youthful for FE though.

maybe mayo, though im slightly unhappy with what they did with marths face it could be a fun style to see

i think i might like Akira Fujikawa a little better though

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16 hours ago, NobodiePichu said:

maybe mayo, though im slightly unhappy with what they did with marths face it could be a fun style to see

i think i might like Akira Fujikawa a little better though

Yeah Marth looks a little too bishounen from what I imagine him to be. Mayo seems to specialize in female characters, but he can do a good job with dudes. Examples:

Spoiler

FEH_Jeorge_01.png

TCGCipher_Randal_01.png

I do like Akira Fujikawa's work as well; I wouldn't mind if they became an official artist either. Although their characters sometimes seem too "shiny", I do like their art style a whole lot. I'm not sure if I like Akira over Mayo though.

As for other possible contenders for the next FE artist, I'm surprised I don't see much talk about Maeshima Shigeki, who designed all of the original Book 2 characters in Heroes and then some. Doesn't it seem weird that they had such a huge role in Heroes?

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I'm pretty sure Hidari is a lady, but, that's a shame since I was starting to warm up to that style.

Kozaki's done work on Warriors and Heroes while working on the new No More Heroes. I think if we can agree Hidari's too busy, Kozaki's in the same position as he was replaced for Heroes Book 2.

But I really like Mayo, so I would be fine with that shift.

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2 hours ago, Dandy Druid said:

Yeah Marth looks a little too bishounen from what I imagine him to be. Mayo seems to specialize in female characters, but he can do a good job with dudes. Examples:

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FEH_Jeorge_01.png

TCGCipher_Randal_01.png

I do like Akira Fujikawa's work as well; I wouldn't mind if they became an official artist either. Although their characters sometimes seem too "shiny", I do like their art style a whole lot. I'm not sure if I like Akira over Mayo though.

As for other possible contenders for the next FE artist, I'm surprised I don't see much talk about Maeshima Shigeki, who designed all of the original Book 2 characters in Heroes and then some. Doesn't it seem weird that they had such a huge role in Heroes?

 

ugggh, im not sure if id like maeshima shigeki honestly, since i really dislike a lot of the designs done in book 2 of feh so far. i mean, so long as they have a good art director behind them then i guess it could work but still i am not endeared.

actually Soeda Ippei might not be a bad choice, certainly an interesting one considering his style at the very least (hes the guy who did arden and dorcases heroes art for reference and hes done some cipher pieces too namely a bunch of old men and flavia)

actually cuboon might also be interesting as tiny hands mc reinhardt aside they have some nice pieces and they seem to do a lot of cipher art including 3 of the five ayra cipher card arts, 2 of annas cards and the petrine and marisa cards among others.

theres also Kokon Konfuzi who did l'arachel's hero art and does some cipher work (including some nice titanias and a flora and felica double set), Ito Misei would also be a solid choice even if he hasnt done as much (he did valentines eliwood and a couple of cipher cards) and Rika Suzuki could be a fantastic choice as well considering her style and she seems to have quite a range.

or we could always get miyuu or AKIRA and give them the chance to shine they deserve

 

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3 hours ago, NobodiePichu said:

 

ugggh, im not sure if id like maeshima shigeki honestly, since i really dislike a lot of the designs done in book 2 of feh so far. i mean, so long as they have a good art director behind them then i guess it could work but still i am not endeared.

actually Soeda Ippei might not be a bad choice, certainly an interesting one considering his style at the very least (hes the guy who did arden and dorcases heroes art for reference and hes done some cipher pieces too namely a bunch of old men and flavia)

actually cuboon might also be interesting as tiny hands mc reinhardt aside they have some nice pieces and they seem to do a lot of cipher art including 3 of the five ayra cipher card arts, 2 of annas cards and the petrine and marisa cards among others.

theres also Kokon Konfuzi who did l'arachel's hero art and does some cipher work (including some nice titanias and a flora and felica double set), Ito Misei would also be a solid choice even if he hasnt done as much (he did valentines eliwood and a couple of cipher cards) and Rika Suzuki could be a fantastic choice as well considering her style and she seems to have quite a range.

or we could always get miyuu or AKIRA and give them the chance to shine they deserve

 

There would probably be an art director that the artist would listen to. But seeing as how the art director wanted thong armor and Shigeki most likely had one for the Book 2 characters, it's safe to say the art would be exactly what you'd expect. I can see them picking Shigeki as new artist because he's fresh blood for the series and his style isn't too far off from Kozaki's, whose style is the most recognizable of the series. 

I like Soeda Ippei's art, but I'd be surprised if IS pick them. Their art may be a tad too much on the "realist" side. Although it would be interesting to see an FE where the characters seem naturally grittier. Weird, I'm looking at the wiki and I can't seem to find his cipher pieces on the artist page. That needs to be edited.

cuboon is another interesting artist, but I would need to see more of what they can do. They're pretty good, but looking at his Heroes work, the characters he's made have a different "feel" to them I guess you can say. Like, if you told me Palla's artist is the same as Lukas', I wouldn't believe you at first. It's good nonetheless- reminds me a bit of Senri Kita in some ways.

Kokon Konfuzi, like cuboon, I just need to see more of. Both of them have worked with FE quite a bit, but I don't see either of them being chosen as the next artist because some other artists either have bigger names, have worked more with them, and/or made characters with bigger roles than the ones they've got.

I'm all for giving miyuu and AKIRA a chance to shine... but I'm not sure if a mainline FE is in the cards. I love their styles, but I think they would work better with other series. They produce good art for Heroes, but I see their style fitting better with other series.

I like all of the artists you listed, but I think IS is more likely to pick Shigeki or Mayo as the artist for FE Switch if they do pick up a new one. Shigeki played a big role in Heroes (although I can't wait to see how he designed Fjorm's brother, since the other males he made were quite... something) and I think Shigeki's style would bring something fresh but still familiar to the series. Mayo has made more cipher cards and printings than all those I previously mentioned and is well versed in the fantasy style.

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6 minutes ago, Dandy Druid said:

There would probably be an art director that the artist would listen to. But seeing as how the art director wanted thong armor and Shigeki most likely had one for the Book 2 characters, it's safe to say the art would be exactly what you'd expect. I can see them picking Shigeki as new artist because he's fresh blood for the series and his style isn't too far off from Kozaki's, whose style is the most recognizable of the series. 

I like Soeda Ippei's art, but I'd be surprised if IS pick them. Their art may be a tad too much on the "realist" side. Although it would be interesting to see an FE where the characters seem naturally grittier. Weird, I'm looking at the wiki and I can't seem to find his cipher pieces on the artist page. That needs to be edited.

cuboon is another interesting artist, but I would need to see more of what they can do. They're pretty good, but looking at his Heroes work, the characters he's made have a different "feel" to them I guess you can say. Like, if you told me Palla's artist is the same as Lukas', I wouldn't believe you at first. It's good nonetheless- reminds me a bit of Senri Kita in some ways.

Kokon Konfuzi, like cuboon, I just need to see more of. Both of them have worked with FE quite a bit, but I don't see either of them being chosen as the next artist because some other artists either have bigger names, have worked more with them, and/or made characters with bigger roles than the ones they've got.

I'm all for giving miyuu and AKIRA a chance to shine... but I'm not sure if a mainline FE is in the cards. I love their styles, but I think they would work better with other series. They produce good art for Heroes, but I see their style fitting better with other series.

I like all of the artists you listed, but I think IS is more likely to pick Shigeki or Mayo as the artist for FE Switch if they do pick up a new one. Shigeki played a big role in Heroes (although I can't wait to see how he designed Fjorm's brother, since the other males he made were quite... something) and I think Shigeki's style would bring something fresh but still familiar to the series. Mayo has made more cipher cards and printings than all those I previously mentioned and is well versed in the fantasy style.

for miyuu and AKIRA i was being a little sarcastic, nothing against their style but it would be a bit radical of a departure from the rest of the series to necessarily be worth it. it would be interesting to see though.

as for cuboon'

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i agree about kokon even if it would be interesting to have em, but cuboon i feel ya could make a case for. especially since they did do the art for some of the most popular characters in fe heroes.

your probably right about your prediction though, unless they bring in a wild card.

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10 minutes ago, NobodiePichu said:

for miyuu and AKIRA i was being a little sarcastic, nothing against their style but it would be a bit radical of a departure from the rest of the series to necessarily be worth it. it would be interesting to see though.

as for cuboon'

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i agree about kokon even if it would be interesting to have em, but cuboon i feel ya could make a case for. especially since they did do the art for some of the most popular characters in fe heroes.

your probably right about your prediction though, unless they bring in a wild card.

cuboon is one of my wild cards. The style just seems so FE to me. I just wish they did more male artwork though. cuboon can make a beautiful girl, but I haven't been nearly as impressed with his artwork of Reinhardt or Lukas.

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23 minutes ago, Dandy Druid said:

cuboon is one of my wild cards. The style just seems so FE to me. I just wish they did more male artwork though. cuboon can make a beautiful girl, but I haven't been nearly as impressed with his artwork of Reinhardt or Lukas.

yeah thats certainly true... i dont think cuboons done a single male cipher card either so im geniunly curious on how well they can draw men now...

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On ‎5‎/‎23‎/‎2018 at 12:35 AM, NobodiePichu said:

yeah thats certainly true... i dont think cuboons done a single male cipher card either so im geniunly curious on how well they can draw men now...

Yeah their artwork of Lukas and Reinhardt look to be of a different style than how he draws women. The girls definitely look anime, but their style with guys is a bit weird, like they were going for a cross between anime and somewhat a more realistic style.

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