[Poll] Thoughts on New Character Designs?

WarioWare Gold includes some changes to character designs. They are small (and can count as design changes or art style changes), but they are changes nevertheless.

Here are a few for comparison. (They're hi-res, so I put them in a spoiler section). Some characters have more Images than others, due to them having different variations. Quite a lot of them are from Game & Wario because that's the most recent game that's not WarioWare Gold.


All in all, most of the changes are to do with the art style. Every character looks less detailed, has no shading and are more rounded. Some of you might prefer this, but some may not! Let me know what you think in the Poll or in more detail if you prefer below! Personally, I prefer the older designs a little more than the newer ones, but the newer ones still look good and are distinct to this game.

Thanks!

Some nice observations here. I’m with you in the way that I prefer the older designs, especially considering that they were the ones which had stuck with me since 2008. I still like the new designs too though.

Also, are you into Klonoa too? I kinda popped when I saw you included his name in this post lol.

Can't unsee the sad duck face on 9-Volt's helmet from Gold. The best change.

Wonder if Ko took the criticisms about the G&W artstyle being too close to Rhythm Heaven to heart and overcorrected

I still prefer the old ones, but these ones have grown on me a bit none the less. Look better in game than official artwork if you ask me.

They're fine I guess. I think a lot of it has to do with just the original artstyle/designs going unchanged for so long. The original artstyle wasn't actually all that remarkable in my opinion to begin with.

Broski3215 said:

Some nice observations here. I’m with you in the way that I prefer the older designs, especially considering that they were the ones which had stuck with me since 2008. I still like the new designs too though.

Also, are you into Klonoa too? I kinda popped when I saw you included his name in this post lol.

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Thanks! Yep, I'm into Klonoa. I played the first game (Both Versions) and the GBA ones. It's a good, really underrated franchise, and I wasn't expecting anyone to recognise what I was talking about but you also surprised me, haha.

Shoonsh said:

Can't unsee the sad duck face on 9-Volt's helmet from Gold. The best change.

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Oh wow. I'm never gonna unsee that either, lol.

Glowsquid said:

Wonder if Ko took the criticisms about the G&W art style being too close to Rhythm Heaven to heart and overcorrected

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That's a good observation. Gold's art style is a lot less like Rhythm Heaven now. I probably should have included more artwork from before Game & Wario, for another comparison.

CM30 said:

I still prefer the old ones, but these ones have grown on me a bit none the less. Look better in game than official artwork if you ask me.

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I agree. The low-resolution of the 3DS sort of clicks with the art style. Plus, in-game, the characters are in motion and are from different angles, which makes them look better, in my opinion.

Triple M said:

They're fine I guess. I think a lot of it has to do with just the original artstyle/designs going unchanged for so long. The original artstyle wasn't actually all that remarkable in my opinion to begin with.

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I see what you mean, but they have made little tweaks to characters over the years. However, Gold is a bigger change, like Game & Wario.


This is another topic, that would work better as a new forum, but I thought I'd just quickly bring it up here:
I really think they'll need to change the animation style with the next WarioWare (If there is one, hopefully). The fully voiced lines don't couple that well with the super-simple animation and lip-syncing. If the next game has full voice acting, it would work better if it had Smooth Moves styled cutscenes. The simplistic animation may have worked well when characters spoke one-liners and/or when hardware was more limited, but it doesn't work as well now.

Turqo said:

WarioWare Gold: Mona (Face Shape looks different. Eyes & Mouth look different)

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I can't believe Fujiko Mine is in the latest warioware

I have my fair share of problems with the artstyle and there are a couple of redesigns that still irk me a little bit, but overall, it's grew on me (Especially after playing Gold.). It's still not my favorite aesthetic of the series admittedly, but I can live with it and I think it'll continue to grow on me over time.

i'll say I think the new designs generally look better from the side than straight up

I'm not too big a fan of the redesigns because the style becomes even more homogenized than it already was. Mona looks like almost every other female character Ko Takeuchi has drawn; Penny, Kat, and Ana all look kind of uncanny in my opinion because of the oversimplified traits. Warioware's style was already simple enough before.

Turqo said:

I see what you mean, but they have made little tweaks to characters over the years. However, Gold is a bigger change, like Game & Wario.

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Damn I forgot about this topic.

What I was going for is that up until every G&W, the character designs didn't really change all that much it was more that every game had its own take on the artstyle.


Mega Microgame$/Party Games$ had minimal shading and was pretty much the base artstyle.


Twisted had blocky lineart and more shading


Touched had it so that the lineart and coloring were slightly misaligned.


Smooth Moves was a more detailed take on the base artstyle.

However, they're all pretty recognizably much the same design and artyle as you can mostly tell from her facial features, whereas the G&W design is a noticeably different design since her facial features are completely different.

I've gotten used to the new ones but I'll still always prefer the old (especially Smooth Moves). Though I think Spitz and Kat/Ana had the absolute worst redesigns.

Glowsquid said:

criticisms about the G&W artstyle being too close to Rhythm Heaven

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And that's bad because...?

ShyGuyXXL said:

And that's bad because...?

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Beats me. Just said people didn't like it

ShyGuyXXL said:

And that's bad because...?

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Judging by the poll, I'd say most people were probably just too used to the old artstyle.