The Citadel

Ohh come on guys, don't fight!

Fans of the show will say: heyy, Eddard doesn't look like Sean Bean!!
Fans of the book will say: heyy, Tyrion is not that old!! And that house doesn't even exist!

Not only the Art direction will get us critics, but, to be honest, I think the fanbase will be glad just to play in this fantastic world. Yes, there will be critics, but come one! I tell you, WE ARE NOT GOING TO PLEASE EVERYBODY. And whoever criticizes the look of certain helmet can have my eternal laugh at him. I would say, well, mod it yourself!
I think they all would play the mod even if the portraits have the multi-colored beard that cabe teased about, even women.

And if there is some consensus on making a sub-mod of the series visual design, well, let's just do that, but after the first release.

So what would you take from the show? Tywin Lannister's hairstyle? The exact gilded embossing on the Kingsguard armor? A good drawing of young Sean Bean as Eddard Stark? What is there really any big deal about?

When you think about it, the graphics for CK2 are minimal. It comes down to:

Faces
Costumes (troop markers on the field count here)
Castles
Banners

So, for Galle: What parts of that are important to all of these "come from the show" people? Honestly, I don't think they will care at all (hardly notice) if the armor is more correct to the books lively description, or the dresses for the ladies done This Way or That Way. Likewise, I (and some of the book crowd) don't really care if the portraits are based on the HBO casting, as much of it is really well done. However, I personally feel it would be more immersive to have the little details right, like Maester chains being tight about the neck instead of loose and jangling (otherwise Luwin is perfect casting).

That leaves Castles and Banners. I still think the HBO Eyrie is ridiculous, but Winterfell is fine, Harrenhall pretty much what I imagined. King's Landing should look slightly different, culturally, from the surrounding areas (conqueror's seat). I lyke Pyke. As for banners, the show has done a fairly good job. I wouldn't object to using the banners we have seen from the show.

But that's IT. What else is there?

Other content is simply characters. But that isn't even a question. This mod is about Robert's Rebellion, which only exists in a fully renderable form in the books, and the amount of TV character changes that affect the period are, well, none. (Robin Arryn is not even born, nor necessarily will be as per Paradox Game Rules, and if the mod names the child Asha to Yara it won't keep me from playing Ironborn, but please understand that HBO only changed it because they feel people are too stupid to deal with phoenetic similarities, and that's not my commentary.)

chinaserf1 wrote:So what would you take from the show? Tywin Lannister's hairstyle? The exact gilded embossing on the Kingsguard armor? A good drawing of young Sean Bean as Eddard Stark? What is there really any big deal about?

When you think about it, the graphics for CK2 are minimal. It comes down to:

Faces
Costumes (troop markers on the field count here)
Castles
Banners

So, for Galle: What parts of that are important to all of these "come from the show" people? Honestly, I don't think they will care at all (hardly notice) if the armor is more correct to the books lively description, or the dresses for the ladies done This Way or That Way. Likewise, I (and some of the book crowd) don't really care if the portraits are based on the HBO casting, as much of it is really well done. However, I personally feel it would be more immersive to have the little details right, like Maester chains being tight about the neck instead of loose and jangling (otherwise Luwin is perfect casting).

That leaves Castles and Banners. I still think the HBO Eyrie is ridiculous, but Winterfell is fine, Harrenhall pretty much what I imagined. King's Landing should look slightly different, culturally, from the surrounding areas (conqueror's seat). I lyke Pyke. As for banners, the show has done a fairly good job. I wouldn't object to using the banners we have seen from the show.

But that's IT. What else is there?

There's also the graphics on the events/some decisions/popups. I've seen some of these in screenshots that included things from the show already.

Well its gained a bigger budget since season 1 and 2 and since u dont need to waste all ur budget on actors like Sean bean now season 3 might be interesting since they did make alot already from season 1 and 2.

I don't believe the money spent on Sean Bean to be a waste, he was one of my favorite characters and a very good rendition of the books imho. I haven't watched season 2 yet (i don't have Sky Atlantic and i prefer to be able to watch it one after the other).

Smoesville wrote:I don't believe the money spent on Sean Bean to be a waste,.

+1

I dont think anyone can argue against that casting... i also love Brianne's casting, looks like hbo/martin are listening to fan discussions...

Overall i like the casting, i also like the actor chosen for Roose Bolton, though i haven't watched any of the second season yet. Also Barristan Selmy is great

goddamn, just use the damn ASOIAF LCG/P&P RPG drawings and stop throwing quotes between yourselves.
it has the most accurate drawings i've seen related to what i imagined when reading the books.

Why not make multiple versions of the disputed art in question and leave it open to team referendum? It won't be a public vote, so the overall art design of the mod would be taken into consideration. The back and forth comes down to the whole lot of "because I said so" while not accomplishing anything.

Wolfgang Pauli wrote:Why not make multiple versions of the disputed art in question and leave it open to team referendum? It won't be a public vote, so the overall art design of the mod would be taken into consideration. The back and forth comes down to the whole lot of "because I said so" while not accomplishing anything.

Why not build 2 Eiffel towers, and let the people choose just one of them?
In our case time constraints... its not that easy to make these... people dont have that much free time to donate, plus no one wants to make something that wont be eventually used.

TBH i think if the mod doesnt resemble the HBO show 80-90% of the people wotn feel inmerse sicne the show popularity superstedes even the book popularity for good or bad and i thionk the mod should be faithful to the show for a larger target audience

Encadi wrote:TBH i think if the mod doesnt resemble the HBO show 80-90% of the people wotn feel inmerse sicne the show popularity superstedes even the book popularity for good or bad and i thionk the mod should be faithful to the show for a larger target audience

In any case, the baseline should always be "What would CK2 look like if Paradox had made it a GoT game", so confidence in having an individual style is key. If the mod sticks slavishly to the show, you have the advantage of being able to say "we know it's not like it was in the book, but look, the show depicted it like this". However, you will NEVER be able to bring the look and feel, especially of the characters, in line with the show, nor will you be able to create a representation of the book that fits everybody's idea 100%.

Yes, there will be the need to get used to the way Westeros is depicted in the mod, just like viewers had to get used to its depiction in the show and in fan art; and similar to the many different interpretations of Middle Earth or Discworld or many other settings out there. I don't think that this is a bad thing that should be avoided at any cost. Those who find that certain depictions destroy their sense of immersion will make a mod-mod. Those that don't will soon feel at home with the mod.

This is not to say that the show and fan art can't provide some guidance (for example as seen with the crown graphics), but in my opinion those creating the characters in question should be the final authority on what look they will adapt in accordance with the team, based on "what feels right", not "what looks most like the show".

Edit: Also, of course, the "to reach a larger audience, we have to..." argument falls kind of flat considering that this is not a commercial project but a community-made mod.

Its not comerical but every author lieksw hen his project is apreciated by a large number of people

Encadi wrote:Its not comerical but every author lieksw hen his project is apreciated by a large number of people

It is a fair point that a major proportion of the current GoT/ASoIaF has either only learned about the franchise via the show or is not aware of other graphical representations of Westeros besides the show.

However, I see multiple problems with keeping to the show that have been enumerated in this thread and other places, and that include the point I made above, namely that any sort of attempt to model the look and feel after the show would remain an approximation, and those demanding perfect compliance with the TV series would be disappointed in any case.

Secondly, there is of course the matter with rights and the worry that Cyanide/HBO, the parties responsible for the TV series' license and its use in computer games (not sure if Cyanide has licensed ASoIaF for more than two games, though), could shut this down if they so wanted. As evident in the course of many Lord of the Rings themed mods and games, a game keeping to the books without using assets directly derivative of any commercial graphical representation is safer, although of course not unaffectable by such action.

Thirdly, the team is already making assumptions and creating original content for various aspects of the world that have not been covered yet. Since all of this is based on a "shared vision" much rather than a single design guideline, I reckon that keeping to the dynamics of a shared vision for ALL elements of the mod is much more constructive and productive rather than measuring things in their resemblance to the show.

Encadi sums it up well.

Just to ensure this debate won't get dragged up again, there will be a graphical sub-mod for anything/everything HBO.

Ogaburan wrote:Why not build 2 Eiffel towers, and let the people choose just one of them?

Well played, ser!

Edric Storm wrote:Encadi sums it up well.

Just to ensure this debate won't get dragged up again, there will be a graphical sub-mod for anything/everything HBO.

That's probably one of the better ways to go about this, that way people can play how they desire