Game elements that need better art

[Leoreth]

A while ago I already asked if people had interest in funding the development of DoC through Patreon. The main purpose I planned to use those funds for was to commission additional art from external artists. I am currently thinking about getting this going, and have already considered using some of my own money for this purpose.

While I have some ideas where this would make sense to use for, I also wanted to ask everyone else. So, the question is:

What graphics that are currently in the game should be most replaced with custom made, high quality replacements?

This can be anything. Leaderheads, unit art, building art, terrain art, interface icons, etc. Please do not suggest art for something that isn't in the game ("If we had art for leader X we could include them in the game"). Examples for this that come to my mind immediately are Topkapi Palace (which currently is a copy of the Hammam building), and Great Statesmen (both its button, and the unit art, which looks out of place with the game and does not have era and cultural varieties).

 

[Temujin8k]

A while ago I already asked if people had interest in funding the development of DoC through Patreon. The main purpose I planned to use those funds for was to commission additional art from external artists. I am currently thinking about getting this going, and have already considered using some of my own money for this purpose.

While I have some ideas where this would make sense to use for, I also wanted to ask everyone else. So, the question is:

What graphics that are currently in the game should be most replaced with custom made, high quality replacements?

This can be anything. Leaderheads, unit art, building art, terrain art, interface icons, etc. Please do not suggest art for something that isn't in the game ("If we had art for leader X we could include them in the game"). Examples for this that come to my mind immediately are Topkapi Palace (which currently is a copy of the Hammam building), and Great Statesmen (both its button, and the unit art, which looks out of place with the game and does not have era and cultural varieties).

Kangxi leaderhead, please. Surprisingly, it's so hard to find a Qing emperor LH here in the forums. I agree with the Great Statesman art.

Iirc, the art for the Topkapi Palace is the Epoch 8-9 Middle Eastern Fortress art from Empire Earth II, although I'm also not sure myself how accurate that representation is.

 

[Leoreth]

Oh right, I think I changed Topkapi Palace at some point actually.

 

[ShinobiHus92]

How about some world wonders change their art style as time goes on? For example having the Colosseum look splendens and beautiful (current artsyle) in the classical era and slowly decays in the medieval, renaissance, modern era etc. This can also apply for the Pyramids, so during the ancient and classical it will look almost white with gold on top and in the later era's will look more how we know them today.

I don't think all wonders should have this treatment but iconic wonders like the Parthenon, the Sphinx, Temple of Kukulkan, Apadana Palace, maybe the Great Wall and Great Lighthouse definitely can.

Another interessting idea should be wonders that change their artstyle if a different civilization has control over it. It already happens when the Ottomans take Constantinople from the Byzantines the Hagia Sophia artstyle change from a church to a mosque. It can also happen with the Mezquita wonder if a christian Civ takes Cordoba it's artstyle can change to a church style Mezquita wonder.

It sounds awesome if only those art styles are available of course or someone that can make those art buildings.

 

[gatsby123]

Will you have any plan or think to add Korean Units graphics which i introduced in the forum? it may not perfect nor urgent thing but not costs

Korean Units Graphic revised (my suggest for next RFCD VD mod units update) | CivFanatics Forums

 

[Leoreth]

I have a ticket for it, yes.

 

[Genghis Khaiser]

I'd say the female Great General.

It's supposed to be Joan of Arc but looks like Saber from the Fate series.

 

[merijn_v1]

Instead of graphics, could it also be audio related? I think thay are very similar in this perspective. Things that come to mind are spoken tech quotes for the new techs and unit selection/order sounds for new civs. Female selection/order sounds would also be nice.

 

[Leoreth]

Oh, that's a good point. I think the scope of say, tech quotes is affordable for an independent voice actor because it is quite limited. Unit voice lines are more difficult because you need to find someone who is actually proficient in the target language (bound to be more obscure for what is lacking) while not being able to speak that language. Do you have a rundown of unit languages that are missing? Any particular voice actor in mind?

I tried to think of whose voice I consider appealing enough to want in this mod and who isn't too big of a name. And now I am wondering if we have Cecil Baldwin money.

 

[rmontaruli]

Language used for unit sentences is a hard deal in my opinion.
We are playing an historical game through centuries, and the spoken language changed a lot in these centuries.

I can tell for Italian language, but i think this is true for almost all languages.
Spoken Italian is a modern language and nobody spoke it in middle ages or renaissance... So it is very weird to listen a medieval italian unit to say any sentence in modern italian language.

A very good work should be to have different sentences in different ages as for building art, but i understand it should be a very hard work, and how useful? If everybody can appreciate different arts for buildings in different places and ages, who is able to recognize old japanese from modern japanese, if we hardly distinguish japanese from chinese language?

 

[Leoreth]

Well, yeah. But what you are talking about is much less of a problem than having Tibetan and Thai units speak Khmer and Congolese units speak Zulu.

 

[merijn_v1]

Oh, that's a good point. I think the scope of say, tech quotes is affordable for an independent voice actor because it is quite limited. Unit voice lines are more difficult because you need to find someone who is actually proficient in the target language (bound to be more obscure for what is lacking) while not being able to speak that language. Do you have a rundown of unit languages that are missing? Any particular voice actor in mind?

The language proficiency is indeed a limitation. But if we find someone, I think the unit sounds are about similarly affordable as tech quotes. Civs have 2x10 selection sounds.

Tab911 once made a list of selection/order sounds that could be added:
https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/all-present-and-accounted-for-the-voice-audio-thread.659237/

A question for the Canadians: Does Canadian English sound more like British English or American English? A simple change is changing the Canadian sounds from English to American if that is more appropriate.

Language used for unit sentences is a hard deal in my opinion.
We are playing an historical game through centuries, and the spoken language changed a lot in these centuries.

I can tell for Italian language, but i think this is true for almost all languages.
Spoken Italian is a modern language and nobody spoke it in middle ages or renaissance... So it is very weird to listen a medieval italian unit to say any sentence in modern italian language.

A very good work should be to have different sentences in different ages as for building art, but i understand it should be a very hard work, and how useful? If everybody can appreciate different arts for buildings in different places and ages, who is able to recognize old japanese from modern japanese, if we hardly distinguish japanese from chinese language?

I think most of the languages are the modern variation. I think a modern version of the language is more appropriate than a completely different language. And having the modern version has its upsides because they are more familiar. I think it's nice that I can understand a few unit sounds of some languages because I know a few words in that language. I very likely wouldn't be able to if it was the old language. (I think I would even struggle with medieval Dutch, despite Dutch being my first language)

 

[Leoreth]

I actually have first hand experience with this because Holy Rome uses Middle High German (?) which is distinctly different from the modern German the actual German civ uses. But this is kind of besides the point. You can poke a hundred holes into the unit voice over if you take that pedantic of a point of view. Language is continually changing and having the correct language for every point in time from 3000BC to 2020AD is an impossible endeavour, not to mention that most civilisations had multiple languages over the course of their history.

In my opinion, being bothered by historical discrepancies in different time periods for languages you are familiar with, while at the same time not caring about the differences in Asian languages because they all sound the same to you anyway because they are too unfamiliar, is essentially provincialism and cultural chauvinism. I'd rather challenge the latter attitude than indulge the former.

 

[DC123456789]

A question for the Canadians: Does Canadian English sound more like British English or American English? A simple change is changing the Canadian sounds from English to American if that is more appropriate.

American English, it's not even close. Most foreigners would probably find it difficult to tell the difference between Standard American and Standard Canadian.

 

[Tab911]

I was thinking for some of the missing languages we could try to enlist cheap, voice over websites.
Take Fiverr for example:
https://www.fiverr.com/search/gigs?...osition=1&ref=gender:male|language:indonesian
Here are loads of options for Indonesian languages which we currently need. There's many other languages as well, some of which have professional level recording equipment. It also wouldn't be difficult to get dialect specific ones as well for Spanish, English and Portuguese.

 

[black213]

The new Russian leaderhead's animations, as well as the some Latin American leaderheads (I can't remember any of their names) who share the same set of animations, could be a bit less... unnatural, I don't know how else to describe it. They look off to me, especially in their pleased state.

 

[Mr-Goriyaki]

I think we should replace the Old Hongwu LH with a new one. The old lh look more like Song Dynasty Emperor than Ming Dynasty one. Especially with the headwear.

 

[Leoreth]

Oh, that reminds me. It is driving me nuts how many Indian leaders are missing in the Civ4 community. I would love a more accurate Rajendra Chola, Tipu Sultan, and Shivaji Bhosle.

 

[Mr-Goriyaki]

Oh, that reminds me. It is driving me nuts how many Indian leaders are missing in the Civ4 community. I would love a more accurate Rajendra Chola, Tipu Sultan, and Shivaji Bhosle.

Yeah... I know what you feel.

 

[RichyC78]

I don't know if this is covered elsewhere, but Id quite like there to be video art of some of the Great Wonders, such as the Topkapi Palace, Borobudur, Himeji Castle.