Super Adventures in Face Editors III

This week on Super Adventures, it's been exactly one year since my second article about video game character creators and six years since the first, so this feels like the right time to bring the trilogy to its epic conclusion.

But this time around I'm not going to write paragraphs of text for each game going on and on about what sliders they have and how many hairstyles they include etc. You can check out the other two articles if that's what you're after:

Super Adventures in Face Editors I - Making Solid Snake
Super Adventures in Face Editors II - Making Lara Croft

And I'm not going to spend ages trying to accurately recreate a specific character either, getting each of the shapes and proportions exactly right. No, this time I'm just going to push the sliders to their limits and make some aliens! Or monsters. I'll take whatever I can get.

Well that's my plan anyway, but how many character editors actually have the power to create a truly alien looking creature? I'll need colourful skin tones, excessive proportions, weird hairstyles, pointy ears, bumpy foreheads... I predict Oblivion's going to do well.
 

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1991 - MIDWINTER II: FLAMES OF FREEDOM (AMIGA)

The first time I did a face editor article I wanted to start by checking out some interesting 2D character creators from the 16 bit era. Back then all I really found was Midwinter II, but I've had six years to do extra research since then and... I still haven't really come up with anything but Midwinter II I'm afraid. Nothing powerful enough to let you put together unusual or specific faces anyway.

But can Midwinter II pull off an alien?

Uh... not really, no. Though you can get some weirdness out of it for sure. It basically uses a photo-fit system where you cycle through different eyes, noses etc., but they haven't separated the different skin tones, so you can create some horrors by sticking the wrong pieces together.

2003 -  WWE SMACKDOWN! HERE COMES THE PAIN (PS2)

Someone told me that if I wanted to see proper character customisation I should check out the WWE SmackDown games, and man they weren't lying. I'm kind of regretting putting this list in chronological order now, because game #2 has probably just won the whole article.

It has all the colours you could want, weird hairstyles, accessories, and sliders for everything.

The sliders have some serious range to them as well, making it possible to come up with some genuinely alien creations. You can even add multiple layers of tattoos and facial hair.

In fact the only downsides I came across with this is that it looks like a PS2 game and the menus are slightly awkward. Things that should take two button presses take three, as you have to hit 'Decision' afterwards. Plus I expect some people might not get on with the soundtrack.

2004 - THE SIMS 2 (PC)

Okay maybe I was wrong and The Sims 2 actually wins the article? Perhaps not in skin tones or accessories, but definitely when it comes to sliders.

If you've got the expansion you can even make alien pets!

The character creator lets you choose a preset for different features and then adjust them from there. There's a slight bug in it though, as if you click a new preset in a different category it resets all the sliders. ALL the sliders. So you can go back into the other category and adjust them some more, pushing them way way past their limits.

Pushing things past their limits kind of breaks things a little, but they definitely look alien!

2006 - THE ELDER SCROLLS IV: OBLIVION (PC)

Oblivion's face editor is fairly powerful when it comes to sliders, but it's chaotic magic. Making aliens with it is easy, it's making humans that's tricky. It doesn't help that you're working in a gloomy prison cell so you can't see the actual colours.

It's cheating a bit though as you can make different races like lizard people and cat people, which look alien by default. (Note: this isn't the default).

2007 - MASS EFFECT (PC)

I don't know what the remastered Mass Effect is like, but the original doesn't have a particularly powerful editor. It's clearly designed to make fairly realistic looking humans with very military haircuts. But there's just enough range to get a bit of weirdness out of it.

2008 - FALLOUT 3 (PC)

Fallout 3's editor isn't much different to Oblivion's, except the viewing window is smaller so it's even harder to see what you're doing! It seems a bit more restrained however, as I wasn't able to go as nuts with the proportions and skin tones. Oh, plus you can't make a lizard man.

2008 - SAINTS ROW 2 (PC)

I knew Saints Row 2 wouldn't disappoint me. Okay it disappointed me on skin tones and you can't go too crazy with the sliders, but there's a lot of scope here for fine-tuning your bizarre faces.

2008 - WHITE KNIGHT CHRONICLES (PS3)

White Knight Chronicles has a fairly powerful editor with plenty of sliders to play with. There's no options here to give your character horns or whatever, but those sliders have a surprising amount of range to them. Enough to distort a pretty anime hero into... this.

2009 - DEMONS' SOULS (PS3)

I decided I wanted my Demons' Souls alien to look like a fish and it turned out that the editor has the power to make my dream come to life. You can really distort faces in this, in a similar way to the Oblivion editor.

It's just a shame the window's so unnecessarily tiny.

2009 - DRAGON AGE: ORIGINS (PC)

I was expecting Dragon Age to be roughly as disappointing as Mass Effect, but there's definitely more scope here to really stretch a face. Though I did cheat a bit, as I picked a dwarf and an elf, and they're not 100% human looking to start with.

2010 - STAR TREK ONLINE (PC)

To be honest I expected Star Trek Online to be the undisputed winner of this article, as it has an actual alien creator built in. But to be fair I decided to see if I could make an alien with just the human settings and yeah I think that's kind of alien looking. Shame you have to put your face right up to the screen to see it because of how small it is. It's even worse in-game because the character won't stop moving.

Alright, now I'll switch to alien mode and show off what this editor can really do...

Oh c'mon what? I hadn't finished, I'm still editing! Okay game, how about you let me continue with my alien, and I'll let you continue attempting to reconnect in the background?

Nope, it kicked me back to the menu. And it wants me to type in my password again! I haven't got time for this, I've got 3 million other faces to make today.

Good thing I already made this image for my last Face Editors article. All the bumpy foreheads you could dream of are here for you to choose from.

Though that reminds me, I got a comment on that article from thekelvingreen saying:

"I like the idea of recreating other franchises' aliens in Star Trek Online. It would be cool to see Londo Mollari in Super Adventures in Face Editors III, or one of those dudes from Space Precinct."

So now I've got to give that a try and see how close I can get. Can Star Trek Online take on the Londo Mollari challenge (I think I already know the answer to this one).

Nope, it was a total failure. Londo from Babylon 5 basically looks like a human with his hair combed up in a fan shape, so I was relying on Star Trek Online's hairstyle selection and ability to fine-tune facial features, and unfortunately both fell way short.

But maybe the editor will have more luck with a truly alien looking alien from Space Precinct.

Surprisingly, yeah it did! I could've spent more time fine-tuning the skin tone, and the editor wouldn't let me pull the eyes out far enough, but that's a much better match than I expected.

You can't do Chewbacca though so the game's pretty much a waste of time.

2011 - DARK SOULS (PC)

Dark Souls was the spiritual successor to Demons' Souls and when it comes to the character creator it lives up to its predecessor. It wouldn't let me go too wild with the colours, but those sliders have a bit of power to them. You can't really tell from the screenshot as there's no self-shadowing, but the guy on the right's nose is inside out.

2012 - DRAGON'S DOGMA: DARK ARISEN (PC)

Dragon's Dogma gets a lot of praise for its character creator, partly because things like your character's height have actual gameplay implications. Unfortunately it's not all that great at making weird faces. Limited skin tones, limited sliders. It's a bit disappointing really.

2013 - GTA ONLINE (PC)

GTA Online's character creator is pretty much unrivalled when it comes to messing up a character's skin. You can go wild with the moles, skin damage, wrinkles, blemishes etc. It's kind of limited at everything else though, as this is the most alien looking creature I could get out of it.

2013 - SAINTS ROW IV (PC)

Saints Row IV, on the other hand, has the power to give you some proper weirdness. It has a billion sliders and options to play with. In fact it doesn't just have different tones, you can also make things metallic.

Okay maybe the face paint is a bit limited, I could only create Lion-O there because that leopard paint was one of the options, but it's certainly among the most powerful editors I've used so far.

2014 - DRAGON AGE: INQUISITION (PC)

Dragon Age: Inquisition, on the other hand, does not have a powerful editor. Sure these two look pretty weird, but the guy on the left is an elf and the one on the right is a Qunari, so they started off looking a bit strange. Plus all editing has to take place in this zone of absolute green, so it's hard to get an idea of what any of the tones actually look like.

2014 - ELITE DANGEROUS (XBOX ONE)

Elite Dangerous does have a fair amount of options and even a couple of weird sci-fi eyes, but this is as far as the sliders and skin tones go. It's not as powerful as you'd hope. Also I couldn't actually apply that eye tattoo as it costs 200 ARX and that's apparently half of the most you can earn in a week!

2014 - THE SIMS 4 (PC)

The Sims 4 is far less powerful than The Sims 2, mostly because it's less broken. Instead of moving sliders you click and drag parts of the face directly, and they don't drag very far. Plus the skin tones are a bit limited. But I think it did alright with these two.

2015 - BLADESTORM: NIGHTMARE (XBOX ONE)

Bladestorm: Nightmare has a few options to play with. You get green, blue and pink skin tones, those weird eyes, and the sliders can give you something moderately horrifying, but I still wasn't all that impressed by it. For one thing maxing out the cheek slider seems to have given the guy on the left fins along his jaw for some reason.

On the other hand, if you want a choice of hair styles, the game has you covered. You can't get a quick preview of them, but these two each had 111 to pick from and they weren't the same set! Though some of them were obviously flipped versions of other styles. It also loses points for the painted-on beards and the fact that the character keeps breathing really heavily during the whole process and it's distracting.

When it comes to editing bodies however...

I'm not sure anything else here can match it. Well, except for Star Trek: Online, but that's designed to make aliens.

2015 - FALLOUT 4 (PC)

Fallout 4's similar to The Sims 4, as you drag the face directly, except it's even more limited. This is as alien I as I could get these two looking I'm afraid.

2015 - XENOBLADE CHRONICLES X (Wii U)

Xenoblade Chronicles X editor is even more limited. It has some awesome looking eyes and plenty of skin and hair tones, but you're stuck with just a few preset faces. There's no sliders here whatsoever. Plus there's only one kind of moustache! I did find some nice butterfly face paint though, which helps.

2016 - THE ELDER SCROLLS V: SKYRIM - SPECIAL EDITION (PC)

Skyrim's character editor is a bit rubbish really. It's bad for making specific people and it's just as bad if you want to go weird. But the game does let you create orcs, lizard people, cat people and elves, so you've got four kinds of aliens right there.

They came out looking pretty good as well. If you didn't know better you might think these were a result of a lot of hard work, and not just the defaults with the colours altered a bit and proportions tweaked slightly.

2017 - MASS EFFECT: ANDROMEDA (PC)

Mass Effect: Andromeda's character creator is even more keen for you to play as an normal looking human than Mass Effect 1, which is slightly weird seeing as there are so many aliens in the game. There's plenty of scope to mess with the eye and hair colours, and it's got all kinds of sci-fi tattoos, scars and makeup, but this is as far as the sliders go.

2018 - MY TIME AT PORTIA (PC)

My Time at Portia's characters look cartoony to begin with, so stretching the proportions to their limits doesn't really make them look all that alien. The different skin tones definitely help though; it's got all the colours you could want. Not a whole lot of hairstyles however, and you can't make your character bald.

2019 - BLACK DESERT ONLINE: REMASTERED (PC)

Black Desert's editor is famous for its power and how awesome the characters look. You can even sculpt the way their hair flows. Unfortunately for me right now it's really really keen for you to make pretty anime people and even though you can click and drag parts of the face directly you can't drag them very far. That guy in the right basically had that face to begin with because of the preset I'd chosen.

2019 - CODE VEIN (PC)

Code Vein doesn't do face sculpting at all, the only faces you can make with it are preset anime ones, and the skin tones are limited. But it's got some powerful features for sticking stuff onto those faces, like ears, horns, glowing wings etc. It also has some impressive eye creation tools, letting you pick unusual textures and fine-tune every aspect of them, and it has a billion eyebrows to pick from.

It also lets you build up custom hairstyles by adding strands and ponytails etc. which is a feature I don't remember seeing anywhere else. The editor's really doing its own thing and it's fantastic at it. Well, except for when you're trying to move accessories into position, then it can get a bit awkward.

2019 - THE OUTER WORLDS (PC)

The Outer Worlds basically isn't even trying. You can make the nose a little bigger, or maybe even a little smaller! I could drag the sliders a bit, I could also play around the eye colour and give them slightly green-tinged skin, but this is another editor that just wants you to make very normal looking people

2019 - THE SURGE 2 (PC)

The Outer Worlds can't even compete with The Surge 2 however. You can make any kind of face you want in this, as long as it looks extremely similar to one of the presets. It does give you a 'fullness' slider to play with, but otherwise you're just picking different shapes from a limited selection and then leaving them as they are. This is the most extreme, bizarre, alien face the editor would permit me to make.

2020 - SAINTS ROW: THE THIRD - REMASTERED (PC)

Alright, that's what you want!

Saints Row: The Third - Remastered's editor is pretty much the same as it always was (so it's like Saints Row IV except with a few less options), but the higher detail models and textures make a real difference. I pushed the sliders to their limits here and they still look awesome.

2021 - PHANTASY STAR ONLINE 2: NEW GENESIS (PC)

Finally there's Phantasy Star Online 2: New Genesis's editor, which seems to be basically the same as Phantasy Star Online 2's editor as far as I can tell.

It's a powerful character creator, with plenty of sliders and options, you can even give people horns or vampire teeth if you want, or make them into a robot. But the way it's designed means that you can drag the dots and sliders as far as you like and you'll still end up with a pretty anime hero afterwards.

Well, maybe you can push it a little.

You can't go as wild as in the Saints Row games or WWE SmackDown, but there's a lot of scope for creativity here. And you can even save your creations!

Here's Phantasy Star Online 2 for comparison, just because I created these two a while back and wanted to show them off. PSO2 definitely had a more interesting background to its editor.

Plus it seems like a bunch of the options in the PSO2-NG menu are for PSO2 characters only, which is strange. Don't know what's going on there. In fact I don't know anything about this game, I've only ever played around in the character creator.


CONCLUSION

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Alright, here's my pick for the top five best and worst editors to make aliens in (out of the ones I've just written about):

Best:

• WWE SmackDown
• The Sims 2
• Star Trek Online
• Saints Row: The Third - Remastered
  
• Phantasy Star Online 2: New Genesis
  

Maybe these each feature a powerful editor in its own way, maybe I just like it when games' title includes a word beginning with 'S'.

Worst:

• Midwinter II
• Mass Effect
• GTA Online
• Mass Effect: Andromeda
• The Surge 2
  

What I'm taking away from this is that you should avoid games with names beginning with 'M', at least if you want to go strange with your character creation.

Okay I think I've played with character creators enough now, there's no need for a Super Adventures in Face Editors VI next year, I can finally uninstall all these games and free up some space on my hard drive. Well, perhaps not all of the games...

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Thanks for reading! Super Adventures will return next week with another mysterious game. Well, it's mysterious to everyone who hasn't recognised it from that tiny clue on the left that is. Let me know if you've figured it out.

You can also leave a comment about video game character creators if you want, or if you want to type a sequence of shorter comments and get a more immediate response you could drop by the Super Adventures Discord.