Animation Source Forums

Personality 6/10: He should have a little more personality

history: 7/10: Its not bad but still need some work

Design 9/10: Very nice design you got there

7.5/10; Over all.

I have a new character named Windseeker.

6/10 The design is too simple and a bit hard to see, the personality is a bit vague, and the character overall just seems to be too perfect. Saying that a lot of dogs have a crush on her but she doesn't on them and that she's strong and smart all the time is a bit too overwhelming in my opinion. She doesn't seem to have a single fault, and is a bit too... as I said, perfect. Although the history is alright and written well.

Roger?

7/10, its not that bad, a good long bio, good detaioled pictures. only down fall is that the history and personality should be a bit longer.


Colia anyone?

Ehhh,

Colia has a nice personality. It's fitting for, you know, a new person who is thrown into a big group (a pack, in this case). Meek.
It would be good to show us how she is friendly if she is shy, and you could elaborate on that more to make it clear. Because, I mean, shy and quiet yet friendly at the same time? How would that work? Well, you would need to explain it.

She has a nice design. I like it, but I think she's quite the mix. lol

The history... eh... How do I say this... it's a bit short. I don't understand why a dog would suddenly just abandon a pup she's been taking care of. In life, a mother animal would only do that if she knew the baby wasn't going to survive. Of course, this is not realistic, so I can dismiss that. It seems a bit... cliche (sp, accent?) though. I believe that you can elaborate on the history and the personality some more!

Also, please correct the grammar mistakes. :> (this won't take away any points from the rating)

I give Colia a 6.8/10. I believe the bio could use a bit more refining. :>






Lapis, anyone?

*deleted*

The ears are something more anatomy-wise, not really character-wise. Art =/= Character.
Also, if one were to look at a picture of a husky's ears or an Icelandic Sheepdog's ears, they are not that large and are around the same size in the pictures.

As for the baby blue, it's a part of her genetics. Her mother Kit is around the same colour as the blue.

(Please note that this character is for a contest and is not official until the winners are announced.)

Now,
onto Kali's rating.




It's hard to see the design, and the chain around her neck is not too visible either.

So, she's always strong, smart, and a lot of dogs like her?
'Perfect' character.
A bit too 'perfect.'

It's almost as if she has no flaws to her, so what I would suggest is elaborating on her personality. Give us why she is this way or that. Give examples of that why. Also, I would change the 'perfect'-ness about her. Give her some flaws, as it almost makes it impossible to 'beat' her. No dog or thing is perfect, and they can always be defeated.

An example would be like Superman. He's strong and everything, but he has weaknesses that can hurt him badly.
One of them is kryptonite(sp?). That's kind of how it works in balancing a character.

Her breed. Okay, she has a lot of breeds mixed into her. Yet... if you look at her and her breeds, she really only looks like an erect-eared bloodhound. I would suggest throwing in her other breeds to make it more believable and realistic, and if not, you could always take out the breeds.

Her history is alright. It was kind of hard to read because of the huge type and grammar errors, so I would ask someone to help you fixe that. *A*
Anyways, it's nice, but a bit too familiar and well-used. Basically, she lives on the streets, has to move, ends up with so-and-so, sees her friend, and makes a group. This was oddly familiar to me, and I believe that you could have said the history in a couple of sentences. (Honestly, histories were the part where I went "BLEH" and gave up on even trying to write it, but I still put creativity into it.)

Overall, around a 5/10... (I'm kind of bad at giving ratings. xD Also, don't be insulted if I give a low rating. :I I'm only giving you what you asked for. )




May I ask for another person to rate Lapis?
I'd like to have a person thoroughly make a rating on her. Which means, please do a decent rating and actually say where faults in the character's BIO are, not the picture. I like the design as is and am keeping it that way (though the tail design might change to what I originally had on the first drawings of Lapis.)

No offense to the other rater, but I can't exactly 'fix' on her if she does make it through the contest. I'd like to perfect the bio and see where I can work on / improve on in character bios.

9.5/10
She's such a lovely character. I seriously fell in love with her. <3 Her design is gorgeous, but her personality and history top it all off. I love how her personality coordinates with the history and how every little thing she's come to be has a reason behind it. I also like how you were able to make such a great history without adding so much tradgedy, something that I find difficult to accomplish. She's honestly amazing, and the only thing I would have to critique is the fact of her anger. I believe it comes from when she was a pup, but it confuses me a bit. For some reason, I feel it doesn't fit as well with the rest of her personality. Or maybe it can be explained as to why it's so contrasting?

Gah, I put the wrong link last time. Whoops. Could someone please rate Roger?

Alright everyone, before I proceed with rating, let me give you all a few words of advice on how to rate a character well. Why? Because reading through this topic, I've seen quite a few people who seem to be rating the character page rather than the character itself, or judging by personal preference. Not all of you, of course, but a decent amount. (though it seems to have been a tad better the last few pages.)

There are multiple things that make a character a good character. Design, though it's not the most important aspect, can certainly contribute to another's appeal to the character. So how dose one rate a design? NOT BY SIMPLICITY/COMPLEXITY. I've seen spectacular characters who are simply-designed and spectacular ones who are complexly-designed. On the flip side, I've also seen not-so-great examples of each. The complexity or simplicity of the markings doesn't really make too much of a difference. Then how do you rate a design? Simply ask yourself: Do the colors coordinate, or do they clash? Are the combinations visually appealing?
It doesn't matter if it's a sparkledog or a naturally-colored one; that's up to the creator's preferences. So long as the colors cooperate, I see no reason for a character of any markings to be given a low design rating.

Next, personality. This is important--the personality decides how a character acts and reacts to a given situation. Now, don't rate a character low because he/she is a jerk, or perhaps you wouldn't like him/her if you were to meet him/her in life. We're not looking for a "good-person" rating here, we're looking for a character rating. Believe me, I've seem characters who I would have despised if they were real--I even have a few myself--but I would still give them decent ratings if they their personality was well-thought-out and thorough. Likewise, don't highly rate a character that you think sounds nice, but is shallow, ie doesn't have a very developed personality. Also, be aware of the Mary-Sue/Gary Stu characters--in other words, "perfect" characters who have no faults. They are not well-done characters.

Now, history. This, tied together with personality, is one of the most important parts of a character. A good history can really make or break the whole thing. HOWEVER, a good history and a long history are NOT the same thing! While more often than not, a good history is long, a long history is NOT always good. Be sure to read through the history in search of, for deducting points, bits not thoroughly explained, overused or "cheesey" plotpoints, the character not acting as described in "personality", etc. For extra points, look for things such as realistic situations/reactions, a unique story, well-thought-out plotpoints, etc. Also look for whether or not the character changes, for better or for worse, throughout his/her history. Dynamic characters are just about always better than static characters.

Last but not least, do not, I repeat, DO NOT rate characters by the following things!:
1.) The artwork. The skills of the artist, or whether he/she used a lineart, render, or drawing, make NO DIFFERENCE to the character his/herself! Likewise, whether they used a reference sheet, a full-out digital picture, a scanned picture, etc, it DOESN'T MATTER. Unless it's not colored, in which case you won't be able to accurately rate the design, THE PICTURE ITSELF DOSE NOT CHANGE THE CHARACTER.

2.) Personal preferences. DO NOT, DO NOT, DO NOT rate a character by your personal preferences! By this I mean stuff like, "oh nice, but I don't like sparkledogs,", "not bad, but I only like emo characters", "good history, but I'm not a fan of human characters", etc. It doesn't matter what you like don't like, what matters is the quality of the character!


-phew- Felt good to get that off my chest! Now on with the game--here's my rating for Kali:


General Bio: 10/10
I liked how you explained all her traits from the different breeds.

Design: 10/10

Personality: 7/10
I do like that you mentioned different aspects of her personality come out with different situations. On the flip side, though, some of her traits seem to be rather contradictory. You mention that she's really friendly and outgoing with her friends, but then later say that she's shy with strangers. I can see how you could be friendly with your friends but not with strangers, but I'm not so sure about being outgoing, yet also shy. I think usually, outgoing people are nearly always outgoing; part of that trait is, I think, not being shy. Also, saying that she is always strong and smart seems just a tad Mary-Sueish to me.

History: 9/10
Not nescarily the best history I've ever read, but I didn't really see anything particularly wrong with it, other than that I think it was a tad random for Kali to go "oh hey yeah, let's start a gang!" out of the blue like that.

Overall: 9/10
Could use just a few tweaks here and there, but overall, very nice! Great work.


How about Casser?

Personality: 10/10

I saw no down points in the history, witch seemed to be very different, not often characters personalitys change as they get older. So yea, no down points there

History: 10/10

Long, descriptive, and VERY nicely done. No Down points here either.

Bio it's self: 9/10

doesn't really explain the parent's, but everything else very nice.

bio picture: 9.8/10

i LOVE his design only down point was that you can't really erad the text.

Overall: 9.6/10


I like another review from different person on Colia.

8.5/10 She's a nice character, but I feel you could elaborate a little more. For example, why is she a bit stubborn? What exactly caused that? And her history is a bit fuzzy... like how did her parents die? She's an awesome character, though! I think a little more elaboration and she'd be set!

Can someone help me improve Nika? I've been trying to figure out what's off about her, but for some reason it's coming up blank.