New Run Anims Threaten Art Team's Main Goal

[YggdraIO]

Just posted the below on the official forums. I know a lot of people feel strongly about this, so if you do, head over there and bump the thread.


(TL;DR at bottom)

As someone who plays a male Night Elf I was discouraged when I heard rumblings from beta players about them having a lackluster model--especially combined with the fact they weren't given an artcraft. Even more concerning, however, were the videos pointing out their new run animation. I logged in on patch night and was pleasantly surprised with the new model. Keeping the art team's main goal in mind--to "update" models without sacrificing their identity--I believed people had overreacted, and that the transition was pretty faithful, overall. What I hadn't expected, however, was for this goal to be compromised to the extent it has been by such a major revision to the run animation.

First, let me say, I applaud the team for taking on new character models. It's an incredibly challenging task from the outset knowing there will be inevitable backlash based on people's strong feelings of attachment to their avatars. Also, the team did a great job. The models look excellent, overall, and succeed when it comes to their primary goal, mentioned above. This is why it is somewhat baffling to me that the team spent so much time adhering to this philosophy only to revise some race animations to the extent that the characters no longer feel like the ones we've grown accustomed to playing.

At the end of the day, new models are very important. We all love to pan around in our favorite transmog and check out the new faces and detail, but in reality, it is the movements of our (almost always armored) characters that we've been experiencing throughout the years. In the case of the male Night Elf--and there seems to be a consensus that it is the most egregious, though I've seen other players voice concern over other races, male Trolls for instance--the animation feels more akin to a Pandaren, and in my opinion, not only feels rushed, but completely illogical for the demeanor of the race.

TL;DR: Some of the new run animations are such a departure from what we've grown accustomed to that they compromise our ability to enjoy the new models.

[Artarist]

They look pretty much identical to the Wildstar animations. I guess everyone needs a little bounce in their step. I like my dwarf animations. Some of the other races I could stand to see replaced.

[snuzzle]

There are plenty of new model threads already existing on the official forums. Why make your own thread rather than adding to one of those?

[Blithe]

Male Night Elf was one of the biggest outcry's among my friends and guild, and more than half of those people who played them have race changed already. I agree with them as personally looking at the running animation is enough to turn me off without giving the rest of the model a second glance, but I'm glad they were able to appeal to some people instead of ruining it for absolutely everybody. Glad you're happy with it.

[YggdraIO]

I wanted to try to get a thread going with a focus on run animation as I hadn't seen one crop up, while all the while seeing it mentioned constantly inside other non-bumped threads.

[ro9ue]

I totally agree. When I saw my new characters at first I was like.. ok this is sweet. Extra details there in the face if you look closely, but you could barely notice that it was different with armor on (which was likely the goal). Then the second I started to run forward on my orc.... I was like WHAT?!?!?! It was extremely bouncy and totally not like the original run animation which seemed much more realistic. The bouncy runs unfortunately spanned across ALL of my characters. It's some sort of exaggerated animation style which looks like the Pandaren and a style I don't find very appealing. Definitely true they nailed the models for the most part, but the animations are ridiculous.

[Deleted]

haters are grasping at straws now. If you don't want the new models, turn them off. Didn't see anything wrong on my orc or troll chars, and the NE I was shown wasn't bad, either. This includes running animations.

[MinTDH]

Found these literally on like the first three pages.

http://www.mmo-champion.com/threads/...and-troll-male
http://www.mmo-champion.com/threads/...male-!-Finally
http://www.mmo-champion.com/threads/...the-new-models

[Celista]

I'm almost certain the male night elf run will be adjusted. The model looks great imo, but that run causes a lot of motion sickness with the default camera settings. Players might be able to adjust to it after some gameplay, but it's rather jarring initially...

[Splenda]

As pointed out, there are other threads on this.