Customizable player avatar in a 2D Game

Question

How can I have that functionality in my game through which the players can change their hairstyle, look, style of clothes, etc., and so whenever they wear a different item of clothing their avatar is updated with it.

Should I:

• Have my designer create all possible combinations of armor, hairstyles, and faces as sprites (this could be a lot of work).

• When the player chooses what they should look like during their introduction to the game, my code would automatically create this sprite, and all possible combinations of headgear/armor with that sprite. Then each time they select some different armor, the sprite for that armor/look combination is loaded.

• Is it possible to have a character's sprite divided into components, like face, shirt, jeans, shoes, and have the pixel dimensions of each of these. Then whenever the player changes his helmet, for example, we use the pixel dimensions to put the helmet image in place of where its face image would normally be. (I'm using Java to build this game)

• Is this not possible in 2D and I should use 3D for this?

• Any other method?

Please advise.

Answer 1

One major factor to consider is animation. If a character has armour with shoulder pads, those shoulderpads may need to move with his torso. Likewise, if he's wearing boots, those have to follow the same cycles as hid bare feet would.

Essentially what you need for your designers is a Sprite Sheet that lets your artists see all possible frames of animation for your base character. You then have them create custom hairstyles, boots, armour, etc. based on those sheets. Yes, its a lot of work, but in most cases, the elements will require a minimal amount of redrawing; boots are about the only thing I could see really taking a lot of work to re-create since they change over multiple frames of animation. Be rutheless with your sprites, try to cut down the required number as much as possible.

After you've amassed a library of elements you can start cheating. Recycle the same hair style and adjust its colour either in Photoshop or directly in the game with sliders in your character creator.

The last step, to ensure good performance in-game, would be to flatten all the different elements' sprite sheets into a single sprite sheet that is then split up and stored in sprite buffers.