Sprites =/= Actual Looks

[Kirby Phelps (PK)]

There's something I really don't get about the character sprites in FFV. The sprites are totally different from what the characters really look like. Bartz looks like he has spikey Goku hair in his sprite, but he actually just has normal brown hair. Lenna and Faris are especially confusing. Lenna's sprite has long pink hair, but she actually has super short blond hair. And Faris' sprite has long purple hair, but he actually has long blond hair in a ponytail, and looks A LOT like Edgar from FFVI. Speaking of which, FFVI does the same thing. Terra's sprite has green hair, but she actually has blond hair. Locke's sprite has him wearing a headband, but he actually wheres a bandana that makes him look A LOT like Firion from FFII. Why did the Final Fantasy creators decide to do this? It's so confusing.

 

[V_Translanka]

Yoshitaka Amano isn't a spriter, go figure...It's someone taking someone else's work & trying to fit it in a different context...Sometimes such goes alright, many times, though, things get lost in translation...

 

[Big Casino]

When playing FFIV, in game Cecil looks like he has purple hair but on his image in the main menu his hair is clearly blonde, This has always irritated me greatly. I dont know why they dont make it blonde.

 

[Blitz]

This is what happens when you take fine art, and try and make a small Pixle based character that has minimal animation out of it.
Besides, who says they can't change hair styles and perhaps wear different cloths every now and then? Even if we never see them shower through out the whole quest.

I mean, whats the deal, where is my nude Sprite Shower Scene?

 

[Kirby Phelps (PK)]

I'm sure they could have animated a sprite of what the characters actually looked like.

 

[EVA]

When playing FFIV, in game Cecil looks like he has purple hair but on his image in the main menu his hair is clearly blonde, This has always irritated me greatly. I dont know why they dont make it blonde.

I always thought it was silver. O_O

 

[Kirby Phelps (PK)]

I always thought it was silver. O_O

Yeah it's definitely silver. Or silverish-white.

 

[SaShman]

I don't know why they didn't stick to the original designs. Maybe the spriters thought that the original designs wouldn't look good in sprite form. With Terra for example, they might have given her green hair so that she stood out and looked significantly different to Celes. Likewise they might have changed Bartz's appearance so he stood out as a main character.

 

[Bambi]

Lets try to avoid one liners guys, these are considerd spam and will be deleted in future

 

[Ryushikaze]

Rosa has a similar issue, appearing as a brunette in battle, despite her obviously blonde hair. FFII and III had similar issues, but made worse by the even more limited pallet.

The sprites were constrained to a limited size, and there were things lost in translation. For some reason, blonde hair was the first thing to go.

 

[Dionysos]

I'm sure they could have animated a sprite of what the characters actually looked like.

Not really. Amano's designs were complicated.. Amano made great art but the designs were not practical to be converted to sprites of that size.
Things had to be simplified and, to make up for that, colours were changed to make characters appear as unique..
E.g Terra was made green haired to distinguish her from Celes... Faris and Lenna/Reina were given different coloured hair in order to distinguish them from each other (having 2 blonde females may have been confusing).

Sprite artists worked seperately from Amano.. When they couldn't get anything like Amano's creations on a sprite they compromised, and went a little beserk in order to still portray the characters as unique, though not having Amano's intended qualities in some of the characters.

 

[SaShman]

E.g Terra was made green haired to distinguish her from Celes... Faris and Lenna/Reina were given different coloured hair in order to distinguish them from each other (having 2 blonde females may have been confusing).

Sprite artists worked seperately from Amano.. When they couldn't get anything like Amano's creations on a sprite they compromised, and went a little beserk in order to still portray the characters as unique, though not having Amano's intended qualities in some of the characters.

I understand what you mean, I can't help but find it funny though that they changed both Faris and Lenna's hair to pink. I mean they could have made one a brunette or left one blonde (though that may have caused some confusion with Krile). But yeah I get what you mean, it does make them stand out alot more.

In a way I'm kinda glad that they did change the hair color on a few characters, it would be kinda boring otherwise considering the majority of the original designs were blonde. Take FFVI for example, If Terra remained blonde we would have her, Celes, Locke, Edgar, Sabin and Relm. My whole final party would have been blonde!

 

[Kirby Phelps (PK)]

Not really. Amano's designs were complicated.. Amano made great art but the designs were not practical to be converted to sprites of that size.
Things had to be simplified and, to make up for that, colours were changed to make characters appear as unique..
E.g Terra was made green haired to distinguish her from Celes... Faris and Lenna/Reina were given different coloured hair in order to distinguish them from each other (having 2 blonde females may have been confusing).

Sprite artists worked seperately from Amano.. When they couldn't get anything like Amano's creations on a sprite they compromised, and went a little beserk in order to still portray the characters as unique, though not having Amano's intended qualities in some of the characters.

....huh...I could have sworn Faris was a guy...

 

[Dionysos]

....huh...I could have sworn Faris was a guy...

Nope. Sorry to spoil it for you, as you haven't got past Ship Graveyard yet it seems.. but theres a scene

Spoiler

that reveals her as a she there... and hence she is described as from them on. She pretended to be a man as a pirate in order to be accepted among them.

Also Faris has different hair to Reina. Reina is a very bright pink, whereas Faris is more of a purple, so you can tell them apart.

 

[Kirby Phelps (PK)]

Nothing makes sense anymore!!!!!!

 

[Fusionist]

Whoa I feel dumb all of a sudden. I always assumed that Amano's art was after the sprites were made, not vice versa xD

But yeah, there's a world of difference between sketches and pixels. And I suppose the odd colours would be beneficial to differentiate among the characters, especially in the original 2D game. You see so many NPCs running around that look the same, but change one of their hair colours, and it's easy to see that they are more than just a random sprite to fill up the area or something.