...Cat? Cat. Hm? Did she say something about being a cat? Cats, cats, cats, cats, cats... So it has become fairly obvious that a large portion of the Starbound community want an anthropomorphic version of their favorite cute, fuzzy animal to be a playable race... I've also noticed a large amount of the threads suggesting that the developers incorporate such a race into Starbound. The most remarkable traits of these threads are their abundance, their diversity, and their low quality (with a few exceptions Shout out to Meldazzar, The Liberi are awesome!) Now, surely, not all of these races can be included in Starbound. Even if the devs took the time to code the myriad of different mammalian races that have been suggested, the quality of the game would suffer as a result of the game being over-saturated with a horde of overly similar races. My idea is simple. Rather than having a separate race each for cat-people, dog-people, fox-people, rabbit people, squirrel-people, rat-people, wolf-people, hamster-people, badger-people, chinchilla-people, mongoose-people, etc, etc, etc... Rather than having that many separate races be so similar, why not have on generalized beast race from which you could create characters that look like cats, dogs, foxes, rabbits, squirrels, rats, wolves, hamsters, badgers, chinchillas, mongooses, etc, etc, etc... I think such a race could be achieved my having their character creation hair styles be ear styles, having a large number of different fur color options which include patterns inspired by actual species, and having their unique feature be facial style. A caveat might be having to limit what combinations the random character gen can spit out for NPCs (as to avoid monstrosities), while giving players free reign to mix and match features. For those who need some imagery This idea was inspired my Namco's character Klonoa, the cat with weird rabbit like lop ears. I actually managed to dig up a redesign concept that would've kept Klonoa's facial style while giving him a new ear style. The main problem with this suggestion is how overwhelming it might be to implement such a race. That's why I'm a bit hesitant to get into details. In the end, this idea might have to be split into two seperate races for animals more cat-like and animals more dog like. As for culture for a generalized beast race... Being Starbound we have to go against expectations, right? I had two ideas for a culture that could be interesting. One was for a hip-hop inspired culture. Y'know, gangstas dat be ballin', real Saints Row 2 styled stuff, because the biggest irony would be a cat that acts like Snoop Dogg. That might be ripping off PaRappa the Rapper though... My other idea would be a culture that borrows elements from American culture post-Wild West pre-Hippies. Like the twenties through the fifties, or somewhere around there. I just like the idea of an anthropomorphic lop-eared rabbit with a fedora wielding a Tommy gun in true gangster style. Of course it wouldn't be restricted to elements from organized crime. I thought it'd be really cool if the armor was vintage style officer uniforms. Who doesn't want a cool M. Bison hat? So what do you guys think? I have to apologize for my non-linear thought process in writing this post, but surely someone here finds it coherent... I should also say I'm sorry for the lack of pictures that aren't crap, but this is more of a conceptual idea than a full fledged race suggestion. The idea might need some polishing, but that's why I carefully chose my words to be approachable. I just thought it'd be better if I actually put my idea out there, regardless of whether or not it has a tangible impact on the game. Cats, cats, cats cats cats. Back in the day, it's like cats cats cats... Edit: So it's been a good twenty days, and I feel there still hasn't been any decent suggestions on a so-called "furry" race in that time frame, so I've decided to return to this idea. First, I'd like to clarify that I'm not a furry, just in case anyone was thinking to use that idea to taunt me. I'm just trying to find a way that we can address this really obvious issue in a way that brings the most happiness to the most people possible, while annoying the least amount of people possible. Also, I'd like to thank the people who've posted in this thread and liked the OP even though I've been too much of a unresponsive, apprehensive jerkbag to actually reply. Autzome and Sinaqui gave me a pretty good idea. Now, I'm assuming that it'd be extremely inconvenient to incorporate into the game a race in which every member of said race had an extra appendage that other races lacked. The appendage I'm referring to is a tail. All mammals have a tail at one point in their development; in humans, it is present for a period of 4 weeks, during stages 14 to 22 of human embryogenesis. It'd be easy to add tails as a back slot item that behaves similarly to the epic scarves and capes we've seen already, but that doesn't make much sense, does it? It doesn't unless, we add a bit of character to the race and say that, like humans, in their evolution to a sentient bipedal species, they lost their natural tail. Then, we can say that certain members of some species still wear artificial, tail-like accessories for either the style or as a call back to older ways. "But doesn't that mean that every race would be able to equip tails?" Now let's go meta for a second. People like cute things. People like cute animals. Wouldn't it make sense for a race composed entirely of cute animals to take advantage of that? Wouldn't it make sense for a race composed entirely of cute animals to try and monetize off of that? Level with me. Let's say the race acknowledges that amongst the various other races there are those that think that the idea of anthropomorphic cat people is "like, super totally kawaii." Don't tell me that that interferes with other races lore because it doesn't. There will be individuals like that and they will most likely all be players. I'd be surprised if a few animal related accessories aren't already in the game, but if they aren't, then a cool way to incorporate them would be to have this yet-unnamed beast race be selling accessories that make they're wearer more resemble said race. And the tails. The tails they technically said race technically doesn't have. So that's that, I guess. Some things to note: -This suggestion is probably never going to be as fleshed out as other race suggestions, because I feel there's nothing more annoying than fans telling devs exactly how they should handle parts of their game when said fans barely know anything about the games systems to begin with. -I don't think I'm going to make any sort of official art to be associated with this suggestions post because I'm terrible at anything art related. I didn't even want to add images to this thread, but decided I had to from a presentation standpoint. -I have no idea why I've even bothered at this point... When I realized it, my notebook was filled with pictures of dying cats... Please post your thoughts, comments, and insults directed at me below. ↓ It's not like this took me 3(+!) hours to type or anything...
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This. A million times this. I'd love this to be in the game. This way you wouldn't have to have a bunch of animal based race, you could just make your own animal. Also love the idea of the race (mostly the 20s - 50s gangster/mafia idea) . I can't wait to learn more about their backstory.
Hmmm I do enjoy the idea of a race of different animal like creatures. Makes me think of the Bishi from Entrian IV
i thought the only reason a feline race didn't get in was because the devs wanted something unique. anyways, well written!
I think this is a very good idea. I hope you expand on it. But please, don't make them have a hip-hop culture. That would be annoying. Do something like the 80's instead.
tails don't work in starbound because it breaches the character base, they would have to add thousands of new sprites and bits of code just to add something that only one race can use. edit : you can hope for ears and call it hair though; but wearing a helmet would make them go caput.
I'm personally of the mind that the "battle for an anthropomorphic animal race" is a moot deal, I think it would just make more sense for Chucklefish to release tails/ears/facemasks as costumes, they could even release them in microtransaction form. I'd be willing to pay a couple bucks for my animal of choice costume. EDIT: More like the "battle for an anthropomorphic non-primate mammal race"
They have fairy costumes so the might have dome ears and such. One thing is for sure though, there will not be microtransactions.
So apparently updating the original post doesn't actually bump it or anything... Of course not... Guess I could just use this post down here to emphasize how unoriginal this idea is. But really, if something like this doesn't make it into the game at some point then I'm sure a lot of people, who aren't necessarily the type to get involved in games' developments and browse game forums in their day-to-day life, will be at least a little surprised... That cat looks like its trying really hard to kill itself yet still failing, and theres even a picture of it crying. And that rabbit looks like it is trying to grasp to life, yet it is always in danger, like life is saying it does not deserve to live at all.
I'd love to have a feline or vulpine character. Then again, I am a furry That said, there are already quite a few animal-esque races. I'd much prefer to see a race even stranger than the Novakid, Glitch, or Floran, which are essentially fire, robot, and plant humanoids respectively. Of course, they are kind of limited to humanoids for player characters, due to the way it is designed. Costumes and stuff would be nice though.
I would love this if it was a thing in the next update or so. Sorry for the bump, btw. --- Post updated --- Again, sorry for the bump, but unless you've heard about it already, does the Fenerox count to be close enough?
