AW Expansion Poll
Added 2023-02-02 02:45:34 +0000 UTC
With the Futa Expansion down to the last few months, it's time to start getting ready for the next expansion. You can find more information on the options in the blog post here. We're excited to hear from you!
Comments
I've withheld and pulled support from projects using AI art, and I know I'm not the only one. I really hope they don't use AI art. Artists are often underpaid, but completely cutting them out in favor of AI art is even worse.
Darkshine
2023-02-12 18:46:59 +0000 UTCCowbot, please come talk to us on discord. You seem to be an expert at this, maybe we can hire you to get this going for us. It does seem like a great improvement from what we were doing in the pre-AI art era.
ThaumX
2023-02-11 17:02:12 +0000 UTCBy the way, that was for photorealistic images. It'd probably be easier with an anime model.
Cowbot
2023-02-09 21:30:22 +0000 UTCI decided to put my words to action and run some tests. I'm able to routinely get good results for a majority of the settings in the character creator without using the generated images. I just used the variables set as a prompt, with a few consistencies: Here's an example prompt: photograph portrait of a pretty 20yo woman, facing the camera, focus on face, hazel eyes, large nose, lizard lips, brown skin, slightly wavy black hair that is normal length For the most part, you can merely enter variables the game already produces as tags in the prompt and use a consistent negative prompt. The AI has trouble with the word "normal." As it doesn't really mean anything, if you delete the word entirely from the prompt it works fine. I'd recommend using different wording. (Normal isn't very descriptive anyway.) The model I used (GalaxytimemachinesGTM_v3) was able to handle the following variables well: Ethnicity - but this overwrote most of the other variables. Currently, in game you can have a black-skinned Nordic woman, but this combination is impossible with my model. So, I removed it. However, it did combine with hair style and hair color fairly well. age - though only in increments of 10. Eye color - No problems as long as "Large eyes" are in the negative prompt and "Restore faces" is used. Was influenced by hair color: the lightest blondes moved hazel to blue, for example. Hair type - straight, slightly wavy, wavy, very wavy, curly, very curly all worked. Kinked did not work. Hair color - a few gradations give identical results, shown here with a / : black, brunette/brown, dark blonde, strawberry blonde, sandy blonde, blonde, platinum blonde, auburn/light auburn, copper/ginger, Skin color - largely determined by ethnicity. With ethnicity removed, it was impossible to get dark or brown skin. Add "African" and it was degrees of dark skin. Lips - My model was too bias towards attractive faces and couldn't reliably produce notably different lips unless combined with ethnicity. Noses - Differences were so subtle I think most people wouldn't notice. Could be controlled with ethnicity better than "button" "upturned" etc. keywords. Jaw - It can be manipulated but not with the default words in AW. Beauty - My model is heavily bias towards beauty, but it is definitely possible to make ugly women using other models. So, with about one hour of tinkering I made tons of portraits with different combinations of eyes and hair with good results. If I were serious and making a program to produce images for a game automatically, I would write a program that went to different models for different characteristics (especially characteristics uncommon in internet photos, like lizard-thin lips), or custom train a model just for head portraits so it got very good at it. It'd be work but we're talking months not years to generate every combination of appearance listed in the character creator.
Cowbot
2023-02-09 21:26:02 +0000 UTCSorry Reimus, but you're just wrong on this one. I can (and have) just run the doll faces through img-to-img to get higher quality images. I don't even need to prompt it beyond like three or four words to get the style I want. It looks fantastic and absolutely maintains unique appearances, styles, eye color, etc. They could use the system they already have to generate the images necessary and then convert them. Probably the main constraint would be scalability: I know vectors scale very well, whereas AI produced images would just be a standard size. It'd be harder to do for the body because there are so many more factors involved, but we already have in-game many NPCs and others with photorealistic heads or anime heads with cartoon bodies. Just do that at first and worry about bodies later. It may make the game a bigger download, but I'm not intimidated by that. I just downloaded a 80gb game: I'm pretty sure even with every combination of face/hairstyle that it'd be substantially less than that.
Cowbot
2023-02-09 19:40:50 +0000 UTCAt some point they could potentially have AI generate the character art in-game according to game-controlled vectors, but obviously neither hardware nor software are there yet or will be very soon. Short of that, I think AI art runs up against the same combinatorial explosion that human generated art would.
Notalie Portman
2023-02-09 14:37:34 +0000 UTCIirc they have a paper doll system which allows a ton of versatility. I don't know how many possible combinations there would be but it could easily be in the millions. There's no way of creating that sort of content with AI at this point. The only option would be to greatly scale back the character customization and have a handful to static images which would really kill one of the things that makes this game special.
Reimus
2023-02-09 10:04:15 +0000 UTCSeriously, ThaumX, if you're interested I can hook you up. If I can run Stable Diffusion models on my POS laptop you can definitely give this game a facelift using the computer you already use. Install isn't hard, and Unstable Diffusion is a massive resource for how to prompt and AI-models that do nudity well. I'm also Cowbot on the Discord.
Cowbot
2023-02-08 19:51:49 +0000 UTCIf they wanted to really put effort into it, they could pay their artist to make sketches then run the sketches through image-to-image and replace all of the doll artwork in the sex engine as well. They could even change the appearances of the two people in the couple to match the actual characters having sex. That would still require an artist, though, so it wouldn't be small. I mean, right now we have photographs of people next to weird cartoon faces next to high-quality anime gifs. Standardize it all! AI can make photorealistic people, use that to replace the cartoon dolls and make all the artwork photographic.
Cowbot
2023-02-08 19:45:47 +0000 UTCWe live in a post-AI art world. They can generate multiple different styles of artwork for the same face with every combination of hairstyle, hair color, etc. in a day with no cost outside of the time spent manipulating prompts. They can go anime, or realism, or 2D digital art. I just don't see the reason behind having flat cartoonish faces when that kind of quality is on the table. They could even use AI art to do the same for outfits, matching different outfits to different body types. It's work, but we're talking months, and with no large expense added.
Cowbot
2023-02-08 19:40:50 +0000 UTCI think they used scaled vector graphics to create the character doll, so are you saying you don’t like the system they have, or am I misunderstanding what you’re talking about?
Notalie Portman
2023-02-07 19:36:39 +0000 UTCI just want more and better artwork for the character dolls.
Cowbot
2023-02-05 21:15:26 +0000 UTCI voted Hucow just to watch the possible punishments by playing a character who is against being selected as one.
Cook Cook
2023-02-04 08:05:47 +0000 UTCI'm really hoping for the sex system to be updated. If there's some more variety in that, it'll really bring the game to the next level.
Reimus
2023-02-03 21:51:09 +0000 UTCYou'd definitely still be able to get pregnant... because it'll basically be mandatory. As you say, part of being a hucow.
ThaumX
2023-02-03 18:57:06 +0000 UTCI'd love if Hucow wins to still be able to get pregnant while a Hucow. It's also part of their whole thing.
Felix A G
2023-02-03 13:15:15 +0000 UTCThe options are mostly for reference. we'll most likely do a subsequent vote for priorities and direction after this is over.
ThaumX
2023-02-03 01:15:08 +0000 UTCI’m very strongly in the Hucow camp and the possibilities suggested for the expansion are very sexy, but personally I think I would outright prefer a more modest “AW but you’re a hucow” approach. That includes if it’s more of a mid-late game expansion in which being a hucow out on the town becomes a little more normal, though perhaps subject to some restrictions like prostitution is, and with perhaps some legal peril if I don’t find a way to make my contractual deliveries. I don’t know if that makes things easier or harder from a game design or code perspective.
Notalie Portman
2023-02-03 00:53:40 +0000 UTC
