Behind the Scenes: Parafolks (Patreon)

Hi guys, it’s Léa!

This week we have a very special update: I'm here to introduce you to the improved and corrected 3D model that we use to generate our Parafolks! This brand new body is the base on which we are going to build every piece of clothes and different body shapes.

The first version of the body had flaws which lead to technical difficulties for our animator Alice and we wanted to create a body that we could bend, twist, scale easily without having weird deformations. We took into account the constructive feedback from the community  in order to create this brand new version.

So here are the first exclusive images of the new improved Parafolk base body, Charlie! It's the name we gave to our neutral character 3D model but it's not a character that you will be able to play with or meet in your town.

In the game, many transformations are applied to this base body to recreate all the different body shapes and facial features: breast, no breast, pecs, muscle, fat, the size of each body and facial parts, etc. So Charlie's body will be transformed to create every other Parafolks in Paralives.

Is there some part of the body you have not been able to resize or customize as you wish in other games? Tell us in the comment section of this post!

Now that you’ve met Charlie, I can walk you through some of the most important improvements that we did on them!

First, we’ve changed the proportions. Our goal is to have a neutral and unisex body to which we can add any masculine or feminine features. This will allow us to create clothes that could fit everyone perfectly. In our first version, the shoulders were too wide and the rest of the body too thin.

We’ve completely changed the head, creating new ears, changing the meshing logic in key areas (like the mouth, the eyes, the eyebrows and the nose). Those changes are important because it will allow Alice to create more accurate facial expression and make the Parafolks feel more alive!

As you can see, we’ve completely reworked the hands to make them … PERFECT! Of course now Alice has something clean to work on. (and they are so much bigger!)

Feet are now a size 7US (size 40EU) and way bigger than their original size since the first Parafolk was a woman with tiny fairy feet (Maggie <3). The feet received special attention too, with actual toes, malleoli and a more accurate shape.

We improved the shoulders size and cleaned their mesh. The torso now has a unisex shape and we can transform it dynamically in the game depending if a character has breasts or not. Also, with Sebastian going shirtless in a past video, we’ve noticed that we could improve our belly area to make it anatomically correct.

Like the rest of the body, the back needed some extra love and care! Here is the new and improved back of our Parafolks! As you can see, the shoulders mesh has been cleaned and the overall proportions are corrected!

Finally, Charlie has been tested by Alice in order to make sure that their body will have the best deformations possible when animating. Keep in mind that this is our neutral body so it’s normal that it has a mix of masculine and feminine features! Starting from this base body, transformations will allow us to create every body shape and body feature in the game.

We really hope that you will love the results as much as we do! It has been a real adventure to finish this character model, and we are now ready to recreate Maggie and Sebastian, but also adding more Parafolks to our world. Edit March 2021: we have now created the new Maggie, see her in this Youtube video.

In the near future, you will see more work in progress featuring Charlie. Now that their body is done, get ready for some fashion and hairstyles updates!

Léa

Edit March 2021: This post is now public so feel free to share it. Please note that we made other improvements and tweaks to our character model since this post.