Left-handed Gaming Characters

  • Mo McDamage
    Marauder
    Insider

    Hi all,

    for some people this topic might be trivial but I actually want to draw some attention to it.

    I consider myself left-handed and playing games for many years. I think it is a pity that in many games (including SoT) you create characters that you want to identify with. You can change your gender, skin, hair and eye color but nearly always they forget about people that are not right-handed.

    In many games, it would be easy to solve this problem by just "mirroring" the character. It would not even change the game mechanics in SoT.

    Link (from Zelda) was actually left-handed and was changed later to right-handed... what is some kind of... unpleasant imo. The Ghost-unit from Starcraft 2 was also a lefty.

    What do you think? Is there any other left-handed person out there who is thinking about it, as well?

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  • OtherFanboy
    Legend
    Insider
    Founder

    @mo-mcdamage yea would be cool but it's whole new set of animations that need to be made for 4 deferent weapons and I doubt it's as simple as just mirroring them and out side it being a neat feature it doesn't serve a purpose other than having a weapon in the other hand I'm not opposed to it being added just odd to add a function that most won't ever use

  • PithyRumble
    Rogue
    Insider

    My Grandma was a lefty. She was so amped when I started off ambidextrous...but then public school happened...It's the classic "Be yourself!" no not like that

    Hand dominance would be a nice option.

  • Musicmee
    Vanguard
    Insider
    Moderator
    Founder
    Deckhand

    Calling fellow lefty pirate @Legendary-Liz 👋

  • RiftenWatcher
    Captain
    Insider

    Speaking as a fellow left hander, It would be cool. However, I have never really been bothered by stuff like this. I like creating characters that are not me. I'm left handed, that doesn't mean my pirate is. But it would be nice if we had the option.

  • Astralenigma
    Marauder

    @otherfanboy said in Left-handed Gaming Characters:

    @mo-mcdamage yea would be cool but it's whole new set of animations that need to be made for 4 deferent weapons and I doubt it's as simple as just mirroring them and out side it being a neat feature it doesn't serve a purpose other than having a weapon in the other hand I'm not opposed to it being added just odd to add a function that most won't ever use

    Don't know how the Unreal Engine Sea of Thieves uses works, but it should be mostly as simple as mirroring the animations since they are mostly tied to the characters skeletons and at least in Unity it's mostly add a mirrored state with the same animations but telling the engine to mirror the actions and put different conditions the problem here would depend on the mask so you it would mostly have to be applied to the arms ignoring the rest of the body.
    So it would have to use a boolean to check if the character is lefty then mirror the action of the arms and the position of the weapon so it won't be on the off-hand.
    Also, if there's no transition animation it would be weird and the states could enter in conflict if terribly configured or a state that needs mimicking gets forgotten.
    In other words this would most likely add more bloat than needed, haven't paid that much attention to the animations but guns should be simple sword might be the problem.

  • OtherFanboy
    Legend
    Insider
    Founder

    @astralenigma I was unsure myself so I assume is harder rather than easier but like is said I'm not against it

  • Lleorb
    Champion
    Insider
    Founder

    I'm not against it, but I think there are more important changes to customization that would bring more individuality.

    Being able to equip peg leg, eye patch, and hook on both hands, choosing individually. The same for boots and gloves, combining different gloves or wearing just one boot would be cool, combining scars, tattoos, maybe curses if it's not too "exaggerated"

    Increase the customization of the ship, especially in the interior, carpets in the map room, the map itself, wood carvings outside and inside, change the color of the barrels, trinkets on the ceiling, lanterns, change the ship's compass...

    All of this is much more "urgent" and unfortunately we don't have it yet.

  • Selgewick
    Master

    Aye. It would be nice to have a toggle for such situations. If some pirates enjoy or prefer have 'eir pirates have gun n pistol in left hand, then why not?

  • Astralenigma
    Marauder

    @lleorb said in Left-handed Gaming Characters:

    I'm not against it, but I think there are more important changes to customization that would bring more individuality.

    Being able to equip peg leg, eye patch, and hook on both hands, choosing individually. The same for boots and gloves, combining different gloves or wearing just one boot would be cool, combining scars, tattoos, maybe curses if it's not too "exaggerated"

    Increase the customization of the ship, especially in the interior, carpets in the map room, the map itself, wood carvings outside and inside, change the color of the barrels, trinkets on the ceiling, lanterns, change the ship's compass...

    All of this is much more "urgent" and unfortunately we don't have it yet.

    Yeah, that seems like a good idea but before they can do that they would have to improve the bloated UI, at this moment there's so many customization options that they don't even fit in the screen even more each item for them.

  • GrumpyW01f
    Legend
    Insider

    I'm glad I'm right-handed... I'd get obsessive about the handedness of the characters I play.

    I think handedness would be a nice feature, but there are things that may get in the way.

    • Animations are rendered for both you and players looking at you, so both would need mirrored. I don't know how hard this is. Would this end up mirroring cosmetics or can animations alone be mirrored?
    • The player cam is on the right shoulder, so it would need mirrored as well. I don't know if this would be a neutral change or not.
    • Bullets you fire actually come from the very back of the gun that's fired. In that way, getting hit when near or inside another player's model would be different for left-handedness. I don't think this would be bad.
    • A cutlass in the left hand, with mirrored animations, would slash in the opposite direction to start. Righty boxers have more trouble fighting southpaws because of the indifference in practice, maybe something similar would happen for cutlass users? Or should slashing animations still start from the right?

    If I were left-handed, I would want to have the option. I just don't know how much work it would require. I'm with @Lleorb , I think picking locations of other items would be easier and serve for more customization.

  • Mo McDamage
    Marauder
    Insider

    Without knowing it exactly, I assume that just mirroring the whole character model (including clothes and weapon design) will not have a big impact on the game mechanics. It will be probably be the same as with the hitboxes. It does not matter if you have a big/fat character or thin/small because the hitbox is always the same.

    Therefore, I guess it will be the same with bullet flight direction and cutlass maneuvers. Otherwise, there would also be differences for every character model.

  • heslashthem
    Legend
    Insider

    I’m curious to hear from people that are actually left handed irl and if seeing their pirate right handed is distracting or if it would benefit from the choice.

  • HiradC
    Lord
    Insider

    I'm a lefty, I would prefer it but not if it's going to take effort away from better content.

    I suspect the main thing affected is throwables as isn't that an over the shoulder trajectory, everything else comes from the middle I'm assuming.

  • Schwammlgott
    Champion

    @mo-mcdamage sagte in Left-handed Gaming Characters:

    Hi all,

    for some people this topic might be trivial but I actually want to draw some attention to it.

    I consider myself left-handed and playing games for many years. I think it is a pity that in many games (including SoT) you create characters that you want to identify with. You can change your gender, skin, hair and eye color but nearly always they forget about people that are not right-handed.

    In many games, it would be easy to solve this problem by just "mirroring" the character. It would not even change the game mechanics in SoT.

    Link (from Zelda) was actually left-handed and was changed later to right-handed... what is some kind of... unpleasant imo. The Ghost-unit from Starcraft 2 was also a lefty.

    What do you think? Is there any other left-handed person out there who is thinking about it, as well?

    Link from TLoZ is only in 2 games right-handed...that's the Wii version of Twilight Princess and Skyward Sword...that's because of the Wii-mote is made to be held in the right hand...for immersion purpose
    In every other Zelda game he's left handed and you can't change that...I never had issues Link beeing left-handed, didn't stop immersion for me...
    So this argument isn't valid...

    I actually don’t care if they add such an option, but I don’t think it's that easy to just mirror the character...in Twilight Princess for example, they mirrored the whole world for this...

  • ScoobyWRX555
    Vanguard
    Insider
    Founder

    Every time I create a new character in a new game I do wonder why there isn't a left handed option esp when everything these days including games are trying to be all inclusive; but never left handed. I wonder why. It probably takes a lot more programming.

    But most left-handers do having varying degrees of ambidextrousness so it would be nice to have but not so much of an issue.

  • Lucky11
    Commander
    Insider

    @lleorb
    Equipping two peg legs, two hooks, and two eye patches? You're talking about the ultimate pirate! :)

    I honestly don't think any of these suggestions are mutually exclusive. I'd love to have increased ship customization at some point in the near future, but as a lefty myself, I'd also like to (potentially) prioritize simple things like which hand your pirate primarily uses.

  • JimmyDSpuffy
    Sailor

    I'm a lefty, but I chose to learn everything with my right hand growing up since it would make things easier. My handwriting sucks though. Anyway, idk how relevant my two cents here is, but I always like to make my characters left handed when given the choice since I am lefty in VR. I would enjoy having this feature, but I would agree that it probably isn't worth the effort.

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