Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Suggestions & Feedback Characters portrait improvement

Hi,

I just want to post this suggestion to hear what you think about it.
Sorry if the words are the not best but EN is not my native language.

I'd really LOVE beautifull portraits in the game both for the main character and for the companions.
Every players of BG1/2, PoE, Wasteland, Pathfinder Kingmaker, old I.E games and many others titles know what I'm talking about.

Actually, the portraits have not much personnalities. They're not saying anything. I'm not sure how they did them but I think it's just a picture of the 3D models or something like that.
In the game, It's sometimes hard to choose the character I want to because my custom char. has a pretty "random" faces, such as Gale and Wyll.

I think it could be great to have beautifull portraits for many reasons :

- Increase the presences of the companion and of their personnality
=> Portraits are saying things. They can show the traits of the compagnions and give a feeling about them, their story, their wishes, their personnality,...

I'm not really attached to them at the moment and I think it's because we don't feel their personnalties enough in the game.
We hear them during a few dialogs and a little bit during exploration but it's not enough to me to feel concerned by them (combats and exploration are the biggest parts of the game).
I think portraits are a good way to bring the player closer to the companions.

- A little touch of BG
=> Portrait are a part of the BG games, of many "oldschool" RPG and/or D&D games.
I think players liked them and it could be a good and "easy" way to please many players.
I really think it's one of those little things that could gather more players arround the game.

- Increase RP
=> As I tried to explain, portraits are saying things.
Choosing a portrait for your character is something everyone is doing wisely because they want a portrait that fit the character and the personnality they want to play with.
This is another way of creating/customize your own character, even if it has no real consequences in the game.

I am aware that in most other games, portraits are the only way to represent our character but that's not really the point.

The only thing I see that could be a problem for some of you is that it's hard to find a portrait that visually looks like our custom characters.
It's not really a problem to me because portraits are small and in the end, you only use them to select your characters and see when you're going to play during combats.
Mods can also add many of them if that's realy a problem to players but I really think beautifull portraits in the game could be another of its many positive point.

EDIT : this is a (not so good) exemple of what I have in mind with the actual companions "portraits"
Of course, it's not really what I call beautifull portrait and it don't really suit the general UI design and the game tone.
https://imgur.com/gMQ1vlm

I like more artistic portraits too but I have not once, ever, liked the preset portraits these games made available to the player. I feel like they limit rp considerably. In BG1, however, I remember they had an option to upload your own which was GREAT. I'm an artist so I was able to make my own portraits and I loved it. (I've actually painted portraits of people's D&D characters here and there over the years as a side hustle.) But in DOS I remember hating the portrait options and there was no option to easily upload my own.

I think having pictures of the models is good for the base game so people's portraits can look like their character by default. I think it's a reasonable trade-off

But I think we'll also get mods that replace the portraits with more artistic options. I know that once modding is supported, if I can figure out how to do it I'd make a mod that did that.

I really think that this suggestion could improve the feelings of the game and the player's attachement to the companions.

As you said mod is an option and I don't think real portrait should be one.

The problem is that everyone looks the same in BG3 portraits. Exact same angle, exact same size, exact same expression. No variance, no personality.

And they are too small on a 27" 1080p screen. Like the rest of the GUI.

DA:O had the same system and even offered sliders to change position, size and expression. And we know from there that didn't infuse the portraits with any kind of personality or uniqueness they need to actually portray a character.

Hand drawn is the only way. In the spirit of BG and basically every other D&D game.

To be honest I think the best solution would asking player about what is preferred: static artistic portrait or based on model portrait.
I personally use artistic ones sometimes, but in most cases nothing just matches. So ones based on model work for me most times as I'm not the person (I just like to use what was given) to look around the net or mods to find something I like and maybe will match my character. But I understand that some people would prefer artistic ones as they have own charm.

Also one Easter egg I would find cool to implement is visible damage and some effects like curse for model based (current ones) portrait in the bottom middle. Something like in classic Doom or Wolfenstein, but with current graphics and possibilities.

The problem with artistic portraits is you either get a generic one (a la DA:I) or a selection of portraits that will not be able to represent everyone's characters. DA:O's system was actually a good middle ground. Being able to change the bg/face position/expression could give them a little more personality *while still looking like the players character*. I know artistic portraits look better but they are just too limited.

Just allow us the opportunity to upload our own portraits for those that want something different like how the original games did it. I only liked a handful of the original portraits offered in those and so I would usually go online to find ones I liked which allowed me to find some awesome artwork to use for my characters.

Bg3 (and Larians previous game) have the same "issue ". The portraits have no personality because they use a 3d render. They don't even let us edit the render like changing background, or making them do some sort of face or action. Dragon Age Origins had some kind of editor alongside its 3d render and that's an old game. Larian is just behind with the times or something.