Female characters use the wrong animations

[Catgorl 67]

tl;dr : The current ingame idle female animation is the male one.
The correct animation is present in the current game, and is actively used in editors, the inspector, and on NPC's.

This pose appeared in the E3 2009 reveal trailer for APB and was broken since day one.

 

The current female idle animation ingame is the male's, despite characters specifically having female animations built for them.

 

The real female animation is displayed in the editors and when you inspect a character. You can tell something's up when you repeatedly tap forward while walking - your shoulders go down, then back up when you stop, because idle and walk/run animations don't match. Holstering your guns in a missions district also shows this - your shoulders go down, where they expect to be, and then suddenly jump back up to align themselves with the male animation.  Surprisingly though, it seems to be correctly used by most female contacts and pedestrians, as only player characters are affected.

This animation was the one used on players in the E3 2009 reveal trailer. You can see it for yourself here, at the 1:46 mark : https://youtu.be/AMkBwHJaSkw?t=106

That tiny detail completely changes the stance and silhouette of characters - thus changing their general outlook from what appears in the editor. That animation differentiates male and female characters more visibly, and makes the world feel more polished and visually diverse. It really is a shame that it's been overlooked for so long. Surely if pedestrians/contacts and the inspector window correctly displays it, I can't imagine it would be hard to make it work as intended in the game world - hence why I'm bringing this issue to light.

Here's some photo evidence of what I'm talking about :

This is the "correct" animation, as seen in the editor, the inspector, on contacts & pedestrians (Though their arms rest lower).

 

This is the current animation ingame. The legs are spread further, the shoulders & arms are bumped up, and the spine is bent rather than straight. The neck also looks shorter as a result.

 

It's very obviously the male pose being applied on the female model. It completely changes the look and feel of female characters, instead giving them that current awkward, strangely buff appearance, while also misrepresenting what appears in the editor, since body proportions change with this aswell. It's a tiny detail, but it's a tiny detail that matters a lot if you make a game about customization and appearances.

 

Finally, here's the tiny animation glitch proving that it wasn't intended to be like this.

 

Standing still, with guns holstered, then walking forward clearly shows that the character's entire figure changes the second she moves.

Again, this is because she's switching back and forth from the male animation (idle) to the female animation (walking/running).

 

Holstering weapons shows the same mismatch for half a second.

Shoulders go down, then back up again once the idle animation starts playing.

 

 

This bug applies to every single female player character that exists in the game without exception.

I'm also pretty sure that running & sprinting is the male's too, but I have no proof to support this.

Edited October 17, 2019 by Haniasita
Mentionned the E3 2009 trailer.

[Azukii 92]

Hi there,

This topic has been moved to the Bugs and Tech Issues section of our forums.

Thank you.

 

- Azukii

[Harmoni 8]

Developers could include such a change as part of the engine upgrade, or sooner.

I have the impression that this is not a error, this animation has been for as long as I can remember.

[Catgorl 67]

2 hours ago, lgawe1994 said:

Developers could include such a change as part of the engine upgrade, or sooner.

I have the impression that this is not a error, this animation has been for as long as I can remember.

Indeed, this animation has been present since day one of the original game. I don't think it was intended to be this way though, I think nobody ever looked into this because nobody had any reason to believe something was off if they'd never seen it be any other way. Let's also not ignore the fact that this is probably a really, really unimportant thing to fix in the eyes of a developper since it's purely visual and nobody was complaining.

 

As a bonus, here's some proof that this was intended to be : In the E3 2009 trailer (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AMkBwHJaSkw @ 1:47), the animation I showed was used on idle female characters. They're seen from the side rather than the front, so it's not as easy to notice, but I can guarantee you that's not what we have in the game currently.

Edited October 17, 2019 by Haniasita
Typo

[Harmoni 8]

If this is a error, when did it happen? Interesting.

On 10/17/2019 at 8:48 PM, Haniasita said:

Indeed, this animation has been present since day one of the original game. I don't think it was intended to be this way though, I think nobody ever looked into this because nobody had any reason to believe something was off if they'd never seen it be any other way. Let's also not ignore the fact that this is probably a really, really unimportant thing to fix in the eyes of a developper since it's purely visual and nobody was complaining.

 

As a bonus, here's some proof that this was intended to be : In the E3 2009 trailer (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AMkBwHJaSkw @ 1:47), the animation I showed was used on idle female characters. They're seen from the side rather than the front, so it's not as easy to notice, but I can guarantee you that's not what we have in the game currently.

fixing this may cause new errors.

[MeanBetsy 24]

I always thought this but thought people would just tell me I am stupid. Would really like to see the editor animations in the game tbh.

 

-100% support on my end

[Catgorl 67]

19 hours ago, lgawe1994 said:

fixing this may cause new errors.

I would agree if this was a very large fix, like reworking the lighting system or something heavy like that, but in this case (With my limited knowledge of the Unreal Engine) I feel like it really is just a case of opening player animations, opening the game script that handles them, then making sure that, first, there really are two different working registers for male and female animations, and then that the female animation set has the correct ones defined.

If the E3 2009 build had them ingame, and the animation system has seen no change in the years gone by (Which I doubt it has), I can't imagine a lot of other bugs would spawn from fixing this.


 

8 hours ago, MeanBetsy said:

I always thought this but thought people would just tell me I am stupid. Would really like to see the editor animations in the game tbh.

 

-100% support on my end

Glad to know other people noticed too! I don't believe it's an important fix in the grand scheme of things, but it's a tiny detail that really grinds your gears when you put hundreds of hours into a game like this.

[Jeffrey_Epstein 17]

Unless its a weapon issue; Little Orbit will NOT fix it.

The female idle animation does look better and vibrant for the game, the current idle animation is ugh.

[Catgorl 67]

I've recently found that while crouching and holstering weapons, character arms get slimmer. Not sure if it proves anything but it's definitely part of the same mis-aligned animation issues.
https://i.imgur.com/GyTN5yu.mp4