2d Game Character Design Tools

A game's character is the hero of the game. Making a good character is very important. Many AAA game companies hire professionals only for this task of creating the game's character. In a 2D game, character design is done with the help of 2D artists. For a new developer, hiring a professional artist is not financially feasible. In this post, we will see free 2D character Creator options and review the character creator 2D asset in the Unity asset store for Unity users.

Basic principles to make a good 2D character

Maintain a Uniform coloring scheme.
The character must display an emotion. For example, while making a ninja, you should make him look strong and angry. A cute ninja might not suit your game.
Be mindful of the shapes and proportions. You can make a character look different by increasing the head size or the nose length.
Keep shapes simple so that you can draw them again. This is needed to make sprite sheets.
Add accessories like swords, shoes, shields, etc. to your character. Accessories add to the emotions conveyed by the character.

Free character creation options

Inkscape: vector 2D character creator

Inkscape is the best free software for creating vector graphics. It is a free and open-source software available for windows, Linux and mac. The tools in Inkscape allow you to draw seamlessly. You can use Inkscape to create a character from scratch.

You can create any complex shape with the Bezier tool. Also, the ability of converting bitmap images to vector art is really useful and can prove to be really handy in many cases. Inkscape allows you to open pdf and Adobe illustrator files too. This enables you to do small edits on work submitted by graphic professionals.

Learning all features of Inkscape can be quite overwhelming. But there are lot of free resources available online for this. If you looking to master character creation with Inkscape, then the course below gives you all you need in one place. This course also teaches dragon bones, which is a free software to animate the characters created with Inkscape.

Free online Websites for character creation

If you are looking for more UI based application for designing your character online, then the below list of websites will help you design 2D characters with just few clicks.

Charactercreator.org
Avachara.com
Rinmarugames
Customanine.com
Kartunix.com

2D character creator: Unity asset review

If you are looking to make your 2D character inside Unity and you don't have any artistic skills then, there is no better asset than 2D character creator. This asset lets to customize and build a 2d character with ease. You can also edit your character during runtime. This gives you more flexibility in trying out different customization. One drawback of this asset is that you can only create humanoid characters. If you are looking for non-human characters then better start learning Inkscape.

This asset not only allows you to create a character but also to animate them. You can animate your customized character within minutes using this asset. The asset does lack a little in the variation available with the armor, weapon, and clothing. But, if you get creative enough then, you can generate an enormous amount of different looking people using this asset. This asset doesn't provide any 2d Character controller.

Final Review

Without a doubt, it's the BEST AAA quality 2D character creation asset in the store till date. It's easy to customize content for your own projects with this. All features are well documented and tutorial videos are available for detailed explanation. For this price it's a must buy asset. Personally, I waited a long time for this kind of asset, so I bought it instantly and have no regret. I strongly recommend this for every 2D game developer.