Do Kerbals Really Matter for KSP? Replacing Kerbal Models with Human Astronauts

[ImJake]

There's a small argument as to whether the Kerbals themselves contribute to the success of KSP. Personally I think they do, but I'd be curious to see what the game would be like without them. If anyone has time to create it, I'd like to see a mod that replace the kerbal models with genderless, faceless, perfectly humanoid astronauts. If you want to be really thorough, you could also rid the kerbals in the advice text boxes and in the buildings like the VAB, astronaut complex, administration building, ect.

[Blu_C]

This would probably be a fairly simple mod (basically a texture replacer), however I suspect a lot of people prefer the kerbals for a bunch of reasons. For one, they are cute and (I at least) have grown pretty attached to them. I could also see an argument about how changing them to humans may limit the ability of educators to use KSP as a teaching tool since people could protest over a game where kids can intentionally build death traps for their astronauts/kerbonaughts should they be humans (of course, as a mod that isn't likely to be an issue).

[Sandworm]

If anyone has time to create it, I'd like to see a mod that replace the kerbal models with genderless, faceless, perfectly humanoid astronauts.

It isn't easy. 3d models of human faces are just about the hardest thing in modeling to pull off. We are very sensitive to human faces. The slightest imperfection in geometry or movement come across as deformed. Ever notice that all celebs look alike? They do, and there is math to back it up. Unless you are going to put serious resources into this (think EA) then 90s anime character is probably the best you could hope for.

[Kibble]

I want them to be dogs! Woof woof!

[amorymeltzer]

To your initial (rhetorical) question, I really like the following quote from the PC Gamer review. I find it captures the essence of KSP quite well.

As a simulation, it would be easy for Kerbal Spaaace Program to feel cold and dryâ€â€like a game designed for an audience of tweed wearing, bushy eyebrow sporting physics professors. That it isn't is all down to the presentation, and the nature of the Kerbals themselves. They're clumsy, bumbling tinkerersâ€â€rated in-game for their courage and stupidity. It's the Kerbals that bring physics down to the layman's level. They're what stops KSP being about formulas and equations, and make it instead about slapdash engineering. In the context of Kerbal mission control, it makes sense that my moon lander was crudely bolted to the top of a barely functional ship. It makes sense that there's a Kerbal stranded in orbitâ€â€and that, years later, he's still wearing a big, ....-eating grin.

[sumghai]

As per the existing topic here, I've pointed out that replacing the Kerbal EVA models with humans is not a trivial task - the Kerbal model is compiled into the game itself, and the skeleton / animations need to be completely redone for humans:

http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/115432-Humanization

[ImJake]

It isn't easy. 3d models of human faces are just about the hardest thing in modeling to pull off. We are very sensitive to human faces. The slightest imperfection in geometry or movement come across as deformed. Ever notice that all celebs look alike? They do, and there is math to back it up. Unless you are going to put serious resources into this (think EA) then 90s anime character is probably the best you could hope for.

I imagined their helmets' solar shields would be down so you wouldn't see their faces.

[basic.syntax]

KSP, or "HSP" would still be an interesting game, but, it wouldn't have grown as quickly. Its mascot characters with "courage" and "stupidity" are an anchor that gave early adopters something more to talk about than building rockets, how hard it was to get your first orbit or first rendezvous, and spaceship explosions.

I'm not an early adopter, I came in with 23.5. I started hearing about the game, and it sounded interesting because of player's funny stories involving Kerbal misadventures - which also told about the spaceship lego mechanics and learning curve underneath it all. It's a package.

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The human mod described tho, would be useful for "total conversions," things like RSS, and could lead to even more TV news broadcasts using KSP like Photoshop, to illustrate space scenarios and news events. Sumghai clearly knows of the amount of work involved... I found another clue in this Devnote Tuesday post:

Daniel (danRosas): I’ve been working on the female Kerbals: I had to do a quick retarget inside Maya of all the animations that are being used in Unity. We couldn’t do the retarget with Mechanim inside Unity because we’re using the legacy animation system, which is extremely technical and not animator-friendly. It will need some further tweaking once some other dev has a look at the code and the way the animations are being called.

In the meantime there’s another part of the Kerbal assets that’s being run with Mechanim: facial expressions. IVA Kerbals look good, although there are some troubles with the position of the arms and feet, but I’m already targeting how to solve those problems in two different ways: I could save a pose inside Maya and apply it to the beginning of each animation, or I could override the bones in Unity. Since the connection inside Maya overrides some other rig properties, reworking the animations there could be a little problematic. I’m learning to stop using the Expression Editor as there’s plenty of freedom with the utility nodes to start messing around with always-running calculations.

[Solarspaceprobe]

Well...kerbals really made it special, in my opinion. They made some of the small gaps in realism acceptable. It's much harder to accept a billion identical humans than kerbals. Overall, I would find it weird to use humans alongside most KSP contraptions. As mascots and characters, I'd probably like KSP a lot less, and it likely would be missing identity.

[TiktaalikDreaming]

As per the existing topic here, I've pointed out that replacing the Kerbal EVA models with humans is not a trivial task - the Kerbal model is compiled into the game itself, and the skeleton / animations need to be completely redone for humans:

http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/115432-Humanization

While picking out reasons this wouldn't be easy, keep in mind Kerbals are about 1m tall. All the crew capsules, and thus all the other parts, would need to be scaled x2.0, with weight etc x8. The Earth is larger, with more deltaV required, but I'm pretty sure there's already (or were) mods to do that. Kerbals are the excuse for making a lot of things a bit easier.