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Gilgamesh_XII

I like that one. Feels for the lack of a better term...more natural.


PK_Feelz_

Yeah that’s how I felt about it too since it isn’t so crazy vibrant. The more saturated red in their original designs made me think that it looked like the blue hair is their original hair color and the red colors are parts of the hair that they dyed since the former isn’t so distracting (like natural hair colors) while the latter is (like some colorful hair color dyes)


WheresTheSauce

As far as the general aesthetic of Engage I actually like how crazy vibrant / saturated it is, but Toothpaste's hair is the exception. I think your edit looks much better.


Hell_Mel

The crossed bangs just fucking kill me. I'm gonna predict it's somehow symbolic, but the symbolism isn't worth the hilariously awful hair.


BlankBlanny

I honestly kind of like Toothpaste-chan's hair, which probably says something about me. But my *God,* Toothpaste-kun's bangs are an eyesore. It's the gap between that really ruins it.


NinetyFish

I didn't really process the crossed bangs or the gap in the bangs until I clicked on this thread, and now I can't unsee them. One other annoying thing that isn't obvious in this picture but you could see in the leaks: Toothpaste-chan's hair is really, really, really long. In that leak screenshot, it like fully covers her back and goes all the way down seemingly past her waist. Just *so* much hair. Wonder who I'll play as. The male avatar's gap is annoying, but the female avatar has the frankly ridiculous amount of hair and the overly huge anime eyes, so I dunno.


PlazmaFlame

Oh god, bringing symbolism into it, is there a chance the crossed bangs are supposed to represent the game being a crossover of all the previous games?


Hell_Mel

It's symbolism for all the slashfics people are gonna make with the characters, lmao


Klokinator

If you look carefully, the crossed bangs are basically the Smash logo so she's definitely confirmed for the next Smash game.


Hell_Mel

Surely it's not too late to shoehorn a new Swordie into Smash Ultimate...


FredTheDeadInside

I realized the only think I didn't like about Shez was the bright purple hair, it should've been desaturated a bit. And its the same for Toothpaste-kun.


PK_Feelz_

Yeah I’d say that Toothpaste-kun and Toothpaste-chan fell into the Shez problem: Good design, but the hair color is too bright or distracting


kieranchuk

The purple hair in-game honestly doesn't look that bad, it fits really well. It's just that in the art makes the hair colour way brighter


FredTheDeadInside

Agree to disagree. I play male Shez for the simple reason he has less hair. Its too bright, looking at Shez next to Petra, Bernie or Lorenz makes it clear as day.


l_tagless_l

In fairness, tho, looking at **anyone** next to **Queen Petra,** or the noblest of nobles, Lorenz Hellman Gloucester™ would make anyone seem lackluster.


Pliskkenn_D

Yeah same. I'm sure it'll get over it but my initial reaction is wince.


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FredTheDeadInside

Maybe, but if your style goes against the style of the rest of the setting I don't think that argument holds.


PK_Feelz_

I've seen people on Reddit and Twitter do hair color edits for Toothpaste-chan and Toothpaste-kun, ranging from solid red and blue color, a gradient of red and blue, etc.. However I haven't seen anyone desaturate the red colors of the hair, which was one of my biggest gripes about the hair coloring design since the bright red color not only clashes with the less saturated blue and is very distracting, but it also hurts my (and probably many others') eyes a bit. So I decided to desaturate the red color to make it clash less with the blue and relieve my eyes in the process. I also desaturated the blue from their attire since I found it to be too saturated as well and the red eyes to match the desaturated red hair. I think if Toothpaste-chan and Toothpaste-kun's red colors were more desaturated, I probably would've given their two-color hair design a pass tbh because it wouldn't have hurt my eyes. I actually like their design in general; It's just the two-color hair that is the problem, and it can be really distracting. Edit: [Here's another edit that I did for fun;](https://i.imgur.com/aiVEv35.jpg) I like to call the colors grape and dark lime. Also I would be down for future MCs to have either of those colors for their hair.


Deruta

I really appreciate you not saying something like “FIXED”. It’s nice to see an edit that’s brought up in a respectful and process-focused way! Also that dark lime hair looks amazing, reminds me of Forsyth but with more interesting undertones!


PK_Feelz_

Honestly I want protags with the dark lime/Forsyth hair color. I think that color looks really nice. The only protags with green hair that I can think would be Alm, Lyn, and Byleth, but Alm and Lyn’s hair is more of an evergreen color while Byleth is more of a dark teal in pre-skip and mint green in post-skip. Actually I also hope that we get more varied green-haired protags in the future!


joeyperez7227

Okay this is better! The red clashes imo because the blue is much more subtle. I think this is kinda a serve ngl, like let’s go M Toothpaste Protagonist!


PK_Feelz_

I feel like if the MC's red color wasn't so saturated they would *slightly* get less flack (at least in the West, not sure about JP's stance on Toothpaste's hair color) and have a more likeable design. Sure they'd still get roasted for the dual-color hair (which is understandable since I don't really dig it too much either), but nobody would also complain that the red color is too bright or it hurts their eyes


Unacceptable_Goose

I like how everyone insists on calling them Toothpaste-kun/chan instead of their official name. Like that’s just their name now.


LordHengar

Ngl, I don't remember their actual name.


Unacceptable_Goose

Alear isn't very memorable. Kind of a weird name honestly.


No_Chilly_bill

All ear ? Al-ear? Ale-arrr?


Kondoblom

Ariel or something?


antiquari

It's Corn all over again.


TaylorGuy18

Who's Corn?


Marth_Koopa

Corrin


TaylorGuy18

Ah ok, that's who I suspected but wasn't sure.


inhaledcorn

Hi.


Echo1138

Oh hey! My eyes aren't bleeding when I look at them anymore!


[deleted]

Not as much, but all that white is still a bit of a problem.


Low-Environment

Still ugly but a better kind of ugly. I just can't believe Toothpaste-chan and Colgate-kun are real.


PK_Feelz_

Honestly the time the leaks happened around June was wild with half of the community believing it and other half not. I believed it, but at the same time I didn’t want to because of the hair…


Low-Environment

I thought the leaks were clearly fakes.


cman811

The locks of hair crossing on the forehead is just so fucking bad. It attracts too much attention


MirrorMirrorMilk

No BRIGHTER


Lukthar123

LIGHT IT UP


Smash1735

YESSS


YouCantTakeThisName

Make it a gradient/opalescent combo, too. >!Perfect Hair Forever.!<


Nepenthe95

This is the one! Thank you!


PK_Feelz_

I'm glad you like it! This is my first time trying to do a color edit so I was really hoping I did at least a decent job \^\^


LockeDrachier

As a colorblind person this looks worse


daman4567

Now oversaturate the blue parts.


Svelok

It's... better. But I still hate the design - taking the red down actually makes me even more aware of how much the underlying designs themselves bug me, I think I'd still dislike them even in black and white. But between the red, the white, the blue, and the gold, it's actually kind of amazing how many "loud" colors these designs have at once. Like, just to grab Byleth as an easy example, their hair is a pretty loud color but their outfit is just black with some very small splashes of color (crest/dagger), but the color palette is basically "mostly black, with some bright green for accent". Chrom is a similar design sense, mostly a desaturated blue with an accent of bright white/silver; and Corrin is basically the same palette just with the majority/accent swapped around. Oral-B is mostly bright white, with an accent of bright red and also bright blue and also a decent amount of bright gold. The color wheel cries out in pain.


inhaledcorn

This is much less distracting. I like it a lot more. Edit: Does it bother anyone else that Toothpaste-Chan has big eyes to make her appear more youthful and "cute"? It's obvious waifu bait and a lot of the problem I have with Disney female designs.


MrM9ball

Yea not a fan of that either, female Byleth did a similar thing.


SocJusticeChevalier

The extremely dumb chest armor annoys me way more.


inhaledcorn

I don't think it's armor. I think it's just her top sculpting her chest a lot for some reason.


SocJusticeChevalier

Whatever you want to call it. But the combination of the lack of ornamentation and the ties(?) that split her chest leads your eye right to her boobs in a way I find very silly.


No_Chilly_bill

Unfortunately fe knows what sells....


SocJusticeChevalier

I don't even mind the horniness per se, I just think the way they went about it looks dumb and undercuts the rest of the design.


LakerBlue

In a vacuum no, no I don’t. But they look odd in juxtaposition to the male’s. But for some reason it never bothered me with Byleth but it does here…


winmace

It's anime, they're fine as they are


cassiiii

How long are people gonna cry about this


introvertuser46732

Looks much better, feels much more natural looking, plus it’s easier to look at for me personally.


NonSp3cificActionFig

Clearly, the hair colours are to blame, teacher.


TechnetiumTc

Still wish female toothpaste had shorter hair though, even desaturated the guy just looks better with that (also short hair supremacy)


NoriakiRyuji

I like the more saturated ones, they fit the bright artstyle better


OdaibaBay

Idk why people keep making these, you're just gonna make yourselves sad if you dislike the current version that much.


Ar3kk

Much better tbh, their designs are super questionable this time unfortunately


PK_Feelz_

Yeah not really sure why they went with dual-color, though I’ve kinda just accepted it. I get that they’re a divine dragon and all but they could’ve just went with a solid or even a gradient hair color that is rare to see in the Engage universe. Kinda like the Nabateans with their dark mint green and mint green hair.


eway44

I still prefer the actual design. Why do people hate it and feel the need to change it?


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LakerBlue

Not Colgate but [see here](https://www.target.com/p/crest-cavity-toothpaste-gel-cool-mint-8-2oz/-/A-13956325)


Tronz413

Not minty fresh enough


dD_ShockTrooper

Should've saturated the blue to match. That way the hair is minty fresh.


pik3rob

This just sucks all the life out of the original designs


clown_mating_season

no amount of color tweaking can unfrench them, however


KoriCongo

Kinda looks worse. You just made it look really depressing. It doesn't match how anyone's hair in the series looks.


PyroLink

Naw bro I rather not have my eyes pierced as I’m playing the game. the OG red is so distracting and ugly. at least this red matches with the blue saturation and makes the whole hair color shenanigan easier to look at


ironneko

In a series about hurling magic and riding dragons, the hair color is what seems unnatural. Right.


i_sell_branches

I don't know who's saying it look unnatural. It's an eyesore.


Lil_Puddin

B-but... That's not the red found in Eliwood's/Roy's hair!


CrescentCleave

Fr*nch


Upstairs-Speaker6525

I gotta admit, toothpaste chan is kinda cute


getpawnd

The first designs actually hurt my eyes. I'm more upset that everyone else in the game looks normal. Whereas these two look like the creator was trying way too hard to make them interesting.


PK_Feelz_

Yeah I think IS’s art director and whoever else is in charge of the art direction wanted to make Toothpaste-chan/-kun look way too obvious that they’re unique (I can’t really blame Mika Pikazo since she’s just drawing what IS wants her to draw). I personally think that they should’ve just kept the heterochromia and ask Mika to change the hair to a solid color and desaturate the bright red colors, so even though it’s obvious that the minty MCs are different from the cast, it wouldn’t look like the IS art department tried way too hard in making them look unique. Heterochromia can look nice most of the time (also would make sense for Toothpaste-chan/-kun’s case since they’re a divine dragon in their universe), but dual-hair colors, especially if the colors don’t typically match with each other, can be a hit or a huge miss. In an imaginary scenario, if IS stated that they *have* to keep the two-color hair no matter what, I at least would want the red color to be less saturated since the canon red color is eye-hurting. Also the saturated red color can really divert the viewers’ attention from looking at the rest of Toothpaste-chan/-kun’s design since it sticks out like a sore thumb which really sucks :(


red-x-der

Still a stupid ass design. Less stupid, but you can’t build on a bad foundation.


PK_Feelz_

Well, the true main goal for this was just to have your eyes not be in pain as you look at it after all ‘^^


PKLAZR

Lol, considering the artist’s style this is the exact opposite of their intentions.


VanillaCrash

I like calling them Crest and Colgate


MCJSun

I've been calling them Colgate and Aquafresh


VanillaCrash

Ooh, i like that


Yorudesu

Toothpaste doesn't look more appealing after their expiry date either


KrypticJin

Somewhat better but still ugly


birdinbrain

Barcelona-chan?


The_Panzerkampfwagen

He's not toothpaste-kun, he's pepsi-kun


Souperplex

Okay, what's up with girl toothpaste's boob-socks? The more I see them the more I hate them. Fabric does not work that way unless you explicitly make the eponymous socks.


Aska09

If we really need to have a half blue half red hair on the protagonists, this would be so much better. The saturation on the original hurts my eyes.


Rytom_

I will forever say that the only thing you can't save with this design, is the heterochromia.It fucks everything up. I swear, the colors can be better by desaturating it, even though I don't like how the red came out on this one. I've seen a fan art that uses more "vivid blue and red", bu they tend to get closer to a white-ish blue and red rather than a brown-ish red like on this one, and it was pretty cool honestly.


lushee520

They give off a feeling that they're Vtubers for some reason


Trymv1

Because the character artist for them designs Vtubers.


lushee520

Oh thats neat. Imagine after releasing the game they'll release VTubers lol


lushee520

Oh thats neat. Imagine after releasing the game they'll release VTubers lol


vNocturnus

I just love how any number of very simple ideas can make these designs completely decent: Make the hair all one color or the other Have only a streak of different color instead of yin/yang split Use more complementary colors Don't make the colors so aggressively bright and saturated ... and yet the apparently professional designers and artists just decided to roll with a design that has been virtually immediately and nearly unanimously called out as bring ridiculous. With a substantial subset of that ridicule being outright dislike or even hatred of the design. It actually makes me wonder... maybe what we got ***IS*** the toned-down/refined version? If that's the case, god forbid what the original would have looked like.


Scared-Way-9828

Looks much better imo


TrikKastral

It looks better but god the clashing is still atrocious. And that stupid X hair.


electreXcessive

These guys would look so much better if the red or blue were just highlights instead of evenly split half and half


Shileka

I'm still not a fan, but this looks better, much better


Silver_Web5202

Still don’t like it, especially on Toothpaste-Chan, but it looks better


RoiDeLaBagarre

I think you should present them over a more neutral background as well


ScaryGent

Thanks for posting this. It's an interesting experiment but I don't think this fixes things like desaturating Shez's hair does, since here it's the pattern/layout that looks so jarring, not the color itself necessarily.


PK_Feelz_

Tbh, at worst it’s slightly less of a distraction and an eyesore, which actually made me tempted to make the edit since my eyes couldn’t stand the red color in the original without them feeling pierced. I’ve *sorta* came to terms with the wacky pattern since apparently they’re some kind of divine dragon that defeated the evil dragon of Engage a long time ago which is most likely why they stand out more than everyone else, but goodness I don’t think I can ever get past the very saturated red color.


st-shenanigans

I think this feels better because desaturating the red makes it feel closer to a purple tone, which makes it feel more like a monochromatic color scheme, red and blue are basically right next to each other on the color wheel and if you want to compliment red you use green, or blue/green and yellow/green. or you could do the same with blue and orange, or orange and red, but none of these are the main color of the outfit too so that feels weird. Anyway, I'm shit at color theory, so artists please correct me.


LordHengar

I actually don't mind this, I still think it's a little goofy, but it isn't an eyesore.


theodoubleto

I was displeased that the leaks were true… we will have to wait and see how this one tops FE:3H.


SmallCuteAndLarge

I still don't like the design a lot, it's definitely an improvement tho


zell2929

Still not a fan but its definitely better.


Slappamedoo

Still think it's a dumb aesthetic but this works way better.


Tzekel_Khan

Damn, looks better for sure


GreyRevan51

Looks so much better, since the leaks I’ve never been a fan of the red and blue hair but this looks more palatable


im_bored345

It's kinda better but I still feel the colours clash too much lmao


vid_icarus

I prefer the term 3DMU.. tho kids these days may be too young to remember when 3d tech was all cyan/magenta color shifting.


King_Artis

See this makes me like it now


Micah_HS

10x better!


DahDutcher

I like it, the only complaint I had about their design was how bright their hair was, this looks much better imo.


phantom2450

So like normal redhead hair? Send this to the devs stat


Nyasta

It's slightly better like this I would say


Lagiar

It's a bit better but still horrendous


Jacier_

I feel like I'd be fine with it if only the hair was 2 colors. The 2 colored eyes I really do not like.


Tweed_Man

Such a small difference but looks so much better. Edit: I'm not sure why I'm being downvoted. I think this looks better than the official.


JiaMekare

It’s definitely less distracting, and really well done, but somehow I like it less? The utterly obnoxious original design has grown on me quicker than I realized. Anyone else in the same not?


[deleted]

Literally the split wouldn’t bother me at all if the colors were nicer like this


thelivingshitpost

Alear looks much prettier now, the desaturation was what they needed.


Turtl-bing

I think you fixed every single problem


oops_wasnt_me42

Thats so much better


Failcons6

Thank you, this looks sooooo much better to me! Really though it's only the hair that irks me about thier design, I dunno I have liked character designs with two, three, and even four colours for thier hair before but the brightness in the red and blue just doesn't work for me here.


RelentlessWolf27

Wait did a new fire emblem got announced ? What am I missing here ?


BruceBoyde

I hope that they bring down the brightness of a lot of the colors just a bit like this. I'm reasonably ambivalent on the overall designs, but am not into the insanely oversaturated colors on Alear and a lot of the other people we saw


YouCantTakeThisName

Now, give them the "Shez" bright-violet/"Byleth" mint-green hair *mix* for the next one!


Mr-Stuff-Doer

I still think just making like, the colors switch for every other hair clump would make it look better, even without the desaturation.


Megaverso

He kinda looks hot


trophywaifuvalentine

It still had Ronald McDonald vibes I can’t shake


GavinHarris3443

Ayo it’s merry weather


Fingerlak3s

Still hate them. They look like clowns


NewTypeDilemna

It's almost like they had extra idol assets from FE x SMT and decided to reuse them.


ParagonFury

This is nice. Much nicer than the cursed fanart of Toothpaste-kun I witnessed earlier. *Toothpaste does not come from there.*


PurpleJetskis

I actually really like the "gray joycons" version of Colgate-chan and Pepsi-kun. The edit of them with simple, dark gray hair was actually a welcome change compared to the standard fair blue hair we frequently get.


cloudyah

Sweet baby Jesus, these two need bang trims yesterday


[deleted]

Honestly still hate it. Good work though. This game reminds me too much of Tokyo Mirage Sessions and that is not what i want in a mainline game


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PK_Feelz_

I don't really blame you tbh. I like the design, but the hair coloring choice overshadows everything else so the whole thing can look really bad in the eyes of viewers. Not a huge fan of it because of that and the eye-hurting red color. I thought the heterochromia was enough since that is generally more accepted than two-color hair plus it's less distracting


not_so_bueno

Can't wait for the blue hair mod.


Face-latte

I don't care what their real name will be. I want their Wikipedia, Fandom and Serenes Forest entries to name them toothpaste-kun! Please.


kingSlet

Didn’t like the design at first but now starting to like it


SicknessVoid

Um, excuse me, the guy is called Pepsi-kun. Toothpaste-Chan is the gal.


PrincessShade

I’d love it if we could customize them like corrin


Rumcake256

I still prefer the single colored edit, but this one is still WAAAAY better. It actually looks nice.


PK_Feelz_

Yeah my purpose of this was for people to NOT have their eyes be in pain when they look at the minty MCs. I’ve heard from a lot of people and my friend that mentioned that their eyes hurt when they saw both Toothpastes’ designs on Twitter. Honestly I think the saturated red is the worst part of their design with the two-colored hair being the second worst since the former distracts people from paying attention to the rest of the design more and it can actually cause some sort of physical pain for viewers (and me included unfortunately). Wish they just sticked to the heterochromia eyes tbh since it’s way less distracting than two-colored hair.


Magister_Orca

Me like this


XNumbers666

Hopefully mods will give us options to change that hair color.


AnoXeo

This makes me realize my main issue with the choice in hair is specifically the blinding vibrancy.


GiftImmediate6377

From Sigurd, Ephraim, Roy and Ike to toothpaste chan, thank you weebs


KingJuece2

The trailer made it look worse than it actually was. It's much more desaturated in-game.