Classic, Ink, or Limelight?

I pretty much agree, except for Ink. I just like the cartoonish style. It appeals to me.
Other than that, yea.

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Same

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My favorite look is Limelight.
Especially when it comes to the women. They look more real and prettier.
My only wish was that the guys could have facial hair. Which is apparently going to be happening soon. So I am super happy about that.
I think people like Ink more then Limelight because it is slightly easier to do Multiple character customization on it. As a story writer.
I don’t like the look of the classic at all.

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classic is creepy AF. i refuse to read any stories written in classic. they move weird, they look weird and i just cant. i like ink because ive played in ink more than any other style. but ive played it so much, im tired of the way it looks. i do still like it but i LOVE LL. it looks more realistic. its just like video games, look how Super Mario looked in super mario 1 compared to how he looks now. this is just the natural progression of things and i love it.

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I still like INK slightly more than Limelight, as when limelight first came out I was a little skeptical. I originally thought they looked weirder ig. Now I am warming up to Limelight a little more, but I wish the guys looked a little better.

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I prefer INK because I like it’s cartoon-ish look and I think the animations look a lot better than Classic and LL. However, I really like the realistic look that LL has and I’m very fond of the amazing hairstyles, different skin colors etc.

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Honestly don’t know why people hate Classic. Joined when Classic was the only art style too. I think around mid-2014. Ink is my favorite art style of them all. Limelight…is the worst. All the characters look like freaking aliens!! They move really weird and they all look the same…

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Ink cause It looks cool

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Classic gives me weird vibes. I have read a few stories in classic but I didn’t get very far. The men scare me but I think the women look okay haha.

INK is still my favorite, I dig the cartoon look and I love their animations. The INK dudes are handsome in my opnion (rip me they’re cartoon wtf)

LimeLight is slowly, slowly , warming up to me. They have so many outfits and animations which I love though. The one thing I’ve noticed is when the guys kiss lol, wth is going on with their hand?!

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I like limelight, because it’s way prettier, and more realistic.

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I love them all equally, but for different reasons. Part of it is that I’m not someone who can bring himself to avoid a perfectly good story just because of the art style, so I’ve had the opportunity to warm up to all of them. I’ve also written stories in all three styles, so that helps.

I enjoy the color range and smooth shading with Limelight. I’m also excited for the new assets to come out, and like the direction the style is going in.

INK has the best animations, and the cartoony look fits the format of Episode best. Since Episode is similar to visual novels, INK’s aesthetic seems like the best fit for the format.

Classic has the best range of hairstyles and fantasy/sci-fi assets. The animations are more dramatic but it works for Episode, especially with comedy.
A side note as a writer: from my experience with having a published story in Classic, the people who still read Classic are wonderfully supportive. My story with only 40 or so reads has actually received more fan mail and shoutouts than some of my stories with hundreds of reads, as well as some fan art. For me, that sort of thing is a lot more important than the number of reads.

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Well yeah limelight might be the best because of the realism. Tho there are things I’d like them to bring in from classic or ink.
for example: classic had more hair options for both girls and guys and limelight doesn’t have as much. i do agree that classic guys were quite ugly but i’d like to see more options in limelight. also clothes… classic had so much choices for girls, and boys weren’t so bad. so mostly just MORE choices for hair and clothes. also there are some animations that i’d bring from classic. and the biggest one TATTOOS!!! I need tattoos for both.
But limelight is the best

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Classic was the days when there were 10x better and more original stories, to be honest. It’s kind of a style you have to grow on and enjoy the actual storyline instead of the visuals. It’s an okay style, I’m not a fan, though. It seems like failed realism that looks like a cartoon that failed to air on television. The animations were horrific… some of them were somewhat acceptable, but the vomiting animation? God no. You probably had a couple of options for each feature and it was very limited.

Ink was a big step up. It looks like a cartoon that actually succeeded to air on television, just a touch of realism, I guess. I probably realism from the proportions and whatnot. It has smooth, improved animations and more options. Though, it lacks diversity. It probably will stop getting updates soon enough. They haven’t added any features, skin tones, eye colours or lip colours that could improve it further, add some more ethnicity. I see they’ve added Limelight stuff, such as hairs, clothing and possibly animations. The females and males are equally attractive (that sounds weird but they are) when intended to look good. It’s easier to make a good looking character in Ink.

Limelight is a great style with a very, very big range of options. They’ve added so many skintones, hair colours, lip colours, eye colours, so many features that you can make very unique and diverse characters. It kind of went back to that bad looking male character thing (at least in my opinion) because I can’t seem to make a male that is as attractive as the ones I made in ink. The shading is very smooth. It’s definitely more realistic. The animations are smooth and good, just some of them look slightly inhumane.

In the old days of classic, no one really made bad stories and that’s what I really missed: unique storylines, good stories, no gems! Argh.

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This is exactly how I feel… I mostly ready only ink stories because I don’t like the animations for ll but I need to stop because I’ll never warm up to it that way and I’ll miss out on a lot of good stories.

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Ink is cool but the next story I’m writing will be a classic story. Classic just has that authenticity ya know? Reminds me of the good ol’ Episode days.

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I don’t know why I replied to @Lex2 lol.

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I wonder if it has something to do with when ppl actually joined episode? I came when ink was already available I think it just came out. Were you here before that? I’ve never read a classic story…ever lol I tried really hard but I couldn’t finish.

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Played for a little bit in the “Classic Era”. Def less gem choices.

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@purplezombieattack Me too. Honestly, you took the words straight from my mouth. Likewise, there are pros and cons to all of the styles available and I agree with that. No style is perfect but the differences between them all are what makes them unique, which I respect. At the end of the day, there is no ‘best style’ when it comes to an opinion as it’s a matter of preference. It’s subjective. People can go back and forth all day about this kind of topic and there’ll never be a conclusion. You have different tools and options to tell your story in different styles: cartoonish, realistic, etc.

@Lex2 I feel the same way sometimes, that when it comes to naming a favorite style, people have a tendency to name their favorite based on the era they joined where that style was more dominant. For example, someone who joined back 2014 to early 2016 may appreciate Classic more than someone who joined later. Someone who joined when Limelight was released may like that style more, and same for Ink. However, this is not the case for every player; just some players, and that is just my personal observation of things.

So what is my favorite style? Classic is my favorite style out of all of them.

Here’s why:

Generally, there’s tons of variety in Classic…

Firstly, the hairstyles, as you mentioned. There is a wide array of hairstyles available for both male and female, especially for the female characters. I believe there are even more hairstyles in Classic than Ink and Limelight. The Classic style was adapted from the old Pocket Gems game, Campus Life. I did some research, and I noticed that there were tons of hairstyles that were left out of Episode’s version of Classic. It’s a little bittersweet because when you consider that in theory, there could have been so much more hairstyles on Classic that it’s insane. Same for the clothing as well. But we got what we got, and that’s okay. Anywho, there’s just a lot of variety in there that you wouldn’t see in the other styles. I also like the way they have been drawn and colored.

Secondly, the clothing. Ranging from old-fashioned vintage, and even sci-fi clothing options that come with the style. There’s also some pretty cool accessories and clothes, such as a Bee Hive Mask, Robotic Parts, and even alien masks. There are some really awesome options in there that you don’t normally see in the other styles. Some things that people have even suggested for the current style were already created in Classic, for example, freckles.

Thirdly, I also love the way the Classic characters express themselves the most. It’s not ‘cartoonish’ or ‘realistic’ as with Ink or Limelight. It’s something entirely different which is cool, kinda like its own style, in my opinion.

Fourth, nostalgia. Yes, nostalgia. Back in the days of Classic, Episode did focus on Romance, but they also created a wide variety of stories in other genres, believe it or not. It continued for a while, but now there’s nothing but Romance. In my opinion, the story quality back then was better than most of Episode’s featured stories today. This era did have its problems but one thing that I do miss is that aspect of quality that Episode once had. It’s not the same nowadays. When I read a good story in Classic, it’s always a nice feeling of the good ol’ days of stories like The Ember Effect by Joseph Evans, Human by Gina Massaro, The Peacock Heist by Asuncion & Rossitto… and so much more… all old, yet gold stories. I feel that it was a simpler time, where other genres were focused on and Classic just happened to be that style that was available in that era before Ink and Limelight. Now the atmosphere has changed. I feel that it’s nothing but the repetitiveness, lack of high quality and creativity from Episode’s created stories, in my opinion.

Those are my reasons. As I always say, even if Classic is my favorite, I do love all the styles available for what they bring to the table. I have no preferences of art style when it comes to reading stories. In my book, a good story is a good story and that’s what should be the main focus.

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Is this the campus life you were talking about?

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