I finished two more portraits for Cheri recently (because the Nexus mod page editor is janky as hell and it's annoying) - revamped the iaido gear portrait, and designed a whole new outfit for the Shooting Star Festival date. This is the first time I designed an outfit directly on the pixel portrait itself instead of drawing one in my regular art, and a lot of that time was spent agonizing over how to tie/decorate the obiage.
These portraits are the edge-most of all edge use cases for a unique outfit. Cheri's schedule has her do practice only from 6-7AM every day. She starts at 5AM actually, but the player wakes up at 6, so there's only a short window of time to catch her in this outfit and read related dialogue. The date outfit is, well, only for the Shooting Star date, and this outfit is designed for an unmarried woman in mind (see the heavily decorated obi and the elaborate obiage design), so I imagine post-marriage she wears a different outfit instead. To be fair, I wanted post-marriage Cheri to have a unique Shooting Star date event where she takes you out riding for a picnic with Snow White, so she would have to wear equestrian gear, which her new summer outfit qualifies as.
For the iaido outfit revamp, I have once again bested kimono sleeves in single combat and came out victorious. Aside from the new base giving a better silhouette, I simplified the rendering on the sword, especially the grip, which in my opinion is the biggest quality improvement for the revamped portrait.
I've got some more thoughts about these two outfits, more design yap under the cut:
In some ways, these two outfits are diametrically opposite of each other. Cheri's iaido outfit is one of the most masc-presenting ones (with the low waistline and a men's hakama, while the date outfit is very strongly femme from its colors to its silhouette and accessories. In fact, it's so femme that it's a major outlier compared to the rest of her outfits, because Cheri is uncomfortable with wearing something so obviously feminine.
More importantly, the date outfit is also an outlier because Cheri does not wear blue, much less in softer shades, for her tops. Her tops are always either red, pink, or white, and blue is almost always reserved for outerwear or bottoms:
Red is Cheri's color motif, not just from what red represents as a color in general, but also because it's her province's color - something reserved for nobility (her Master is often seen in red or wearing red accessories). In fact, it's a not-so-subtle hint of how favored she is by her Master, because she wears a lot of red for a peasant and her sword is also very much red-accented as it's the clan heirloom sword that unofficially marked her as his successor.
There is always some amount of (dark) blue in Cheri's outfits, which for the present day is a hint of her connection with Balor. However, the iaido outfit is notable for being the only outfit Cheri has that entirely lacks any blue elements. It's monochrome with red as the accent color, which is also how I render all art related to/set in Cheri's childhood. It's my way of saying that Cheri in her practice gear, wearing dark red, is her expressing the core of her self: her Master's favored student, the bearer of his legacy, and an embodiment of the violence she lives and breathes. The unrepentant Blood-Red Swordsman.
Cheri may not be actively (or openly) committing the kind of violence she used to in Mistria, but that part of her never left either, no matter how she tries to pass her sword practice as one of the ways she meditates. She's a creature of habit, and she still does her sword practice out of fear of losing her edge; still someone who never really quit living in survival mode.
On the other hand, her date outfit has a very soft color palette with blue as the main color. I've yet to have 'proper' art for this part, but the date outfit's color palette is actually the most similar to the colors she used to wear while travelling with Balor and their friends as a teenager. Cheri still wore red accessories, but she also wears soft or desaturated blues as the main color. This is significant, because Cheri (or at least herself prior to living in Mistria) has come to view this part of her own life with deep contempt. She blames herself a lot for the incident that drove their little ragtag band of misfits apart and killed their friends. This separation from Balor, too, is the biggest cause of her incredibly poor mental state in the present day.
So the fact that Cheri goes on a date wearing these colors and an outfit that is pretty, soft, and absolutely not practical to fight in whatsoever is my way of conveying that it's a moment of both physical and emotional vulnerability for her. She's dropped her guard down, wearing something that she normally is uncomfortable in, just for the occasion... which is significant because I plan to make Cheri only truly romanceable after you hit 8 hearts, and to reach that point, she has to reconcile with Balor, too (i.e. you have to finish their special story arc).
The patterns for the date outfit are kawa (river), koi fish on the obi, and lotus as the flower motif. Many of these are symbols of perseverance and resilience. Lotus is also a deeply Buddhist flower, which I think is an appropriate motif because at this point in her character arc, Cheri has gone a long way into her personal path of enlightenment - she's moved on from or reconciled with many parts of her past.
So the TL;DR is that 'the curtains are just blue' is absolutely not applicable for Cheri in all aspects, because I'm very fond of symbolism and like putting many hours into thinking about them. As a bonus for reading this far, have these designs that I drafted for a younger Balor and Cheri! He's in his early 20s and Cheri is about 14 years old here.
(I personally headcanon Balor as Very Tall, which is unfortunate because he's canonically average height. At the same time, Cheri was also comically short as a teenager, so she would be a lot tinier than him regardless.)
Taking a break from today's publishing chaos to style my boy... now he is more acceptably dressed for a date.
I've always found it hilarious (and mildly infuriating) that March shows up to the Shooting Star date in his work outfit. To be fair, all the other romanceables also use their summer portraits, but people like Ryis are still well-dressed enough for a date even in their workwear!
I like to believe that March is chronically unfashionable in a way of having little sense of what's actually 'appropriate' to wear to a function if he thinks he's clean and decent-looking already (if it ain't broke, don't fix it and all). In their little friend group, this makes him the odd one out compared to Reina, Ryis, and Cheri, all of whom put (almost) equal effort in practicality and aesthetics despite the amount and type of labor they do every day. Lining all of their portraits up, especially for summer, gets pretty funny to me.
Anyways, this outfit was the result of Ryis catching him in time before the festival began. He felt scandalized that March seriously planned to go to his date dressed like that — when a couple days earlier, Cheri had gone to him for advice/moral support about her outfit, which was a Big Deal for her — so he got fashion-policed very hard into dressing nicer.
... well, as nice as March could get, which means utility pants, quite a bit of pockets everywhere, and steel-toed boots. But it's better than his apron, at least.
March and Cheri's park date, commissioned from dxnut00 (Tumblr, VGen)! Please check out their super charming art!
The park date was one of the ones that left a strong impression on me, right after the Deep Woods picnic date (which, in the MC!Cheri canon, was their first date spot). As soon as March's post-date dialogue came up and it implied that he and you exchanged childhood stories, I audibly went 'oh no. OH NOO!' and started laughing because of Cheri's dubious childhood experiences.
However, at this point, March is more than used to their various eccentricities, so this is basically how it went (and is the context behind the concept for this comm):
Some extra ship talk under the cut!
One of my notes for this commission is to make it obvious that these two are holding hands. Cheri has hang-ups about physical contact thanks to the life they've led. While they eventually get used to it because among other things, Reina was quite touchy-feely with her affection and Landen tends to pat them on the shoulder, Cheri still gets flustered by the idea of handholding—more than kissing and other forms of physical intimacy.
It makes them very aware that someone is touching the part of them that has enacted so much violence, all unflinchingly, even if justified. Though they seem unfazed and can be shockingly transparent about that fact, it remains the part of their identity that they view as aberrant and the greatest source of their self-alienating tendencies.
(And for those unaware of my OC/CC ship, March accidentally asked for Cheri's hand in marriage by gifting her a replacement sword, so they're actually engaged and not 'just' dating. There's some more context + slight worldbuilding in this post if you're interested!)
