After creating a Northern, a Southern, an Eastern, a Western, and both a Day and a Night Dragon, it’s a little surprising, (yet logical), that Kinzart would release a Central Dragon. We’ll cover it in this review.
Out of the Box:
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Observations:
Build and Skin:
Right out of the box, this avatar is visually interesting in a number of different ways. Perhaps the one way that it achieves an eye-catching effect is through its texturing. Everything on this avatar is very beautifully textured, easily making this avatar one of, if not the best texture-jobs from Kinzart to date. The scutes on the belly are well coloured, shaded, and drawn; and in specific areas of the body, the hand-textured scales add a good bit to the avatar. Users get the choice between using Gecko-influenced arms and legs, or Avian-influenced legs and arms.
The avatar comes with shapes for both sexes, and a unisex skin with a pleasant sheen over the scaled parts of the body. For some, the shading on the unisex skin’s chest may be a bit too accented for males; perfect for females. There is also a mature skin included here: Warning, Link is Mature. The scale shine brings a lot of visual depth and volume to the avatar, but those who dislike the shine may be dissapointed to find that there is no skin without it.
Build-wise, this avatar maintains the Kinzart standard; the sculpts are clean, and the textures match up nicely between the body shape and the attachments. Creases between prims are kept at a minimum, especially as evidenced by the majority of the face only being made of one sculpt.
Attachments:
As mentioned before, this avatar comes with two types of feet attachments; Gecko and Avian. The picture below shows the difference between both. Both of these options provide a little extra room for users to customize the avatar, and suit the Central Dragon reasonably well. There are not many options regarding the feet, except the ability to toggle between ‘flat’ and ‘curled.’ On ‘Auto’, the feet curl in flight.
The arm attachments follow in the same vein as the legs; Gecko or Avian, as shown above. For the avian arms, users simply wear the Avian hands, (5-Fingered human-styled hands with avian scales and sharp talons) and wear one of two “Gloves” which turn the lower arms into ‘armscales’ without needing to wear a different skin. The gloves will either be the same colour as the avian hands or completely white (for tinting). To help smoothen the transition from dragon-to-avian scales, users can wear what appear to be feathers just above the elbow. The Gecko-hands appear less avian in their style but come with all the same features as the Avian hands. As always, users can use any of the 7 preset finger positions (Point, fisted, etc.), or create their own position for each finger and save in the HUD.
The tail for this avatar comes in three forms. Each is displayed below in this order; 1. Bare, 2. Phoenix, 3. Fanned. The two latter tails are mostly flexible prim and borrow heavily from Avian influences, while the ‘Bare’ tail is stubby and more reptilian.
This brings us to the wings. The design of these wings is interesting because it merges traits of both Draconic-style wings and Avian-style wings. The result only adds to the ‘hybrid’ style of the avatar’s look, while remaining graceful and aesthetic. In flight, the wings open up and the avatar flaps its wings with the included KZK flight animation overrider (AO).
Head:
We finally get to talk a bit about the head. One could immediately say that the head is pretty much that of a Gecko’s. The face itself is somewhat simple; but the textures really get to stand out with their bold markings. Additionally, the eyes themselves are a focal point. The irises are large and colorful, and users again have the choice of how dilated they would like the slitted pupils to be. From a side view, the eyes look focused and attentive, but directly from the front, at times, the eyes could seem to give the avatar a slightly ‘derpy’ look.
Users can easily change the brow setting from that of a ‘Neutral’ expression in favour of either an Angry or a Sad expression. There are no muzzle expressions included with this avatar.
The interior of the dragon muzzle makes the face look a fair deal more ferocious due to the two rows of tiny but very sharp-looking teeth. The tongue on this avatar is somewhat mammalian, opting more for a ‘full’ tongue with a muted ‘fork’ in the tip. Users can change how wide they want the mouth to open, and whether to stick the tongue out or not.
As we bring our discussion of the head to a close, we’ll point out one last feature to the head; that of the horns. Users can choose between the two types of head horns using the included HUD or text commands (See photo below for the two horn options and some facial expression combinations).
Finally, the head is completed by a decorative plumage of feathers on the cheeks and the rear of the head. This decoration adds an exotic touch to the head overall and accents the face very well, though users have the option to detach it.
Features and Heads-Up Display (HUD):
This avatar’s features are all accessible through the HUD that came with it, as well as commands that one can find in the ‘Central Dragon Documentation’ notecard. The features are all more or less explained in the HUD photos above.
Customization:
This avatar is copiable and modifiable, so there shouldn’t be any major issues getting the job done in terms of making this avatar truly one’s own. If users wish to wear a third party hair, some will fit perfectly, though others will have difficulty thanks to the sloping brow and muzzle. Also, if one removes the avian and draconic attachments from this avatar, the user is left with a pretty nifty Gecko. (See below)
Conclusion:
The Kinzart Central Dragon is another successful addition to KZK’s lengthy lineup of the creatures of legend. Each in the line offered something a little new and different from one another, giving users a large amount of choice. The overall design of the avatar may, to some people seem a little cluttered, and to others, make this avatar all the more visually appealing. In the end, however, this avatar continues the Kinzart tradition with strong textures and an interesting design that attracts the eye.
