User blog comment:Cruiser One/My Hunger Games computer simulation/@comment-58.6.204.138-20130531063043/@comment-1852938-20130706003108

Concerning showing avatars instead of blocks, the Daedalus engine used to display the graphics operates on blocks (similar to Minecraft) so arbitrary 3D avatar models isn't easily added without major rewrites. Certainly with a $50 million budget and a team of graphic artists like the major commercial games have, I could do a lot more. ;)

What at least can be done already is texture map the block surfaces with photos, such as seen in this corn Maze picture . The surfaces instead of being solid colors with black markings on them like we have today, could be profile photos of people. Although then we'd probably want a random library of people (perhaps with the option to import your own photos) since this isn't the 74th Hunger Games (although we could also have a "profile library" of 74th HG tribute photos if we wanted to reproduce it).

Of course, there are some limitations with even photos. Photos are usually opaque, while the semitransparent blocks we have now allows one to look through them to see tributes and environment on the other side, which is important to gameplay. The photos need to be adjusted somehow in order to see wielded weapon and current health, which is another important gameplay element. Also it may look weird facing a block corner on, because then you either see two faces (one on each block face), or have special side views for the sides (which makes it take more work to set up pictures, and means keeping track of which direction each tribute is facing).