Hello,

Please be brutally honest. The first word that comes to mind would be good, plus some constructive feedback too if possible. :)

If you want to make a judgement-call on whether the icon matches the game, then there's a gameplay video here.

Cheers,

only the hair sucks- just needs some gradients

The art style is a little off-putting. If I could put a pin on why it's because there's different levels of detail on different elements. It's clashing a bit. My guess is you're doing a CG render with a photoshop paint over - you're allowing a ton of details to come through from the render (shading, sculpting imperfections, even a reflection of the armor on the cheek) but the paint over (hair, ear) is a very illustrative style (flat, no noise, only hand-painted gradients). I would either push to have more detail in the paint over, or take steps to reduce detail from the CG render. This could be done with a toon shader, or by painting over more of the render. The irises of the eyes in particular are off-putting from the clash.

For positives, I think you've sculpted a very emotive face. I like the expression, it sets a fun inviting tone.

Also, please factor into this feedback that I'm not an artist myself and disliking the art style is at least part personal preference.

You need to look at it the way that most people will see it:

His skin colour is a bit lifeless.
Maybe try something warmer \ more saturated.

An icon, like the name already says, should be iconic, more abstract, easy to read, easy to remember, easy to distinct.

You need to look at it the way that most people will see it:

Phones are getting bigger..

Sorry, couldn't figure out how to change the attachment in the original post.

As Hodgman rightly points out, a much smaller size is what people will see:



I agree that the hair is a bit ugly, and that's very easy to fix; however, I'm more interested to know what you think about the icon as a whole. What is your instant reaction when you see it? Is it one of "that's lame" or neural, or "that's reasonably cool"?

Also, how do you think it would be perceived by teenagers, who are the main audience?

looks like a google play game

My first thoughts were, the icon doesn't seem to tell me anything about the game.

How about having him with that same creepy smile, while decapitating an enemy, with blood spurting out? Or maybe a pizza if that's too graphic. But something with a sword in it. :)