Being a longtime RO player, I have always liked the game’s sprite art. A large part of its charm is in its cute anime look, and countless headgear you could equip. And that’s all achieved by sprites.
However, the art of RO sprites have changed dramatically over the years. With the introduction of the Renewal patch, the 3rd Job sprites now look far removed from its predecessors.
Case in point:
(from left: Swordsman, Knight, Lord Knight, Rune Knight)
From Swordsman to Lord Knight, you can see a natural progression. The skirt gets progressively shorter (all the better to move around!), the body type becomes taller and more adult-proportioned, and the armor turns more and more ornate.
But the Rune Knight throws all of that out of the window, except for the more adult body type. Instead of more armor, it throws us a chain-mail bikini instead. Why the sudden change? I read from somewhere that the 3rd Jobs were modeled after the characters in the Ragnarok manwha. That’s funny, when the game has painstakingly avoided the look for so long. I still don’t get it.
The other sprites look even weirder. You can tell they were going for more detail, but the end result looks like a huge fashion disaster. I don’t know what Gravity is thinking anymore!