Characters you created that you admit are blatant expy?

DekuKurohi

What would a combination of ZUN and Nasu be like?
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Expy: Characters that are stand-in/clearly based on existing characters.

We all have inspiration somewhere and probably read a story or two at least. Chances are at least one of the character you created are more transparently inspired by characters from different story from your own. Maybe most of your characters are clearly inspired by others but there's that one that seem painfully obvious that maybe you put in some tongue in cheek lampshades into the story itself.

Mine is Belphi first introduced in Re:Maou (And not the og/prototype story T&F) who is obviously meant to be similar Byleth from Fire Emblem: Three Houses on the Nintendo Switch. Similar design, introduced in an academy, was a professor teaching there at one point, use whip-sword as a weapon of choice, on the calmer side, was a mercenary once. Writing the prequel with her as the P.O.V. character actually made me put in more Byleth-like backstory with a horse-riding mercenary father and a green-haired mother who worked in the church once, legendary whip-sword, lost bloodline, and a head gremlin (Though in Belphi's case she's mostly quiet).
That's a lot of similarity I can admit to. I try to muddied it a little by giving her (not) Master Spark and liking sunflower (or just flower in general) as a nod to Yuuka Kazami from Touhou. Belphi not being much of a blank-slate, and actually have a beating heart.
There's actually a reason why I included her in the rewrite as a rather blatant Byleth expy since during planning of T&F I was originally gonna make it a Three Houses-esque story so I put her in there as a nod to what it could have been.
Hopefully I'm not pushing my luck too much with her.

Anyone else wanna fess up?
 

SailusGebel

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I have such characters, but I don't want to say which of my characters are expy. Also, a question, what if you only copy looks?
 

ModernGold7ne

That fly you can't swat.
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Nov 25, 2020
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Expy: Characters that are stand-in/clearly based on existing characters.

We all have inspiration somewhere and probably read a story or two at least. Chances are at least one of the character you created are more transparently inspired by characters from different story from your own. Maybe most of your characters are clearly inspired by others but there's that one that seem painfully obvious that maybe you put in some tongue in cheek lampshades into the story itself.

Mine is Belphi first introduced in Re:Maou (And not the og/prototype story T&F) who is obviously meant to be similar Byleth from Fire Emblem: Three Houses on the Nintendo Switch. Similar design, introduced in an academy, was a professor teaching there at one point, use whip-sword as a weapon of choice, on the calmer side, was a mercenary once. Writing the prequel with her as the P.O.V. character actually made me put in more Byleth-like backstory with a horse-riding mercenary father and a green-haired mother who worked in the church once, legendary whip-sword, lost bloodline, and a head gremlin (Though in Belphi's case she's mostly quiet).
That's a lot of similarity I can admit to. I try to muddied it a little by giving her (not) Master Spark and liking sunflower (or just flower in general) as a nod to Yuuka Kazami from Touhou. Belphi not being much of a blank-slate, and actually have a beating heart.
There's actually a reason why I included her in the rewrite as a rather blatant Byleth expy since during planning of T&F I was originally gonna make it a Three Houses-esque story so I put her in there as a nod to what it could have been.
Hopefully I'm not pushing my luck too much with her.

Anyone else wanna fess up?
So far, none.
 

Bartun

Friendly Saurian Neighbor
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Oh yeah, I'm guilty of that one too. Although my character is inspired only visually.
 

HokuouTenrou

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should be some of them
my main heroine and her best friend are basically slightly younger Celia & Reina from Walkure Romanze lmao; just made the heroine slightly more emotional, and the bestie more perverted
the protagonist's best buddy is Namazuo from Touken Ranbu, just sillier and without the emotional baggage
a girl from rival school is Ritsu from Girlfriend Beta, but with Smartphone's Yae's speech patterns
maybe there will be a slightly more talkative Samus-expy kek

EDIT: a senior guy in the rival school is the pro wrestler Kouta Ibushi as a high-schooler
 
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ArcadiaBlade

I'm a Lazy Writer, So What?
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Dec 23, 2018
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Most of my main characters are based around me. The appearance was one thing I change and I did kinda raise their intelligence but apart from that, I actually based them on my own experiences and skillsets.

The more people say that 'this character doesn't feel real' or 'what kind of person act like this?', I would look at myself and feel myself disappearing, thinking that I actually don't exist at all.

I even wrote some of my own RL experiences and thought that some people call it BS that I'm too afraid to publish my own life story out of fearing that it would be so unrealistic.
 

CupcakeNinja

Pervert Supreme
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Jan 1, 2019
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Expy: Characters that are stand-in/clearly based on existing characters.

We all have inspiration somewhere and probably read a story or two at least. Chances are at least one of the character you created are more transparently inspired by characters from different story from your own. Maybe most of your characters are clearly inspired by others but there's that one that seem painfully obvious that maybe you put in some tongue in cheek lampshades into the story itself.

Mine is Belphi first introduced in Re:Maou (And not the og/prototype story T&F) who is obviously meant to be similar Byleth from Fire Emblem: Three Houses on the Nintendo Switch. Similar design, introduced in an academy, was a professor teaching there at one point, use whip-sword as a weapon of choice, on the calmer side, was a mercenary once. Writing the prequel with her as the P.O.V. character actually made me put in more Byleth-like backstory with a horse-riding mercenary father and a green-haired mother who worked in the church once, legendary whip-sword, lost bloodline, and a head gremlin (Though in Belphi's case she's mostly quiet).
That's a lot of similarity I can admit to. I try to muddied it a little by giving her (not) Master Spark and liking sunflower (or just flower in general) as a nod to Yuuka Kazami from Touhou. Belphi not being much of a blank-slate, and actually have a beating heart.
There's actually a reason why I included her in the rewrite as a rather blatant Byleth expy since during planning of T&F I was originally gonna make it a Three Houses-esque story so I put her in there as a nod to what it could have been.
Hopefully I'm not pushing my luck too much with her.

Anyone else wanna fess up?
do body parts count? cuz if so, yeah the main characters for all my stories have enormous cocks and i'm a bit ashamed to admit they're pretty blatantly based off of mine.
 

Ilikewaterkusa

You have to take out their families...
Joined
May 21, 2021
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Expy: Characters that are stand-in/clearly based on existing characters.

We all have inspiration somewhere and probably read a story or two at least. Chances are at least one of the character you created are more transparently inspired by characters from different story from your own. Maybe most of your characters are clearly inspired by others but there's that one that seem painfully obvious that maybe you put in some tongue in cheek lampshades into the story itself.

Mine is Belphi first introduced in Re:Maou (And not the og/prototype story T&F) who is obviously meant to be similar Byleth from Fire Emblem: Three Houses on the Nintendo Switch. Similar design, introduced in an academy, was a professor teaching there at one point, use whip-sword as a weapon of choice, on the calmer side, was a mercenary once. Writing the prequel with her as the P.O.V. character actually made me put in more Byleth-like backstory with a horse-riding mercenary father and a green-haired mother who worked in the church once, legendary whip-sword, lost bloodline, and a head gremlin (Though in Belphi's case she's mostly quiet).
That's a lot of similarity I can admit to. I try to muddied it a little by giving her (not) Master Spark and liking sunflower (or just flower in general) as a nod to Yuuka Kazami from Touhou. Belphi not being much of a blank-slate, and actually have a beating heart.
There's actually a reason why I included her in the rewrite as a rather blatant Byleth expy since during planning of T&F I was originally gonna make it a Three Houses-esque story so I put her in there as a nod to what it could have been.
Hopefully I'm not pushing my luck too much with her.

Anyone else wanna fess up?
Oh thought you meant exply like they are mob to farm exp
 

RavenRunes

Filth Wizard
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Mar 23, 2022
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I have one character who is kinda based on both the Devil and the Morrigán, and another on King Edward 1, and another on Lugh Silverhand, although only vaguely.
 
D

Deleted member 54065

Guest
My characters aren't based on another character of mine. However, they are based on real people, since I love observing their actions and behavior.
 

LostLibrarian

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I rarely copy characters directly because I like them. Instead, I often look at the themes certain characters bring with them and often copy parts of that or write my own take on that. Most of my characters are some kind of variation on tropes that are known to work or I found really interesting.

With the visuals, I often try to look at what a reader might think when they see the character design and then try to pick the desired effect. Though yeah, there's probably also a lot of "I like that design so let's use it" hidden somewhere in there.
 

BearlyAlive

Certfied Super Secret Final Secret Final Boss
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Not sure if they count as expy, but I kinda frankenstein a few of my characters out of traits and looks I liked
 

EternalSunset0

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Most of them. When I design a character, I pick an appearance template then start working from there, modifying the backstory, changing personality traits a bit, adding/subtracting from their appearances, fusing multiple characters into one, etc.

I think it's more of a frankenstein like Bearly said though, instead of being expies.
 
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