Why do you like, or not like, closed species?

I'm not big on adopting characters in general. I don't think it's bad or anything, I just don't do it nor have any use for them! I feel better when I design my own characters, it makes me feel more attached to them! So closed species aren't my thing to begin with.

One thing that bothers me about more popular closed species is that I'm bothered by how many of their appendages are mostly vestigial and don't serve an actual biological function. I KNOW this doesn't matter when it comes to designs but idk I just feel weird about how many CS are creatures that are basically dressed with their own natural decorations... I know some of them have an explanation but it's my pet peeve i guess D:

The other thing that I think is that... I would be 100% on board with interesting open species where anyone can make their own (like, no MYO slots, but you could buy the original creator's designs if you wanted, to not entirely destroy the market) and share their lore and stuff! Roleplay or headcanon or just make a very interesting story with a species that's made by the community! :D

i have kind of mixed feelings and i suppose it depends on the species and how they're handled

design wise: i enjoy closed species that are very original and have lots of thought put into them, like fumi, which are one of my favorites. im not really a fan of cccats or bagbeans but i think those are also good examples. im iffy about species that are like, a dog + food, cat + bubble, etc. tho, i guess its fine if the owner of those species doesnt do anything like go after people who just have similar characters? segwaying into another point, how theyre handled can kinda make it or break it

i used to be super into sushi dogs (i do still own one from a while ago tbph) but now not really because of how theyre handled. revoking characters, (sometimes for what i think are very bad reasons) not being allowed to redesign a sushi dog without approval, i think there was someone with a 'fake' sushi dog who got a commission of a character, and then the creator banned them from the community, and redesigned their character and sold it to someone else, which is very very wrong!!!
that is an example of handling a closed species really really badly, but from what i gather most species dont attempt to revoke characters, or pull stuff like that. when someone breaks enough rules usually what i see is the creators revoking the character's status as an official CS design, which probably wouldnt have much impact unless u were big on trading and selling CS

to answer your question, i think cs are appealing mainly because they're popular and also have a community to connect with? i guess that appeals to a lot of people, for me though i enjoy some closed species because they're creative and just appeal to me personally //shrug

hasgjfk sorry this was all over the place, thought i would share my thoughts tho

I personally really like them! As a CS owner myself I feel like I couldn't even give any other sort of answer really, but even before I got into the business I really admired people who had their own CS and actually managed to run the group - it's not easy in the slightest. 

For me the fun of CS is combined with the creativity of the creators, fun and inspiring designs and the community around the characters! I have found communities are a super good way to develop characters, find new and inspiring artists to follow and opportunities to make new friends & contacts with people who also have more or less similar tastes. I'm a very story-oriented creator and usually always want my characters to be parts of active settings and stories I could potentially write out for a larger audience, but I feel like it's really fun to also have characters who are for less ambitious purposes, most notably adopts in my case as I don't feel right using them for things I might self publish one day. It's not like I can put ALL my characters into stories anyway and so adopted characters including CS are for other types of fun & work as building blocks for my worlds - sometimes having a species that isn't originally part of yours really helps to put more perspective on the setting you have created and how it responds to unknown species, if that makes sense! 

However, I totally do understand CS (and adopts in general) aren't everyone's cup of tea and that's alright! The only time you're being a Debbie Downer is when you actively consider CS characters lesser of creations or somehow "impure", because there is no need to be rude about them & we're all creators here and should know better than to start making it a competition of who has the MOST original character and who doesn't. CS characters can mean a whole lot to people even if you don't understand the appeal, and I think it's just basic decency to respect that difference since the existence of closed species is hardly a threat for people ; v ; 9

i prefer working on my own, personalized universes where i have full control. that's all! a closed species doesn't allocate me enough freedom or worldbuilding for me to fully enjoy em.

Probably gonna be wrong or posting some dumb stuff but hey, asked for my thoughts. All my own opinions, might be strongly worded in spots, but I really don't mean anything by it, I use some extremes, if you own or wanna own or make some CS stuff, go for it, you enjoy it, that's what counts in the end! I'll probably see them if you post in forum games often and go "They're pretty good!"

There's a lot of stuff with them that keeps me away. Things like the cost usually, oh you don't get any art, but pay an amount that could get you 10 or 12 pieces of art for the right. Okay, sure that's probably only one or two that costs THAT much if that, but the basic point stands, you pay for the right to have the character, but nothing visual, often times not even a base. Customs and adopts do make up for that, but I've seen tons of MYO slots only sales. That's just coming off as money hungry, yet hey people buy it. Better than money going to worse things. So in short, customs or adopts of the species are fine in my opinion. MYO slots as an option for those who could draw should be cheaper than the options that give you art. I mean I never looked into it so I think that might actually be the case. If so, there you go.

Another thing, you rather rent the rights technically, I've seen people be told their rights to use the species were revoked. How is that in any way right? "Oh you broke some term thing, so that character you might have spent even more money on? Haha no it's mine now." Like damn, sure I don't know all the details and maybe it is just a thing that could happen but hasn't yet. Just the idea of rights being able to be revoked is too fucked for me to want a part of.

Also another big deal breaker, but not monetary wise. Most, if not all, CS have strict lore. A lot of open and semi open ones do too. This is fine! Often times they are fantastically written, cataloged, and just wonderful work put into em I can admire and call good. But me, there's not much worse I like being told than how to do shit for stuff I have power over. If I want a new magical character and I picked some Closed Species only to be told, no they can't be magical. You have no power in my universe unless you have characters involved. The only people with a say into it are a few friends. Point is, if it's gonna be my character in my universe, it'll be able to do what I want in it. Your lore doesn't happen in my world.

But once again my opinion is probably shit, and well hey I don't even do adopts so maybe the whole appeal is lost on me. I just hate the idea of being told how to limit a character, and monetary issues, but I'm broke 11 months of the year when it comes to disposable income.

I like it! There's some CS that really fit my aesthetics, so I'd p much get it CS or no CS. Tho it does kinda add to the collection aspect of it! Tho I mostly like it as a "record" of an artist's work, sorta? It's interesting to see other people's design aesthetics and CS is a part of that!

I gotta say that they just aren't... original in most cases.
i dunno if you like see it from Deviantart or somewhere else but like they take two (or more) already existing things and slap a shit label on it (think shit like "sushidog" and "waterdog") and then claim that NO ONE can make one or anything similar because it's 'closed' or whatever, when the concepts aren't even original enough to claim that you blatantly stole it y'know. Anyone can make a dog made of water and there's nothing you can do to stop that like seriously.

My other big problem, relating to legit unoriginality, is them taking stuff that literally has been a thing for YEARS, whether it be like decades or more, and then saying 'this is my super original closed species and you can't make one'. Like i see just outright Kemonomimi's and anthros with a INCREDIBLY generic design, like there's literally nothing special about them, being sold for inane amounts and being called a closed species like fuck off please? You can't take a SATYR, a mythological creature that's been a thing for CENTURIES, and claim it as a closed species (Looking at you "Dainties" they're literally just satyrs but deer legs instead of goat legs as if it's that different)

it's also pretty shitty that you just aren't allowed to do anything else to the design to make it feel more like your own character, you can't tweak it or anything and that's extremely limiting. not to mention a lot of the dumbass rules species creators put, especially the whole 'don't sell for more then you payed for it regardless of extra art you payed for' (not limited to just species sellers but adopts in general, if i payed for something i'm getting my money back for it especially if i shelled out even more money on it and i don't want it anymore, it isn't fair to me to not get some sort of compensation for that) OR 'if you break my rules i'm taking the character back and reselling it' which is literally fucking THEFt because it was PAYED for and no longer under THEIR possession :/

And to be completely frank, CS communities are some of the most toxic places i've seen outside of garbage fandoms for shows and it's a HUGE red flag to keep away. They think they're like better then you because they decide to waste 100's of dollars on designs that literally anyone can make because it feels 'exclusive'. I also think that it frankly ruins you, as a creator, to do nothing but work for species (specifically if it got popular) because then that's the only thing people follow you for and you would immediately crash if you tried to do literally anything else because that shit gets boring.

Many of them aren't even original at this point and just exist as a status symbol for rich people who can afford them along with some quality drama towards people unintentionally making similar designs that aren't CS at all.

I'd rather have full control of what I can do with my characters.

I don't mind them! Speaking as someone who owns both CS and one-off designs roughly equally, I like the idea of CS because having established lore for the species, however minimal, makes it easier to build onto the character's backstory + provides a shared basis for RP. Also, certain CS are a good investment, financially speaking - I can easily trade them for one of the same species or even sell them off if I want because of the high demand, and I value that in designs. Can't say the same for one-offs. I agree that CS can be a cash cow for popular artists, but... if people will pay for their designs anyway, why not? Good on them, they've found a way to survive in a world where it's difficult to make a living off of art. And if you're jealous of people who can buy/sell adopts simply because they can, that's your problem, not theirs :p 

CS or adopts in general aren't my thing because I have no use for a character that doesn't fully belong to me, that I can't use in my comic or some other project. I don't hate them, though, and I admire the creativity some have! It's just not my thing at all.

i think there's good and bad,,, and they serve different functions. some are just novelty toys, and others are more story oriented and come with lore. i prefer making my own characters, but when i do shop around, i usually try to pick cs that have an associated arpg group on deviantart. most of my cs are acquired so i can join in with my best friend, who loves those. a few i just find the lore interesting and it's a way to play in that sandbox. 

interestingly, sometimes the unintended aspect overtakes the creator's intent,,, with browbirds, for instance, they're pretty lore-rich and have detailed fantasy designs, but the big ones that get bought up (for sometimes literally thousands of dollars) often get set aside to gather dust as collectibles while the owners pay more attention to their myos, which i think says something about the appeal of specificity versus the appeal of personal control. so where browbirds are made to be playable and interesting, they're more just collectibles haha .... really pricey ones. but it sets a high bar for entry, so people with less money and more interest in using them as characters are left out in the cold. any effort to even point out the financial disparity with species like these is met with vitriol, which i suppose is to be expected when you've pumped rent-money-level amounts into your collection.

(as an aside - while i'm happy that popular adopt artists can make good money off their work, and wouldn't mind making that sort of money myself, it drives me up the wall if someone defends their income with claims of 'that's what professional character designers get paid' - i promise the amount of thought and work that goes into designing characters professionally does NOT go into adopts lol. give me your silhouette lineups and texture plans, pull up detailed turnarounds, draw up a style guide, and show me movement tests if you want to argue that. otherwise, be honest and explain it's branding.)

overall i think its as much a money game as it is anything else. some are heinously priced based on name brand over any semblance of quality lol,,, but i think theres a huge oversaturation of them? everyone and their mother has a cs, and most of them are lame--not to put people down, but its just statistically true. there's a sort of 'safe zone' i consider most cs to fall into, with usually four limbs, a tail, maybe some sort of wings or similar extra bit, patterned body, and a fairly cute/cool/otherwise appealing face.... baby proportions on four-legged cs is extra popular. there's even the hyper-safe zone of anime kemonomimi adopts, which are junk like "this anime boy's ears and tail have x pattern on them, $500 please". no offense to people who are into those, to each their own, but personally i find those the least appealing.

my point is, most things fall into that general safe area, which leaves room for only so many combinations - you can slap anything onto that format and call it a CS, but that doesn't mean it's a good idea, or really interesting. there's cs that look like other cs, and some cs that are so vague with what makes them special (or so highly variable, or both) that are difficult to identify as cs when you're looking at them out of context. i've actually mistakenly bought or traded for a few like that!? usually those are highly lore-dependent which is a bit of a turnoff to me when i find out. 

overall i don't think they're inherently good or evil. it's a neutral concept that can create playgrounds or hellholes or both, depending on how it's handled, and considering we're all amateurs at the wheel i don't think expecting flawless performance is reasonable.