Personality, yes. While it's quite true that traits you can see are the most important to people in a mainly-visual environment, there is no real reason all traits need to have a visual effect.
It's like putting on shackles to run a race. Sure, everyone else is doing it; but why?
How about some pseudo-visual traits? Cats talk, so why not have collections of phrases which differ from cat to cat, controlled by genetics? Or collections of animations? Or movement speeds and frequencies?
I've even though it's sort of silly (although a good marketing idea) to even assign names and list the traits. How about simply putting the factors in and NOT listing them. You could then wait until they're discovered by keen-eyes breeders and run a naming contest or naming poll and add the text to the info/pedigree/etc only AFTER its been discovered and named by the users.
Wow. Talk about timing. I wrote the above sitting on the porch having my coffee. Walked in the house. Charm has Music Choice up running Christmas music. And what is the ad on the TV? "Need a gift for a geek? How about a species? $500 to have a new plant or animal species named after them."
This starts to get into a different area. One of the hints that I've seen dropped about SL2 is that there might be greater support for AIs or NPCs in games. I have said before, in the context of SL2, that I would love to see the cats programmed with more NPC or AI capacity. Perhaps that could be part of a permapet package? I mean, I see that people who are just breeding huge numbers of cats and menagery-ing them in large numbers wouldn't want this. But for people who have pet cats, and for those who want to keep a subset of cats around their house, having some personality in the cat, and a much larger ability for the cat to engage and talk would be a plus.
The capacity would exist to create AI that would, for instance, have a AI that Knows the KittyCatS wiki. So that you could ask your cat if BaliFlame is dominant to oh... whatever fur... if it was known. And it would tell you.
And sooo much more...
You mean like the trainable (but not breedable) dogs?
I can see it now:
Click 'train', select a series of Poses. Assign the localchat keyword 'sit' to the sequence.
Tad says, "sit"
Ole Blue Eyes looks at Tad, blinks, and wanders though the door.
See? Realistic cat training.
What struck me when I first saw KittyCatS was that they were all the same shape. The Burmese Sable was much too fat to be Burmese! (We used to have burmese cats at home ... very slender & delicately built, though sturdy in their way.)
I would love to see a difference between skinny / wiry cats and normal/chubby cats. Tad suggested this, early in this thread, as a "width" trait. I'd really go for that, since not only ordinary house cats have the striking shape difference, but so do many of the fancy breeds.
Then there's also the head shape -- "round head" versus "pointed head" -- I mean, as real-life Siamese cats have changed in the last several decades, they are bred more for the pointy head (they used to have more of a normal "apple head" shape).
[Which ones were the "Jellicle Cats" that TS Eliot mentions in his poem in the _Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats_? I think they are the ones with the wiry build. Hm, okay, I looked it up and they are "rather small" but they are also "roly-poly". Anyhow ... the weaselly ones. ]
Long hair would rock!
If that is no option it could be richer animations and basic movements or the current highlights in their eyes per default and a super duper highlight as a trait as a sparkling highlight.
Perhaps default butterflies to chase and chasing bees and flowers or so as an extra trait.
Also extra pet options could count as a trait and perhaps for the kitties to finally wash that right ear for a change it starts to be smelly!
A trait could also be that they are twice as fast happy by cuddling for those who use no milk.
Extra room in their closet for clothes.
It could be a trait that it has became a royal cat which will more easily produce gems and other gifts to develop which gives access to new rare items.
Eyebrows...lol I would love to see them get the eyebrows ...
Nose trait.. like black nose, spot at nose etc
Double paws I've had double pawed cats in rl and love them!
(12-08-2014 06:55 AM)Kayleigh McMillan Wrote: [ -> ]It could be a trait that it has became a royal cat which will more easily produce gems and other gifts to develop which gives access to new rare items.
I like all these suggestions, but this one is my favorite as a Tenth Trait (or as a special bonus comparable to the "special size" feature).