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bouncybrain · 19 days ago

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CharacterHub vs. UnVale pt. 2

Because good god can I not be succinct? Anyway, from the first part:

[Link] to Part 1

These are two emerging "character storage" sites, in which you can create little profiles or pages to store and/or share your characters. The idea is the same, but the UIs and social spaces surrounding them are significantly different, and they include notable differences between them. Both of these sites are free to sign up for, but they are also constantly being worked on. UnVale states it's a beta, but CharacterHub does not.

You should use these instead of ToyHouse, primarily because they're free and you don't have to busk around for a code, but which one do you choose? I haven't seen anyone actually make a post comparing and contrasting these two, so I guess it's up to me!

All information beneath the cut, and I am so sorry about how long this got. I was going to keep it short and then I didn't.

We'll address everything in groups, so I'm going to list the primary topics out here, first, so you can skip sections if you prefer. (Account creation is simple and standard for both, so this will not be discussed.) There's a lot to cover since I want to be thorough. Here is what I covered in the first part:

User Profile: just how you set up your own profile, options there, and the differences between sites.

(Also, what will be showcased publicly on your profile.)

Character Storage: this is about the actual storing of characters, such as the image capabilities and information it can hold.

Custom Character Profiles: this will be about creating profiles, as these are significantly different across the sites.

World Creation: both sites offer "world" options, which differ from characters.

Additional Hosted Content: other types of content you can create/post on the sites beyond a character or a world, and how easy it is to work with these, or how discovery of these types of content is handled.

Social Interaction: what about the community and how they interact on-site? This is something I was more curious about that nobody was talking about.

And here is what I will be covering in this part:

On-Site Events: I have nearly a month's difference between joining CharacterHub and UnVale, so keep that in mind while I speak about the events I've experienced and seen.

Artist vs. Author Experiences: both of these sites advertise that they are for both those who draw and those who write, but how well do they cater to both?

Site Stability: how well they’re handling the site, traffic, downtimes, etc. and how that effects the end user experience.

Discord Experiences: they both have a dedicated, public Discord server that can be freely joined. Ties in slightly with the social interaction section, but dedicated solely to Discord experiences.

Stances on AI and Picrew/Warforge/avatar maker usage: this is typically addressed all together so I'm doing that, too, just be aware I despise use of AI in creative spaces and that I know it's completely different from avatar makers.

What About Money: what do they offer, how they offer it, and do they facilitate monetary transactions through the site?

Everything Else: I forget stuff, or don’t know where something goes, so I need a place to tack all this stuff on as well. No less important than the rest, it’s just this is a lot of information to organize and write out and keep track of already, so stuff will be thrown in the junk drawer for use later.

If you find you want more elaboration on a subject please feel free to reply, reblog, or send me an ask about it (anon always on). If you use the reply function I'll likely make it into a post to better elaborate. Reblogs will be reblogged directly unless you plainly say you'd rather see it in a separate post instead of attached to this absolute monster.

Now, the rest of my compare and contrast and review post.

(Anything marked as a "late addendum" was added literally last night because of recent updates that I felt needed to be mentioned in all of this.)

On-Site Events

Both sites do host events, but they handle them incredibly differently from each other. Please mind I've been on CharacterHub longer, and that I entirely missed any October events UnVale may have had because of my timing.

CharacterHub has absolutely constant site-wide, staff-hosted events. I don't think I've seen the number of hosted events go below... maybe 15? You can even pay real money or real-money-turned-into-currency for events just for you. I'm not going to cover every single event I've seen because it's literally hit nearly 50 in the few months I've been here. I am not doing that. They have a whole section just for events aside from being able to browse them on the homepage. There are daily, weekly, monthly, or occasional events, as well as paid events, and seasonal ones. You may have seen my posts about the daily writing prompt events, or their "OCtober/Storytober" event across all of October. They host what can be multiple daily art events, multiple weekly ones, or multiple monthly ones. This does mean there is literally always something to do. Always. It can get exhausting quickly. Thankfully, there are sometimes events where your only needed participation is "pick a character" or "design a themed profile and pick that character" and then everything else is out of your hands. There are sometimes "bidding" events, in which you can bid for the chance to do something special, usually designing a temporary logo for the site or the coins (we will talk about coins later, I have Thoughts). You can sometimes win gems, if you win.... Some seasonal events will give you a "profile ring" to put on your avatars.

Oh, did I only mention daily writing prompts? Haha, yeah, don't worry about that. I have a section for that. It's coming up next. (While writing this post, a haiku event started, as well as a microstory event, which is 100 words or less.)

UnVale events are actually... mostly hosted by the community! There have been events hosted by the staff of the site, but you can probably find constant events of some kind being hosted by the UnVale community. These are almost always presented in a world, as this is a post type the entire userbase has access to creating, though any staff events will be announced in a blog post that will usually accompany a pop-up notifying you of the blog post on the site itself—so you are unlikely to miss a new blog post, or a staff event! This does mean there are absolutely no rewards. It's just for fun, and to experience the creativity of the community. Unfortunately, I can't say much about the amount of art vs. writing allowed across events, because I can't as easily see all of these events unless they are mentioned and therefore linked in a monthly “community spotlight” blog post. What I can say, though, is that the staff events/challenges will offer options for both creative leanings! (Even if this is just saying that Picrew/avatar makers with proper credit is allowed, it's still something.) UnVale also has a Question of the Day on the homepage, where you can answer the QotD either as your character or for your character, and these will be simultaneously uploaded to the character profile in a "trivia" section, and all answers are publicly shared--that means users participating in the QotD often go and "favorite" characters whose answers were interesting enough to bring them to the character profile. This is the way to get your character out there constantly, but there are thousands of responses by the end of it, so there is no guarantee people will even see your response(s).

Also, with events being mostly user-run, it does mean UnVale events may be a complete flop or people might not actually complete their half of the event, and the user(s) in charge may miss when people fail to comply with rules or expectations. Thankfully, there are no currency or exclusively available cosmetics as prizes, so any feelings of FOMO (fear of missing out) are significantly lessened. I think this is a good thing. (Although, this is still a “so far” thing, as it’s in beta.)

Artist vs. Author Experiences

(This will be very long.)

If a site is telling me writers, who don't draw, can also use it, then I'm going to critique it as both someone who writes, and someone who draws. While I am an artist, I have joint pain that prevents me from drawing as much or as often as I would like, and it has both gotten worse and started happening more often. Because of this, I have been writing more as typing doesn't aggravate the issue as much or in the same way.

My qualifications for an "artists and authors" character storage site are simple. If I can make a good-looking character profile without having any pictures, of art or otherwise (because not everyone can find a Picrew/avatar maker that works "close enough" to their character, nor does everyone have the money to commission art for their character), and it doesn't irritate my design senses, then it gets a point. If the site's own staff work to equally boost writing as they do art, then it gets a point. I won't hold "likes" against these sites, because it is very unfortunate, but users are more likely to view art over text, unless the writing is being boosted over art, which would disrupt the balance, anyway.

CharacterHub is an unbelievably artists-first site. Remember in the last section, where I only mentioned one writing event? Yeah, most of the time there is literally only one event in which you submit writing. Everything else that isn't a character-submission or bidding type is 99% of the time going to be an art submission event. Remember how I said you can earn gems sometimes? There's been one event that I can recall so far that has offered gems as a reward, and it's a recent one for someone else's OC. What do you get for all those daily writing events, though? If you write every day, surely you'll get something for it. Right?

For every 7 prompts in a month, you'll pocket an Ink Drop—hoard 10, and trade 'em in for a Bronze Inkwell. At the 15-prompt milestone, you'll earn a Quill Feather Piece; collect 5, and craft your own Bronze Quill! Complete 28 prompts in one month to receive a Bronze Parchment Fragment. Secure three scroll fragments and unveil a bronze parchment! The fun's not over! Level up your Ink, Quill, and Parchment through Bronze, Silver, Gold, Platinum, to Diamond! Got 10 Ink Drops? You're at Bronze Ink. Get one more Ink, jump to Silver. Same for Quill and Parchment! Can you write your way all the way to Shakespeare's Diamond Writing Set with Diamond Ink, Quill, and Parchment?

So. Yeah. That's what they're using to motivate writing on the site. Why are they using this to motivate writing on the site, you ask? Well, see, remember how in the last post I said you have to actually be searching for types of posts to see them if you're not on a character that has them? That's where writing goes. Hardly anyone sees it, unless it shows up on their homepage, and then they're very unlikely to read it. Then they're not going to "like" it or comment on it.

I mentioned something called "OCtober/Storytober" earlier. CharacterHub created prompt lists for every day in October. If a user managed a 28 day-streak (which you wouldn't know if you managed it or not) they would get a profile ring (avatar frame) tied to the event, with the OCtober and/or Storytober one depending on which event you participated in. For 28 days straight. This was immediately followed up by a NaNoWriMo event. Combined with the daily writing prompt.

There was a fascinating phenomenon I noticed while participating in Storytober and doing daily writing prompts at the same time. Every writing event had the exact same tiny pool of users participating. Because there's no reason to participate if you can draw. There's no real draw in comparison. There's only one guaranteed writing event compared to nearly 20 art ones. Not to mention that while only submitting your writing to events will get attention from others participating in the event, it's completely gone by the time the next one rolls around, because even the "my submissions" tab doesn't work to let you see what you've written. (I brought this up, but nothing has changed, yet.)

Character profiles look absolutely terrible if you don't use images while filling it out when a section says you "can" add an image. Nearly every single placeholder image looks awful when combined with other placeholder images. If you have a profile full of placeholder images, I want to tear my hair out, because it's just so bad. The colors chosen (when applicable) look awful next to each other, and placeholder images working character page sections are absolutely huge compared to any text, and I feel like I would genuinely leave the site if I couldn’t draw and couldn’t find “close enough” avatar makers. (I brought this up but nothing has changed, yet.)

UnVale has a beautifully simple writing system, an easy way to access all writing to browse regardless of tags (mostly because you can't sort anything by tags except characters, yet, so it’s just chronologically sorted), and staff outright encourages writing contributions to their events and challenges (or avatar makers). It is far more accessible for those who write, and while I haven't really posted anything, I know that I could, and that it could be seen, far more easily than anything I posted on CharacterHub. It wouldn't be hidden within an event, where people likely aren't going to look unless they're also participating in it. It isn't going to make a big, annoying rectangle that can't be collapsed out of the way while looking at a character profile. It's got its own dedicated little section on the character profile like everything else.

Admittedly, you can't access just your writing on your profile on UnVale like you can by going to your posts and sorting on CharacterHub, but you can't access just your art that way, either. Personally, I think UnVale is already definitely going in the right direction, because you can browse writing freely! You can't like writing, but you can comment on it, and it's accessible, and you can put as much of it in as you want, and it looks very clean.

Unfortunately, with UnVale, you also can't post characters or worlds without at least a primary image. I tested it, and if you don't upload it with one image to show everyone, it will not show up in the "recent" feed. I don't know if it's going to show up in the "random" feed, either, but that's because it's a really good randomizer, but it's unlikely it will.

Outside of that little bump, though, the UnVale profile is so simple and text-reliant that it doesn't look like absolute garbage if you try to add too much information about your character's inventory without using images, because that either goes in the text-only boxes in the traits section or in the writing in the writing section! There's no need to stare at a thousand placeholder images, other than the default UnVale one, which is actually a nice shade of purple that I think I could handle seeing more of.

Unlike whatever is going on with the colors and placeholder images CharacterHub has chosen.

All-in-all, if you're more focused on getting writing out there than anything else, use UnVale. It's not obviously more likely to get your writing seen by users because society is crumbling, but it's much less likely to smother your writing under hundreds of other posts. The dedicated section for writing is genuinely so important, but I don't think people really understand why. Unfortunately, I haven’t heard of any decent social-creative spaces like this that cater specifically to those who write instead of lumping artists and writers together (though PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE tell me if you find one so I can review it!!!!!). This section is already way too long, though, so I have to move on.

Site Stability

These are both small sites with small teams, so I'm not going into this expecting much other than that they'll handle outages when they happen, and that they're paying attention to the stability of their servers and how the site functions.

CharacterHub is actually pretty stable most of the time. Sometimes it will just completely die out and nothing will be available because nothing will load, but it gets resolved quickly enough. There are some times when it will randomly have a massive lag increase, where things will take much longer to load or it will just forget it was opening something. Any slowness will be site-wide, but they have said they are working on it. That is fine. The servers don't seem to often have problems with increased traffic, but when they do they typically recover quickly.

UnVale... tends to go down a lot, but briefly. Their QotD and comments will often stop loading. This is the hallmark for an outage. These can be reported on the Discord, and it will be handled reasonably quickly most of the time, unless it happens when staff is off. Sometimes it happens multiple times a day, but it's never for too horribly long. Unfortunately, this may cause users to miss a QotD or lose something they tried to post while the site was down, but that is the worst of it. I'm unsure what causes this, but loading characters on UnVale takes for. Ever. This is the only consistent problem with loading that I've seen, beyond the randomizer animation (it's a card flipping animation to reveal severally randomly picked characters) tending to lag when "reveal all" is chosen, but, like. My laptop is from 2016 and my phone is slated for death soon, too.

Late Addendum: It has been stated the UnVale team has "brought on some new engineering help, and they're working on a big fix for it" as stated by a co-founder on their Discord server. Crashes will either be solved or will change in frequency in "~a month or so" which is very nice to hear.

I wouldn't particularly call either site "very stable" in comparison to professional sites, but they're doing well for small teams. It's not too bad. It could always be so much worse. Even during the holiday season these outages weren't particularly bad, though UnVale didn’t have a continuous outage like CharacterHub did. Even though I only have a few months’ experience on both, they do appear to handle constant uptime decently well, even across holidays (despite that one bump CharacterHub had over Christmas).

(Going by reports of activity bogging down servers through their Discord channels, it appears most heavy usage comes from America, even though there are, of course, many people from across the world active on these sites. If you’re not awake with the majority Americans you’re likely to get a smoother experience, though apparently you should be wary of American National holidays.)

Discord Experiences

These sites both have a Discord server on offer. They are both public. They both have invitations accessible from the main site.

CharacterHub's Discord server at time of writing this sentence has 4,161 members. CharacterHub actually actively advertises the Discord server on the homepage. There is a required step to get deeper into the server than a couple of channels. They have a "starboard," which is where any message sent with ten ⭐emoji reactions will be showcased. Dedicated channels exist for reporting bugs and offering feedback for both the site and the server.

You cannot say "yaoi."

UnVale's Discord server at the time of writing has 5,534 members. UnVale's invitation link is at the bottom of the site, including their Twitter and Instagram links, and otherwise not particularly visible. They do not have a particular system for promoting something many people have enjoyed. Dedicated channels exist for "help" with the site or server; these two channels act as bug and feedback channels for each, instead. (Since starting this, UnVale added an “UnVale suggestions” channel.)

You can say "yaoi."

Again, these spaces tend to have a lot of Talkative Youths. The servers can also spontaneously become incredibly busy or incredibly silent, as larger servers tend towards. I have not seen any major issues crop up in either server, yet, but they seem fairly level otherwise. There was one issue on the CharacterHub server but I'm going to be quiet about that since it was between users. The UnVale Discord kind of fucking exploded over the nipple ban a bit ago, but it was such a big argument that I am not reiterating points here, just that it will remain for the time being. If you don't particularly enjoy larger servers, I would say these count, as they both have large numbers of members that continue to grow, a large number of channels, and periodic dramatic increases in activity. Moderation is done by staff members, though some small things do tend to slip through, as they do.

They're fine, I guess? I’m not a particularly social person, but from observation they aren’t toxic cesspools, so that’s a win in my book.

AI and Picrew/Avatar Makers

Yes, yes, yes, I know, they're nothing alike! But these are usually addressed either together or in the same general vicinity of each other, so I'm just packing them in.

CharacterHub does not have a strict policy against AI use in all but stated events, raffles, and marketplace offerings. AI can be used everywhere else. This does mean there are... quite a number of AI """"""artists"""""" on the site, or just people who use AI because they think it's toooootally fine (it's not). They do not automatically get taken down for simply being AI as long as they are not in spaces where AI was specifically said not to be used in or it is improperly used or marked. There are no clear rules stating that Picrew/avatar makers/etc. cannot be used in events, but there is the invisible expectation that they will be drawn.

UnVale has a strict no-AI policy. That means you can happily report all the AI you see to your heart's content. AI is outright not allowed on UnVale (site and Discord alike), and they take this very seriously. I haven't run into a single AI-generated image my entire time here compared to the many I've seen on CharacterHub. It's wonderful. It's perfect. Some events state that Picrew/avatar makers/etc. can be used, implying they do not wish for these to be used for all events, just a few.

Both sites allow Picrew/avatar maker/character creator images to be used elsewhere as long as they have appropriate credits/permissions. Not crediting a Picrew/avatar maker/etc. still counts as uncredited/stolen art, so be sure to put credit somewhere visible where it can be read and checked. Also, like, what if someone wants to use what you did? Just say it.

What About Money?

This will cover things you can spend money on within the site. Because I do have a relevant disability (dyscalculia or “numbers dyslexia”) I won’t be going into depth about finances and numbers and percentages or whatever; literally gives me headaches and makes me want to cry. All information is, thus, publicly available and fairly easy to find, if you want to find it. No real digging.

UnVale goes first here because it does not currently (Jan 2025) have a way to spend real-world money on-site. Payments can be facilitated elsewhere but are not hosted primarily on the site. There used to be a section dedicated to commissions and such (real-world transaction focused) but it was removed soon after I joined. Currently, you can mark characters as “for free,” “for trade,” or “for sale” within their settings, which lists them on the Market (accessible in the list you get by clicking on your profile image). This is as close as UnVale gets to an economy at the moment. They do have plans to reinstate their previous plans for a commission-focused function for the site but it does not seem imminent.

Of course, this does not mean all “for sale” characters are being sold for real-world money. It’s just the only place on the site right now where anything is sold for real-world money.

How is UnVale funded? Ask answered here with what I know.

CharacterHub, on the other hand, has… a load to do with real-world money. Because there’s quite a bit to go through and explain, I’ll separate all of this into subsections.

Hubux

These are the free-to-earn currency used to purchase most profile rings/avatar frames and background overlays. It currently has, in my opinion, an absolutely abysmal free-to-earn rate. They did literally just update that but that’s going into a different section. As a free user, spending no money, you can earn Hubux through opening six gift boxes daily—these give such a wide variety of coins that you’re unlikely to receive more than 100 in a box more than once a day, if that. You can also get two digits’ worth of Hubux in every box for the day.

There are cosmetics that cost over 100,000 Hubux, by the way.

You can either grind for a year to get that profile ring that might not even be in stock for a while, or you can just go buy a package of 98,000 Hubux and 3,900 Gems with real-world money (“Supreme Currency Bundle” for $23.90USD, feel free to tell me the conversions for your country on this).

They have only just recently added a small Hubux reward for commenting on Com[liment Bombed characters on the homepage. How small, you may be asking? Well. 50 Hubux. Not 500 Hubux, not 5,000 Hubux, but 50 Hubux.

Late Addendum: They just added Fanart Flares. You can get 150 Hubux for participating.

Gems

Gems are the premium currency of CharacterHub, in that you can get your hands on these in a very limited number of ways: winning an event, being paid them on the marketplace, or purchasing them using real-world money. These are notable only for one thing: exclusive purchase options.

There are cosmetic items that can only be purchased with Gems. Most items displayed in the Shop are Gem-purchase only. This is where I have the most gripes, and you’ll hopefully see why in the next section.

Shops

There are currently the “CharacterHub Store,” which lists everything from “special offers” to “gem packs,” the “Profile Rings” shop, and the “Background Overlay” shop. This is where the primary real-world money transfers occur, because there are so many things to buy with real-world money. (USD)

Behold, the shop as of January 21, 2025:

VIP Winter Holiday Package (10 profile frames!) {$49}

Magic Garden Pack - LIMITED Weekly Bundle (Expires 1/16) {$49}

Welcome Starter Pack {$2.99}

Starter Pack! {$6.99}

Super Value Currency Pack! {$2.54}

Special Pack! {$8.49}

Lite Currency Bundle {$2.99}

Super Currency Bundle! {$4.99}

Deluxe Currency Bundle {$9.99}

Supreme Currency Bundle {$19.99}

Rate My Character {1,800 Gems}

Compliment Bomb {1,800 Gems}

“Ask Me Anything” for OCs {4,000 Gems}

1 Fanart Flare {9,000 Gems}

Fanart Flare Trio {22,500 Gems}

Compliment Bomb Trio {4,500 Gems}

(Following daily boxes interruption) Small Compliment Bomb Bundle {9,000 Gems}

Medium Compliment Bomb Bundle {15,000 Gems}

Large Compliment Bomb Bundle {30,000 Gems}

Support The Site {1,500 Gems}

Fanart Flash {9,000 Gems}

NaNoWriMo streak freeze {200 Gems}

Your Custom Profile Ring {4,950 Gems}

Your Custom Animated Profile Ring {8,800 Gems}

Your Custom Profile Ring Drop {12,420 Gems}

Profile Frame Gift Box {700 Gems}

Throw a Party For Your Character {8,450 Gems}

Giant Special {33,600 Gems}

Led The Site For A Day {30,000 Gems}

Adopt An Advertisement {7,500 Gems}

Followed by, of course, the Gem Packs listings (doubled on first purchase):

200 Gems {$0.84}

1050 Gems {$4.24}

2200 Gems {$8.49}

4600 Gems {$16.99}

12000 Gems {$42.46}

25000 Gems {$84.99}

38250 Gems {$127.49}

55000 Gems {$169.99}

The Profile Rings shop contains a load of profile rings/avatar frames. Some of them are permanent, some of them rotate every few days, some of them rotate in and out per holiday seasons, and some of them are Gems or Subscription Tier exclusive. As mentioned, some profile rings/avatar frames are over 100,000 Hubux, and there’s one available that’s 1,000 Gems. Some of the. Are animated, some of them are user-designed, but they are nearly all worth months of daily hunting for six gift boxes.

Background Overlays are new, so they’re a bit buggy and there aren’t nearly half as many of them as there are profile rings/avatar frames. There are no other ways to purchase these overlays other than through Hubux right now. The price range is 4,500 Hubux to 65,000 Hubux. Some of these are animated, some of them aren’t, and you can try them on while browsing the shop.

Now there's other stuff to address, and I'm putting it in here because this is the only consistent place to acquire said stuff without hoping you get one for dumping comments on a character. I am very passionate about this but it is important to know about.

Compliment Bombs are a method to get your character to show up on the homepage. This means you can buy a compliment bomb... to force people to look at your character, because it's going to be up for as long as it takes to get 10 comments at the very least. The biggest problem I have with compliment bombs is that these are thrown up on the homepage, and users are lured into commenting on these characters through the promise of "maybe" getting a compliment bomb in return, and more recently the 50 Hubux per character commented on.

If you want tens if not a hundred or so empty comments on your character, this is the way to do it. And when you get a load of comments on your character, this pushes them higher up in the "trending" sort view, and compliment bombs are the one sure way to get any interaction on CharacterHub.

You can fucking buy your way to popularity.

I'm not even kidding. People with the most popularity on the site, with hundreds of followers and tens of reactions per character/post/etc., are all people who are able to keep at least one character up on the compliment bomb feed at all times. This obviously drives more people to their profiles by the sheer presence they're able to gain by constantly sitting at the top of the homepage all the time, where people are constantly passing through trying to get their own compliment bomb and 50 Hubux per character, where they are naturally going to get curious about the user, and then they're going to go interact further with the user elsewhere on the site.

For comparison, please look at the profiles for Maddox and Mort. Since Mort was the first character I uploaded and you think that's going to affect the numbers (it's not) then you can look at Li Hua instead, who is directly linked on Maddox's profile and was uploaded about four days before I used a compliment bomb on Maddox.

If you didn't go look, Mort, my oldest character, has zero comments and 4 likes. Li Hua, directly linked to the character I bombed, has zero comments and 4 likes. In comparison, Maddox, who was on the homepage for 3 days, has 77 comments and 17 likes. Excluding replies and the only comment he had prior to the bomb, as well as the likes he had prior, the total is 50 comments and 12 likes. (I kept track of this at the time so I could refer to it later like this.)

Compliment bombing is, at this moment, the only reliable way to get people looking at your character, and only maybe your profile. It's still the best way due to the reliability, and why I hate it, because this is a case of you can buy interactions and popularity, and I personally believe this is completely against the spirit of the art community.

If you see a character with hundred of likes and more than ten comments, don't feel discouraged, because the average user barely gets ten likes a character, much less one comment.

Late Addendum: They have recently updated the site with "Fanart Flares" that can be purchased in the shop. This is asking people to make fanart of your character in exchange for a paltry amount of Hubux. This is also, similarly to Compliment Bombs, buying popularity through spending money to get on the homepage. I haven't had the chance to review the Fanart Flare in comparison to other characters or the Compliment Bomb (if you're on CharacterHub and are willing to send me one, I'd appreciate the donation so I can add the information here!), but it really is just another way to purchase your followers without buying bots to follow/engage with your content.

Marketplace

This was mentioned previously. The Marketplace is different from the Shop in that the Shop only carries CharacterHub products. On the Marketplace, users can make their own listings, and accept payment in real-world money or Gems (or for free, I guess). The minimum real-world money is free, and the minimum for Gems is 200. There are fees. I don’t know what they are because it makes my head hurt.

Offered default types of listings are:

Art commission

Writing commission

Character sale

Art base

Merch

Reference sheet

Emotes

Animation

Your Character Here (YCH)

Other

They do not allow for the sale of AI images by users, and those can be reported in order to have them taken down.

Subscription Tiers

There are two subscription tiers available on CharacterHub. There is the “+plus” tier and the “+plus ULTRA” tiers (yes, the plus ultra tier). Here is what the cheaper tier, $10.99 a month or $84.99 (Save 35%) a year, consists of:

50GB of character art storage!

Custom background images for your profiles!

Special Username Colors

FREE limited edition profile frame monthly!

Show off badges next to your username!

Double your Hubux rewards daily!

Supercharge your profiles: attribute sliders, alignment charts, timelines, trivia

Ad-free Browsing!

GIF Profile Pics!

6 more Daily Personality Quizzes

Hundreds of Extra Trait Options!

3 Slideshow cover photos!

6 Extra Profile Highlight Slots

And the +plus ULTRA tier, $21.99 a month or $114.99 (Save 55%) a year, consists of:

125GB of character art storage!

Custom backgrounds for your profiles!

Special & Super Special Username Colors!

FREE limited edition profile frame monthly!

Show 2 badges next to your username!

TRIPLE your Hubux rewards daily!

Supercharge your profiles: attribute sliders, alignment charts, timelines, trivia

Ad-free Browsing!

GIF Profile Pics!

9 Slideshow cover photos!

Unlimited Daily Personality Quizzes!

Hundreds of Extra Trait Options!

9 Extra Profile Highlight Slots

Everything Else

Like always, you should be sure to read all posting rules and regulations, as these are never the exact same unless it’s a bit shady. There’s no harm in reading through them again if you’re worried, and questions can always be asked through on-site help chat (that little floating bubble—might not be visible if you have an adblocker) or in their Discord servers.

CharacterHub does allow posting of mature content but only under certain corcumstances with restrictions on how they’re presented, and they must be marked appropriately, which you may not be able to do if you’re under 18.

UnVale does not allow any mature posting (the Discord kind of did fucking explode over nipple censure, so) and does not have any way to hide such content, anyway. They do not use bots to reinforce their content rules at all, though, and all their staff is paid, so they do have limitations simply in the number of hands to handle such things. More mature content may be allows in the future, but the user base is young and they would rather protect them over anything else.

If you’re over 18 and prefer more mature content (does not include only nudity, but things like violence and other such topics) you’re better off with CharacterHub and using the mature filters appropriately. If you don’t care or are under 18, UnVale will work just as well for you as will CharacterHub.

Opening things in a new tab isn’t something I originally thought would be a topic to discuss but it turns out I probably should, somewhere. On mobile CharacterHub, you cannot open (practically any) links on the site in a new tab. Long-pressing will do nothing but highlight. Absolutely nothing. This doesn’t apply to desktop. They claimed this is to prevent stolen art through saving it when I brought it up, but this makes no sense considering this isn’t a thing on desktop. Only mobile. You can right click normally on desktop even though the mobile equivalent just doesn’t work.

UnVale allows for opening in new tabs no matter what you’re on. This, of course, makes it easier to do things like… participate in collaborative worlds/events, comparing your own character profiles, and looking at characters without losing your place in your browsing.

This is something that doesn’t really belong anywhere else since UnVale doesn’t have an equivalent, but CharacterHub offers personality quizzes you can take for your characters. You can then add those results to the profile, if you want. For free, you get a limited number of quiz steps you can take per day, though this does appear to be connected to the same internal system that manages other timers across the site, so sometimes it completely breaks and won’t give you your quiz tickets on time.

Additionally, CharacterHub has an iOS app in closed beta at the moment. Updates to the app are far, far slower than updates to the site itself, but it's supposed to have the same functionality as the mobile site (it does, sometimes, except for when it doesn't, because it's a little broken).

UnVale, as far as I know, does not have any plans for a mobile app in the near future, iOS or Android. I don't mind since it works identically on desktop and mobile, already, anyway.

I forgot……….. they’re also here on Tumblr @characterhub-com and @unvale-io. Tagged so you can just click to go to the blog instead of searching for them because I find that annoying on posts I’m just gonna nudge them for ease of acces nbd

#characterhub #unvale #unvale.io #site review #review #extremely long post #long post #oc #ocs #i am so sorry for the length but i literally could not say less #BOUNCY. REVIEW.

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bouncybrain · 19 days ago

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CharacterHub vs. UnVale pt. 1

All information beneath the cut, and I am so sorry about how long this got. I was going to keep it short and then I didn't.

User Profile: just how you set up your own profile, options there, and the differences between sites.

(Also, what will be showcased publicly on your profile.)

Character Storage: this is about the actual storing of characters, such as the image capabilities and information it can hold.

Custom Character Profiles: this will be about creating profiles, as these are significantly different across the sites.

World Creation: both sites offer "world" options, which differ from characters.

Social Interaction: what about the community and how they interact on-site? This is something I was more curious about that nobody was talking about.

And here is what I will be covering in the next part:

On-Site Events: I have nearly a month's difference between joining CharacterHub and UnVale, so keep that in mind while I speak about the events I've experienced and seen.

Artist vs. Author Experiences: both of these sites advertise that they are for both those who draw and those who write, but how well do they cater to both?

Site Stability: how well they’re handling the site, traffic, downtimes, etc. and how that effects the end user experience.

Discord Experiences: they both have a dedicated, public Discord server that can be freely joined. Ties in slightly with the social interaction section, but dedicated solely to Discord experiences.

What About Money: what do they offer, how they offer it, and do they facilitate monetary transactions through the site?

User Profile

The user profile is where all your goodies are kept. The profiles look completely different between the sites, so they're very unique and won't be mistaken for each other.

CharacterHub's profile contains an avatar and a header. You can write in your pronouns. Your age can only be hidden if you put in that you are over 18 years of age, which also allows you to publicly post "mature" content (they have a policy for that). Minors cannot publicly post mature content. Other socials you can link directly with little icons on the profile are Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Tumblr, TikTok, and deviantArt. You can put a little decoration on your avatar for free, but other options for the profile on offer are available through their subscription service; Username Color and Username Badges fall under this. The profile description/about section has unlimited characters, allows for insertion of images/gifs/links, and can be formatted.

UnVale's profile contains an avatar, a header, and three extra slots for additional images. Your username and display name do not have to match, as you can (currently) change your display name but not your username. You can freely write in your pronouns. There is not an option for selecting your age, and therefore there are no options to hide more mature content from minors, which is reflected in their terms and rules. You can select a country, as well as any languages you speak; there is an extensive list of languages to pick from, and you can clarify your level of familiarity with the language (basic, intermediate, advanced, or native). The other socials you can link directly with little icons on the profile are ToyHouse, Carrd, Inkblot, Instagram, Twitter, Patreon, Pixiv, Linktree, Twitch, Art Fight, YouTube, Tumblr, and one additional free link. The profile description/about section has a 250 character limit, and cannot be formatted.

On UnVale, the email you used to sign up will be fully visible in plaintext if you click on the profile icon at the top right of the site.

Content Displayed on Profiles

CharacterHub's profile displays featured achievements, characters, and folders, as well as latest posts, marketplace listings, and creations (characters, story worlds, social spaces, and folders). You can feature six of each for free, with additional slots unlocked per subscription tier. Your three most recent posts are visible, with a button to "see all." Creations are separated by little tab buttons to swap between the types, and you can rearrange how these are displayed to your tastes.

UnVale's profile displays your characters in pages right there, though they can also be accessed through other tab buttons (home, characters, worlds, favorites, and transfers). Favorites are "likes" and always public. Transfers are kept private, and is therefore only visible when you're looking at your own profile. The date you made your account is also displayed beneath your @ pronouns, and country. Your characters can be rearranged as well, but it's a little more difficult, as the "best" method of doing so is going through to click "send to front" in the reverse of the order you want your characters to be listed in.

Both sites display comments on the profile. These are fairly standard, though UnVale comments have a 500 character limit and CharacterHub comments have no character limit.

Character Storage

Both sites have currently unlimited character creation. You can have thousands of characters on these sites if you so desire, as nobody has yet reached the limit as far as I know. Both sites offer a default site watermark that can optionally be applied to images when uploaded, and can be applied or removed at any time. Both also allow for character transfers between users, or a form of crediting an off-site source when necessary.

CharacterHub has a limited image storage capacity (5GB), which you can pay a subscription to upgrade. Images are generally uploaded at the proper resolution, so images will appear at the size originally uploaded as. This means minimal crunching of your images. Images that count towards the storage limit are all the types that appear on the character profile, and not any of the other locations an image may be uploaded or used (posts, events, fanart, and decorations). It is very easy to create a basic character (name, age, pronouns, species, blurb, the like) and has plenty of options for storing written information without storage limitations. All lore and information can be stored on the character profile in collapsible sections, which are expanded by default and simple to scroll through. Characters can be browsed through a tagging system, through the feed on the homepage, or when they are promoted using a “compliment bomb” (which is something to get into later). Accessibility, from what I can tell, is really a case-by-case basis, as some profiles are literally unreadable even if there’s anything written in them, and they may contain bright colors, flashing gifs, or odd combinations of factors that could cause complications visually. Some of these will have warnings while others will not.

DO NOT RESIZE YOUR DESKTOP WINDOW WHILE FILLING OUT A CHARACTER PROFILE. IT WILL ERASE EVERYTHING YOU DID SINCE THE LAST SAVE. AUTOSAVE MAY NOT WORK OR RANDOMLY TURN ITSELF OFF DO NOT TRUST IT. (Applicable across the site but most devastating when making characters.)

UnVale has no image storage limit, but they are currently highly compressed and you lose a lot of detail, particularly if it’s a very high-res image to begin with. (As far as I know, this is an issue that’s been brought up before on the Discord and they’ve been trying to figure it out.) It is incredibly easy to create a very basic character. There is a very limited character bio, as this also has a character limit (2,000 characters). This does not mean it’s more difficult to store character information, though, as there is a traits section to hold other information, and a rather robust writing system to hold the rest (which will be discussed further in another segment). Characters can be browsed through tags, trending (across various timeframes), a very good randomized feature, or through being featured on the homepage (changes per major update, via staff response).

DO NOT LEAVE THE PAGE OPEN FOR TOO LONG OR IT WILL REFRESH AND YOU WILL LOSE EVERYTHING. UNVALE DOES NOT HAVE A DRAFT FEATURE (yet?) SO YOU HAVE TO MAKE SURE YOU POST BEFORE YOU GO.

As of the current moment, CharacterHub’s discoverability leaves a bit to be desired. While they are actively working on improving this via the "recommended" section on the homepage, other than looking through the tags, this or continually posting are going to be the only ways anyone will see your characters; this means you will see an immediate dropoff when your character has been up for "too long." (Ignoring compliment bombs right now.) UnVale, on the other hand, has much better discoverability, which I'm going to have to attribute to the randomized browsing feature (and another feature I will address in the events segment). Genuinely, I have no idea why UnVale's discoverability is just so much better. If you are looking to be seen, I cannot, at this time, recommend CharacterHub.

Going purely by the proof of “likes” alone (referred to as “favorites” on UnVale and “reactions” on CharacterHub, which have different preset compliments with accompanying emojis) UnVale is better. I say this with confidence as I have uploaded many of the same characters on UnVale as I have on CharacterHub and can (and have been) directly compare these numbers. This is, again, with about a solid month between account creations.

Custom Character Profiles

Both sites offer a variety of things to add to a profile to help flesh out a character. These are different enough not to have a list of similarities, so this section will be a bit longer than previous so I can be sure to cover what I want to get through.

CharacterHub allows for full color customization to most features of a character profile. I’m talking different sections, the background, the optional borders, the text, all of that. You have total free reign over the colors you can use. There’s different fonts that can be used on every instance of text on the profile. You can put additional decoration around the picture like you can your own. These are all the free options for visual profile customization. Some options are, again, locked behind subscription tiers. Beyond that, there are many different options of sections you can add to the character page to organize all the sorts of information you might have for your OC. (I'm not writing all of them out, they're also in this post I wrote when I joined, as well as screenshots and more detail about the initial experience.) This is an insane amount of detail you can get into entirely for free, and there's more if you're subscribed. Even if you aren't subscribed, there's a free-reign blank section you can title after whatever else you need it to be.

CharacterHub character pages can be completely illegible because of this amount of freeform customization. If you are concerned about making your character profile legible, I made a post about that right here that you can see, even without an account (also an example of the formatting available).

UnVale profiles initially come across as less detailed as CharacterHub's, as they do not allow for full, total color customization of each character's page. This does, however, mean every single page is legible. There are a good number of default color themes available to be used to customize a page. Despite being initially more limited in scope than CharacterHub characterization, the legibility is much better across the board, which I honestly prefer much more than everyone being able to pick colors that mean I literally can't read anything. Being able to directly store writing on a character page in a tab that doesn't distract from the images, or vice-versa, is also much preferred, as despite being more "hidden" it is also more organized, as having many bits of writing for a character does not have to distract from the images, or having many images does not have to distract from the writing.

If the appearance of your profile matters more to you, CharacterHub will work for that, though it obviously has less customization than ToyHouse's coded profiles. If the appearance does not matter nearly as much, UnVale will fill your needs perfectly fine! It is best to keep in mind the visible accessibility when choosing which site to join, as sometimes you can get flashbanged by an eyestrain profile full of flashing gifs without warning on CharacterHub, but not UnVale, as warnings for these things are not guaranteed on CharacterHub and simply not possible on UnVale.

World Creation

Worlds are additional places to store information, and link characters or other writing types directly to each other in one space. These serve similar purposes and work similarly, though the use across sites is slightly different, but I'll speak more on that in another section.

CharacterHub worlds have very similar (expansive) options for information organization as the character profiles do, though they do not have custom colors; they instead use images to stand out from others on the site. Worlds can have an insane amount of detail, as well as being directly connected to characters through the world itself and the character profile. (There's a much more in-depth review of this and the options on this post when I first started on CharacterHub.) These can also be placed in folders, alongside characters, to ensure all worlds and all characters can be separated into even the most nuanced of categories you might want to put them in.

UnVale worlds are similar to character profiles in that they can have images and writing uploaded directly to them, but character profiles can also be added, which also shows up on the character's page. There are no "fill-in-the-blanks" type sections like with CharacterHub, but writing specifically for the world and not characters can be uploaded completely separate from any writing that has been added to characters. All writing here also contains the same amount of formatting. It initially looks very simple, but can contain a lot of information if you so desire. Any images used as the "initial" image (the big one) will be slightly-visible in the background of the world, which is similar to the background of writing and characters. Other images uploaded through the "add content" function in a world will be displayed without changing this initial image, as they would in a character profile but without the rotating function.

Discovery of worlds differs between sites: for UnVale, there is a choice to view worlds alongside characters, writing, and art while browsing. For CharacterHub, world browsing usually only happens while searching or when browsing the homepage (can be filtered for); there is no other way to really browse worlds, because there is no easy way to find random worlds.

Additional Hosted Content

I've mentioned writing, and posting, and folders, but what does any of that mean? Well, it means there's other things you can post that aren't just characters and worlds! Not all of these are shared across sites, though. Some other things you can "create" may be mentioned elsewhere, but these are the ones that make sense here.

CharacterHub allows users to make general posts (with "types" such as Art, Art WIP, Story, Comic, Meme, Social Post, Roleplay, Journal, Personal Update, and Q&A) that are displayed on the profile. These can be seen on the homepage, as well (randomly through “recommended,” or sorted for through “posts” “art” “art WIP” “story” and “comic” options) and you can tie these posts directly to characters (if you want to). These have full formatting like the character profiles, and have several different font types available by default. Any art here cannot be censored unless there are multiple images or it is placed under the "mature" tag which automatically hides it from minors. The posts sections on character profiles will always be fully visible, but they only show three at a time and you have to click through to see the rest; there is no scrolling through them from the character page despite having different sections per "type" available. Folders can hold worlds, characters, and other folders. This is essentially just another worldbuilding/character organizational tool, as it cannot hold posts. They have two images: one that is immediately seen, and one that is essentially a header. You can also host raffles in which CharacterHub will randomly pick the winner(s) for you... and then tell you to contact them via email, but you don't have to. Sometimes they double up if the site bugs or you lag a little too much, your raffle might end and get stuck in purgatory for a while, and there was an incident a little while back, but this isn’t a post about the social tea.

UnVale allows users to add "writing" to characters and worlds. Writing is where you can fully format everything you write, and is accessed directly on the character profile in the "writing" section, or plainly on the world alongside characters and images. Writing can be seen in browsing alongside characters, worlds, art, and the random option (more on this last one later). They have no character limit, and you can add an image to add some flavor, though the image will not be plainly visible on the writing itself, as it is only partially-visible behind the writing itself and on the "thumbnail" behind the title and brief description while browsing. In fact, you can go ahead and browse writing right here without an account! As you'll be able to see, writing is used for a great deal of things on UnVale. I personally haven't uploaded much writing writing, at this point, but it works very well.

Social Interaction

This is purely about on-site social interactions. There will be another section later about their Discord servers. Also, surprise! I'm going to talk about roleplay in here, too!

CharacterHub is perhaps the single most socially-oriented space for artists I've ever seen. This one is going to be multiple paragraphs, because I have so much to say, here. There are two entire dedicated portions of the site for "social spaces" and "roleplay," which has "rolechat" which is as close as CharacterHub comes to private messages.

Social spaces hold chatrooms, which are all created by users and... unfortunately, I cannot, in good faith, tell literally anyone to go ahead and have fun exploring the social spaces at this point in time. Practically all moderation of these spaces is left up to the users, which means a lot of issues are either left ignored or tend to blow up between users, which gets dragged across even more social spaces, which—well, it really just compounds. Because users are completely in charge of social spaces and the chatrooms within, I cannot say this is completely safe, even for underaged users despite the ability to create social spaces behind the "mature" gate that keeps those who chose minor as their age out; private chatrooms (even within public—not private—social spaces) that must be requested to join could be so much worse than what I've seen out in the open and I would never know. This is also where general large, group roleplays happen, as CharacterHub allows users to pick between their characters or themselves to speak in these chatrooms alongside comments. I'm not in any social spaces because it sucks.

Rolechat is where you go to have your private one-on-one roleplays. You can request to roleplay on a character's profile if it's been enabled and if the user has created their rolechat profile. Roleplay starters can be posted on the "explore" page, where other users will be able to request to join a roleplay with you. Rolechat profiles will have your preferred message length, favorite roleplay types, a section to fill in what's most important to you in roleplay, and a section to fill in a sample of your roleplay (both sections have no character limit). Starters contain a starter message, a list of characters the poster is willing to use in the roleplay which link to the appropriate character profile, the poster's username which links to the appropriate profile, the preferences chosen for their rolechat profile, what the poster is looking for, and the sample of their roleplay. I also cannot recommend spending much time here, because I keep stumbling on people saying they'll do 18+ type roleplays despite the rules stating they must be 13+ in keeping with site rules, and this does not have a "mature" block like other things on the site do. Also, not to shade anyone, but I have never seen a single starter that meets my personal standards, so it's best not to get your hopes up if you're the type of roleplayer to have standards.

As always, be wary of the ages of the people you’re talking with; even if they’re engaging with your mature-locked content, there have been multiple people that outright say they aren’t 18+ simply to encroach on this type of content that has been kindly separated from the children for a reason. Do not simply assume all users here with a “+18” on their profile is telling the truth.

Remember that you, the user, MUST be the one to report anything happening inside these more social spaces. CharacterHub does not seem to be working particularly hard on fixing the problem of rampant toxicity, lack of internet safety, dangerous spaces for minors, and complete disregard for other users they've managed to cultivate with these spaces.

ACTIVELY SEEKING OUT AND PARTICIPATING IN CHATROOMS ON A WHIM WILL, IN MOST CASES, END POORLY, EITHER BECAUSE SOMETHING HAPPENED WITH YOU OR BECAUSE ANOTHER CHATROOM MEMBER BROUGHT SOMETHING ELSE INTO THE CHATROOM EVEN IF IT'S COMPLETELY UNRELATED. IF YOU KNOW YOU CANNOT HANDLE EMOTIONAL DISTRESS BEFORE IT SPIRALS OUT OF CONTROL, I CANNOT RECOMMEND EVEN JOINING A SINGLE CHARACTERHUB CHATROOM. THIS IS FOR YOUR MENTAL HEALTH. It doesn't matter who's "right" or "wrong" in any given situation, because it has an unbelievably high likelihood of exploding, anyway, thanks to the other party/parties involved. The best way to enjoy chatrooms is to not join any of them. I am completely serious about this. I once followed a situation across at least six chatrooms, and those were only the ones I knew about at the time.

UnVale does not have a lot of socially-oriented features. This is much more about the creations themselves. Comments are really just about as much social interaction as you're going to get, but users actually comment quite a bit more than I expected. Users are generally kind and chatty. Roleplay will be the primary socially active spaces here, but I haven't gone very deep in here because I'm confused. Roleplay often happens on worlds, through comments (I think?), and there are several very large roleplay communities. The staff has promoted several of these before in their monthly news posts on the blog, which is the only reason I actually stumbled on this, honestly. From what I have seen, staff is active enough that any problems in these limited social spaces have been handled well enough I haven't randomly stumbled onto it like I did the second I tried to explore CharacterHub's chatrooms. Additionally, UnVale does not currently have a way to warn or hide more mature content, and thus it is generally not allowed, as both of these sites are for all ages (by which I mean 13+ you had damn well better be at least 13 out here).

It is important to remember that the more vocal portions of users on these sites tend towards the younger side. This is nothing against you younguns, but sometimes adults prefer speaking among adults, and that is not something that gets simply stumbled upon most of the time. This is also going to skew the perceived social maturity you'll see across the site.

PLEASE GO TO PART 2 OVER HERE: [link]

#characterhub #unvale #unvale.io #site review #review #long post #oc #ocs #i am so sorry for the length but i literally could not say less #BOUNCY. REVIEW.

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