#theyre implied to be doglike anyway. theyre inspired by looney tunes and mickey mouse.

[calllynx]

Your rainworld ancients are just anthro dogs?

Sure they're "just" anthro dogs. If you don't find them satisfying then draw your own.

My logic was that ancients are likely related to the mammalian creatures of Rain World such as scavs, slugcats, lantern mice, and lizards. So they likely have two eyes, two ears, a nose, and a mouth. From the iterators we can infer they've got an upright posture.

From their masks they seem to have some sort of snout or long face, but maybe they have a flat face, judging by the statues in the depths and the spherical faces of iterators. I choose to interpret them as having snouts instead, because I like how it looks, and it's implied by various bits of graffiti in the game.

From there I just kept drawing them to be closer to my own aesthetic preferences and I ended up with dog people.

So it goes. I like how they look, and they're very inspired by @tickfleato 's ancients.