Ramblings About the Ring of Heroes Portal Masters Part 6: Adriana

(This is a cleaned-up repost of a series of essays I wrote in 2022)

For this section, I will be talking about Adriana, Energetic Gardener and the fourth original portal master introduced in the revamp, as well as the second one to be revealed post-revamp. A gardener who befell an unfortunate fate when she was pulled to Skylands and her beloved garden was taken with her and didn’t survive the trip, only to have her misfortune become her greatest strength when her dying plants were revived using magic and became a powerful plant gauntlet capable of wiping out foes with a single punch! Adriana was technically not only the third portal master to be added post-revamp and the second one to be revealed post-revamp, but also the last due to the game’s shutdown in February 2022.

Adriana’s character motif is gardeners, as showcased not just from the gigantic plant gauntlet on her arm, but also via the flower in her hair, the bag of gardening tools she carries on her belt, and even her colors! Rather than just making it obvious by slapping a bunch of green and brown in her character design and calling it a day (though her design does have those as prevalent colors), they go for more of an across the board approach with copious use of warm, earthy tones to give her design a very natural look to it. The same philosophy also applies to her outfit, which is lacking in frills and fuss and generally favors the kind of stuff you can easily move around in, making it perfect for running around in the forest or working in the garden on a warm day.

This more practical attire also gives Adriana a bit more of a physically active edge compared to Ryeo and Eugenie, the other two girls in the portal master roster. She lacks the long, flowing clothing, ditching the skirts and dresses and capes in favor of shorts and more snugly-fitting clothing, with the only loose and flowing aspect of her design being her hair. The accessories she wears are practical, close-fitting things like armbands, gloves and belts, as opposed to Eugenie’s lengthy cape or Ryeo’s fancy jewelry and headpieces. Unlike to those two, who tend to support the Skylanders more on the sidelines with their respective skills, and who generally have less physically active hobbies (Eugenie being a bookworm and Ryeo being a fortuneteller), Adriana is implied to be a pretty physically active person. After all, not only does her title calls her energetic, but anyone who’s ever taken care of a garden can tell you it’s a pretty physically strenuous task, especially if it’s a particularly big garden or if the plants are somewhat demanding, and Adriana is also the only portal master whose skill involves directly attacking her opponents. Heck, even in her idle animations she’s swaying and moving around while the others stay relatively still! Thus, her attire is perfectly tailored for somebody who spends a lot of time being physically active. Very few loose and easily-catchable bits paired with comfortably-fitting clothes that are easy to move around in, and even a little bag for carrying whatever tools she may need means that this girl is ready for whatever adventures she faces, whether they involve fighting bad guys or weeds and pests in the garden!

And of course, I’d be remiss if I didn’t examine how she fits in with the rest of her portal master team! I’d already touched upon how her design compares to Eugenie and Ryeo’s a bit above, but let’s see how she compared to the rest of the group.

Adriana shares the basic elements of the other portal masters’ designs and that of the other high school-aged portal masters, though hers deviates from the main four’s style slightly. She forgoes the skirts and cloths in favor of shorts, and the armor and fancier accessories the others wear are foregone in favor of more practical accessories… But, she does share a few design elements with the others, such Eugenie’s opera gloves and bags/pouches, an armband like Bruno has, and Ryeo’s round earrings. In fact, it almost feels like her design mixes the standard design for the high-school aged portal masters with Oscar’s design!

I’ve already covered Adriana’s similarities to Oscar’s design in his post, but it seems like her design basically took what made Oscar’s design unique, and combined it with the standard style for the teenaged portal masters to make a character design that blends well with both groups! The pants are incorporated into Adriana’s shorts over tights in lieu of a standard cloth/tunic/skirt and paired with the belts that the others all wear, she wears her portal amulet directly on her shirt, but has the arrow underlining it so that it fits in slightly more with the decorated accessories the portal masters usually have. All in all, if you took out the plant gauntlet, her attire feels a bit more grounded in realistic fashion styles with little flair and fuss and looks more like something you’d see someone on the street wearing, much like Oscar’s more simple styles, while still keeping the general style and influences of the other portal masters’ outfits! In a sense, you can almost say that Adriana is the metaphorical bridge between him and the rest of the portal masters, allowing him to fit in a bit more with the rest of the group while still having a very distinct look.

Previous Installments in this series:

(Portal Master Designs as a whole) (Eugenie & George) (Bruno) (Ryeo) (Oscar)