There's currently a competition running over on CGHub, a big community of artists who (mostly) work in the entertainment industry. It's to design a new Mass Effect character. Some of the entries are impressive, some especially so, but there are others which will absolutely blow your socks off.
The rules are simple: "create a character that would fit into the Mass Effect universe. He or She could either be from an existing/established race from the game's universe or an undiscovered race."
What follows are some characters so detailed and interesting that it's a damn shame they're not actually the stars of an upcoming Mass Effect game, especially those with a backstory, like the mind-blowing Varro Krios up top there, the grandson of Thane and the first non-human to join the N7 program.
In addition to the Mass Effect competition, there's also one being run to design a new Dragon Age character. I'll run some of the best of those next week.
You can see some of the best entries below, but you can check out the full selection - including very hi-res versions of the art (too big for this site to handle) - here.
By threedsquid, aka Marthin Agusta
By amdetweet
By Baolong Zhang
By Berto Souza
By re1mon, aka Gerardo Justel
By bs999, aka Dae Eung Lee
By changiz, aka Christopher Parnian
By gahpe, aka Gabriel Pereira
By guedin, aka Nicolas Garilhe
By iime, aka Iouri Rybalka
By mandoo
By Max Loegler
By monkibase, aka Oleg Memukhin
By mosena, aka Eduardo Mosena
By nikitany, aka Nikita Volobuev