Pixelation
Critique => Pixel Art => Topic started by: ndchristie on August 06, 2006, 01:02:27 am
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something i did while i had artists' block on my other 3 projects.
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(http://pixeljoint.com/files/icons/full/mocky__r162331711.png)(http://pixeljoint.com/files/icons/full/mocky__r145031711.png)
Done with the GBA in mind (and therefore practically 0 restrictions as the pixelart and tile assembly goes)
Any crits, or better yet, suggestions? its an early mockup and done quickly, so if something got cut off funny in the assembly its not worth pointing out really, i can already see at least one place where i forgot the transiton tiles
in case you cant tell, its all 16x16 tiles on an 8x8 grid but in quite a few places they've been cut into 8x8 for more interesting placement
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Really sweet color choices as always. However some of the trees blend into the tiles too much - for instance i really had to strain my eyes to see part of the middle tree. Color experimentation is good but perhaps try not to be over experimental. Its also quite busy and just not to my taste. I love the sprite though.
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I really like this.
The variety of hues you use make the image look very alive, which is fitting for the jungle-ish environment.
The design of the trees look creative, they look more like giant plants though or flowers.
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thanks alex, and i dont mind that you see them as giant plants, because they are giant plants :P i havent figured out a good way to do the trees yet since they are just so large.
slight update: (http://pixeljoint.com/files/icons/full/mocky__r162331711.png)
tried to fix the big leaves to stand out more, and also fixed some tiling issues
Feron, i really wasnt experimenting at all here, so perhaps you could be a little more specific as to which color combinations you dont like?
i was thinking about something like this for the trees:
(http://img74.imageshack.us/img74/5025/mockytvj1.png)
but decided that they blocked too mmuch of the screen that way, so im not sure what to do
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Some of the purples were blending into each other - the latest edit looks great. By color experimentation i meant not using the generic greens and browns seen in most rpg games. Since Tsugumos tutorial analysing the Som3 tiles i havent really seen many that differ (although i cant say i've seen every tile-set ever created, but i think many would agree that re-creations of the som3 grass tile seem to pop-up more often than any other rpg grass tile)- your work however is very creative. ;D
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The trees's silhouettes is hiding the screen too much...It would be painful to play.
Maybe you could put some leavage silhouette near the border but not in the center ?
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yeah the problem with that fil is that then there arent any trees :P
small update, but now im torn between two color choices in the dirt:
(http://img462.imageshack.us/img462/9537/mockyhq5.png) and (http://img483.imageshack.us/img483/6648/mocky2gb7.png)
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right one is more realistic, but the left one is more fitting of the style.
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Left - its more distiguishable as another texture and purple is one of my fav colors.
EDIT: after a long time looking at these i now prefer the right one - there not so harsh and the transition seems better.
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I'd go with the right one. Slightly less contrasting, which is good for something that generally isn't contrasty, in a game-design kinda sense.
Actually, how about the color of the left one, but a tad brighter and less saturated?
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So heres the newest at your suggestion:
(http://img458.imageshack.us/img458/8219/mocky3pd2.png)
are people feeing it or should i go back to the drawing board?
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I'm lovin' it to be honest... ;D
Though the orange in the tree leaves is throwing me a bit...Maybe desat some? *shrugs*
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i'm not really feeling it :( i like the little cavemen, and the palm tree leaves are nice, but the sizes and focus and colors are all very competitive to me. I think as a color experiment it is very interesting and educational, but as a mockup or game scene it is boring and hard to read. The background ranges from monochrome to beautifully hued while your characters suffer with a single ramp and no shadows to separate them from the ground. There are apparently garbage cans in the middle of the jungle too?
I dunno, it all feels very busy and disconnected to me. I think some shadows and outlines would go a long way toward pushing this piece forward!
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Unless it's too much to ask (I personally think it would be since I'm not bothering to do it myself, but you seem to be less lazy than me), could you post your tileset? I have trouble tiling, especially with tiles that look so natural and fluid and have tried to avoid tilesets because of it, but I've seen a couple tiles from you that break the grid fairly easily and I just don't get it. And I really don't want to go through the trouble of cutting up the pieces of the mockup, finding out which tiles were actually split into 8x8 from the original 16x16 and so on just so I can study the structure of it.
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(http://img204.imageshack.us/img204/6377/tiles3qc9.png) its not anywhere close to optimized or even organized but there you have it. most of the fuidity stems from the fact that all of the tiles have enough static detail that they can be cut apart and pieced back together in an almost random fashion to create the scene. if the person who constructed the levels was not me, id feel bad about giving them such a clumbsey set
Adam, could you be a little more clear as to what you mean? I feel like you have a lot of good things to say, but i dont quite understand. If you mean the scene is boring or confusing, its because its a test of the tileset and how the things work together, and nothing more, its not trying to tell a story. If you mean the tiles themselves are confusing, then what about them? what sizes are bothering you, and which colors? what about it is hard to read? where does what disconnect? except for the characters, there are shadows everywhere, so where could they be added to make things clearer? what about the character's single ramp makes them suffer?
heres my reasoning for a few of the things you mentioned that i understood:
the monochromatic aspect of the characters allowed them to stand out from the background which becomes desaturated by the hue combinations, and their nakedness doesn't allow for multiple ramps. parts of the background are near-monochromatic for a different reason, in this case because they are ment to fall back and the hue mixing adds interest that they dont have. unlike the characters though they are desaturated to begin with, allowing them to fall farthes back into the scene (and since they are ground tiles, that is where they belong, no? Also the 'trashcans' are just sun-bleached wooden barrels, which granted dont belong in the middle of the forest either, except here the buildings or camps (not drawn yet) also happen to be, but again this isnt ment to tell a story, only test a tileset, so who cares?
part of the difficuty i have is that i know what everything is and why it is that way, because i made pretty much all of the decisions that led to them being in that form. when someone has a question or a concern, its hard for me to understand unless they say something like "The orange is far too bright" or "The jungle plants are hard to see, they should use some darker colors to separate them from the ground." "boring" on the other hand is much harder to address without a bit more info to go on.
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well, for example your sprite sheet has shadows for your guys but they're not actually used in the mockup. I will doodle around in photoshop real quick here and try and show what I mean - it may just not be what you are shooting for, but I think it would help! I'll attach an image in a few minutes here.
Your latest mockup --------------------- my probably bad edit!
(http://img458.imageshack.us/img458/8219/mocky3pd2.png) (http://adam.lastchancemedia.com/sprites/adarias_edit_probably_bad.png)
I played around with a lot of stuff, some of it I expect not so successful as others! The big changes are some shadows for some of the objects, and I generally darkened and desaturated most of the greens in the image. I ramped up the saturation of the characters. I hope this helps in some way; btw omega props for your color mixing on this one, I didn't realize how few colors you were using for that range of hues! I still think you can push this to be more presentable though. Hope this helped!
DOUBLE EDIT - My apologies for not being more specific earlier, work was kind of crazy today :P I try to be more specific in general but I was having trouble formulating my specific feedback; I wasn't sure if you wanted targeted feedback or the more "yay or nay" type response that you seemed to be asking for!
WHOA triple edit - I cropped off (REALLY cropped - this image is no longer the right size but i'm too lazy to edit in new tiles to fix it :P ) the frame as that is one of the things that was feeling too busy for me earlier, I really do prefer it without it (but that is more subjective I think, this is not really rooted in any design thing, except that it seems to steal a little thunder from your scene):
(http://adam.lastchancemedia.com/sprites/adarias_edit_probably_bad2.png)
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Wow, thanks, most people dont put that much time into an edit :P
The shadows you put on the characters look great, so i will definately put the shadows in in my next update. i will put in the push in saturation, its much more orange than i would have dared to go but i like it. Also i like the shadow onthe barrel, which is easy enough to add. I dont know how i would put on the shaow under the big plant, since its surroundings change dramatically, but i can use the existing tiles to make something similar.
Though normally i too would prefer a colored outline, it just doesnt read as well. Ive actually experimented with more or less the same color, and in the end decided that the near-black was the way to go for the sake of visibility
the darker green i dont think ill go for, since it takes away from the lighting i think. in yours there is dark and not dark instead of dark and bright, and from what i remember of forests when there is light its fantastically bright compared to the rest (though also, from what i remember of forests, there's not much grass there either). Also, it makes the taller weeds feel larger, like bushes, since they become so much brighter. it no longer looks like the character could stomp his way through them, and they play a big role tactically both for the Concealment skill and also for basic manuvering, since some characters move through brush easier than others (based mostly on weight of equipment) but im giving away too much of the game i think :P.
enough people have talked about the border that i think i will nix it. personally im sad to see it go, but im apparently the only person in the world since 1823 that likes facy borders :P.
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hey glad I was able to help some. I think you could save the border if you just drop the contrast on it some, it is just kind of distracting right now. My other beef with it is that it adds nothing to the screen but uses up a decent amount of space - I mean, you are basically labeling the sides of the screen "up" "down" "left" "right" etc. Which is kind of self-evident :P Now if the game had mode7-style rotation and the NSEW tags slid along those edges...
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the NWSE tags could be gameplay-useful if they only occured when there was an exit from that way.
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Helm, would something like this work do you think?
(http://img196.imageshack.us/img196/2447/mocky4im7.png)
(only done a bit better so that it feels like its actually flat on the ground?)
this would have one big advantage in that escaping requires moving you characters off of the map, and this shows you exactly where to do that and gives me square that they can move onto before being removed from play
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I think you hit the nail on the head with that one...Very nice! :)
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if this is for the GBA, just alpha those borders 30% to 50% animated to make it look sleek.
(http://www.locustleaves.com/dirtyfast.gif)
something like this, only better. Perhaps when a button is held down.