Pixelation

Critique => Pixel Art => Topic started by: ScaryPotato on February 10, 2012, 03:52:54 am

Title: Adventure Apes Screenshots (WIP Platformer)
Post by: ScaryPotato on February 10, 2012, 03:52:54 am
Hey everyone,

I've been working my tail off trying to get this game done, and it's close enough now that I want to show it off a little (the game, not the tail)!
Anyways, it's pretty much your standard metroidvania style game, only it's cartoony, and centers around a little monkey named Mitch. Everything in the game is pretty small (16x16 for the most part), and I didn't adhere to any colour limitations while making it. It really is a labour of love, and I'm hoping to have a demo version ready to go very soon.

Please let me know what you think of my humble offering, thanks!

(http://www.adventureapes.com/images/AdventureAepsAndTheMayanMystery.png)
Title: Re: Adventure Apes Screenshots (WIP Platformer)
Post by: ErekT on February 10, 2012, 10:49:14 am
They're good mockups but I feel a strong urge to just go in and color-reduce the shit out of em! It's important to strive for maximum clarity with pixel art since the canvas resolution is so limited and an abundance of colors will kinda work against that. All them color shades will muddy up the objects because they're too tiny to accomodate them all. Make sense? I think if you stick to a limited range of colors you'll find everything much easier to work with and tweak.
Title: Re: Adventure Apes Screenshots (WIP Platformer)
Post by: 9_6 on February 10, 2012, 12:59:33 pm
The background could be a bit more subtle since it distracts from the main action.
This is especially apparent in that water level.
(http://i43.tinypic.com/jjspol.png)
Take note how you can almost not see the bat on the left.
Pushing the background back a bit more by making it darker would help improving the readability which, I assume, would improve gameplay since you can recognize stuff faster.

Also you could do some hue shifting instead of working monochromatic in the tiles if you'd be willing to go over those again.
(http://i39.tinypic.com/ixt4hu.png)
Title: Re: Adventure Apes Screenshots (WIP Platformer)
Post by: kriss on February 10, 2012, 01:11:29 pm
Pls take a look to this hud, because is more readable

(http://www.snes-fr.net/images/dossiers/special_mmx/redimensionne/rd__256x223_Mega_Man_X_3_SNES_ScreenShot2.jpg)
Title: Re: Adventure Apes Screenshots (WIP Platformer)
Post by: ScaryPotato on February 10, 2012, 02:16:14 pm
Wow, thanks guys for the awesome replies! Firstly, I should mention that for these screenshots, I've removed a vignette that darkens the surroundings the further things are away from the player. It does help to tone down the colours somewhat, as well as make all the HUD junk a lot easier to read. It was taken out because it was a gradient made in photoshop, so doesn't count as pixel art...this is what the game looks like during normal game play:

(http://www.adventureapes.com/images/Screenshots/Level5-Magmatoro.png)

When I started this game, I knew nothing about programming or standards/limitations with colour palettes, and it's still a learning process for me :) The points about making the backgrounds darker, and hue-shifting the tiles are wonderful bits of advice, and I will definitely be implementing those for the final version of the game. Will probably leave them as-is for the demo however...

Thanks ErekT, 9_6 and kriss for the advice and looking at this stuff with some fresh eyes!
Title: Re: Adventure Apes Screenshots (WIP Platformer)
Post by: pistachio on February 10, 2012, 08:44:32 pm
Yeah there's a lot of pillow shading/staircase banding going on in most of those tiles. Especially the jungle level and mine tiles, round shading on a flat surface doesn't make much sense. First and last levels were better.

(http://i.imgur.com/ZmIm7.png)

Also thought the tiles were a bit grid-like, like they were tiles for a puzzle game. Tried out some new tiles, brick pattern kinda unified the whole thing, so that's worth a try IMO. You should explore ways to eliminate the grid pattern for other level tilesets too, (most are way too obvious compared to the level 1 tiles) you don't have to look far to find good examples (http://spelunkyworld.com/original.html) really, but don't be afraid to get creative. If you are going for the grid pattern though, you should still eliminate the pillow shading.

Sprites: I worked with few colors at first (to the right) to check major pixel clusters and see how readable the sprite can get. Readability is important at this size, I can't emphasize that enough. Lighting is a bit inconsistent there... from above on the head, below/side on the body? When shading find out what shape a part of the sprite is, where the light is coming from and stick with it. Also fixed some depth/banding problems with the bones and bat sprites.

EDIT: Just saw the promo art while searching for the demo. Good stuff! Download link for the game is 404'd however. I'd like to see how the tiles work out in context, while playing the game. (Videos look promising.)
Title: Re: Adventure Apes Screenshots (WIP Platformer)
Post by: deadlock on February 11, 2012, 11:21:10 am
I think the GFX look really nice, which platform is it made for ? PC ? Like to see the demo.
Just put a link here where we can find it...
Title: Re: Adventure Apes Screenshots (WIP Platformer)
Post by: PypeBros on February 11, 2012, 12:52:18 pm
@potato: welcome on board, and congrats for the work so far on your monkey gem.

Sprites: [...] Lighting is a bit inconsistent there... from above on the head, below/side on the body?

Although that's true in the general term, this monkey's head is likely to prevent any light from above to lit his little belly, isn't it ? And similarly, any glow diffracted by the ground will back-lit his body, but would likely fade too much to have a significant effect on the head.
Title: Re: Adventure Apes Screenshots (WIP Platformer)
Post by: ScaryPotato on February 11, 2012, 06:03:51 pm
pistachio - That change to the blocks is really great! The way I set up the blocks in the majority of the levels was to have each randomly choose its x- and y-orientations, as well as angle (0,90,180,270) in an attempt to give the most variety possible visually, but you're spot on about all the pillow shading etc. I might have to give your rendition a go as it really does look much more like dilapidated old stones...same with the character lighting. I was trying for a 3/4 type thing, but it is flat compared to the pot-belly version you did...man! So much good advice, I really wish I had known about this site earlier!

deadlock - Yeah, it's now being made for just the PC. I'm pretty sure the download link works on my site? Anyhow, you can click to it from here if you'd like to give it a try: http://www.adventureapes.com/swag.html (http://www.adventureapes.com/swag.html)

PypeBros - Hey! Nice to see you here, and thanks:) As you can probably tell, there'll be some changes to the game in the near future after all the revelations here. Everything is totally valid and welcome...I think these things could really breathe some fresh air into this!
Title: Re: Adventure Apes Screenshots (WIP Platformer)
Post by: ScaryPotato on February 12, 2012, 06:49:34 am
(http://www.adventureapes.com/images/Screenshots/FinalDesign/Level2Update.png)

All right, so here is a quick shot showing new tiles and a darker background for level 2. The effect is more convincing than the previous tiles IMO, so I'm looking forward to trying to come up with something better for the rest of the levels!
Title: Re: Adventure Apes Screenshots (WIP Platformer)
Post by: ScaryPotato on February 14, 2012, 06:20:55 am
Okay, so after tweaking a few things here and there, I've put up an updated (beta) version of the game for download (http://www.adventureapes.com/downloads/AdventureApes-MayanMysteryBeta.zip). Figured that if a picture is worth a thousand words, a video should be somewhat more valuable, so I posted a clip on youtube (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=npfxvhA_5Ns) showing a bunch of the new levels!

I've had some really awesome suggestions so far from you guys here and would love to hear what you think of this, thanks so much:)
Title: Re: Adventure Apes Screenshots (WIP Platformer)
Post by: TheMonsterAtlas on February 14, 2012, 07:15:22 am
When under water I somehow got stuck in the ceiling and died multiple times .___.

If you die in the game you should be warped back to a check point, this not only makes the gamer want to proceed further but it's also good for debugging.

(I got stuck where the chest is in the first level, first couple of seconds into the game, don't want to spoil it ;] lol)
Title: Re: Adventure Apes Screenshots (WIP Platformer)
Post by: dugan on February 14, 2012, 01:08:25 pm
Cute looking game - is it made in gamemaker?
Title: Re: Adventure Apes Screenshots (WIP Platformer)
Post by: ScaryPotato on February 15, 2012, 02:45:09 pm
XLR8ED - I am going to have to fix the collision detections somewhat if that's the case, I occasionally would manage to stick to walls, but never a ceiling, so that isn't good. Thanks for pointing it out. There are savepoints throughout the game, but I guess they`re only really useful if you can actually make it that far without the game eff-ing it all up!

dugan - Why yes it is made in gamemaker. How did you know, does it have the look and feel of something made with that program (add questions mark here, because mine suddenly stopped working)
Title: Re: Adventure Apes Screenshots (WIP Platformer)
Post by: ScaryPotato on February 22, 2012, 03:01:28 am
Before:
(http://www.adventureapes.com/images/Screenshots/Catacombs.png)
After:
(http://www.adventureapes.com/images/Screenshots/FinalDesign/LevelC.png)


Before:
(http://www.adventureapes.com/images/Screenshots/UnderTheSea.png)
After:
(http://www.adventureapes.com/images/Screenshots/FinalDesign/LevelD.png)

So here are a couple new shots with some (hopefully) more convincing looking blocks. I kept the option to flip them horizontally, which means that there are places where the 'mortar' between each one is 2px wide on occasion, but aside from that, I'm pretty happy with them! The last one will be some lava tiles, and as much as I want to have some nice rippley variations, something more bumpy and rocky is probably the way to go, as it'll let me throw in random gems and pockets of lava much easier:)

As always, suggestions are more than welcome. After all, it's the feedback I got from you guys that sparked the change, so thank you!

P.S. Sorry about the size difference, I scaled the 'before' images up for my site
Title: Re: Adventure Apes Screenshots (WIP Platformer)
Post by: 9_6 on February 22, 2012, 11:19:00 am
If you want to be a lazy bastard, you should look into autotilers.

You can make a tileset like this (except less crudely ;P):
(http://i39.tinypic.com/55lq0.gif)
And then never have to look at it again because you just place blocks in the map and have the game figure all the tiling pishposh out itself but without randomization (e.g. flipping tiles).
(http://i40.tinypic.com/1zn5wu1.gif)
This is especially helpful with the gm room editor which can just drive you crazy.

This may look like an intimidating task at first but if you break it down, its really simple:
(http://i40.tinypic.com/4qa1k.gif)
You just need a way to check the tiles and a 2 dimensional array should do that trick just fine.
This can make all the difference to your sanity on bigger levels.

Also I'm not really sure if the light system adds something to this game.
It just looks way too smooth for all the hard pixels you have imo.
Title: Re: Adventure Apes Screenshots (WIP Platformer)
Post by: PypeBros on February 22, 2012, 02:12:50 pm

So here are a couple new shots with some (hopefully) more convincing looking blocks. I kept the option to flip them horizontally, which means that there are places where the 'mortar' between each one is 2px wide on occasion, but aside from that, I'm pretty happy with them!

To be honest, I can hear the "thematic" blocks crying for a return from here.
[img=http://i.imgur.com/gUMHw.png]
The wave pattern and the octopus shape of level D were equally (if not more) important. Such artistic elements is what makes temple apart from regular architecture, imho.
Title: Re: Adventure Apes Screenshots (WIP Platformer)
Post by: ScaryPotato on March 03, 2012, 05:58:48 pm
(http://www.adventureapes.com/images/Screenshots/FinalDesign/LvlC.png)
(http://www.adventureapes.com/images/Screenshots/FinalDesign/LvlD.png)
(http://www.adventureapes.com/images/Screenshots/FinalDesign/LvlE.png)

Here is a little update of the different levels...

PypeBros - My wife agrees with you completely about the old blocks with the patterns! When I showed her the first update, her reaction was underwhelming to say the least, so I added a few patterns in the mix to give a little variety.

9_6 - The last image has a test at the sort of block-placement that you described, and it makes a big difference. With 16 different situations and 9 types of blocks, it made for a lot of image files, holy! I'm not sure if it's something that would be worth doing on the other levels, given the fact that they are carved blocks and the effect would be very subtle compared to the lumpy rocks and lava, but you never know:)
Title: Re: Adventure Apes Screenshots (WIP Platformer)
Post by: 9_6 on March 05, 2012, 04:01:27 pm
9 different block types?
Just what are you doing that needs 9 different variations of stone?
I can only see 3, normal, lava and with crystals in them.

Btw the lava should probably glow aka not be affected by the light system.
Title: Re: Adventure Apes Screenshots (WIP Platformer)
Post by: ScaryPotato on March 05, 2012, 04:35:48 pm
It's nothing more than to satisfy my own whims really. I wanted to make three variants each type of block, plain, lava and bejewelled in an attempt to make the tiling seem a little less obvious. Granted, there is only so much variation you can squeeze out of a 16x16 tile!

I had thoughts of trying to do little alpha/glowy fades on the lava and such, even making the jewels twinkle, but those little touches will probably wait until I get the rest of this thing done. It's become a much longer running project than I had originally planned!
Title: Re: Adventure Apes Screenshots (WIP Platformer)
Post by: ScaryPotato on March 19, 2012, 12:06:18 am
It was pointed out a while back by pistachio that the lighting on the player sprites was inconsistent and could be improved. Seemed kind of daunting at the time to go and redo all the images, but in the end, my goal is to make a game with as much visual appeal possible...so they've been revamped. I played around with the saturation and colours a little as well and think the end result is a lot nicer. It's fairly subtle when playing the game, but the character has a lot more depth now and seems to fit in with the rest of the game better.

Here's a little comparison of several of the sprites ( I hope it hits the mark!):

(http://i.imgur.com/k0yt2.png)
Title: Re: Adventure Apes Screenshots (WIP Platformer)
Post by: PypeBros on April 03, 2012, 09:32:58 am
here's some inspiring concept art (http://kyomu.deviantart.com/art/Sacred-Seasons-2-Shrine-BG-163114737?q=gallery%3Akyomu%2F1410798&qo=15) by kyomu. I saved it for my "lost temple" level ... maybe you'll find it helpful too.

Quote
I wanted to make three variants each type of block, plain, lava and bejewelled in an attempt to make the tiling seem a little less obvious.
You should be able to do that with less pain with two layers: one that contains the "plain rocks" and a "jewel overlay" (overlay at run/build time, as you see fit).

Btw, have you considered simply using a smaller window and dropping the shadow thing altogether ? I'm not sure it brings so much to have it applied globally on the game, personnally.