Pixelation
Critique => Pixel Art => Topic started by: diefox on October 03, 2006, 02:26:10 am
-
Well, here it is, DT2 first set Mock-ups.
I´m not sure about characters line up yet, but the ones featured on those mock-up are almost sure to be on the game. The gameplay on last game was like SF series, SFZ series to be exact. In DT2 the play mode is going to be totally Marvel VS capcomnish plus a lot of more stuff. The RPG mode is going to be more fluent, not as stiff as it was on last game, not sure if it will stay isometric though.
Even though those pictures are all mock-ups, the actual game engine is not that different from what you see, righ now im focusing on programming the new system (tags, counters, new common attacks and stuff like that), and only Charlie and Ingrid are playable characters and there´s no AI yet. And I still have many doubts about how the VS series gameplay works, what to do and what not to do. When the fighting system becomes totally functional ill start making the characters, converting the old ones, converting all the old stages to a High-jump enviroment and stuff like that.
Well, I´ll explain now each of the mocks you see.
(http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y26/diefox/dt2mockup1.png)
1. Cammy fighting against an idle Donovan, you can se by the angle that she´ll miss... The Background is Chun-lis stage from SFA
(http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y26/diefox/dt2mockup2.png)
2. Storm doing a Super Special on poor Iori (he deserves!)
(http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y26/diefox/dt2mockup6.png)
3. Megaman (from Battle Network) shooting against Zangief, who doesn´t seem to care about blocking.
(http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y26/diefox/dt2mockup4.png)
4. Vega finishing Scorpion with a Super Special, wich will probably be like Cammy´s and Spider´s special attack on the versus series.
(http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y26/diefox/dt2mockup3.png)
5. Ingrid doing a Star Guard (parrying) on Sol Badguy, Cammy Stage from SFZ3
(http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y26/diefox/dt2mockup5.png)
6. Kun Lao hat trhowing at Wolverine, The Pit stage from MK3
(http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y26/diefox/dt2mockup7.png)
7. Player selecting their players at Team arcade mode, works just like KOF. Cammy and Monica(my Original Character) has been chosen and Morrigan is selected, then the player chooses from 3 different play modes: Star, Thunder and Sphere.
(http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y26/diefox/dt206a.png)(http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y26/diefox/dt206b.png)(http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y26/diefox/dt20c.png)
8.and this is a screen shot from the actual game itself, no BG for I have not converted any yet.
BTW, I havent make up my mind about all the other characters to be on DT2, hope you can give me some ideas about it ^^
-
Here's the critiques you are likely to get: They won't like the gradiants in the first background. In the Mega Man background, the trees and floor are obviously dithered. The swirly background isn't pixel art, and WTF is up with the textured building roof? Also, the sprites aren't shaded. YOU MUST HAVE SHADING!!! THEY WILL KILL YOU IF YOU DON'T HAVE SHADING!!
As someone who uses gradiants and dithered noise to give texture to my own work, as well as my own dislike of shading, that's not the critique I'll give you. Plus, I really like the Storm sprite. The zigzag in the hair is what does it. The textured roof does look pretty bad though - just use the noise effect you used for the forrest rather than a full on texture. Use it across the entire background though, because it will look strange when parts are and parts aren't. Just copy the layer, apply a medium noise to it, and set it's translucency to about 10%.
-
I don't like the gradiants (sic) in the first background. In the Mega Man background, the trees and floor are obviously dithered. The swirly background isn't pixel art, and WTF is up with the textured building roof? Also, the sprites aren't shaded. YOU MUST HAVE SHADING!!! I WILL KILL YOU IF YOU DON'T HAVE SHADING!!
Seriously though, anything in these pics that you did with a gradient or photoshop noise/texture filter, needs to go. There is probably a fast, relatively easy way to achieve a similar effect using simple pixels that will be cleaner and easier to read for your audience. Gradients are almost never an accurate way of portraying light or volume, and they're USUALLY used where no gradient at all was necessary, nor any lighting period.
That said, I am 100% charmed by your Zangief sprite, he's hilarious! Keep at it, and stay away from that automated photoshop stuff - it's just wasting your time ;)
-
You don't have to have shading, but if you want your sprites to look interesting, I suggest implementing it. That is, of course, unless you're going for low color count.
The sprites remind me of the Neo Geo Pocket game SNK vs CAPCOM: Match of the Millenium ( http://www.mobygames.com/game/neo-geo-pocket-color/snk-vs-capcom-match-of-the-millennium/screenshots ). The game has very simple sprites, but hey, the color restriction on the NGPC is pretty harsh.
-
KILL ME THEN im not going to shade those characters XDDD. serious, im not that good a pixel artist, keeping them simple helps me concentrate on animation and more and more characters, and i want to make them NGPC style.
the whole idea of this game was to make it simple, but it became bigger and this came out:
http://paginas.terra.com.br/lazer/fanzic/dt/index.htm
(go to dowloads to get the game)
and ill keep an eye on the backgrounds, i might repaint them all, without using dithering because im not that much a fan of it, ok... i dont have patience for that... thats the reason.
the first background was the first BG I made for DT1, thats why its so crappy, and I kind of took SFA from Game Boy as a reference.
but thanks so very much for the help! Ill try my best to improve all BG.
-
I think if you did the backgrounds using just a few colours, maybe outlines but very desaturated you could get something that matches the flat look of the characters. I'd actually suggest doing something similar to the characters but with no outlines at all. For the characters the shadingless style is fine as long as you keyframe really well. It just puts a lot more emphasis on getting the animations perfect or else creating visual confusion.
-
you should really get the first version of duel toys, so you can see how it works, especially the animations.
just google for "duel toys"
BTW, THANKS YOU very much for ALL your CNC, its so great that you didn't bitch me around like someone did when I posted this SAME topic at PixelJoint forum. ^^
-
okay, heres the link ^^
http://paginas.terra.com.br/lazer/fanzic/dt/down.htm
-
BTW, THANKS YOU very much for ALL your CNC, its so great that you didn't bitch me around like someone did when I posted this SAME topic at PixelJoint forum. ^^
Seriously, there was absolutely no need for that.
-
yes, there is.
BTW, i have the right to be mad for what have been done to me, at least respect that.
-
The art is generally good, but a few small things stick out at me. The mountains in #1 and the trees in #3 have a thin dark outline and that would probably work better with the style if it was a thicker shadow. Also, the bottom-left status bar in screenshot #5 looks rather jaggedy due to the pixels in vertical lines there.
-
BTW, i have the right to be mad for what have been done to me, at least respect that.
You have the right to get over whatever it was and swallow your dignity along with the rest of your sandwich, and get back to doing something worthwhile instead of letting the internet run your life. <3
I'm going to play this game when I have time (not for a few days, since I am such an important and busy person and spend my time going Out Of Town on various and sundry Trips). It looks brutally charming. ^_^ Though I myself am not keen on black or very dark outlines...thus the Zangief appeals to me the most, since he lacks most of these inner outlines.
Peace and orange zest to you.
-
oh god.. internet doesn't run my life.... never did, but my PRIDE runs it and fucks it up XD
anyway, those are not the screenshots of the actual game working, just mock-ups.
but the first version is almost the same, just the resolution is smaller.
Below are some real screenshots from DT1. If you want to play it, just google for "duel toys"
(http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y26/diefox/dtad2.gif)
(http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y26/diefox/855.png)(http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y26/diefox/new8.png)
(http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y26/diefox/new7.png)(http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y26/diefox/new6.png)
(http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y26/diefox/new5.png)(http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y26/diefox/new2.png)
(http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y26/diefox/new3.png)(http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y26/diefox/new.png)
(http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y26/diefox/010611.png)(http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y26/diefox/010608.png)
(http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y26/diefox/8511.png)(http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y26/diefox/010601.png)
(http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y26/diefox/857.png)
(http://diefox.com/pixel/isodt3.gif)
(http://diefox.com/pixel/isodt2.gif)
(http://diefox.com/pixel/isodt1.gif)
-
I really like this. Mainly because it's an idea I've tried to do myself of years, I just haven't got around to it for a while. However, my idea didn't involve miniature figurines. Mainly for one reason: A game called "Power quest". It's a rather unknown GBC game that i managed to pick quite a few years ago. The gameplay is strikingly similar to this. Small robot figurines that you upgrade via shops and you go around and defeat opponents in RPG style. Your game has a lot more freedom though, which is a big plus.
Could the overhead style by chance be inspired by the Megaman Battle network games? I see a lot of similarities, there's also the pokémon-esque badge collection. Still, they are all games I enjoy. I'm not accusing you of anything, just saying you've got good sources. The Power Quest similarities are interesting though, even if they are by coincidence.
Anywhoo, I've tested the game. I have to say, for using Multimedia Fusion you've got a pretty solid battle engine. Something to improve on in your next game are the combo attacks. I can hardly execute any special attack at all past the regular hadouken attack. The double button attacks rarely work and I have yet to do a super attack. Also, there are times when I can't damage the opponent at all after a series of hits. Unless it returns after the opponent decides to punch me, I am doomed to loose the match unless I've got time on my side. Apart from that, there's hardly anything technical to complain about as the game is pretty well polished. (There is of course the text that goes beyond the text box, but meh...) I do wish that one could walk around and explore rather than battling in a room until said boss gives you a badge, but that's just a suggestion.
OK, so on to the pixel art.
I actually quite like the way you made the 'duels' in the fighting mode. There are a few things that break up the style though. For example, there are no shades. Yet, sometimes there will be powerfull highlights or eyes that have barely visible shades. At times even the outline has a different colour and that breaks the pattern. The backgrounds have already been covered pretty extensively, so I'm not going to analyse them right now.
As for the overworld, it does suffer from a lot of equal colour hues. Most of the time, the colours rarely vary in contrast and everything sort of merges together. I had a very hard time seeing the faces of the people in the game due to this. If you could increase contrast on the outlines a tad (not too much though) and use shadows where needed, it would be lot better on the eyes. And as a side note, the hero's hair is very pillowshaded.
That said, I really enjoyed playing the game. If the next one turns out even better It'll be a sure download on my side. Keep it up!
-
all right snake!
thanks for the bug report, its quite hard to keep a stable battle engine on MMF, but anyways those bugs REALLY BUG ME, im trying my best to keep DT2.
and OF COURSE i got inspiration from a lot of games, but mainly fighting games, making it a RPG was kind of a last addition, and it ended up like pokemon and megaman, by accident, really XD.
this game is a dream that came true, it brought me lot of good things, its like my chlid. Especially Monica and Paolo, my original characters.
about the pixel art.
ill fix ALL BG and Outline issues you guys pointed.
and about the over world, what should i exactly do? make all charcaters stand out more? make all the colors less saturated, except from the charcters, right?
oh... and i REALLY want to know your ideas for DT2, im making a pre-poll and some characters seems to be pretty popular, want to know your ideas.