Pixelation
Critique => Pixel Art => Topic started by: Squirrelsquid on June 26, 2007, 05:14:02 am
-
well, I decided to spice up my shoot em up with some more weapons and selectable ships.
now I need a new select screen, and this is the current result. still heavily WIP.
here's the complete layout. obviously still missing some weapons in the list.
(http://i193.photobucket.com/albums/z180/Squirrelsquid/select_1.gif?t=1182846138)
also when selecting the ship the lower part is displaying a box with information on the ship.
This will also be done for the weapons in a simmilar fashion.
(http://i193.photobucket.com/albums/z180/Squirrelsquid/select_3.gif?t=1182846137)
someone at PJ mentioned that the blue hud is distracting from the actual ships.
I'll try to adress that with an animation on the selected ship, and some glowing effect.
heavy C&C welcome
-
Thats pretty kick-ass, make your own font and make it more legible(for the details on the ship part), try making the ships a bit more diverse.
-
yea, doing a font is a good idea, I'll do that when I get to it.
-
Cool, but personally I feel that the box on the left displaying the selected ship is a bit useless, it just repeats the same ship graphic which is already highlighted clearly enough. I think it should either show the ship from a different angle (closeup, perspective) or show some other relevant information.
-
Cool, but personally I feel that the box on the left displaying the selected ship is a bit useless, it just repeats the same ship graphic which is already highlighted clearly enough. I think it should either show the ship from a different angle (closeup, perspective) or show some other relevant information.
Maybe it could show the ship shooting, ala Tyrian?
This work is really really cool. I think the sprites could use more contrast, though. I find the borders too large and distracting, also.
-
sexy stuff as usual...i ditto the sentiments so far though. Maybe the giant box of specs could be slightly smaller, and the ship could appear in the bottom left, on a little repeating AI thingy, where it dodges a couple asteroids, fires a few lance shots, then fires a burst, then dodges a couple asteroids, etc. It'd look for sex and would make the screen pretty cool and exciting!
-
I too feel things. I feel that the massive frames with dotty pixels, as well as the blue shiny oulines around the.. thingies, detract from the focus and readability of the... thingies themselves.
I'm not sure what you're trying to do, but I'd consider punching the frames back in Value \/ Contrast \/ Noise.
-
here's the current version... tried to adress as much crits as possible.
(http://i193.photobucket.com/albums/z180/Squirrelsquid/select4.gif)
@AdamAtomic: that sounds like a great idea, though something like that would be very code intensive. I'll go with the diagrams for now.
here's another update... toned down the metal frames a bit
(http://i193.photobucket.com/albums/z180/Squirrelsquid/select5.gif)
-
I'm sorry about the conceptual crit, but could we for once, avoid the anime pilot cliches?
-
I'm sorry about the conceptual crit, but could we for once, avoid the anime pilot cliches?
yea you are right about that... I'll see what I can do
-
I'm sorry about the conceptual crit, but could we for once, avoid the anime pilot cliches?
Good point. It'd be cool to see some chaos engine style portraits or something... ;)
Regarding the latest mockup, I find that text difficult to read, I think lowering the value of the light blue around the white would help it alot.
-
If I had something to say about the matter, I'd prefer some sinister colors and harsh lighting with a lot of contrast, and colder colors. I'll make you an edit if I get the time.
-
I vote for no pilot at all. Why? Because shmups always present a great chance to have the player in the pilot seat, since there's no need to show the pilot upclose. Great stories have spots for the viewer to fill in. If the character you make isn't needed for expanding your universe, then don't make one, cause then it'll only be an empty shell taking center-stage instead of the player. I remember someone saying in your previous thread that the screenshots seemed to hold in some good story. Great many games take benefit of telling the story without language. It's always good to let the player define things for themselves, unless of course, you have something so spectacular that requires predefined aspects. R-type final is a good example. Every bit of graphics and sound contribute to a good story and only a sentence of written text is given between missions to give a hint of what the story is.
Not to get too off-topic, i really like the ships themselves as well as the silhouettes showing their weapons. Other than that, i agree with others, the user interface is too bulky and takes attention away from the ships. Try thinking in levels, then make an interface that doesn't rise too high above the ships and give the ships some subtle containers.
-
I kinda agree with you huZba, but still I'd like the player to give an impression on the pilot, like the pilot in Axelay where you see the pilot behind a helmet... a bit like the Master Chief.
so, I'm currently working on a new portrait with a helmet.
in the meantime, here's 4 new enemies! EDIT: now there are 5 enemies... converted the sprite from the 16 color thread here...
(http://i193.photobucket.com/albums/z180/Squirrelsquid/stage2_enemies.gif)
@ Jad: what do you mean by sinister colors? The blues are kinda a set standard since pretty all HUD elements are in these colors.
Still I'd love to see an edit from you.
Edit: ok redid the portrait. I think it is more an avatar telling the player: That is me!
think I've outdone myself quite a bit :D
(http://i193.photobucket.com/albums/z180/Squirrelsquid/select6.gif)
-
The new portrait has a really short neck, and really thin shoulders. The single red eye doesn't lend itself well to a character that is meant to be a blank slate.
-
Your art suffers from broken outlines, banding and brittle vague-lighting highlights. The ships don't show this as much becase they're small spaceships, but the portrait(s) certainly does/do.
-
well done portraits (both of them). The "robotic" one somehow reminds me of Power Rangers :-\
Btw, if you're concerned by the argument "let the player be the pilot -- don't show him another figure", you could still show the guy/lady who's trying to sell you the ship -- or tips from your commander or whatever.
The font is a bit hard to read, with that glowing outline ... not so sure it's a good thing...
-
Nitpick -- the colors of the enemy ships seem to blend in with the background too much. At a glance, it would seem they share the same color scheme (red, warm-gray), but some of the exact colors. You might want to tone down the background saturation or use higher contrast value ramps for the enemy sprites to make them pop.