AuthorTopic: GR#061 - Werewolf - Low Res Game Art  (Read 23687 times)

Offline knivel

  • 0001
  • *
  • Posts: 22
  • Karma: +0/-0
    • View Profile

GR#061 - Werewolf - Low Res Game Art

on: May 17, 2011, 03:47:02 pm
Hey folks,

I was hoping to get some feedback on my player sprite for the werewolf game I'm working on. Below are the rotations of his human form and wolf form:



I'm using Arne's palette, and I've zoomed the sprites to 2x for this post, which is how they'll render in the game. Any critiques are very appreciated!

Latest Update:

The game is out! Where I Go At Night





« Last Edit: July 17, 2011, 05:02:55 am by knivel »

Offline Mathias

  • 0100
  • ***
  • Posts: 1797
  • Karma: +2/-0
  • Goodbye.
    • http://pixeljoint.com/p/9542.htm
    • View Profile

Re: [WIP] Werewolf game sprites

Reply #1 on: May 17, 2011, 06:37:40 pm
The werewolf form retains all clothing except shoes? Eh, it's a game. No need for hyper realism.

Nice colors. Werewolf face hard to read. Seems he should have a protruding snout in profile sprites.

Offline knivel

  • 0001
  • *
  • Posts: 22
  • Karma: +0/-0
    • View Profile

Re: [WIP] Werewolf game sprites

Reply #2 on: May 18, 2011, 05:13:42 am
Thanks, Mathias. Here's my latest version of the wolf form:



Here's my first take on the walk cycle:


Offline knivel

  • 0001
  • *
  • Posts: 22
  • Karma: +0/-0
    • View Profile

Re: [WIP] Werewolf game sprites

Reply #3 on: May 19, 2011, 03:32:36 pm
Here's the walk cycle for both forms in all 4 directions:



The wolf form will actually has a higher frame rate and moves faster on screen, but it was simpler to throw both sprites together in a single .gif.

Offline lilwing

  • 0001
  • *
  • Posts: 95
  • Karma: +0/-0
    • View Profile

Re: [WIP] Werewolf game sprites

Reply #4 on: May 20, 2011, 01:47:39 am
The werewolf's arms should be moving.

Offline Mathias

  • 0100
  • ***
  • Posts: 1797
  • Karma: +2/-0
  • Goodbye.
    • http://pixeljoint.com/p/9542.htm
    • View Profile

Re: [WIP] Werewolf game sprites

Reply #5 on: May 20, 2011, 10:56:44 pm
If they did move, you don't have to move them in tandom with the body bounce, they could be offset by one frame and have their own delayed bounce. You may or may not have enough frames for that, though.

Offline Greger

  • 0001
  • *
  • Posts: 84
  • Karma: +0/-0
    • View Profile

Re: [WIP] Werewolf game sprites

Reply #6 on: May 21, 2011, 11:02:38 am
If they did move, you don't have to move them in tandom with the body bounce, they could be offset by one frame and have their own delayed bounce. You may or may not have enough frames for that, though.

They could move up and down with the legs, so when the left leg goes up his right arm goes down and the other way around.

Offline tehwexxl0rz

  • 0010
  • *
  • Posts: 446
  • Karma: +0/-0
  • Swing the bat.
    • ianwexl0rz
    • https://pixeljoint.com/p/15996.htm
    • View Profile
    • Ian Wexler | Game Developer

Re: [WIP] Werewolf game sprites

Reply #7 on: May 21, 2011, 11:46:49 am


BOUNCE! :)
« Last Edit: May 21, 2011, 11:50:05 am by tehwexxl0rz »

Offline knivel

  • 0001
  • *
  • Posts: 22
  • Karma: +0/-0
    • View Profile

Re: [WIP] Werewolf game sprites

Reply #8 on: May 21, 2011, 06:44:17 pm
Thanks guys! Especially tehwexxl0rz with your really helpful edit.

I've added a couple more frames into the cycle so I could get some of that nice bouncy secondary animation:



I'm pretty happy with the animation at this point, so I'll probably start moving onto the townspeople and then the background tiles.

Offline PypeBros

  • 0100
  • ***
  • Posts: 1220
  • Karma: +2/-0
  • Pixel Padawan
    • PypeBros
    • View Profile
    • Bilou Homebrew's Blog.

Re: [WIP] Werewolf game sprites

Reply #9 on: May 23, 2011, 10:29:13 am
I'm pretty happy with the animation at this point, so I'll probably start moving onto the townspeople and then the background tiles.


So, errm. Is that hands I see at each side of the wolf's head ? I initially thought it was some wolf-head-thing until I realised the wolf otherwise had no arms :P

Offline tehwexxl0rz

  • 0010
  • *
  • Posts: 446
  • Karma: +0/-0
  • Swing the bat.
    • ianwexl0rz
    • https://pixeljoint.com/p/15996.htm
    • View Profile
    • Ian Wexler | Game Developer

Re: [WIP] Werewolf game sprites

Reply #10 on: May 23, 2011, 11:08:36 am
Glad you found my edit helpful! :) I think the wolf's hands read fine.

My only critiques now are that the legs don't seem to bend at the knees, the feet just kind of flop, and the human only seems to have elbows in the forward-facing sprite.

Offline Mathias

  • 0100
  • ***
  • Posts: 1797
  • Karma: +2/-0
  • Goodbye.
    • http://pixeljoint.com/p/9542.htm
    • View Profile

Re: [WIP] Werewolf game sprites

Reply #11 on: May 23, 2011, 09:29:24 pm
Yep, wolf reads good, IMO too.

My only critiques now are that the legs don't seem to bend at the knees, the feet just kind of flop, and the human only seems to have elbows in the forward-facing sprite.

Really? Do you think there's enough pixels to actually indicate joints bending, man? I think it looks good as is.

He does need to get these 1st two sprites right, so they're like a template, or standard, he can use to apply to all subsequent human sprites. Once he moves onto the next assets, these this human/wolf combo needs to not get revised for fear of breaking continuity, don't you think?

Offline knivel

  • 0001
  • *
  • Posts: 22
  • Karma: +0/-0
    • View Profile

Re: [WIP] Werewolf game sprites

Reply #12 on: May 26, 2011, 05:07:42 am
Thanks for the feedback guys, and sorry for the delay since the last update! I decided to move onto the townspeople, so here's the first one with his walk, run and death animations:



Edit: Hrm, I'm not sure where those white pixels around his head in the forward-facing walk are about. I'll fix that in the next update.
« Last Edit: May 26, 2011, 05:12:19 am by knivel »

Offline ErekT

  • 0010
  • *
  • Posts: 330
  • Karma: +0/-0
  • fistful of pixels
    • View Profile

Re: [WIP] Werewolf game sprites

Reply #13 on: May 26, 2011, 05:37:56 am
Hehe, these are cool. The villager doesn't look panicked enough imo. How about having him wave his arms around more to distinguish his animation from the werewolf's?

Offline knivel

  • 0001
  • *
  • Posts: 22
  • Karma: +0/-0
    • View Profile

Re: [WIP] Werewolf game sprites

Reply #14 on: May 28, 2011, 10:36:59 pm
@ErekT: Thanks for the feedback! I messed around with making the arms wave, and I couldn't get it to look satisfactory. At this point I've decided to trudge ahead.

The werewolf is a firm believer in gender-equality when it comes to his victims. Here's the female townsperson:



The character sprites are taking up a lot of time, so we'll see if I have time to go back and do a child version. I'll be starting on background tiles next.

Offline PypeBros

  • 0100
  • ***
  • Posts: 1220
  • Karma: +2/-0
  • Pixel Padawan
    • PypeBros
    • View Profile
    • Bilou Homebrew's Blog.

Re: [WIP] Werewolf game sprites

Reply #15 on: May 29, 2011, 09:09:12 pm
@ErekT: Thanks for the feedback! I messed around with making the arms wave, and I couldn't get it to look satisfactory. At this point I've decided to trudge ahead.

The werewolf is a firm believer in gender-equality when it comes to his victims. Here's the female townsperson:



The character sprites are taking up a lot of time, so we'll see if I have time to go back and do a child version. I'll be starting on background tiles next.

Still the lovers, the hunter, the sorceress, the oligomancer (divination), the hunter, Cupido, the thief and the captain, and  you'll be done with the cast :-)

Offline TheChannel

  • 0001
  • *
  • Posts: 53
  • Karma: +0/-0
  • Sky Rockets in Flight, Afternoon Delight.
    • View Profile

Re: [WIP] Werewolf game sprites

Reply #16 on: May 29, 2011, 11:17:36 pm
I know this was kinda already said but the side walking does look like the legs are like tentacles and flop around. Although it is hard to do anything with legs on a small scale like that.

Offline knivel

  • 0001
  • *
  • Posts: 22
  • Karma: +0/-0
    • View Profile

Re: [WIP] Werewolf game sprites

Reply #17 on: May 30, 2011, 06:45:33 pm
Thanks for the feedback, guys! The floppy feet really stick out to me now that you guys have mentioned it, although I think it's less noticeable in game with the character moving around. I'll keep it in mind, and maybe I'll attempt a fix later when I'm polishing things.

Meanwhile, I've forged ahead with the world map tiles. Here's a screenshot of the town:


Please ignore the doors which obviously don't match the palette. They're remnants of my placeholder art.

I'll be adding detail objects such as windows, chimneys, street lights, fences, etc. next.

Offline Mathias

  • 0100
  • ***
  • Posts: 1797
  • Karma: +2/-0
  • Goodbye.
    • http://pixeljoint.com/p/9542.htm
    • View Profile

Re: [WIP] Werewolf game sprites

Reply #18 on: May 30, 2011, 06:52:44 pm
whoa woa wo, the rainbow-colored pavers gotta go. Something more neutral.

Offline knivel

  • 0001
  • *
  • Posts: 22
  • Karma: +0/-0
    • View Profile

Re: [WIP] Werewolf game sprites

Reply #19 on: June 01, 2011, 03:13:50 pm
Haha, fair enough, Mathias. To be honest, I was noodling around with different patterns and colors for the ground for hours so I probably started losing perspective. My trouble is I want the ground to have an overall grayish look, but I can't seem to find any colors in the palette that don't contrast or vibrate with the gray too much. Anyway, I've tried pulling out some of the more rainbow colors for a more neutral look. It still strikes me as a little noisy for a background, though.


The new doors are in there, too. The little blue door mats are intended to help the player find the doors located on the sides of buildings that would otherwise be occluded by the roof.

Offline Mathias

  • 0100
  • ***
  • Posts: 1797
  • Karma: +2/-0
  • Goodbye.
    • http://pixeljoint.com/p/9542.htm
    • View Profile

Re: [WIP] Werewolf game sprites

Reply #20 on: June 01, 2011, 04:26:58 pm
Pavers are better. Though, I highly recommend knocking down contrast. Meant to mention that last post. New doors good.

So we're going for swiss-esque archictecture with the large beams and plaster look? Koo


Did a quick edit, suggesting a further paver street change and addressed building roofs' priority. (palette not followed for expedience)
« Last Edit: June 01, 2011, 04:28:44 pm by Mathias »

Offline Unhero

  • 0001
  • *
  • Posts: 29
  • Karma: +0/-0
    • View Profile
    • My works

Re: [WIP] Werewolf game sprites

Reply #21 on: June 01, 2011, 05:11:19 pm
dark roof looks better  :)

Offline talin

  • 0001
  • *
  • Posts: 27
  • Karma: +0/-0
    • View Profile

Re: [WIP] Werewolf game sprites

Reply #22 on: June 02, 2011, 06:45:15 pm
This is incredibly cool. I would definitely go for the dark roof version, though.

Offline talin

  • 0001
  • *
  • Posts: 27
  • Karma: +0/-0
    • View Profile

Re: [WIP] Werewolf game sprites

Reply #23 on: June 02, 2011, 07:26:05 pm
Just out of curiosity: what tools are you using for your project? What do you use for animating your sprites as you create them,
what sort of game development tools, etc? I just begun working on something similar myself... Do you use some sort of multiplier
to make it work with high resolutions?

Offline knivel

  • 0001
  • *
  • Posts: 22
  • Karma: +0/-0
    • View Profile

Re: [WIP] Werewolf game sprites

Reply #24 on: June 02, 2011, 08:52:46 pm
Just out of curiosity: what tools are you using for your project? What do you use for animating your sprites as you create them,
what sort of game development tools, etc? I just begun working on something similar myself... Do you use some sort of multiplier
to make it work with high resolutions?

I use Photoshop CS4 for the sprites. The game engine I'm using uses traditional sprite sheets, so I work in Photoshop's .psb file format with the sprites laid out as they'll be used by the engine. To save out animated .gifs for critique on this site, I've got an "animation" .psd that I load the .psb file into as a smart object. Then I make a layer mask the size of a tile and slide the smart object sprite sheet around for each frame. That way, I can update the sprite sheet and just reload the smart object in the animation .psd to update the animation version. Finally, I save it out for web as a .gif at 200% side with "nearest neighbor" as the scale mode to avoid interpolated pixels. For the actual in-game sprites, I simply save the .psb file as a .png and I'm good to go. This is a new workflow for me that I came up with for this project, but so far it's been working pretty well.

As far as the other game development tools, I use the Flixel flash game library with FlashDevelop for writing code and the Flex compiler for compiling. When it comes time for audio, I plan to use bfxr for sound effects and musagi for music. Those tools all tend to default to a retro, 8-bit style, which is why I like using them together. Flixel has a built in resolution multiplier for that purpose, so I use that to blow my sprites up to x2 in game.

Offline knivel

  • 0001
  • *
  • Posts: 22
  • Karma: +0/-0
    • View Profile

Re: [WIP] Werewolf game sprites

Reply #25 on: June 04, 2011, 08:39:58 pm
Again, thanks for the continuing feedback, guys! Here's my latest take on the buildings and pavers:


"Oh God, what have I done!?"

As you can see, there are a few new sprites in there as well. I've added:

- Broken down versions of the doors.
- A bottle of werewolf cure.
- Piles of boxes.

Here's the werewolf cure by itself:


And here is the animated box pile (the boxes are dropped by the player and will pile up):


Finally, here are three variations of a slash animation for when the werewolf is breaking through doors and box piles:

Offline pistachio

  • 0011
  • **
  • Posts: 639
  • Karma: +4/-0
  • Mostly lurking
    • http://pixeljoint.com/p/125138.htm
    • View Profile

Re: [WIP] Werewolf game sprites

Reply #26 on: June 05, 2011, 10:46:11 am
You still really need to darken up those streets (see Mathias' edit). Right now, it looks like they're made of diamonds. You can't possibly afford, in any time period, to pave your entire town's streets with diamonds.

Also, for now I'm assuming that's the inside of a building, but it's looking rather bland. At first glance, I thought that was a patch of grass surrounded by a fence. It's still pretty bright, as if the sun's hitting it straight-on, so I say do the same thing you did with the streets and try darkening that, too. Consider adding some props, too, but then again that part's just something I'd like to see and not necessarily something you have to do.

Offline knivel

  • 0001
  • *
  • Posts: 22
  • Karma: +0/-0
    • View Profile

Re: [WIP] Werewolf game sprites

Reply #27 on: June 07, 2011, 04:12:00 pm
Thanks for the feedback, pistachio. I've got to say though, I'm actually getting pretty fond of the diamond streets. I haven't been able to cook up anything that works as well for background separation with the characters while still looking like daytime. I can't get near Mathia's edit without adding some more desaturated colors to the palette, which I'm not totally against doing, but I'd like to exhaust my options using the palette first.

Maybe my eye is totally off or I've just been staring at the tiles too long, but I'm seeing the current version as a mottled white cobblestone, sort of like this: http://elliottback.com/wp/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/old-san-juan-02-street.jpg

Anyway, I'll continue to noodle with it.

For now, I did change the building interior colors. I like the warm look with the pink floor, but the female sprites are getting lost in it. I might just change her dress color if I'm sold on the pink floor. What do you guys think?

Offline Candy Man Criminal

  • 0010
  • *
  • Posts: 116
  • Karma: +0/-1
  • ~Reality is a plague, we're the medication~
    • View Profile

Re: [WIP] Werewolf game sprites

Reply #28 on: June 07, 2011, 05:15:50 pm
the pink floor feels very out of place with the color scheme of everything else

Offline Phlakes

  • 0010
  • *
  • Posts: 236
  • Karma: +0/-0
    • View Profile

Re: [WIP] Werewolf game sprites

Reply #29 on: June 07, 2011, 05:22:59 pm
It's still pretty hard to read people against the cobblestone. Even if it won't be realistic, it's better to take some artistic liberties and make it work well.

Or you could just change the people, like this-

(I only took about thirty seconds, so of course it's not perfect)


Just darkened the outlines on the arms and added a very simple shadow. Makes it pop. Contrast is always good.

Offline Mathias

  • 0100
  • ***
  • Posts: 1797
  • Karma: +2/-0
  • Goodbye.
    • http://pixeljoint.com/p/9542.htm
    • View Profile

Re: [WIP] Werewolf game sprites

Reply #30 on: June 08, 2011, 04:27:00 pm
I think it's time to try something totally new for the pavers. I suggest implied stone shapes rather than actually drawing each stone; some cracks/edges here and there, etc. (love your posted reference)

Usually, when an element in my projects proves troublesome I throw it out and re-do. You're under no obligation to do anything at all of course. This is your creation. Feel free. We only suggest for your benefit.

Nice sprite edit, Phlakey.

Offline knivel

  • 0001
  • *
  • Posts: 22
  • Karma: +0/-0
    • View Profile

Re: [WIP] Werewolf game sprites

Reply #31 on: July 17, 2011, 05:01:14 am
Hey guys, sorry to dredge up this old thread, but I just wanted to let you know I launched my game:

Where I Go At Night

As you can see, I ended up adding an outline to the character sprites. I also stuck with the controversial pavers! Anyway, I like the way it came out.

I learned a lot from all of your critiques, and I just wanted to say thanks to everyone who gave feedback!

Offline CharlesGabriel

  • 0010
  • *
  • Posts: 160
  • Karma: +0/-0
  • Veritas Omnia Vincit
    • View Profile
    • CG Artsenal

Re: [WIP] Werewolf game sprites

Reply #32 on: July 17, 2011, 09:01:34 am
Hey, the game isn't bad... I was playing it for a bit just now, up until round 2 started then I stopped. I love the werewolf gameplay, the human not so much. Wish you could make it an option to be the werewolf only, 1 player and make it that you can go out killing and also eating humans haha. Either way, nice work, as far as pixel art, I like the map character styles.

Offline fil_razorback

  • 0010
  • *
  • Posts: 309
  • Karma: +0/-0
  • Captain of a ship without a name
    • View Profile
    • Partisan - Tactics Battles

Re: [WIP] Werewolf game sprites

Reply #33 on: July 19, 2011, 08:07:17 pm
The wolf part is unplayable on non-QWERTY keyboards. Poor of us europeans =(
I love the concept and the art is nice so good job with that.