AuthorTopic: Adventure Apes Screenshots (WIP Platformer)  (Read 11244 times)

Offline ScaryPotato

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Adventure Apes Screenshots (WIP Platformer)

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!

Offline ErekT

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Re: Adventure Apes Screenshots (WIP Platformer)

Reply #1 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.

Offline 9_6

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Re: Adventure Apes Screenshots (WIP Platformer)

Reply #2 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.

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.
« Last Edit: February 10, 2012, 01:18:38 pm by 9_6 »
Does scaling an image blur it?
Opera fix Firefox fix

Offline kriss

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Re: Adventure Apes Screenshots (WIP Platformer)

Reply #3 on: February 10, 2012, 01:11:29 pm
Pls take a look to this hud, because is more readable

Offline ScaryPotato

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Re: Adventure Apes Screenshots (WIP Platformer)

Reply #4 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:



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!

Offline pistachio

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Re: Adventure Apes Screenshots (WIP Platformer)

Reply #5 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.



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 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.)
« Last Edit: February 12, 2012, 09:48:16 pm by pistachio »

Offline deadlock

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Re: Adventure Apes Screenshots (WIP Platformer)

Reply #6 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...

Offline PypeBros

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Re: Adventure Apes Screenshots (WIP Platformer)

Reply #7 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.

Offline ScaryPotato

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Re: Adventure Apes Screenshots (WIP Platformer)

Reply #8 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

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!

Offline ScaryPotato

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Re: Adventure Apes Screenshots (WIP Platformer)

Reply #9 on: February 12, 2012, 06:49:34 am


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!