AuthorTopic: [WIP] Racing game C&C  (Read 3830 times)

Offline BenW

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[WIP] Racing game C&C

on: July 01, 2012, 05:24:57 pm
Hi everyone,

I'm a programmer looking to improve my pixel art. I'm working on a simple racing game at the moment and I wanted to post a few items from it for critique. I haven't included all of the art from the game but I would like some feedback on what I think are the most important elements.

Here are the player and enemy cars:





And here is a basic segment of the track:


Finally, here is a screenshot of how they currently look in game as a reference.

Offline Tourist

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Re: [WIP] Racing game C&C

Reply #1 on: July 01, 2012, 06:05:00 pm
The graphics are simple, but nice.

By putting the health(?) bars directly in front of the cars you are explicitly blocking the line of motion.  I don't think this is a good choice.  Placing them on one side would give a visual bias.  Perhaps integrate this into the car graphic itself.  Either a few states (fine, damaged, really damaged) or maybe even get tricky and incorporate it into some racing stripes.  Hmm, maybe not enough pixels for that last idea.

I suggest reducing the saturation of the grass quite a bit to reduce its visual priority.

Many racing games offer a small image of the overall track so the player can tell where they are at with a quick glance.  But that depends on how the game plays, I  suppose.

Tourist

Offline BenW

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Re: [WIP] Racing game C&C

Reply #2 on: July 02, 2012, 02:19:16 am
I agree that the current health bars are an issue and I think it makes sense to have damage sprites for both the player and enemy although I may need to keep a health bar somewhere on screen for the player.

Enemy damage sprites:



I also tried desaturating the grass. Once I had done that, the red on the sides of the track was way too saturated so I adjusted it too.



I made a new mockup since I haven't had time to add all of this into the game yet.

Offline Grimsane

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Re: [WIP] Racing game C&C

Reply #3 on: July 02, 2012, 06:02:03 am
just some suggestions on what you could try to do without breaking the style too much




with and without the road pattern
I'm guessing the game is straight ahead no turning, some suggestions in the edit also is to have 3 driver states for turning, hope it's illustrated okay, depends on how much effort you are putting into it,

oh yeah one issue is the wheels they are too light on the shadow side of the car so you should darken them to contrast with the shadows.

oh and found this old one of mine from a game of mine, might inspire some ideas or something  :lala:



I like the damage idea, and you got it having his HP bar on the HUD itself would be the way to go

*crap inadvertantly mirrored it back with the shadows on the red car meh here to illustrate the general idea

« Last Edit: July 02, 2012, 06:13:05 am by Grimsane »

Offline questseeker

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Re: [WIP] Racing game C&C

Reply #4 on: July 02, 2012, 11:56:39 am

Enemy damage sprites:


A brilliant implementation of the suggestion to integrate an health level display into the cars, but the two cars aren't different enough.
The severe damage sprite should look like it suffered more impacts than the mild damage sprite, not a worse version of the exact same damage: for example, you could crush the front left corner (a common accident, and contrasting with how it bulges outwards compared to the front right corner).

Offline PypeBros

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Re: [WIP] Racing game C&C

Reply #5 on: July 02, 2012, 12:24:03 pm
Damage cars could also produce smoke from their motor ... the darkest the smoke, the more damaged.

Offline BenW

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Re: [WIP] Racing game C&C

Reply #6 on: July 03, 2012, 12:45:07 pm
Thanks for all the help guys. I haven't had time to implement the latest suggestions but I did end up doing some simple animation for the wheels on my player car so that it no longer looks like it's floating around. I should have turning animations as well as a new severe damage sprite done sometime in the next few days. Unfortunately it's difficult to find time to work on both the art and the code.