Am I going crazy here?

[rikfuzz]

(but I don't think I've ever seen an example I don't prefer to dull flat ramps).

just curious what you think of this since this game doesn't use any crazy "hueshifting"
 

It looks good!  Maybe I was too hasty to say that.  There's a lot of contrast in the value of the shades, and a lot of contrast in the saturation between foreground and background in, so it's pretty hard to describe it as dull with a straight face.  Of course more interesting lighting conditions might be a more fun image for me, it's a little hard to say it's a fault in this case. 

[AlexHW]

PS: Alex, I dunno if you are doing this kinda stuff on purpose, but your post here, with the Last Blade screenshot is kinda trollish, and some of your other posts are semi trollish. You do not need to reply to this here, it is just an observation. It just seems to me that you want to get some sort of discussion going which does not necessarily have much value. I recall a certain discussion about veganism from a couple of years back. Not quite as bad right now, but similar kinda stuff.

I don't know what you're talking about. And I'm just wanting to know what rikfuzz thinks of that screenshot. Also wanting to clear up misunderstandings related to colours and reveal what hueshifting is/does by looking at more concrete understandings.

As far as colour. Seems like it's one of those terms they use for generalized impressions of varying hues, and I guess most people tend to lump together brightness/chroma, etc with it and call the overall combination a red, blue, whatever colour for convenience sake with cataloging all the possible configurations.. Kind of seems more like a complication in my opinion as it serves to dilute the focus from the true fundamentals.
This kind of thinking reflects the term hueshifting as well since it doesn't add much to what is obvious about how colors work. It like a name for a slightly different shade of grey. Infact, I could probably come up with the term greyshifting. Let's all use the term greyshifting to describe the use of our shadows.

[AlexHW]

This is just an idea, but maybe when begginers think about hue shifting, they may tend to think of hue as being seperated into "hue families" rather than hue simply being a smooth scale from red to magenta.  By hue families I mean like: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple.  So when they have something green its easy to think that they must shift into the adjecent hue families (yellow and blue) rather than thinking they can just move into a warmer green and a cooler green.  Or maybe its just too much SD3 influence.  In anycase whenever I suggest someone does hue shifting I try to explain the basic cooler shadows, warmer lights idea, but also suggest that the opposite could work in some situations too.  Too often the hue shifting I see is too predictable and boring (purple/blue shadows, yellow/orange lights).  I think thats because theyre only open to the cool shadows, warm lights idea, without being open to other possibilities.  Subtler hue shifts may open more possibilities too (orange shadows and blue lights might look totally wrong, but a more subtle variant might look interesting)

Yes, that is the most likely case. They see a color as an identification of a combination of brightness/chroma/hue and haven't yet learnt to utilize each proponent individually yet because they haven't understood the dynamics involved with light yet(they aren't aware these details exist, or at least aren't aware of their pertinence with the overall color they identify with). This is taught in art classes, and students are given tasks to paint achromatic gradients, monochromatic gradients as well as polychromatic gradients to help the students become comfortable with these transitions.

It looks good!  Maybe I was too hasty to say that.  There's a lot of contrast in the value of the shades, and a lot of contrast in the saturation between foreground and background in, so it's pretty hard to describe it as dull with a straight face.  Of course more interesting lighting conditions might be a more fun image for me, it's a little hard to say it's a fault in this case. 

Yea, I love the greyshifting that they use in the background and foreground!

[API-Beast]

(but I don't think I've ever seen an example I don't prefer to dull flat ramps).

just curious what you think of this since this game doesn't use any crazy "hueshifting"
 

Actually those ramps are all hue shifted... it's used in moderation but it's there. And they look good

Hue shifting is a mere tool and it's primary use is rather to add contrast rather than have to have some weird hues, you don't need to use it but if you know how to use it its definitely useful.

[rikfuzz]

Well I thought the same, but I flattened them in photoshop and the difference was incredibly negligible. I'd consider them the same hue through all shades for the sake of this discussion, even tho there's technically a little movement. 

[Carnivac]

(but I don't think I've ever seen an example I don't prefer to dull flat ramps).

just curious what you think of this since this game doesn't use any crazy "hueshifting"
 

It looks good!  Maybe I was too hasty to say that.  There's a lot of contrast in the value of the shades, and a lot of contrast in the saturation between foreground and background in, so it's pretty hard to describe it as dull with a straight face.  Of course more interesting lighting conditions might be a more fun image for me, it's a little hard to say it's a fault in this case.

I'd have to disagree.  I certainly find the color ramps particularly on the characters extremely dull.  Particularly the drab red of the shortest character but the green shades on the one on the left aren't much better.  Not keen on a lot of the pixelling either.  There's bits of the characters that aren't anti-aliased which I find very distracting and obvious compared to parts of them which are.  Ok it might just be cos certain game graphics are rushed or it might just be a style of that game (which I used to play a while ago and do consider it one of SNK's actual good fighting games and certainly better than King of Fighters and Samurai Shodown).  To me it looks sloppy and unfinished.  The slightly hue-shifted gray ramp of the status bars is nice though.

[AlexHW]

I'd have to disagree.  I certainly find the color ramps particularly on the characters extremely dull.  Particularly the drab red of the shortest character but the green shades on the one on the left aren't much better.  Not keen on a lot of the pixelling either.  There's bits of the characters that aren't anti-aliased which I find very distracting and obvious compared to parts of them which are.

I'd much prefer to look at something like this while playing a game than some amped up hue splurg that lacks consistency. The greyshifting in this looks really nice and the color is intelligently applied where appropriate.
As to the lack of anti-aliasing..that shows technical precision regarding the understanding of the shapes and values. A sprite rendered well doesn't require anti-aliasing.

[rikfuzz]

Antialiasing is a tough one, obviously you can't have antialiasing very easily if you can change the character's palette.  (Which brings the possibility that character palettes were possibly put together by coders considering they're separate from the assets). 

Yes, I still think I'd prefer more interesting shifted palettes, but I think I was overstating how bad it is to not have them earlier, as the examples I'd normally see would be poor in other ways.   

(Also, stop trying to make greyshifting happen. It's not going to happen). 

[Carnivac]

I'd much prefer to look at something like this while playing a game than some amped up hue splurg that lacks consistency. The greyshifting in this looks really nice and the color is intelligently applied where appropriate.

'amped up hue splurg'?   Who's asking for that?  I just find the colors very dull and washed out and could benefit from more interesting color ramps.  Not overdoing it.

As to the lack of anti-aliasing..that shows technical precision regarding the understanding of the shapes and values. A sprite rendered well doesn't require anti-aliasing.

But it's the fact that some of a sprite is anti-aliased and some isn't.  Look at the big guy's hair for example.  On our left the hair draping down that side of his face lacks the AA the other side has when it could easily have it.  As it is now it looks horribly jagged in comparison.

[Lachie Dazdarian]

You bring up really important issues here, Alex. Not sure why ptoing felt it was trolling. Weird.

Anyway, to a beginner (who seems unable to find time to pixel for the last two weeks, argh!!!), colors are still quite a mystery to me, and precisely these "local" terms like hue-shifting only increase the confusion.

Would appreciate a good tutorial on colors in pixel art exclusively.