[C+C] Platformer Character Sprites

[Azuyre]

Lately I've been working on some graphics for a platformer and I was hoping I might be able to get a bit of feedback on how things look so far:

It's probably a bit obvious but each character is based off of an old nes game. The games they're based on are; Ninja Gaiden, Castlevania, MegaMan, Mario, and Blaster Master.

I was originally just going to post asking if anyone could give me tips on the wheels for the tank at the end but I thought that I might as well post all the characters and see if anyone notices any glaring issues with them. I've been going over these two threads a lot lately to try and learn what to avoid and other ways I can improve. The only people I've really shown all the graphics to are the rest of the team for the game but for the most part they just say it looks good and leave it at that.

I was hoping that by posting them here I could get some tips on fixing any issues that may be present so I can avoid repeating them later as I continue working on new graphics.

[TheMonsterAtlas]

Everything looks relatively clean and follows a lot of the pixel placement rules that I know of. Something I realized is the megaman like one has metal on his left arm and left leg which would make walking extremely awkward. It's really not that big of a deal, but when you think about it, it seems odd that one person would have one entire side of their body to be weighed down more than the other. (Or those parts weight roughly the same as they would if they were flesh.)

Everything else looks appealing, well done, the suspenders could use some touching up to look like they being pushed out by the stomach on the Mario-esque ones. Other than that, pretty impressive work!

[Ashbad]

Had 10 minutes free, so here's a quick edit:





I only really edited the girl on the far left well-enough to show improvement, so I'd mostly ignore the edits of the others.  With that in mind, these characters are a bit hard to read at this size -- they're better at a 2x zoom, but since you made no mention that they're going to be displayed like that, so:

• Removed most of the really small details, since they read as noise (except for the eyes, which should at this size read more like eyes than what you had due to the higher contrast across the surrounding skin/hair/eye, but it's also a bit more of a style thing I suppose on my part to have them so JRPG-ish)
• Reduced color count, made colors contrast more internally (I think you could contrast them even more than I did)
• Kept the dark outline color to outline almost exclusively on the very outside -- makes things less flat, and also helps the character stand out more (I should have shown this more myself in this edit, but I didn't really think about it until now.)
• Larger and simpler pixel clusters, reads better at 1x resolution
• Skin is a bit too bright to effectly portray facial features like eyes well -- I might have gone a bit *too* dark, but something a bit lighter could work well.  You also don't have much room to effectively cast much light/shadow on most of the faces (the only ones where it could work is with the bros), so I'd go with more flat coloring.

I think these problems were most pronounced in the large blaster-master vehicle and the girl, and least obvious in the cape dude (He could go on his way with the least amount of modification, actually.)

I think when I have time again later today I'll try to modify the girl a bit more to better show what I mean with a better edit

[Azuyre]

Everything looks relatively clean and follows a lot of the pixel placement rules that I know of. Something I realized is the megaman like one has metal on his left arm and left leg which would make walking extremely awkward. It's really not that big of a deal, but when you think about it, it seems odd that one person would have one entire side of their body to be weighed down more than the other. (Or those parts weight roughly the same as they would if they were flesh.)

I hadn't really thought about that, my main idea was that he had been in an accident that had mostly hit the left side so that would be the cause for the parts. I'll think a bit about it and see if I can make him feel a bit more balanced.

Everything else looks appealing, well done, the suspenders could use some touching up to look like they being pushed out by the stomach on the Mario-esque ones. Other than that, pretty impressive work!

I tried making a small change on their suspenders based on what you suggested, I think it looks a bit better. Thanks for the compliment by the way.

Had 10 minutes free, so here's a quick edit:





I only really edited the girl on the far left well-enough to show improvement, so I'd mostly ignore the edits of the others.  With that in mind, these characters are a bit hard to read at this size -- they're better at a 2x zoom, but since you made no mention that they're going to be displayed like that, so:

• Removed most of the really small details, since they read as noise (except for the eyes, which should at this size read more like eyes than what you had due to the higher contrast across the surrounding skin/hair/eye, but it's also a bit more of a style thing I suppose on my part to have them so JRPG-ish)
• Reduced color count, made colors contrast more internally (I think you could contrast them even more than I did)
• Kept the dark outline color to outline almost exclusively on the very outside -- makes things less flat, and also helps the character stand out more (I should have shown this more myself in this edit, but I didn't really think about it until now.)
• Larger and simpler pixel clusters, reads better at 1x resolution
• Skin is a bit too bright to effectly portray facial features like eyes well -- I might have gone a bit *too* dark, but something a bit lighter could work well.  You also don't have much room to effectively cast much light/shadow on most of the faces (the only ones where it could work is with the bros), so I'd go with more flat coloring.

I think these problems were most pronounced in the large blaster-master vehicle and the girl, and least obvious in the cape dude (He could go on his way with the least amount of modification, actually.)

I think when I have time again later today I'll try to modify the girl a bit more to better show what I mean with a better edit

Thanks for taking the time to do an edit. Regarding the size, for anyone with an hd capable monitor they would likely appear at about 4x size:


We'll probably have support for using 1x-4x though.

I've edited the characters a bit based on what you've said and some stuff you did in your edit, here's a normal size version with the changes:


I'm a bit unsure about making the colors as dark as you have them, though I think I might try changing the skin color to something just a bit darker, I guess it was a bit of a strange choice to have used such a light color right next to white for the miners (mario/luigi). As for the ninja girl I was aiming for the scarf to cover the bottom of her face and for her hair to cover most of the top so you kinda get the feel of the ninja masks that cover all but their eyes. Do you have any suggestions for making the scarf work a bit better that way? Or do you think I should lower it like you did? I did some small changes to the tank too but nothing major yet, I'll probably post with an updated one sometime soon.

I've had a few other people not realize at first either but the caped character is female too, I had been having a bit of trouble with her, I wanted her to look a bit tough but she usually comes across as male when people see her without knowing. Any suggestions on how I might be able to make it more obvious that shes female?

Thanks for all the help so far!

Edit: I ended up changing the ninja girl's face to something similar to what you did with it:

[Ashbad]

A good step forward!  I suggest that you still probably drop all internal black outlines, since they are flattening her a bit; the same advice goes towards the other characters.