The B.O.B.'s Dump: B.O.B. finally submits something new...

[Cow]

I like the front and back facing animations. The side-facing ones seem to have that... strobing effect that happens a bit when you don't use many frames. If you want to keep the frame count, maybe you could move it a bit, so the leg in the back isn't in the same place as the front leg on the previous frame (or the previous frame after the previous frame, as I notice you have an inbetween now x_x).

[Conzeit]

OMG mgs fanart =o

Anyways...heh, did you base your little Snake on MGS3 art? I can tell u gave him a little eyepatch n everything =) nice detail on that aspect..remember, the eyepatch guy is Naked, the guy who gets old is Solid.

hm...looking at the motion as if he WASNT Snake, I can tell you have a problem with keyframes, all directions have the same problem, the transition phase frames have the logs too spread out, so much you cant really diferentiate them from the suspended phase frames. try to make the transition phase have the legs more centred, make the sprite all black every once in a while and check how it looks as a sillouethe.

Now, Snake has a very specific way of moving about, he's the original "sneak" guy, so the concept artist has always put an emphasis on making him look like he's "always infiltrating something".
  http://www.spriters-resource.com/other/konami/mg/display.php?file=http://www.spriters-resource.com/other/konami/mg/snake.PNG There's a MGS for GBC, if u wanna check it out, snake's pretty well animated there
http://www.spriters-resource.com/other/konami/mg/ http://www.metalgearsolid.org/gallery/index.php?gallery=1.%20Metal%20Gear%20Saga/Metal%20Gear%20Solid http://www.metalgearsolid.org/gallery/index.php?gallery=1.%20Metal%20Gear%20Saga/Metal%20Gear%20Solid%202 http://www.metalgearsolid.org/gallery/index.php?gallery=1.%20Metal%20Gear%20Saga/Metal%20Gear%20Solid%3A%20The%20Twin%20Snakes http://www.metalgearsolid.org/gallery/index.php?gallery=1.%20Metal%20Gear%20Saga/Metal%20Gear%20Solid%20Portable%20Ops there's some MGS art u can check...
u couldc heck some gameplay vids in youtube too....
 
NES Metal Gear, huh? NES MG happens to be a disgrace to the series, Kojima even personally said the port was fucked up, he even likes the non-canon sequel better, it "sticks more to his vision" than the port ninty peoples made.

[EDIT] HELM: Kojima didnt "disown"  the NES MG1 because as just a port, he just points people to the original in  MSX console. The NES version relayed on situations scripted so you'd get spotted, ruining the stealth aspect, THAT's what ruins kojima's vision, gameplaywise.
MG2:Snake's Revenge was made whitout his permission, and isnt cannon, yes. But it's actually the only reason he continued the series. Legend goes that he was done with MG1 and wasnt interested in MG anymore, then met one of the programers who worked on both games in a subway ride, the programer asked Kojima to make a "REAL" sequel cause he knew MG2Snake's Revenge's plot didnt continue the original plot points. Kojima then went and played the game, and while the plot wasnt right, he felt it was more respectful of his vision than MG1's port, because the gameplay kept the focus on stealth, so he got some ideas for a sequel and made MG2:Solid Snake.

in short, while non-canon, whitout Snake's Revenge there wouldnt have been a Metal Gear series...MG2 SolidSnake actually picks up some of the ideas from Snake's Revenge.

[Helm]

Actually I thought Kojima said 'snake's revenge' on the NES is disowned, not canon and he hates it. Sorry to OT.

BOB: on the south/north walk, keep the feet together. Snake touches as little ground as possible to avoid traps etc. It's just training for soldiers.

[Xion]

His up/down legs are fat, but his left/right legs are skinny. Make up your mind, you amorphous mullet-spy!
I also most definately do not loke the way his side-view legs just like, spaz as opposed to his vertical-movements' somewhat smooth legs.

[The B.O.B.]

-->

El updato!

*   listened to some stuff-a-roo, and moved his legs closer together, about one pixel distance between(else both legs would get lost in a sea of dark black-ish hues, creating doppleganger, "pogo-stick" Snake...)

*   I also agree with the inconsistency of the skinny to fat ratio with the frontal/back to side views. I tried to fatten up the side views a bit, but only enough to show movement. Any more fatter, and it'd be really difficult for me to make it more clearer that he's sneaking. It's already hard enough to tell as it is. I don't, however, want to change his key frames from 4-6, mainly for 2 reasons: I want to stay the course and force my self to learn key frames, so that movement is clearly shown, with the least amount of frames, and the other reason being that my frame count is already so high. Adding 6 frames would mean a surplus from 16 to 36 frames, just from the directional anim. alone! That's more than doubling them! But if they look too shitty, than I'd be content in changing them.

*   And yes, I noticed that in the shooting frames, his side view's head does not shake like his frontal/back do when firing. Ugh, I just can't figure out how to get a better jerk of motion from firing a gun, while making it clear in such a little sprite, without making it look like some cheap marquee select, shift selection action, or random pixels. Still learning...I may actually put in a crawling motion, explosion, and death anim. before I quit this guy.

   @Camu-I mean Conceit: Heh, yeah I don't wanna put you through the hell of explaining MGS story and canon to me again. I'm sure if I were to take a written exam, I'd flunk the poo out of it. And you'd be there standing in the door way, shaking your head in disappointment as I walked away with my head down, and tail between my legs.
   This may be a little off-topic Question, but: Is Solid Snake Naked Snake/Big Boss's son, or clone? I'm guessing Naked Snake(yeah, the one I'm animating) is the older one, but Solid Snake, from the MGS4 previews, looks old as crap. What the hell am I missing here? 

Any hoo, thanks for the critiques so far, they've really been helpful everybody!

[Helm]

There's something wrong with the way you've colored this small sprite and I've been looking at it for a while trying to figure it out. First of all, it's somewhat messy, but not dramatically so. Second, the lightsource isn't very defined, but again not a dramatic error. I tend to think the biggest issue with this is that from BLACK to any next darker color in your ramps, the next darker color is too light. The black therefore is not united and doing its work as shadow and segmentation, it just looks like messy blocky outlining that the artist hasn't bothered to clean up yet.



it's an information/detail issue at this stage. You shouldn't even try to convey pant creases at this res. A single pixel is about 10 cm at this res. Try to get the volumetrics to work, and then detail SPARINGLY and what matters. I took out so much but what did I put in? An eye, because snake is a spy dude, so he's looking around, and a single pixel of MULLET. These are important things, not pant creases and armbands that get confused with the gun.

[Conzeit]

I agree with Helm, except for the eye thing. Whole point of Solid Snake's original design(which naked's stems from)  was to look ok whitout eyes, because of PS1 limitations, that's the whole big deal with his bandana. Even in MGS4 with super realistic depiction the Bandana keeps creeping over his eyebrows, as if it were sticked with SUPERGLU over them ( I cant even imagine a way of tying a bandana that would make it so tight).

As for the actual edit...I think you over-used the black a bit, I would keep it to diferentiate body divisions (head, torso, legs) I belive the hand/weapon definition was a bit much

For the whole Solid/naked issue....

MGS1 has a really young Solid Snake in his 30's, takes place in 2005

MGS2 has a bit older Solid Snake, takes place in 2007-09

MGS3 Has a Naked Snake in his 30's, takes place in 1964

MGs4 Has a 60's looking Solid Snake that is in his 40's (since he is a clone, his cell deteriorated making him look older than he is, like real life clones) Takes place in 201x

so, to answer your question plainly, yes Naked snake would be the older one, problem is we havent seen his old self rendered in 3d in any of the games, while Solid's story HAS followed him into his old age. most likely because Naked probably called himself BigBoss by the time he looked as old as Solid does in MGS4

Oh. as a little bonus, here's a character profile of the guy you're spriting, the one actually used in the audition call to get the actors.

Male, 30s, Standard English. His real name is Jack. Naked Snake is the code name he uses in the VR Missions and during Snake Eater operations. He will later be given the name, Big Boss, and is the Big Boss of the future. 6'5" high, and his physical constitution are thick like 'Schwarzenegger'. He has more of an "all mighty", tough fighting style. He is a persistent, highly independant hero. FOX (Force Operations X), the special forces team that Snake serves with in MGS3, will eventually become the unique special forces team, "FOX-HOUND", formed at the end of the 20th century for solo infiltration and destruction.

[The B.O.B.]

El Yay, Bob's still in da game!

fighter made for pixeljoint contest(I rushed the poop out of this one, so exqueeze me for being so damn sloppy...)



I'll just call the character "Amalgam" since he is a mix of many Asian martial arts...
thoughts?

[Xion]

Ouch, man, that big white and orange thing behind him is just...Well, it's very distracting to say the least, and it detracts from the superfluous amount of awesome contained in the rest of the anim.

Sliding foot, maybe?

His leg (thigh) looks like it changes size.

Stretchy crotch!

The tail of the jacket shirt fighting uniform thingy...the tip of it...it stops for a sec...You see it? You see it?
Also, the background part of the tail of the jacket shirt fighting uniform thingy, the dark part, it's bottom seems to remain fairly horizontal, which looks wierd in comparison to the constant, fluid motion of the rest of the it.

One last thing: the way he just jerks back up when he reaches the bottom of his stance, without any kind of weight or momentum...it's sorta like an animation mirror, I suppose. Yeah, the upper half is cool, but on the legs, it's kinda blatant and stuff.

Aside from those thingsies, like I said, this reeks with the putrid stench of Awesome.

[Helm]

I am having much trouble reading this, even at x2 zoom and in animation. I believe you have to think about color and contrast in terms of readability when you make game art.