Cyberpunk pixels

[Oz]

Hey all!

I'm not really a GFX artist (musician at heart), but I toy around with pixeling at times. My buddy Acke posted in these forums, and it inspired me to show some of my stuff. Take a look and see what you think. Most of it is from a 2D adventure game (unfinished) called The Prophecy. They are all low-res so you might want to zoom in a little!

Promo screen:



Cut scene still (another version of this image is used in a cyberpunk platformer I'm working on with some friends - http://www.wayofthepixel.net/pixelation/index.php?topic=533.0 ):



Some character faces (I know they are very generic):



Tile map (top-down view ala DreamWeb, for those of you who remember it!):



Intro stills:

[Darion]

I'm not really a GFX artist (musician at heart).

Well, you have proved yourself to be multi-talented. I love these; they have such mood. The style of the faces are so ordinary .. which isn't bad at all; I love it.

[Oz]

I'm not really a GFX artist (musician at heart).

Well, you have proved yourself to be multi-talented. I love these; they have such mood. The style of the faces are so ordinary .. which isn't bad at all; I love it.

Thank you! I've been trying to vary the faces but there are so few pixels to shuffle that it's easy to get locked up with one facial expression. It would be easier if they weren't all front perspective.

[TKSkater]

Wow those are sweet. I love the detail and I can tell you put time into it. Did that game go anywhere?

[Oz]

Wow those are sweet. I love the detail and I can tell you put time into it. Did that game go anywhere?

Thank you.

The game is still "in production" but it's going slowly. I'm working on it from time to time.
I might just kick-start the development again after reading these kind comments from you guys. Thanks again.

[Gil]

Great skill!

I'm going to go over some of these, since I think that composition wise there is some stuff left to do.

#1: Promo screen:

What is lacking imo is depth. The rock on the foreground needs to be detailed more and lightened up, so it comes out in the foreground. Try making it a blue that's the opposite of the reds used in the background. A glow around the parchment to make that jump out would be ace too. As for the parchment itself, I don't like the black edge on the curl. Symmetry could be broken by putting the foreground rock to the left and the city to the right.

#2: Just lovely scene, breath taking, no crits for it...

#3: The faces could use some extra highlight, or a secondary light source, perhaps even some sort of ambient lighting. Also, you need extra highlights on the glass and the helmets, those look very dull. http://www.spriteart.com/tutorials/02_ambient_face.html <- might come in handy...

#4: I don't like all those black outlines, try colouring them depending on where the light comes from. This is alot of work on this ammount of tiles, so perhaps you'd better keep it in mind for next project or something . Also, is that lava? I dunno if you looked at real lava, but it's firey and bright with ALOT of contrast, I'm really missing that here...

#5: Pretty good, but I'm missing contrast, and perhaps a hue shift...

[Bo]

silver fang to the max.

i love all the work that you posted in this thread. have any more of it?

the faces looks kinda dull but that could add some humor to the game if deaalt with right.

[Acke]

Oz: Hey there mate. Bout time you showed your stuff off in a forum. One thing I noticed tho, is that they are very effing dark! Oh. Make them footstep sounds allready!

[Oz]

Great skill!

I'm going to go over some of these, since I think that composition wise there is some stuff left to do.

#1: Promo screen:

What is lacking imo is depth. The rock on the foreground needs to be detailed more and lightened up, so it comes out in the foreground. Try making it a blue that's the opposite of the reds used in the background. A glow around the parchment to make that jump out would be ace too. As for the parchment itself, I don't like the black edge on the curl. Symmetry could be broken by putting the foreground rock to the left and the city to the right.

Yes I agree. This was one of my first "full screen" pixeled images, and it's kinda flat. Great suggestions composition wise!

#2: Just lovely scene, breath taking, no crits for it...

I'm glad you like it.

#3: The faces could use some extra highlight, or a secondary light source, perhaps even some sort of ambient lighting. Also, you need extra highlights on the glass and the helmets, those look very dull. http://www.spriteart.com/tutorials/02_ambient_face.html <- might come in handy...

This was also my first attempt at pixeling faces, and I just couldn't seem to vary them enough. I haven't really thought about experimenting with lighting (which I guess is why they look so flat) and I might try this. Good point.

#4: I don't like all those black outlines, try colouring them depending on where the light comes from. This is alot of work on this ammount of tiles, so perhaps you'd better keep it in mind for next project or something . Also, is that lava? I dunno if you looked at real lava, but it's firey and bright with ALOT of contrast, I'm really missing that here...

Aaah. Those black outlines. Hehe. It was actually a concious decision to include them as I was trying to mimic the visual style of the game DreamWeb (which had black outlines). Some people love them, some people hate them. I agree they can get a little obtrusive, especially with that many tiles on the screen. I haven't tried to remove them though, and I definitely could try that. As for the "lava". Haha, yeah. That was a mistake I made when I built the 8-bit palette for the project. That particular gradient is way to too orange. It's supposed to be sand of course.

#5: Pretty good, but I'm missing contrast, and perhaps a hue shift...

A hue shift definetely!

[Oz]

Oz: Hey there mate. Bout time you showed your stuff off in a forum. One thing I noticed tho, is that they are very effing dark! Oh. Make them footstep sounds allready!

Oi Acke! Yes, finally. And I'm getting lots of good pointers here, so it was a good move.

Yes, they are dark, and I think my monitor is to blame. It's been ready to give up the ghost for a couple of years now (very dark) so I have to turn up the contrast A LOT to see anything, which means that it's hard to know how bright the image is on a "normal" screen.

I got the new version of the 'punker last night (no sound lag), so I'll put down some work on the sounds as soon as I finish my essay (hopefully this week). Just kick me out of IRC if I join or something, I need to get some work done.

[Acke]

Indeed.

Ah yes. The neverending issues with monitors. Atleast its not as dark as Blompas old monitor.
Aha. Spec fixed the soundlag then. Coolios. Go out for a couple of beers Friday?

[Oz]

Go out for a couple of beers Friday?

Wait am I'm hearing this from YOU?

Sure thing though!

[Acke]

Hey! Payday tomorrow!

[Kazuya Mochu]

isn't the second one the same that acke used on his mockup?

everything looks awesome!!! very good pics!!!

[Oz]

isn't the second one the same that acke used on his mockup?

everything looks awesome!!! very good pics!!!

Yeah, it's the same. It's just a different version of it. Me and Acke are working together on that project and we used my image as a temporary background.

Thanks!

[Mercury Rising]

Just wanted to point something out, someone might have already said this but, this
looks exactly like the intro to INDIGO PROPHECY same font too.  Just the city is blue instead of your red.  Ordinarily I would let it slide but this looks way to much like it.  Same font, same skyline, same moon, even half the same title, just in a different tint.

[Oz]

Just wanted to point something out, someone might have already said this but, this
looks exactly like the intro to INDIGO PROPHECY same font too.  Just the city is blue instead of your red.  Ordinarily I would let it slide but this looks way to much like it.  Same font, same skyline, same moon, even half the same title, just in a different tint.

Funny. I hadn't even heard of this game until you mentioned it, but if you are referring to the game that was (is about to be?) released this fall by Atari, I should be clear of any charges as I produced this image well over a year ago.

And here is the proof: http://www.bigbluecup.com/yabb/index.php?topic=16067.0

Do you have a screen shot of this particular scene?

[Acke]

haha

I'd have to say that I'm 100% sure of the fact that Oz hasnt ripped anything here. Its not exactly a motif that hasn't been done before, and it WILL be done again. And again. And again. I also remember helping Oz a bit on it quite a while back. I remember adding some detail to the cliffs. And if you mean Indigo Prophecy as in "Fahrenheit" then theres no chance in hell since that game came out not too long ago.

I also know Oz personally and he's definetly not the kind of guy who'd do something like that on purpouse.

[Gil]

It's not like a similar city scape with a tech font hasn't been done time and time again in movies and games. It just makes for so an impressive sight

[Oz]

Thank you guys. I can assure you all that this is a product of my own imagination (although you're always subconciously inspired by other images). Like Acke and Gil pointed out, it's a classic and widely used motif, and of course it has been done countless times before. But most importantly, I produced this image well over a year ago, so I couldn't have "ripped" it from Fahrenheit. Well, I don't feel like defending myself anymore. You'll just have to take my word for it. Thank you.

[Bo]

*cough* robocop *cough*

[Mercury Rising]

It just looked so exact. IP was the first place I had ever seen an intro like that and the title was so similar I had to say something.  I'm taking your word for it this time, but if I see a Master Chef or Gordon Freeguy I'm gonna have to take you down.

[Conzeit]

Cut scene still (another version of this image is used in a cyberpunk platformer I'm working on with some friends):

er....is anybody else getting a strange sense of deja vu in here?

Anyways. Thought I'd post a screengrab from the platformer. Note that the "enemy(blue guy)" is just the player sprite in a different color atm.

well, I guess that friend who you're making the cyberpunk platformer is acke....you could've just told us "hey btw, this is the same bacgkground acke is using in his platformer topic"

Man, Like you have yourself admitted, you have to work on your character art, it is looking quite generic right now, but I got no doubt you can do that, because like a good musician you've got a really good sense of atmosphere going on in those cutscenes.

the tileset....it has a strangely makeshift look right now, it's like it was made by a completly diferent person because...it's just got no atmosphere at all :p the gray parts are too gray, and the red is too red heh, I think it'd look a lot better if you integrated the hues of eachother a little more, and it really does show you need to learn a sense of depth. I dont think I can show you that though...atleast not in a single crit, maybe we'd have to get on an IM app and talk about it see if I can help you out :p

[Oz]

Camus,

Yeah, I mentioned further down the thread that we used the city scape image in the cyberpunk platformer, but I included a link to Acke's post to avoid confusion (hehe, although I think Acke should have tagged the background as mine in HIS post ). Depth yes, definitely something I would like to learn to achieve in pixeling. Lighting also. I'm still a rookie, and I'm not pixeling regularly, just from time to time, so there is obviously a lot to learn. Thanks for the crit!

And oh yeah, feel free to contact me on ICQ (116401400) if you have any tips or tutorials you think I might benifit from!

[Helm]

Dreamweb, along with Captain Blood are two of my favourite adventure games. On the whole though, your tileage is too dark. You could up the contrast a little and retain the same mood, more or less.

Give us a few assembled tiled backgrounds to see how everything meshes.

[Oz]

Dreamweb, along with Captain Blood are two of my favourite adventure games. On the whole though, your tileage is too dark. You could up the contrast a little and retain the same mood, more or less.

Give us a few assembled tiled backgrounds to see how everything meshes.

Good idea Helm. I'll see what I can do!