Mageziya's Irrelevant Sprites

[Mageziya]

Huzzah!

[Cirrial]

psst I'm doing secret things don't tell sundance I'm practising making weird new things before martian mode

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/s/r2nt..._steps.mp4

I'll post what the fuck is actually going on when I have more of a demo to take to the ideas forum

also I don't know how to embed mp4s on this forum

[NateTheSquid]

psst I'm doing secret things don't tell sundance I'm practising making weird new things before martian mode

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/s/r2nt..._steps.mp4

I'll post what the fuck is actually going on when I have more of a demo to take to the ideas forum

also I don't know how to embed mp4s on this forum

Holy shiiiit that looks nice!! There seems to be a bit of delay when switching sprites (when you change direction) but it looks great

[Mageziya]

Well shit, that's cool to see in motion. As for the delayed turning, not sure if this helps or not, but the sprites are synced up in motion for each direction, so it shouldn't be a problem with the DMI.

The portrait system is also interesting.

EDIT: Wait, is that what the admin UI looks like? Sweet mercy, I knew it was scary, but that's something else. Also, why is the option to "Gib" literally right next to the option to "Heal", I feel like I've heard stories on that one before.

[somepotato]

also I don't know how to embed mp4s on this forum

vid tags, but I wouldn't do that with a dropbox link.

[Mageziya]

Welp, I made a "pixel painting" of questionable quality. It isn't really a usable sprite for SS13 in anyway what-so-ever, but I don't have anywhere else to put it, so here:




Real sized version:



Based off of this digital painting that I stumbled across.

[Mageziya]

Here's a quick concept sprite for Cirrial's Intrusion game-mode idea; The spire building, since it seems like the one that's mostly likely to be made at the moment.



The building on the left was me just drawing the building as is, in terms of concept. Half-way through, I remembered, "Wait, don't structures in this game have perspective? Aww crap." So the structure on the right is the in-perspective sprite.

While making the buildings for the set be in-perspective would be ideal, it's a lot harder, and I tend to over complicate designs, which doesn't help. Some some feed back on "drawn as idea" vs "drawn in perspective" would help.

Also, looking at it, the palette I used for shading for some reason feels nasty and needs work, and the large amount of outline used is conflicting with the ability to shade and detail. I need to fix things up. Now that I think about it, I actually don't know what this game's standard for outlining sprites is. Either way, ideally, the shading and what not on these sprites is not final.

Edit: I did some tinkering because bleh perspective:

[Mageziya]

Alright, I went ahead and "finished" the spire for now.



It's times like these that make me question my art skills; Though I've also realized that I apparently try adding curves and spikes to everything I sprite, which is why everything can feel like such a hassle at times. I should probably stop that.

For development purposes, the DMI is included in this post, but over time everything should probably be consolidated into one DMI.

[atamusvaleo]

Alright, I went ahead and "finished" the spire for now.

... I think it looks pretty rad.

Artists are always their own harshest critics.

[Sundance]

The sprite looks good. There is no "hard black" border on goon sprites, barring the exeption of black objects, so you got that down.

The perspective is mostly uniform "Zelda" perspective, although the player sprites themselves seems to not exacty adhere to that (otherwise it'd be more the top of their head).

For me, the light is always hitting the front of the object, darkening towards the back, otherwise "standard sun" lighting, meaning the source of light is always from one point, for uniform sake. You seem to manage to get that lighting and the perpective on this sprite on the right:


While i'm not too sure about the sprite on the left (is background pylon in the middle jutting above the front? Why is the shading of the middle back pylon brighter than the front?)
The righthand one is alot more better pespective wise, but i'd be wise to ensure the thumb rule of brighter in foreground, darker in background.

[Mageziya]

The perspective is weird because it's supposed to imply quadrilateral symmetry. I always treated shading as coming from top-down in addition to front-back, as that is what I had seen in most sprites. I also had a problem with shading the spire in the space available to imply definition through shading is limited. I also struggle with contrast within a palette, as too contrasting can be easy to see, but look ugly, but too little contrast can cause you lose everything. I was also limited in use of vertical space, which further restrained how I could use it to properly display the building in the slightly slanted perspective.

[Mageziya]

Have some reactionary trash:




Dirty Orange Outfit - "A rather foul smelling orange shirt and pants. Appears to be covered in cat fur."

Blue Boots - "A pair of well worn, casual boots."


Night in the Woods is a good indie game, and I'm making this now before it catches a lot of attention and becomes the next piece of reviled trash that people like to make fun of.

Noticed some odd spots in the sprite, will be quickly fixing those before attaching the DMI.

Edit: And, fixed.

[misto]

make greggs leather jacket and beas ankh dress

[Mageziya]

Isn't there already a leather jacket like Gregg's in the game? Like, there MUST be, if not, I'll be amazed.

Side note, I also learned that Mae's boots are supposed to be a weird shade of green, not blue. Whoops.

[Mageziya]

I don't know how, but ZeWaka somehow talked me into making a cruiser sprite for the long unfinished cruiser project. In a nutshell, cruisers are GIGANTIC pods that can crew multiple people at once. A syndicate cruiser is already in the game, though more as a test sprite.

For reference, the syndicate test sprite:
Spoiler!

I was tasked with creating a cruiser for NT. I didn't have many references, so it was sort of a crapshoot on my part to keep making something until I got something that worked. It also didn't help that the syndicate cruiser is better than anything that I can make, and that the cruiser sprites are absolutely massive. (160x160, or 5 times the standard sprite size.)

Good news is that I was able to use themes to overcome my personal shortcomings. The syndicate cruiser is very pointy and angled, almost organic. As such, I created a contrasting design by making the NT cruiser boxy and almost boring. After which, it was basically a trial by fire set revision after revision via lots of help from the IRC to sculpt the cruiser sprite I had made from a piece of trash into something presentable.

One problem that arose, though, was deciding on the color palette to use. In the end, I decided to just make several and let coders decide what to use.


Top Left: Nanotrasen Blue: This seemed to be the most popular color palette. It uses the standard shade of NT blue found on several pieces of NT gear throughout the game.
Middle Top: Escape Shuttle White: This was the color scheme that I started with. It was white to match the white used for most vehicles and future tech seen in the game, with blue stripes indicating the NT nature of the ship.
Top Right: Experimental: This is based off an experimental NT pod that can apparently be found in the game.
Bottom Left: Green: Wonk wanted a green version. Why not.
Bottom Middle and Right: FTL Alliance and Rebel Colors: Since the ships were looking like a sprite you would find in FTL, and seeing as the concept for the cruisers is basically multiplayer FTL, I decided to include these two palettes, since they seem like they could be fun during admin events.

Problems with my cruiser sprites:
-Perspective is broken with them. The original syndicate one at least had some perspective to it.
-Shading, lighting, and texturing just all feel off to me, no matter what I tried to do with it. It feels like FTL's flat style more than SS13's more modern shaded style. The engine's were stolen from a sprite by Gannets, and you can see the contrast in shading and coloring styles.
-The NT's on all of the cruisers are mirrored wrong. This is a result of how I often only make half of a sprite, then mirror it if the sprites are symmetrical, to save time. I just noticed this, and they'd be an absolute pain to fix, so they're stuck there, forever. Whoops.

The DMI to these monster sprites should be attached.

Edit: QuiltyQuilty has created a DMI with the fixed NT symbols.