Levels & Items Art

What happens September 1st?

 

We all die.

Or stuff starts getting put into the tech demo, I guess.

 

Our intention is to release the tech demo no later than mid-September. You will probably want to be alive for it. :-P

 

I can't wait for the tech demo.

I really wish I had artistic ability to help with any of this :p

 

Hi all,

I just thought I'd give the waterfall a go. I decided to have two layers of water, one being semi-transparent above the other and moving at a different speed to give it a bit more fluidity. Is this too realistic?

 

Doesn't look bad, but it's hard to do a comparison unless you put another version next to it (Not the original game one, probably Exodus' rendition). Maybe get yours mirrored out like DoR and adjust the speed for the top and bottom sections?

 

I'm torn whether that would clash with the style on the top portion or not. It's fairly tough to tell what the original design was meant to be with so few pixels to work with. If I've got the time later on I'll make the changes myself to post.

 

Was the original mirrored, though? If not, perhaps the waterfall graphics should be fixed instead?

 

Even if it is I think we shouldn't mirror it considering how obvious bad the waterfall tiles because of it being mirrored.

 

<!--quoteo(post=215233:date=Aug 10 2008, 02:54 PM:name=Woot)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Woot @ Aug 10 2008, 02:54 PM) [/quote]
Wow. Just, WOW.

I'm fucking loving this waterfall attempt. Your method seemed to work better than the previous ones. Well done.

 

About two pages back, and in the database, I posted a slightly improved still of my waterfall with better colours and regular horizonal tiling I.e. not mirrored. I attempted to animate it but it turned out really bad especially when compared to DoR's method. Not to put any pressure on DoR but I requested him to animate the new tile in the same way when he got spare time.

I am very happy to see Woot's waterfall, I like it! It looks great tiled.

Great to see work on the grass as well; I agree with Canned Karma that the bottom fringes of the grass need to look more 'organic'. The shape of the top is looking good though and the only thing that sticks out to me is that it looks too uniform IMO.

 

Excellent job on the waterfall effect! The transparency effect between the two layers almost give it a colored pencil effect. I'd be excited to see how this looks next to the other pieces of level artwork and scenery.

 

<!--quoteo(post=215258:date=Aug 10 2008, 02:24 PM:name=Vincent)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Vincent @ Aug 10 2008, 02:24 PM)

We've been working on the BASIC HD tile of EHZ grass.[/quote]
Don't like it. The shading is OK, but the shape is a step backwards when compared to the last attempt:

<!--quoteo(post=214248:date=Aug 6 2008, 02:48 PM:name=Master Emerald)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Master Emerald @ Aug 6 2008, 02:48 PM) [/quote]
The shape on this one is just SO much better!!! Well, the bottom part is not THAT great, but the top is perfect, IMO.

I feel like this is one of those cases where we have to go beyond what the pixels tell us, because grass can be a pretty detailed thing. IMO, the direct interpretation of the pixels looks hideous!

 

<!--quoteo(post=215392:date=Aug 11 2008, 02:56 AM:name=tokumaru)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (tokumaru @ Aug 11 2008, 02:56 AM) [/quote]
The shape on this one is just SO much better!!! Well, the bottom part is not THAT great, but the top is perfect, IMO.
[/quote]
Agreed. If anything, the grass on the bottom doesn't need much if any angle applied to it - it's hanging down, so a basic droop is expected. What we don't need is for it to look like you could impale someone on it. The main challenge I'm seeing over and over again is going back and forth between a sharp, thick design, and a 'fuzzy' chaotic one as I pointed out earlier.

Makes me wonder if the equivalent tiles in all the other zones are going to be the most hotly debated too.

 

Personally I don't think it looks any good reflected, but I don't think it's something we should rule out. What do you guys think...?

Normal:



Reflected:



Edit: By the way I think this one is brilliant:

 

Doesn't the water look too weird when you follow it? It looks like the graphics are flipped in certain places, or something.