don't click here

General Project Thread & Feedback

Discussion in 'Sonic 2 HD (Archive)' started by Vangar, Mar 8, 2008.

Thread Status:
Not open for further replies.
  1. Yarharhar

    Yarharhar

    Oldbie
    58
    0
    6
    Oh, so as a hobby project about 5 months ago I made an emulator that did this (a modification of gens). I've been putting it off recently but I guess I could make the source available. The graphic replacement was complete and palette replacement was partially complete I believe. I was in the process of building in a graphic editor into the emulator (as trying to edit tiles in an external program for this reason is not-feasible).

    I'll make the stuff available in a week or so (want to clean up/comment the source first)
     
  2. Rolken

    Rolken

    Tech Member
    Well that's certainly random and awesome.
     
  3. If you need some high-def tiles it's possible I could pitch in with some level art or something. I know photoshop like the back of my hand.
     
  4. PsychoSk8r

    PsychoSk8r

    PsychedelAnt | Tone Turner Oldbie
    2,641
    57
    28
    Birmingham, UK
    30 Day Project: Revisited.A New Release!
    Agreed. One question though, will there be an option for music replacement too? That'd be extra-awesome =P
     
  5. Vangar

    Vangar

    Member
    3,654
    62
    28
    Wow, my plan might come way earlier then expected then. A few questions:

    And editor inside the application, because any external one is not feasible? I'd just like to ask why? Making larger tiles with the same pixel by pixel editor similar to the other fan made ones might prove insanely difficult. So you sure there's no way to make something and have the emulator call to it? Yarharhar, would you mind if after the source was released, if I were to request some small features if it wouldnt bother you too much? just more arty ways to edit the new graphics rather then technical based (which im guessing it is now).

    Either way, I greatly appreciate your efforts and can't wait to see this released.

    Spex, as long as you don't mind sending me the graphics beforehand and I do a little work on them after if I feel I need to, im a little compulsive with some projects. =P.

    EDIT:

    PsychoSk8r, there already is a music replacement modified Gens that Qjimbo made some time ago. Maybe it was a seperate program that ran side by side Gens, I remember it being a Ram editing process, but I'm not too sure.
     
  6. PsychoSk8r

    PsychoSk8r

    PsychedelAnt | Tone Turner Oldbie
    2,641
    57
    28
    Birmingham, UK
    30 Day Project: Revisited.A New Release!
    Yeah, I'm aware of S2MP3 tool, I'd just love to be able to replace tracks in S1/S3K too.
    Man, I'm looking forward to this just as much as I was the Proto release =P
     
  7. Yarharhar

    Yarharhar

    Oldbie
    58
    0
    6
    The reason the tiles need to be edited in-engine is that to make a mapping, you need to uncompress the graphics. This leads to having thousands of tiles with no way to really distinguish what they are (not to mention how this starts to take up space). One might be able to set the engine instead to click a tile and open an external editor, but I assure you for any large amount of tiles this gets to be veeerrry tedious. It's also far more efficient to see the result of editing in an actual game scene.

    No worries though, I'm a heavy photoshop/flash user so I know that having a good UI is essential.
     
  8. Vangar

    Vangar

    Member
    3,654
    62
    28
    <!—quoteo(post=183777:date=Mar 13 2008, 08:08 AM:name=Yarharhar)—><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Yarharhar @ Mar 13 2008, 08:08 AM) [​IMG]</div><div class='quotemain'><!—quotec—>The reason the tiles need to be edited in-engine is that to make a mapping, you need to uncompress the graphics. This leads to having thousands of tiles with no way to really distinguish what they are (not to mention how this starts to take up space). One might be able to set the engine instead to click a tile and open an external editor, but I assure you for any large amount of tiles this gets to be veeerrry tedious. It's also far more efficient to see the result of editing in an actual game scene.

    No worries though, I'm a heavy photoshop/flash user so I know that having a good UI is essential.<!—QuoteEnd—></div><!—QuoteEEnd—>

    that's excellent. I wonder though, would it be possible to open an external editor with several tiles in the right order? I always found editing of tiles seperately was insane.
     
  9. Vangar

    Vangar

    Member
    3,654
    62
    28
    Here's a nice video I created full some fancy graphics I created as a test.

    Also,
    [​IMG]
    a huge ass image. I can't stress enough that this is just a test and more then likely won't be in any game versions (way to basic, just a simple enhancement with no new lighting or textures) What this does do, however, is show off how fancy higher detailed graphics could be in the game. It was a two step process to detail what I did there, and didn't take too long, using the original layout as a reference. (obviously more feasible versions could be drawn following proper limitations on where I CAN actually draw, not just wherever I feel on an image.)

    Sadly, this project won't even hit the starting line without a dedicated programmer.
     
  10. Sik

    Sik

    Sik is pronounced as "seek", not as "sick". Tech Member
    6,718
    1
    0
    being an asshole =P
    Wow, that palmtree and the grass rock! But now, the badnik and the ring... >_>
     
  11. ICEknight

    ICEknight

    Researcher Researcher
    This is pretty amazing, but the new graphics should be made based on how they were supposed to look on real TVs, not based on the plain unfiltered pixel art. For example, the leafs in those palmtrees were really supposed to look transparent and holographic-like, while the new graphics don't show that.


    Also, the "painting" look is quite interesting, but somebody should try drawing graphics in the style from the manuals, with more angular and polygon-like graphics for the backgrounds.



    I can't say I like those monkeys, by the way. =\
     
  12. 87th

    87th

    FOX HOUNDER Member
  13. Sik

    Sik

    Sik is pronounced as "seek", not as "sick". Tech Member
    6,718
    1
    0
    being an asshole =P
    Good, I wanted those sprites! (sidenote: I know there's an even bigger spritesheet of Sonic)

    By the way, what's wrong with the palmtree? I know it doesn't look transparent, but I like it, in fact it looks more like a real plant that way :P Maybe we shouldn't stick so much with the original ideas and try to make things look a lot better. In fact probably backgrounds should be different. Why? Because Sega was limited by the fact they could use only one scroll. But we don't have that limit. If back then they didn't have it too, they would have choosen a different path too.
     
  14. PsychoSk8r

    PsychoSk8r

    PsychedelAnt | Tone Turner Oldbie
    2,641
    57
    28
    Birmingham, UK
    30 Day Project: Revisited.A New Release!
    Good to see that people are throwing ideas into this.
    Yuski, it's good but sonic looks like he has a bit of a receded chin =P
    ICEknight, you're style's pretty good, IMO, a mixture of yours/yuski's would be great.
     
  15. Hivebrain

    Hivebrain

    Administrator
    3,047
    154
    43
    53.4N, 1.5W
    Github
    I just remembered something:

    [​IMG]

    I made that for the Shield page. It looks nearly the same as the original when resized to 30x30 pixels.
     
  16. Rika Chou

    Rika Chou

    Tech Member
    5,276
    169
    43
    You know, I really don't think that modding an emulator is the way to go for this. Wouldn't you still be restriced by mappings and number of art tiles?

    Wouldn't it be better to use the dissasembly and port the game to windows or something? (I know that before Lost vanished that he was working on porting S1 to windows...but I don't remember how far he got.) That way you could have much more options. It's really a good idea though, I was hoping Sega would make something like this when they announced the "HD" version of Sonic for XBL.
     
  17. LocalH

    LocalH

    roxoring your soxors Tech Member
    One snag with that - any engine peculiarities that come from the hardware itself or the fact that the game uses 68000 ASM would have to be specialcased for a truly authentic port. On the other hand, if you mod an emulator to do this, then you're 100% exact to the original game except for the graphics.
     
  18. Yarharhar

    Yarharhar

    Oldbie
    58
    0
    6
    Yes and no -
    16-bit games are sort of the sweet-spot where mappings were unique enough (as opposed to the 8-bit days where mappings were abused severly).
    Also, this technique bypasses the compression that games like sonic 3/sonic and knuckles used where parts of a tile were used in many tiles. This technique treats each tile it finds in vram as a unique entity.
    With a tiny bit of modification, it could also treat tiles that were flipped horizontally, vertically, and both as unique tiles(I would not recommend this, it would triple the memory requirements again).
     
  19. JoseTB

    JoseTB

    Tech Member
    716
    59
    28
    Something like that can easily take months... Maybe Pseudo-emulation (sonic jam style) could take less time, but I wouldn't go for that to be honest... On the other hand, I can tell you LOst wasn't the only one working on such thing ;)

    I must say, that looks completely wonderful to say the least. I see some talent there.
     
  20. P.P.A.

    P.P.A.

    SONIC 2 SUCKS, SONIC CD FOREVER Member
    644
    0
    0
    Germany
    Sonic MD (Currently: Art for Zone 3)
Thread Status:
Not open for further replies.