Hill Top Zone

how many vines are twisted round on there? It looks like 3 of them; so perhaps if there were just 2 together (and as the others said, if it was thinner) it might not look too strong to break.

 

Hmm, looks like a fair bit more work . Although perhaps not so much if it's just two wrapping around each other rather than three (which, as has been pointed out, would make more sense anyway). I have to admit, I was wondering if there was anything I could do with that part of the vines. A single straight line looks a bit dull. If I have time I might do two versions. One with one vine, one with two.

I just want to explain that the reason I thought (still think) the checkered idea for the trunk worked, is because the tree (what with all it's sharp angles, symmetry, repeated shapes) was hardly organic itself. Matched up with the more realistic trunk it just seemed to clash for me. I couldn't figure out what it was trying to be (as a whole). Did it want to be organic? Or did it want to be artificial and geometric? The checkered trunk, being very artificial and geometric like the tree itself, made immediate sense. Suddenly the tree looks consistent top to bottom (to me anyway) It even reflects the styling of the zone. Whenever I see the realistic trunk, I always feel it needs something a little more natural on top of it. But in the style of Sonic 2, it's hard to fit that in...

 

My issue with his concept at the moment is that it looks like something you would see in a dense jungle. I'd like to see each vine thinner so it looks like more of a rope instead of some overgrowth. I do think I like where it's going, though. ME's idea about having a chain with some overgrowth instead of an actual vine was kinda neat as well, but we'll see where this takes us first.

 

I also think those vines were never supposed to look like that kind of strong jungle vines, but rather like those you'd see growing over a building's wall.

 

Just a thought...If you choose to have the vines disconnect at the top, then you will probably have to create an animation of the vines flailing in the air as the stand falls, and also of them catching up to the stand when it makes contact with the ground. May be better to have them unravel where they meet the stand instead.

 

I came across Sonic 4 the other day and I thought that their vine looked similar to the one I just created. And I honestly didn't even know about it. But now it kind of looks like I copied them.

 

Thinking along those same lines, I was wondering how the vines of S2 compared to Sonic 3's vines of AIZ.

Although it's the wrong colour, it could give us a better idea with how to do this:

 

I always thought those Sonic 3 swings and so on were rope. They look like old rope that has been out against the elements too long and are starting to fray.

 

Guys, if you make the vines like those, they're going to look like these:


Which, again, brings up the point that the original designers could have made the Hill Top vines look like that, had they wanted to, but they didn't for whatever reasons they had (in this case, adding more variety, in other cases, asthetical reasons).

They knew what they were doing when designing appealing and varied stuff (at least, judging by the game's sales and the common oppinion on this game's graphics), so I think we should keep sticking to the original designs as much as we can.


The original vines can be improved in other ways that don't mean replacing them, like adding an animation then they snap, making some better looking leaves with more volume, etc.

 

Here's a quick little fix-up of how I think you think the thing has to look like... minus the knot...

 

I think it could do with being a more vibrant color as well as being a bit thicker. Looks like a good start otherwise.

 

Nice concept.

 

If you liked our previous concept and products, I'll throw in an update COMPLETELY free of charge.



So, you guys found an idea for how the base connects with the plants yet? :3

 

Looking good, but the base of the platform looks kind of ugly to me. I don't see what was wrong with the original design.

 

Oh, I took the platform itself from a couple pages back. That would be MaximusDM's concept.

 

I think you should use a knot like the ones at the top, and have it loosen to the point it opens apart.

 

Just did a quick edit to compare the old and new versions of the platform:

 

In case it helps anyone, here's a tiling vine for the diagonal part. I think this one may be about a pixel or so too thick though.



May need a bit of extra contrast to stand out against the background sky (which itself is a lot darker than I thought it was). Looks weird against the "Rusted Copper" theme of this forum too...

Edit:

Here's a WIP. Didn't have a lot to do, so thought I'd finally get started on it. Here it is before I get too far into it:



Sorry I'm not using vectors (still can trace later if I have to). By the way, I like the platform with the angled/layered base. Looks a bit more balanced to me. I think it could do with the holes being all equal size like mentioned earlier though (hope I didn't miss anything about that).

 

I think that what you have too much, I have too little and vice versa.