Tried creating a run cycle in pixel art, but old-school animation style. Meaning no nudging or copypasting, only actual tweening by hand.

It curiously works, even if it's an uneven number of frames (asymmetrical cycle, if you will).

EDIT: Actually, here's a step-by-step.

Conclusion: Tixel seems to be absolutely perfect for straight lines as well as sharp and circular curves (which make up 80% of most given images), but doesn't seem to interpret smooth/slight/snaking curves perfectly.

Meaning rock guy, crystal dude and especially energy being were converted very well, while the roller bean, Spindly McScrapbot and pinkyclaws didn't make it quite as well.

On the other hand, I can't help but feel that it's the pixel artist's job to actively avoid these cases - diagonals other than 2:1 or 1:1, snakey patterns, intersecting diagonals - and that Tixel just highlights in an unpleasant way what the brain itself would interpret as unpleasant anyway.

Edit: Actually wait, why does it get glowy greenguy's curves so right while fumbling badly with the lady captain's skirt or rolypoly's antenna?

Dear Lord Paleskins, that is some masterful use of contrast! Incredible!

FTL fan art!

The Engi design has zilch all to do with the in-game sprite I admit. But the baseline direction for this was to emphasize how dangerous/competent each race is in combat, so a unicycle bean with floppy arms was too good to pass up!

Edit: x3 version for people who crave crispness while actually being able to see a damn thing.

File this under never-gonna-get-done-pipe-dream-in-the-pipe-sky-fancy-private-project.

(Those things the CZECH ORTHODOX MONK SKULL GHOST is tied up with? They're plot-relevant!)

(And the book on his back too.)

Thanks!

Those eyes are actually stolen from inspired by Gary Larson, who gave them to dumb animals of every species (including humans):

I dislike anime eyes to be honest, and these are pretty much the polar opposite. Much like glasses, they force the viewer to get into the picture and interpret the whole face for themselves.

Marxism II: The March

MARXISM

In the spirit of the Global Game Jam!

Hope you guys like pretty bad 32x32 tiles:



Not a big fan of most of them, although i do think i managed to get the bridge down decently.

My main issue is the mountain and hills, as well as the trees. I tried differing variations of forests near the bottom. I also uh, kind of don't have a grass or "plains" tile, left it green, I've tried grass tiles in the past but i can never get them down.

I was hoping to go for a sort of shining-force like tile-set, a mix between map-like tiles and ones that could be used to display a small area, like a specific battle field or town, if that makes any sense?

Looks good to me, and made me think of Shining Force right away.
You might want to check whether you do or don't want black outlines, it doesn't make much sense that the river has two and a castle has none.
Also I'm not really sure what the dark stain-like area below the lighter forest is supposed to represent.......

W-what is a Noir detective doing without his three o'clock shadow? This is madness!

But seriously, this looks very nice!

Pretty good for a start!
As the first thing I'd recommend trying to get some contrast between sprites and background, or between game plane (sprites + platforms) and background. There's a ton of ways you can do that:

- lightness (one dark, the other light)
- sharpness (one with black outlines, the other without)
- saturation (strong colors on one, faded colors on the other)
- hue (pick two general colors and more or less assign them to either part)

 ...As well as a ton of other, fancier options! If you google games you like while keeping an eye on how they separated sprites from scenery, you'll find a lot of other tricks.

This is great already, especially with the little extra hitch he does before actually striking.
The only thing that could be improved in any way for me would be adding *some* extra motion or preferably extra flourish when he puts the weapon back. It's a neat visual concept and the character seems to have the personality for it too.

i think the fact that the blue part of the gradient is so saturated is what causes more issues tbh

You're right, maybe this would look better.
I'm just leaving the other image up so people know what the hell you're talking about.

^ Agreed, even knowing the actual concept I cannot force myself to see the white area as anything else than a mouth.......

In other news, used my time of sickness and misery to draw a cute baby penguin:

I admit the red gradient may be super cheap and distracting...

Tried this for a second today, and after my first predictable freakouts ("Where's my color palette?" - "Where's my frame timeline?" - "Where's my 1:1 preview") I noticed this is super advanced, easily on par with professional programs in terms of basics. I can see myself switching to this easily once I get the hang of how things are set up here. First impression great!

Feel free to use the stuff as placeholder textures, though I'd SERIOUSLY advise getting a complete makeover, as the kinda pseudo cheated lighting on the 2D assets look really bad when put on top of 3D objects. 

I'm really really sorry to be pooping this, but do you think the character could look a bit toward the firing direction? Or the monster more toward its target?
I get it's meant to look tongue in cheek and affably cheesy, and old covers had all sorts of things to point out, so feel free to disregard this! I just feel it would help the image get even better...

These are great! What game was it for? I'm imagining a pixel style Crossy Road.

Thanks!
And literally no game came out of it or was even behind it. I just figured I had to do a gummy penguin, that's all...

Absolutely very sweet.
Came for the dedication to a single style, stayed for the wonderful flowery winding harmonics.
I love how your tracks have zero downtime, no age-long intros, no fluff - just right into the music and keep mixing it up after nearly every measure. It's just interesting, exactly the way VG music should be.
Also a really pleasant choice of, err, soundfont? Is that what it's called?

Anyway, just some compliments. Dammmmmn good work.

I made a, uh, pink skull for an unrealized jam project.

Edit: Gee, this is pretty harsh on the eyes after keo's muted and serene card artworks.