next »

[oahda]

Agreed! But not entirely sure what I'm looking at inside the house, pots, a counter? But what are all those things to the left with round edges? o:

[SolS]

Thank you both, those are just weird oval storage looking containers meant to look a bit unfamiliar.

Added in what I have of tiles for this area. I'm going to try testing parallax on screen transitions next. And also probably animate the background a bit to make the clouds and water move.

[Alain]

Nice atmosphere and lighting in the screenshot!

I don't know how you do it, but your creatures consist only of a couple of animated pixels and yet look sooo intriguing to me. What is that creature we can see here?

[oahda]

Ahhh, that sunset is gorgeous. Looking forward to animation. Glittering water?

The indistinct nature of some of the sprites can be fun, like making out shapes in clouds. To me that looks like someone wearing a skull mask slouched over, riding some blue creature.

[Alain]

The indistinct nature of some of the sprites can be fun, like making out shapes in clouds. To me that looks like someone wearing a skull mask slouched over, riding some blue creature.

That analogy to making out shapes in clouds nails it. I've never made pixel art but I am sure it is not easy to find the sweet spot of details (starting with pixel dimensions) that there are enough details to spark interest and still leave a lot of space for the viewer to interpret things.

[SolS]

Finding shapes in clouds is also really how I find new tiles while experimenting with graphics as well. Overlapping less detailed bits to find new textures and details. Sometimes I'll look at unused older experiments and see something new I could use.

The blue enemy is directly based on the spiders from the tower in Super Hydlide, A blue spider with a small gem looking eye in the middle.

Anyways thanks again!

Got parallax mostly working on transitions. Still need to tweak some things, it's not always even where it lands...

[oahda]

Nice!

[SolS]

Testing the background animations. The water needs to be touched up a bit and I'm thinking I'll only make the clouds move at certain times, like dark windy storms at night but then calm stillness during the day.




Also added in the blue/silver border for the frozen coast and a few other locations.

[Alain]

You seem to be very deliberate when adding the background animations, which is great I think. Your art style has a lot going on concerning details and with that cautious way you make sure the animations are not overpowering the sweet look you already have.

[SolS]

Thanks, I often think of this as a Super Hydlide fan sequel so it's partially just what I'd expect to see in that when it comes to the balance and feel of things.

Here's some unfinished frozen sea volcano mockups.







Also found an alternate version of the previous volcano mockup.

[oahda]

I've gotten so used to seeing nearly monochromatic washed out palettes now that the first and last of these are really jarring haha. I think number three is my fav. Also crystal graphics are really pretty.

[SolS]

Thank you!

Yeah I like to jump around once I've worked with / stared at one location long enough. I'm thinking volcanoes will be a small area with eruptions going on that change the lighting from blue to purple, I also still want to add in some cracks in the ice too.

Here's a few alternate palettes for the ice area.





So the other day I was experimenting with overlapping these mockup's over itself 1 pixel offset to force some detail and extra color in, similar to a CRT effect. There's blurriness and too many extra shades in the colors I'd need to remove, and the statues are still very unfinished but it's a good start to a fresh area I think!

[SolS]

Experimenting with the old town tiles again.

[Alain]

To be honest, all of them look fine to me. I'd say the last one is the easiest to read, because of the contrast, but the second one is most pleasing to my eyes.

[SolS]

Thanks!

Here's some kind of sandy place. The rocks are from a photo, I still need to clean them up a bit more.

[SolS]

A few other palettes.

[SolS]

Testing some tiles and colors for the old subway area.

[bacon]

This continues to look outstanding. Weirdly giving me Metroid 2 vibes, I love the idea that the environment itself is sort of unknowable, as it really inspires careful traversal and exploration!

[SolS]

Thanks! And yeah I can definitely see how metroid 2 could come to mind.

Here's some unfinished experiments,

[SolS]

Testing some new ideas.















I know I already have too many very blue areas, I'm thinking I'll try to move away from the monocolored look in general for a bit if I can.