The VG Resource

A bit off-topic but, am I the only one who actually likes Sprite Comics here? Atleast when they're done right?

(12-08-2010, 07:11 AM)Iceman404 Wrote: [ -> ]A bit off-topic but, am I the only one who actually likes Sprite Comics here? Atleast when they're done right?

I like them when they're unique enough, most of them can be put in several awfully original categories that I don't care for.

Most of the sprite comics that aren't based entirely on original art fit a general idea/story that just doesn't hold my interest at all, naming a few;

1. The hoardes and hoardes of Bob and George clones

2. The whole sonic spriting community, I think they originated with "Psyguy" ?

3. "crossover" comics where people just take a few sprites that don't fit in together at all and try to make different characters intermingle that way.

4. "custom" sprite comics where every character is technically original but not entirely self-made and often provided by tons of different low-quality artists, leading to something worse than bittage-mixing, namely, bad quality bittage mixing.
(not to mention the second big flaw, "me and my friends having adventures and I want to cameo 30 of them"- often leads to horrid stories that nobody outside of the direct friendcircle would care about.

The only "sprite" comics that aren't 100% self made that I can think of when I think of enjoyable sprite comics generally have the following traits:


1# The person in question actually knows quite a bit about photoshop (or sometimes paint), leading to pages actually looking very clean and readable, people who do this still use too many "effects" for my taste, but at least the comics are presentable.

2# As long as the quality is high, another important factor is that the person in question does something with the sprites that makes sense;

BobandGeorge, back in the day, still had it's very "traditional" megaman-beating-the-robot-masters segments which really made the use of sprites fitting, the big problem is, of course, that not all games are fit for this style of storytelling and that, if someone has done it before, you immediately seem like the rip-off.

When a person takes a game with sprites that genuinly work well within the context of a comic (not just story-wise but artistically as well) and uses the sprites to make a comic that in some way relates to the game/sprites, It can actually seem good. (as long as the writing is)


Other than that situation, I've seen some okay sprite comics that take something like, say, RPGmaker2K sprites and backgrounds, which are so devoid of character that one can actually use them as original characters without it seeming odd that Sonic's suddenly called Mel. (and Rpgmaker has a lot of different sprites people can use, meaning that people can generally use plenty of characters and aren't forced to rely on bittage mixing)


The number of sprite comics that fit these criteria to the point where it genuinly makes them good? I'm not sure if there's honestly any, I kinda feel that the only people honestly capable of producing those are people capable enough of making a good comic without the use of premade sprites, I might be wrong though.

i started out doing customs (manly face)

i don't see what's wrong with the current way we have things, tbh. so we get maybe eight of these threads/members a month, that isn't so bad. that's why there's a community to help people improve.

here's another can of worms: what if a person WANTS an edit?
"hi, i'm GoldenLugia64, and i'm trying to edit this trainer sprite into my character. c+c?"
maybe they aren't even trying to be a spriter?

(12-08-2010, 12:39 PM)Murderbeard Wrote: [ -> ]here's another can of worms: what if a person WANTS an edit?
"hi, i'm GoldenLugia64, and i'm trying to edit this trainer sprite into my character. c+c?"
maybe they aren't even trying to be a spriter?

This is a good point.

Maybe they're not actually looking to improve their skills, but rather trying to improve the sprite quality of something. Which means "Looks good" takes precedent over "I learned something". I'd like to think this is quite the common issue with sprite comicers and (fan) game makers that do not yet have the skills to make decent art and thus rely on others and their currently limited spriting talents. Is this the lazy way? Perhaps, even likely. But the point is, some of them may to look for those better versed in spriting for advice on how to make what they have look really good even if those with better trained eyes and more talent can tell it really isn't that hard.

Tl;dr Some people just want the end results not the practice and rather focus their attention on other things, like writing or programming.

i've read through this and i'll see what i can do next time a thread and situation of that kind appears.

many of these inexperienced sprite-editors (as they can't be called pixel artists or spriters at this point in time) are younglings that've barely entered their oh-so-glorious-teenage-years, ranging from around 12-13 or so. I bring this up because I think it's an important part of why they end up making horrendous excuses for edits and sprite comics for the following reasons:

1. Teenagers are lazy (lazy people make lazy edits)
2. Teens are inexperienced (low amount of art, writing, and technological skills)
3.Teens have overinflated egos (they think everything that they make is gold, and that hinders improvement)
4.Teens think that everyone is against them (they can't take constructive criticism which is supposed to help them do better.)

There are a few examples that are able to disprove these observations, but I'm speaking on general terms here.

conclusion is basically each case has to be handled individually. the whole point is to always give the person the option that doing a custom work would help them improve its skill in a more meaningful way than simply reworking a premade concept, rather than force it down its throat.

because edits might be an option after all, but you'd still need to read paragraphs in order to produce good quality edits, since most people just try to mimic what they see without really understanding why should they do it and how they should (namely most people doing sel out on pokemon sprites, for example)

(12-08-2010, 02:17 PM)Terminal Devastation Wrote: [ -> ]

(12-08-2010, 12:39 PM)Murderbeard Wrote: [ -> ]here's another can of worms: what if a person WANTS an edit?
"hi, i'm GoldenLugia64, and i'm trying to edit this trainer sprite into my character. c+c?"
maybe they aren't even trying to be a spriter?

This is a good point.

Maybe they're not actually looking to improve their skills, but rather trying to improve the sprite quality of something. Which means "Looks good" takes precedent over "I learned something". I'd like to think this is quite the common issue with sprite comicers and (fan) game makers that do not yet have the skills to make decent art and thus rely on others and their currently limited spriting talents. Is this the lazy way? Perhaps, even likely. But the point is, some of them may to look for those better versed in spriting for advice on how to make what they have look really good even if those with better trained eyes and more talent can tell it really isn't that hard.

Tl;dr Some people just want the end results not the practice and rather focus their attention on other things, like writing or programming.

Pardon me for asking this, but am I a total nutjob for not seeing how this is a problem at all?

(12-08-2010, 02:47 PM)Sketchasaurus Wrote: [ -> ]There are a few examples that are able to disprove these observations, but I'm speaking on general terms here.

That's not biased at all.

A bitchslap to teen spriters.
That's what that is.




I know no teens that try to sprite that are like that.
More like you're describing a weeaboo from dA rather than anything else.

Not even that, but you start off taking about 12-13 year old editors and then follow to teenagers as a whole as spriters.
That's a jump, right there.

Quote:(lazy people make lazy edits)

wat.
Lazy people make lazy everything.
Even custom.

(12-08-2010, 04:08 PM)Neoriceisgood Wrote: [ -> ]

(12-08-2010, 02:17 PM)Terminal Devastation Wrote: [ -> ]

(12-08-2010, 12:39 PM)Murderbeard Wrote: [ -> ]here's another can of worms: what if a person WANTS an edit?
"hi, i'm GoldenLugia64, and i'm trying to edit this trainer sprite into my character. c+c?"
maybe they aren't even trying to be a spriter?

This is a good point.

Maybe they're not actually looking to improve their skills, but rather trying to improve the sprite quality of something. Which means "Looks good" takes precedent over "I learned something". I'd like to think this is quite the common issue with sprite comicers and (fan) game makers that do not yet have the skills to make decent art and thus rely on others and their currently limited spriting talents. Is this the lazy way? Perhaps, even likely. But the point is, some of them may to look for those better versed in spriting for advice on how to make what they have look really good even if those with better trained eyes and more talent can tell it really isn't that hard.

Tl;dr Some people just want the end results not the practice and rather focus their attention on other things, like writing or programming.

Pardon me for asking this, but am I a total nutjob for not seeing how this is a problem at all?

Only if you're okay with the common movie game.

(12-08-2010, 04:08 PM)Neoriceisgood Wrote: [ -> ]

(12-08-2010, 02:17 PM)Terminal Devastation Wrote: [ -> ]

(12-08-2010, 12:39 PM)Murderbeard Wrote: [ -> ]here's another can of worms: what if a person WANTS an edit?
"hi, i'm GoldenLugia64, and i'm trying to edit this trainer sprite into my character. c+c?"
maybe they aren't even trying to be a spriter?

This is a good point.

Maybe they're not actually looking to improve their skills, but rather trying to improve the sprite quality of something. Which means "Looks good" takes precedent over "I learned something". I'd like to think this is quite the common issue with sprite comicers and (fan) game makers that do not yet have the skills to make decent art and thus rely on others and their currently limited spriting talents. Is this the lazy way? Perhaps, even likely. But the point is, some of them may to look for those better versed in spriting for advice on how to make what they have look really good even if those with better trained eyes and more talent can tell it really isn't that hard.

Tl;dr Some people just want the end results not the practice and rather focus their attention on other things, like writing or programming.

Pardon me for asking this, but am I a total nutjob for not seeing how this is a problem at all?

It's perfectly reasonable to think like that, since I was just pointing out a few of the more valid reasonings behind trying to get help making a good edit, instead of making a bad scratch at the moment. Just a way of saying, give the editers a chance to make what they have good.

(12-08-2010, 02:47 PM)Sketchasaurus Wrote: [ -> ]many of these inexperienced sprite-editors (as they can't be called pixel artists or spriters at this point in time) are younglings that've barely entered their oh-so-glorious-teenage-years, ranging from around 12-13 or so. I bring this up because I think it's an important part of why they end up making horrendous excuses for edits and sprite comics for the following reasons:

1. Teenagers are lazy (lazy people make lazy edits)
2. Teens are inexperienced (low amount of art, writing, and technological skills)
3.Teens have overinflated egos (they think everything that they make is gold, and that hinders improvement)
4.Teens think that everyone is against them (they can't take constructive criticism which is supposed to help them do better.)

There are a few examples that are able to disprove these observations, but I'm speaking on general terms here.

I kinda wanna bitch slap you for this post.


If you haven't noticed tSR's member base of active members go from 14-24 years of age. Meaning the prime life of teenagers (and some young adults) in here.

Another thing you seemed to have not noticed; We tell people who post edits to do customs, we give rather harsh and blunt creative crit, and if people can't take it then they leave because they think it is a personal attack on their work instead of help.

To be honest you are just describing DA and not this forum. This forum works in the exact opposite way.

(12-08-2010, 04:46 PM)Terminal Devastation Wrote: [ -> ]

(12-08-2010, 04:08 PM)Neoriceisgood Wrote: [ -> ]

(12-08-2010, 02:17 PM)Terminal Devastation Wrote: [ -> ]

(12-08-2010, 12:39 PM)Murderbeard Wrote: [ -> ]here's another can of worms: what if a person WANTS an edit?
"hi, i'm GoldenLugia64, and i'm trying to edit this trainer sprite into my character. c+c?"
maybe they aren't even trying to be a spriter?

This is a good point.

Maybe they're not actually looking to improve their skills, but rather trying to improve the sprite quality of something. Which means "Looks good" takes precedent over "I learned something". I'd like to think this is quite the common issue with sprite comicers and (fan) game makers that do not yet have the skills to make decent art and thus rely on others and their currently limited spriting talents. Is this the lazy way? Perhaps, even likely. But the point is, some of them may to look for those better versed in spriting for advice on how to make what they have look really good even if those with better trained eyes and more talent can tell it really isn't that hard.

Tl;dr Some people just want the end results not the practice and rather focus their attention on other things, like writing or programming.

Pardon me for asking this, but am I a total nutjob for not seeing how this is a problem at all?

It's perfectly reasonable to think like that, since I was just pointing out a few of the more valid reasonings behind trying to get help making a good edit, instead of making a bad scratch at the moment. Just a way of saying, give the editers a chance to make what they have good.

Then they should find someone to sprite for them if they aren't gonna put all the effort in themselves to make it look as best as it can. I mean, do you see *any* major company use edits for all of their sprites or have they made the sprites themselves. OH HEY GUESS WHAT! They make their own sprites!!!!

Even if it is just a game for fun, if you enjoy making the game you should put all of your effort into making it so you can feel more proud of it afterwards.

I apologize for the inaccuracy and improperly placed bias of my previous post.

(12-08-2010, 06:04 PM)Sketchasaurus Wrote: [ -> ]I apologize for the inaccuracy and improperly placed bias of my previous post.

User was warned for this post - Unnecessary spam with no discussion value. -a6

goddommit.

(12-08-2010, 04:46 PM)Terminal Devastation Wrote: [ -> ]It's perfectly reasonable to think like that, since I was just pointing out a few of the more valid reasonings behind trying to get help making a good edit, instead of making a bad scratch at the moment. Just a way of saying, give the editers a chance to make what they have good.

I think we might've agreed from the start then, I wasn't sure if you were stating it as a problem or as a reason to allow edits.

Quote:Then they should find someone to sprite for them if they aren't gonna put all the effort in themselves to make it look as best as it can. I mean, do you see *any* major company use edits for all of their sprites or have they made the sprites themselves. OH HEY GUESS WHAT! They make their own sprites!!!!

Even if it is just a game for fun, if you enjoy making the game you should put all of your effort into making it so you can feel more proud of it afterwards.

Really? Why?

I know that I'd personally feel like that, but I don't follow how it applying to some people means it should apply to all.

I'm sure quite a few people could happily feel good about making a game with sprite edits, just the same way people can feel proud about a ROM hack.

Is it commercially viable? No, but if someone's just doing it for fun, why care about that?

(12-08-2010, 05:20 PM)Kat Wrote: [ -> ]Then they should find someone to sprite for them if they aren't gonna put all the effort in themselves to make it look as best as it can. I mean, do you see *any* major company use edits for all of their sprites or have they made the sprites themselves. OH HEY GUESS WHAT! They make their own sprites!!!!

Even if it is just a game for fun, if you enjoy making the game you should put all of your effort into making it so you can feel more proud of it afterwards.

I apologize for not being more clear. I am not refering to cases where they are trying to get away with minimal effort.

I am refering to projects where the edits will be upgraded/replaced later with increasingly greater quality as they are able to get them, either by an increase in their own skill or by finding someone to make better sprites for them. But while they wait, they try to make something as presentable as they can with the skills they currently have. Sort of a compromise between having something "done" now, and having the real quality one wants. The effort is there, just not quite the time to have decent results right away.

After all, projects have died due to stagnation while someone waits for quality sprites. I know of at least one really promising fan game dying due to the programmer waiting for superior sprites, rather than just going ahead with placeholders and the best he can make for now.