Castlevania: Seal of the Curse (Simon's Quest Remake)

[ronny14]

This is what became of my Castlevania 1 remake.


I've got a teaser:


If you didn't notice, that is footage of the current Alpha, which is very early in this development period. I am aiming for a full game to be release for public Beta testing late this year or early next year. On the list of priorities, I'll probably get this done if I focus only on gameplay until I have a full game, and focus on touch ups later. Touch ups will include replacing sprites taken from other series.

Let me know what you think, and I'd appreciate criticism and suggestions.

[SmithyGCN]

While I would have appreciated some credit for some of the sprites you used - but, I probably should have labelled my sheets as such, so that's my fault. Looks good so far. I like the way you used them.

[ronny14]

I'm sorry about that! I normally add credits to game releases but it slipped my mind this time around. Credits added to the video description & also annotated. And you are right - Those sheets look like they take copius amounts of time and deserve credit.

Thank you! Planned touch ups include giving the enemies friction in their walk cycles - to make them a little smoother, like Simon's.

[SmithyGCN]

Don't worry about it. At least they're getting some use.

[Kosheh]

If you don't mind me asking - why is Simon so cute in this game? I love it - but like, typically I associate the character with a big, burly Austrian man with a whip.

Actually, that's more a question for Smithy - is the Simon sprite in SD fashion to conform to like, the Kid Dracula aesthetic or something?

[ronny14]

I had asked him via PM before - I believe it's a more detailed Wai Wai World 2 style. The Simon sprite is going to be revisted later as I continue, but the style will be kept intact. *Edit: Smithy did not make the Simon sprite!* Of course, he will be made bigger and taller than he currently is. His sprite currently is a slightly recolored and edited version of the original Wai Wai World 2 sprite. He's only 32 pixels tall, making him comically shorter than most of the NPCs. I want to bump that up to 48 pixels. I'm not the best spriter however, so I'm saving most graphical revisions for later.

[ronny14]

So I've actually gone ahead and started the revised Simon sprite. (Also ripped by Smithy)


It's based off of the Goemon cameo of Simon.

As for the game's progress, I got some screenshots of Berkley Mansion:

[PS: I know my health is zero is most of those screens]

[MoneyMan]

one thing im noticing in these screenshots is that the backgrounds and foregrounds (including objects, etc) kinda blend together, both being rather unsaturated. the foreground could probably use a bit more saturation so players could at a glance see "i can interact with this."

[Gors]

the graphics are an eyesore - I'll paraphrase Moneyman and say that the BGs look too busy and detailed, which is confusing. I think you'll need to tone down on the BG's detail, desaturate it and increase brightness on the enemies, player and interact-able objects

[ronny14]

I've desaturated the backgrounds, and have noted to reduce their detail later. I do want to say that on most of those screenshots, it was nighttime and a black filter was placed over the screen. That's whats probably making them seem darker in the screenshots, most sprites are pretty bright at the moment. This is not the final effect, I just want tilesets to be finished when I work on those. Tilesets and backgrounds will change palettes based on the time of day.

[ronny14]

Here's another alpha teaser to show off some of the new touch-ups and progress:

I'll be posting a progress report in the near future.