DDP's Sprite Workshop

[Kelvin]

Ahhh, those cobblestones look way better now. Nicely done!

[DragonDePlatino]

So, how long ago did I release Dig Dug Redug? What? 3 months? And since then I've gotten experience with projects like Koten and Mother: 25th Anniversary Edition?!? Unacceptable! Seems it's due time for revamp, where I'll be going back and fixing my old Dig Dug sprites for more clarity. Dang, I used to have a real obssession for cramming detail in there. Here's my progress so far...I tried my best to reuse as many 8x8 sprites as possible.



Also, I was struck with a bit of inspiration during my afternoon walk and I decided to add on another screen to my "MOTHER 2: Giegue's Revenge" mockup. I had fun designing these enemies!

[DragonDePlatino]

Man, I've been on fire lately! Churnin' out mockups like there's no tomorrow! YEAH!

I'll be finishing my Loqui mockup later, so for now I'l be focusing on my "Dig Dug: Part 2" mockup. My goal here was to experiment with NES restrictions and remake Dig Dug using a few tiles as possible. I'm pretty happy with the results so far, and I might be actually submitting this to TSR once it's finished.

    

If you look below the mockup itself, you'll see the CHR-RAM! In the CHR-RAM, the NES stores its tiles and sprites in separate 128x128 banks. On the left is the sprite bank, and on the right is the tile bank. Sprites can be rotated, flipped and made transparent while tiles cannot. And if you haven't noticed, I have a lot of blank space left! That's good for me, because it means I'll get to add lots more characters and scenery.

[DragonDePlatino]

Sooo...Dig Dug? Earthbound? Anyone? :I

Well, fine then. Have it your way. I'll post something you guys will actually be interested in! In celebration of his newest Smash Bros appearance, I redrew the Mega Man using the original NES game's restrictions:



In case anyone's curious, I was originally inspired to draw this after seeing Snake's beautiful mockup over on PixelJoint. But the thing is, Snake's sprite looked great but it wouldn't have worked very well on the NES.

[Sketchasaurus]

I really like the Dig Dug sprites here. Though, with Fygar(the Dino) I'd probably look for a brighter green to allow for the blue to stand out more.
as for the tiles in the background, you could vary the strata a bit by implementing sort of a W pattern on the borders between levels, or you could add more variation by making alternate tiles for layers in the ground to reduce the tiling effect.

[-Ash-]

I really like the Dig Dug sprites here. Though, with Fygar(the Dino) I'd probably look for a brighter green to allow for the blue to stand out more.
as for the tiles in the background, you could vary the strata a bit by implementing sort of a W pattern on the borders between levels, or you could add more variation by making alternate tiles for layers in the ground to reduce the tiling effect.

Would you say you DIG, the dig dug sprites? I'll be here all week.

[E-Man]

The remade Mega Man sprites look cool, but what is the deal with that black part of the helmet? I can't tell if it is supposed to be shading or his hair sticking out.

[Deathbringer]

I think it is supposed to be shading.

[E-Man]

I can see that, but what would the helmet look like without it? It looks a bit jarring to me.

[DragonDePlatino]

Taking into account what's been said so far, here's my progress. First up is Mega Man.



I really liked the black shading like on Snake's sprite, but I realized that it won't look very good if Mega Man's palette changes, so I went ahead and removed it. I also cleaned up some of Mega Man's running frames and shrunk his head to make him look more like an action hero.

Next up are my Dig Dug: Part 2 sprites. I'll admit the tiling was a little extreme, so I went ahead and swapped around some of the dirts 8x8 tiles to come up with something much more natural-looking. I also cleaned up the enemy designs a bit and finalized the GUI.

      

Sorry, Sketchasaurus, but I couldn't find any other greens to use for my Fygar due the palette I'm using. It's YY-CHR's default palette which is excellent for smooth palette blending, hue shifting and colorful designs, at the cost of loosing some clarity and contrast. Here's the palette in question:

[DragonDePlatino]

Still trying to work out a good design here. I think the last Mega Man I posted had eyes that were a little too small, so I made them larger here. I also made a few animations and compressed the sprites to how they would look like in the ROM...so far, I have almost all of MM1's animations and tons of space left!



But...I can't help but feel Mega Man is too small here. If I keep Mega Man small (16x24) then it will reduce sprite flickering and let me make more animations. But if I make him larger (24x24 or larger) then I can give him a more accurate design. What do you guys think?

I'm using this design of Mega Man, by the way.

[Kelvin]

I'm not so sure I like Megaman's face. He looks like Alex Kidd. The jumping looks pretty cool, though, and I love that little mettaur. ^^ The climbing sprites look a bit scrunched vertically.

[DragonDePlatino]

Alex Kidd? Eh, I don't mind my sprite looking like that. I mean, at least he doesn't have that gormless cross-eyed stare anymore.

Ohh! And thanks for pointing out Mega Man's climbing sprite! I didn't realize that I was working with a 16x24 sprite when I should have been drawing a 16x32 one. I'll go ahead and fix that.

[DragonDePlatino]

After a few hours of work and some very careful conservation, I've decided on the final design for my Mega Man.



I never would have thought this is possible, but I've managed to draw a Mega Man that's larger than the original while using fewer 8x8 minitiles. The standing sprite is also 2 minitiles wide instead of 3, so if this sprite was used flickering wouldn't be a problem and you could have 4 buster shots on the screen at a time instead of 3. And don't worry...the new 24x32 hitbox wouldn't make the game much harder because that's actually how large X's sprite is.

Later, I'll finish up the rest of Mega Man's animations and see if I can add in some ducking or aiming frames with the leftover space. I'd really like to make a ROM hack using this sprite at one point!

[DragonDePlatino]

OK! I know I said final design, but...I put some more work into it, and I managed to come up with an even better design! I didn't originally plan to anti-alias or shade my Mega Man because it would create clarity issues, but after a bit of experimentation I think it'll work as long as one color is brighter than the other. This version uses even less minitiles than the previous one but is even larger!



What do you guys think? I worked a lot more on my posing this time and went with a face closer to the original sprite. And before anyone asks...that awkward sprite below the climbing sprite is Mega Man's pose when he reaches the top of ladders. You can see the origin of that pose on this sheet.