Sprite Work

[firedraco]

Anyone want to do sprite work for a (probably free) game? I can't pay, so I won't really expect you to do expert work or devote yourself to it. You'll get in the credits though!

[Script Coder]

Whenever I make a game, this is the area I struggle with.

[hamsterman]

Indeed, this is probably something most programmers aren't too good at. You might want to find some other site for this, though I don't know where there is the right ratio of geekness and proficiency. I think some do sprite sheets for old games for the fun of it. You might be able to find yourself one of those, if your needs are generic enough. Speaking of which, what do you need? Have you figured out a story already?

[firedraco]

Currently I'm just using *cough*stealing*cough* sprites from other games as placeholders and to test my system and make sure I can do everything I want to do in it.

As for story/stuff, yeah, I have a general idea or the plot and notes for everything so far, but I have specific characters in mind so I don't think I'll find anything useful in a generic place except maybe background objects or something.

It's a Classicvania anyway so the plot isn't too special anyway, more focus on the action. Maybe once I get the gameplay tweaked I'll figure out how to add more story.

[hamsterman]

So you need castle walls and stairs and some monsters, some pickups and a dude with a whip? Is it in retro resolution? Is it tile based? Better yet, do you have a prototype to show?

[m4ster r0shi]

I really don't think I can say this enough times: Use blender for 2D artwork [1].
There's a special build that allows you to even do amazing pixel art [2, 3].
If I find some time I'll whip up something (a treasure chest perhaps) today.

[1] http://www.cplusplus.com/forum/lounge/77850/
[2] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Bu4ztKR4rU
[3] http://www.blendswap.com/blends/view/44982

[BHX]

http://www.hongkiat.com/blog/pixel-art-tutorials/

Not sifted through all of them to see if links are broke, but looks promising. I remember there used to be a tutorial that showed how to make a 3D spaceship and save it so it looked like a 2D ship for a shooter.

[firedraco]

So you need castle walls and stairs and some monsters, some pickups and a dude with a whip? Is it in retro resolution? Is it tile based? Better yet, do you have a prototype to show?

Basically, but it's not actually Castlevania though; I'm just stealing the gameplay style.

Not retro, was going for SotN/DS game style (16 bit I think? idr)

Right now all I really have is an area with no actually graphics excepting the player/some random enemies I made.

I really don't think I can say this enough times: Use blender [1] for 2D artwork.
There's a special build that allows you to even do amazing pixel art [2, 3].
If I find some time I'll whip up something (a treasure chest perhaps) today.

Thanks for the info, I'll check it out.

Not sifted through all of them to see if links are broke, but looks promising. I remember there used to be a tutorial that showed how to make a 3D spaceship and save it so it looked like a 2D ship for a shooter.

Hm well I looked through most of them and most of them seem focused on isometric stuff...the basic ones might be useful though, thanks for the link.

[m4ster r0shi]

There. A small treasure chest filled with gold coins -> http://tinypic.com/r/oohvp/6
You wouldn't call it a masterpiece, but I wasn't exactly trying to do my best either.

If you want, post a list of what you need, and I'll try to make some more.

[firedraco]

Looking for stuff like this:
http://img.gamefaqs.net/screens/9/6/9/gfs_50215_2_9.jpg
http://img.gamefaqs.net/screens/b/7/7/gfs_50215_2_10.jpg
http://img.gamefaqs.net/screens/4/a/a/gfs_114017_2_4.jpg

As for a list of what I need...are you sure? I have massive list of stuff (incomplete and mostly with specific requirements).

[m4ster r0shi]

I have a massive list of stuff

When I'm faced with situations like this, I usually just ask myself "What's the next thing with the biggest
result / effort ratio?" and do that. You could pick a couple of things from your massive list that would really
be nice to have in the game during these early development phases and don't seem too difficult to create.

This is a good example -> http://tinypic.com/r/wclk4h/6

It's not too difficult to make, because it consists of a small number of simple shapes
and it's symmetric. On the other hand, it fills a significant amount of the background.

[Computergeek01]

I usually use this site to "prototype" if all you're looking for is place holders until you can find an art guy: http://opengameart.org/

[m4ster r0shi]

Also, don't forget that you have the option to draw some of the stuff you
need programmatically -> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Procedural_texture

Example -> [ http://ideone.com/z9vLhW | http://tinypic.com/r/efp6o2/6 ]

EDIT:

For a much better result, add this line just before setting the
pixel color -> val = (val + std::rand() % 15 + 35) % 256;

This is what it looks like -> http://tinypic.com/r/2w5spkk/6

[cire]

For kicks, the SFML code above converted to 2.0:

http://ideone.com/Vg7gGq

[MrHutch]

@m4ster r0shi, I've never seen that 3D technique for sprites before. It's fantastic.

[m4ster r0shi]

I believe this one looks much better than the previous two, as a castlevania-like game
wall -> [1, 2]. If you want something even better, you may want to take a look at this
here -> [3]. Familiarizing yourself with the interface will take some time, but it's worth it.

Sorry for the (sort of) thread hijacking, haha :P

@iHutch105: Yeap, it's pretty cool! I've been using it extensively since I learned about it.

@cire: You are welcome to convert the code below to SFML 2.0 as well :)

[1] http://ideone.com/rHMiIt
[2] http://tinypic.com/r/1411uet/6
[3] http://www.mapzoneeditor.com/

[cire]

@cire: You are welcome to convert the code below to SFML 2.0 as well :)

The following code is not quite true to the original code (as that would've involved more work than I was willing to do -- some of the images should be converted to sf::RenderTextures, and if you're going to go that far, you may as well convert it to use shaders too,) but it does achieve a similar result, for anyone who wants to play with it.

http://ideone.com/ONTIEd