34 replies to this topic

[Exate]

Radien's is good, but I don't always fall for bosses like others. Regardless, Gashin's overall design and tiles are more appealing to me.

HEY 
I made that background!

People are entitled to their own opinion, so they don't have to like the BG, Zemious.

[Redmage777]

My vote goes to Gashen, the color ballance in nigh-perfect. The Coloredl trees comlement the Flowers, and the Leafy Texture of the Large Trees in the Perfect complement to the BS Mountain texture.

Hopefully we will be playing this quest soon.

[Highsight]

I voted for Shashomaru. I would have done Gashin's but I have seen these tiles alot at this point and I know it can do better then that.

[lord_jamitossi]

I -love- Gashin's shot. It's near-perfect.

*votes*

[link3505]

I voted for Shashomaru.  I would have done Gashin's but I have seen these tiles alot at this point and I know it can do better then that.

it? contrary to popular belief, I am not an "it"

and for the record, Zemious, you did not create that background. you ripped it from Mystic Quest. you even said so yourself. you have no reason to be angry at anyone over a comment about something you didn't even do yourself

and Redmage777, this quest I do intendo to finish THIS YEAR, so you will be playing it, probably soon

[Zemious]

Johnathan said
well Zemious i appologize for my use of such harse words

Thang you for opolygizing, I apreasheate that.
Radien I believe edited my version which looked a ton better.

Just kidding Radien, yours is fine also.

[Rambly]

Gashin's shot has already won SotW in my mind.

Gashin's shot is just DAMN AMAZING.

If you don't vote for Gashin, the terrorists have won.

Gashin's shot is perfect in every way.

I'm not just saying this because he'll do ...favors for me tommorow either. >_>

[Zemious]

I don't want Gashin to win in SotW at all so I will vote for the next best thing.

Voted for Radien

[/M/]

...Zemoius, you already said that you voted for Radien so there is no point of evening posting that.

Also, why wouldn't you want Gashin to win at all? He has a good shot. And this is SToM, no SToW.

[Radien]

BH4:

Yeah, plenty of variety... but we still have two dark forest screenshots, so it's not 100% varied.

Radien I believe edited my version which looked a ton better.

Huhwha?....

By the way, don't get me caught up in any grudge wars or anything; I think Gashin deserves the win this month.

[Fox]

Yay! Time for my reply to something I haven't been involved in for a long time!

I suppose I should start at the top, and work my way down.

First, LinktheMaster:
That's quite a bit of purple. Purple water, purple trees... I'm curious as to why. Is it for artisic purposes, or is there a reason for it? Either way is fine. Though, I'm not a fan of the shades of purple you used. They seem a bit too vibrant. If you toned it down, I think it'd look better. The shrubbery around the edges is a nice touch. And the red-eyed crows scare me. They look thirsty for blood. I think you could choose a better color for the menu up top, though I'm happy to see you're experimenting with something other than black. Maybe just a darker version of that. Good sprites up there, too. Is your B item the boomerang? I prefer a different kind of health bar (the kind you use is a bit hard to glance at and get good information). The layout looks good, save for the four lined-up trees. Those diagonal trees just seem a bit unnatural to me. And as much as everybody seems to like those Prince-made mountains, they still look like stomachs to me. I dunno... they just don't work for me.

Next up, Gashin:
Yeah, lots of people love this screen. And for good reason. It really is well put together, and boasts a lot of eye-candy. Gashin is one of the best tile-artists around. Those just discovering this fact have been out of the loop; he's been creating great tiles for a long time now. But no screen is perfect, and I like to get even those tiny details ironed out so that it can only improve. So, here are my (very) minor suggestions:
+ Mix up those flowers a bit! Every white flower on that screen comes from the same pattern: bottom left, top right. Get some other combinations in there to mix things up! How about top right - bottom right? Or top left - bottom left - bottom right? Maybe even top right - middle left. Anyway, maybe something to break up the pattern. Also, another color or two would be very nice. Perhaps a very light pink or blue, if your palette allows?
+ Curve the grass! All your long grass ends at right angles. It would flow better if your grass at least curved at the corners. Hmm... maybe you could even be the first to create a transition tile that changes long grass to short. That would be something new, and I'm sure it would look nice.
+ Get rid of the tile fences! While the fences do look nice (and I see the backward fences - nice touch), they are easily identifiable as tiles. If you connected the fences, you could make the graphics feel more natural.
+ Square dirt? It looks good, but... I think it COULD look better if you created some natural dirt. The house does seem to be out in the wilderness...
+ Change the perspective of the small trees! The big trees come from a more top-down view; the small ones seem more at a side. Not very noticable, but if you're going for perfection, that would need to be addressed.
+ Different palette? Everyone seems to love this palette, but it seems a bit bright to me. If you made it just a touch more vibrant and less pastel, and a couple shades darker, I'd really like it.
All around, your shot is great. The good in this shot far outweighs anything I mentioned. I just mentioned those because I believe there's always room to improve. I especially like the rounded entrance to the house.

Now we have Radien:
Another good shot (but what can I expect? It's shot of the Month). The main attraction (yes, the bird) looks great. It's animation seems smooth and real. In the foreground, the only things that look strange are the hookshot posts (those ARE hookshot posts, right?). It just seems really wierd to have wooden stakes sticking out of stone slabs. Other than that, the foreground looks nice. The background also looks good, though I think more could be done with the sky. As it stands, it's a bit... bare. The clouds add somewhat, but their simplicity doesn't help much other than to add variation. If you could somehow add... cloud texture... to the clouds, I think it'd work well. Don't ask what I mean by cloud texture, because I don't know. Maybe you could try night instead of day? It wouldn't be a hard transition: just get the sky to a darker color of blue. Then maybe some darker grey rainclouds? And pouring rain? You could even get some flashes of lightning in there. And not just layer 6 white that shows up every few seconds, either. Lightning that illuminates the battlefield in the pouring rain. As to how you would illuminate it... palette cycling? If that's not an option, then perhaps make this boss battle its very own palette if you haven't already, and dedicate one cset to illuminated objects. Then, if you're willing to use the tile space, you can use animation to create flashes of illumination every once in a while. Or even just a starry nighttime scene? I don't know. Just some ideas. Of course, daytime can work well, too. But again, nice job on the boss.

Finally, we've got Shashomaru:
First, I like the shrubbery/vines on the top and left sides of the screen. Also, good use of shadows. The cliffs, though, seem a bit confusing. You've got them overlapping all over the place. The top-right and middle-left parts of the screen, in particular, look confusing. The torches look good for the most part, but the tops look odd, as they are flat. Maybe if you could shade the inside to make it look curved inward, or did the opposite and pushed the top of the torch outward and into a point. My wording is a bit choppy there... try to make sense of it. I know people have been raving about that clear water, but it just doesn't look right to me. Seeing a murky brown with blue ripples just doesn't seem real. Maybe it's just me, since everybody else seems to love it. The sparkles that blink on the screen could be a nice touch, or could just be strange. I would think that they would work well. They seem kind of like my forest sprites and fairies, where you need to see them in true action to really appreciate them. And it's definately unique, with great potiential. So some good points there.

Hoo boy, that was fun. Lucky this wasn't a 9-entry SotW. That would take a while.

Overall, I liked the selection of shots. While each had its good points, Gashin's shot wins above the rest. Great tiles back up a good layout. The palette is a bit bright for my tastes, but it works. Overall, the shot just flows. So congrats, Gashin.

[Radien]

Fox:

Thanks for the advice. Hope you don't mind a response...

Re: Hookshot posts

Yeah, I see what you're saying. However, do you have any other suggestions for something that could be used as a hookshot-able object, which is outside the dungeon and atop a series of towers? I can't think of anything that'd make more sense... even torches would look wierd atop a tower.

Re: sky

I do plan on working more on this. I'm not sure the mountain range really works, because what's supposed to be behind this building is either a series of mountains, or a bay with mountains on the far side of the water. I was messing with palettes for awhile, trying to get a sunset effect; however, I couldn't get it looking or working right so I ditched it before SOTW.

Not sure what I'd do with the clouds, but I'll try... I already replaced the default Pure clouds with Gashin's 3-tone version.

The boss will have lightning! ...However, it'll be an actual attack, which means combo-cycling, and it's nigh impossible to synch layered animations to combo cycling.

I'm trying to avoid water; I have too many watery dungeons... but night might work. These were originally 'the Cliffs of Night and Day," until I ditched that idea. But I could bring it back.... the dungeon has multiple outdoor segments, though, so it'd be a comprehensive thing.

Thanks for the advice. I'm glad the bird seemed to be to your liking; it'd be much harder to edit than the background and palette.....

[link3505]

+ Mix up those flowers a bit!  Every white flower on that screen comes from the same pattern: bottom left, top right.  Get some other combinations in there to mix things up!  How about top right - bottom right?  Or top left - bottom left - bottom right?  Maybe even top right - middle left.  Anyway, maybe something to break up the pattern.  Also, another color or two would be very nice.  Perhaps a very light pink or blue, if your palette allows?

I'm actually going to make the flowers a bit smaller, but still keep that Zelda look to it I'm also going to make layers to the flowers, so they can be colored differently without changing the palette

+ Curve the grass!  All your long grass ends at right angles.  It would flow better if your grass at least curved at the corners.  Hmm... maybe you could even be the first to create a transition tile that changes long grass to short.  That would be something new, and I'm sure it would look nice.

first, a note: I ripped that from Minish Cap. I do plan to add variety to the grass, so don't worry. but the short-long grass tiles would be a bit hard to make, but certainly possible

+ Get rid of the tile fences!  While the fences do look nice (and I see the backward fences - nice touch), they are easily identifiable as tiles.  If you connected the fences, you could make the graphics feel more natural.

again, Minish Cap tiles, just edited. those are one of the only tiles I have no plans to change

+ Square dirt?  It looks good, but... I think it COULD look better if you created some natural dirt.  The house does seem to be out in the wilderness...

...those are path tiles. I've already got some natural-looking dirt made

+ Change the perspective of the small trees!  The big trees come from a more top-down view; the small ones seem more at a side.  Not very noticable, but if you're going for perfection, that would need to be addressed.

yeah, the perspective has been bothering me too. I'm going to edit them once I finish up the rest of the trees

+ Different palette?  Everyone seems to love this palette, but it seems a bit bright to me.  If you made it just a touch more vibrant and less pastel, and a couple shades darker, I'd really like it.

actually, I've already done this, to a degree. the current palette you see has been modified just a bit, so that it is about a shade darker (wow). there will also be much darker palettes to offset this. while the tiles themselves may not look completley realistic, I am going to make the colors feel more real. you'll see what I mean in the upcoming Expo

I especially like the rounded entrance to the house.

you have DFW to thank for those. I made them for a tileset she wanted (it didn't make it very far...), and I loved those entrances, so I decided to use them in this quest

thanks for the comments. I love to hear what other people think of my work, and how I can improve it

(edit) seems my quote tags don't like me...
(Happyman) For two reasons: the /quote must be on a new line, and I think there's a limit to how many there can be. :\
(Radien) Fixed.

[Radien]

+ Change the perspective of the small trees!  The big trees come from a more top-down view; the small ones seem more at a side.

I forgot to mention... Gashin, I have some tree tiles you can use for that if you like. They're altered versions of Pure trees. They're not exactly the same perspective as LttP trees, but they are darn close.

[Zenith]

Radien, that Thunderbird boss battle looks...climactic. My vote easy.

I still think Gashin's shot is too bright.

Shash's shot looks detailed, but the screen design is kinda simple.

Hey Radien, y'know what would be cool? If near the end of the fight the bird tried to fly away, and then there was a cutscene where Serenia was on the bird and stabbed it between the eyes. Of course that would be really tough to pull off.