Lord Glenn

According to both Joystiq and Kotaku, Nintendo has inadvertently announced a new entry into the Kirby series on the Wii, being developed by its original development studio, HAL Laboratory. Both sites have the same gameplay footage, one that sparks memories of Kirby 64: The Crystal Shards in terms of its visual appearance. Personally, I'd rate Kirby 64 as one of my higher titles in the series, so that's certainly a plus. Also, there appear to be "Super Attacks" of some kind, such as Fire Kirby "summoning" a fiery dragon that flies across the screen (almost reminds me of one of Joe Musashi's Ninjutsu attacks from the old Shinobi games, albeit horizontally instead of vertically) and some kind of alternate Sword Kirby that uses a scimitar enlarging said scimitar and performing a giant slash. Also of note, the more enemies that Kirby swallows at one time, the more points he racks up (granting 1UPs after a certain number, a la SMB) and the larger the star that's exhaled becomes. Needless to say, this falls under "DO WANT" for me. EDIT - Kirby doesn't gain 1UPs for inhaling large quantities of items. A 1UP was in between two enemies and was sucked in. (Shame that they don't acknowledge it right away though...) EDIT2 - YouTube link to the trailer, provided by Venusaur: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hFWwo5G7mvQ

I can think of two that come to mind that might sound nice. Ironically, both were composed by Noriyuki Iwadare: Grandia II - Memory of the Gods (Full Version) - Probably would make a nice title/intro theme (like the stuff showing the Scouring before the title screen in FE7). Radiata Stories - Unknown and Unnamed Spot - Would likely make a nice dialogue music track. EDIT - Krad's choice (below) made me think of an HG/SS track as well: - Basically screams something like that track that plays when almost anything regarding Serra happens.Also, - Can anyone say something akin to Campaign of Fire?

I'm liking what I'm seeing, at least significantly more than I did when the PSP originally launched. Well, the early software list doesn't really hype me too much, but, according to Joystiq, there are a ton of companies working on software so there's bound to be something out there that interests me. Though, I'm feeling like Ike-Mike; I'm still catching up on PS2 games that I never had a chance to buy and I don't even have a PS3 or a PSP and those both have their own lists of stuff that I want for *them*, so I'm likely going to be holding off of buying one of these (and the 3DS as well, though that's because Paper Mario is the only thing I'm interested on it so far) until I can catch up on other stuff, both in purchasing and playing. As for the 3DS vs. NGP, from a strictly worldwide sales perspective, I think the NGP will win out, simply because of the PSP's current momentum (mainly because of the multitude of Monster Hunter that it's been getting over the past year) and the fact that the 3DS doesn't really have a huge draw to consumers other than the casual market with all of its features. (Yes, it has a few "killer apps" in rehashes of OoT and SF64 but I doubt those will sell high volumes of systems alone since, you know, they've been around for forever.) EDIT - Also, I kinda wish the acronym was the XGP instead of the NGP...

When you say once a battle, are you meaning once per chapter or once per individual fight, like what Eclipse does?

If it wasn't settled already, I would have pointed out that 1) this map is larger than the previous round's, 2) it has water, mountains, and snow variance (arguably three of the harder parts to maps), and 3) most people are likely back in school now (high school, college, etc.). Yes, these points don't apply to everyone, but I'm sure that having larger maps as well as harder requirements may cause a ton of people not to be able to enter, myself included. (Look, I'd love to spend every waking minute spriting, dev planning, mapping, etc., but being a senior in college kinda kills my free time - course work, senior thesis, job searching, etc.) Anyway, that being said, good luck to those that are going to enter.

Didn't an exec say (over the summer, I want to say - after E3) that during the interim while waiting for the 3DS that they were going to focus on localizing some titles that hadn't made it across the Pacific yet? (EDIT - Oh, I guess said article was posted above. Point still stands though that NoA hasn't really been doing anything on this front in regards to localizing JP-only titles here in NA.) And, there's the fact that FE12 came out forever and a day before Golden Sun: Dark Dawn, yet GS3 has been out in NA for months now with no mention of FE12 at all. And, I'd wager that GS3 had its own fair share of dialog in it too... Sure, the 3DS might be involved in its delay right now (if it's being localized), but that doesn't really account for the fact that a game that came out 3 months before another one in Japan had said later-released game get localized before the first one even did.

Since I know the TCG reference that you used for Yuria, two things (both the same issue) immediately jump out at me. The shoulder... things and the central diamond piece all seem a bit flat. And, yes, I know how much of a pain the shoulder things must have been to do, but compared to the ref, they don't really have that appearance of depth to them. My suggestion? try shading the parts that wrap around back to be darker, to show the change in angle. As for the diamond thing, I think you'll need to add in the white shade or the outline here, because just using the skin tones isn't going to give the correct amount of depth that the ref has. The right side needs to be lighter than the left (our PoV) or the left side needs to be darker than the right. And, to do that, you'll need something darker or lighter than what the skin offers (and I know there aren't any free colors). (You might be able to get away with changing up where the existing shades are used, but that's something that you'll have to see if you want to chase.) On FALCON!Rey, personally, I think that the right side of the helmet (again, our PoV) needs some added shading to show the curvature of the helmet. Yes, I see that there's shading around the outside part of the helmet (adjacent to the outline, that is), but all of the inner stuff is the same shade. To some extent, I suppose the top might be guilty of this as well, but it's less noticeable if it is.

Intelligent Systems has nothing to do with bringing New Mystery to NA/EU. They're only the developers. You'd have to point your fingers at Nintendo of America or Nintendo of Europe as to why the game hasn't been localized in those regions yet.

You missed the "corner" tiles up near the top that have the square-diamond pillar caps above them. Right now, you just have horizontal wall tiles there and they should be like the tiles 5 spaces to the left and right of the left and right lowest row of pillars in the throne area. (Basically, the "corner" tiles right above the outer straight walls.)

I prefer the above version of the two, and I've taken the liberty of drawing up circles for some issues: Red - Denotes shading issue. For the wall top tiles, they require shading like what the wall height tiles have to the left of a wall. Uphir covered the stairs in his post. The one to the right of the chest needs to have the left side shaded. Green - Denotes an incorrect tile. The top two need to "hook into" the "capstones" that are above them. The wall on the left side probably should match the brick patter that all of the other ones use. The pillar one has shading on the left of it when it should use the regular bottom like the pillar above it.

Map for the first round of the Mapping Contest. Nothing special, especially since I cranked it out in like an hour. (Requirements: 15 x 10 tile map, using FE8's 01 02 03 tileset and containing a mountain trail or castle.)

Size and tileset are correct. I don't think I copied anyone else's design, seeing as I did it off of the top of my head. (If I did subconsciously, then let me know and I'll make a new one. >__>)

I'm going to guess that it's a multipart chapter a la Day Breaks in FE9. Except each part is in a different part of Elibe and after you finish one part, it jumps to the next "chapter" immediately.

"lrn2fe3" But, seriously, yeah it's been around for a while now.

I had to look up what it was you were actually talking about for a minute. XD Anyway, go ahead and use that one. It was originally for a project that died like 2-3 years ago and it's just been sitting around. Just toss a quick mention somewhere in the README/Instructions/whatever, and we're good.

Edit, no (at least not without good reason and my approval - or for demonstration in the case of something like suggesting a shading fix), and for usage it depends on what it is. Some of the older icons that I posted back on the first page I might consider being allowed to be used, but stuff like my maps or the icons for seph1212's hack (etc.) would be a large no, since I've generally made them specifically for certain things. I'm assuming you had something in particular that you were wondering about?

New icons for Elibian Nights. Not going to spoil what they are (well, the first two should be obvious, but not telling for the others..!), so you'll have to play the hack to see for yourself! :D

I'm going to have to echo Trent on a different reason. VBA 1.7.2 has worked for YEARS for every single ROM hack that's been done. There should be *NO* reason that it shouldn't work for yours. If there is, then there's something wrong on your end in the coding, since it hasn't been a problem for anyone else. And, as a project designer/programmer, it's basically your duty to ensure compatibility for your users. The more user-friendly something is, the more people you'll have that will be interested and willing to play the hack. As such, if it isn't working for 1.7.2, then you should fix it so that it is.

I approve of more sexy Pent action. And, I guess that leaves the General to either be Wallace (man, that guy gets lost so damn much!), Douglas, or a new character. Also, your map has a few tile issues in it. Just in the one screenshot, there's a handful of shading problems (notably with the chests and with the wall tile to the right of the "capstone" tile on the left side). Thought I'd point it out, so that the mapmaker can tweak it. ^_^ Oh, and finals are done. Send any ideas for special icons my way whenever you think of 'em.

No clue. I just make 'em. shadowofchaos does the inserting for seph1212, so out of the people here, he'd be the one to ask.

You know, as much as I love the fleshed out Version 2 template, with the shields and towers, I do have to agree that this one seems more Fire Emblem fitting than it does. I think I went for too much detail in the previous version, where this one's a bit more simple and clean. And, I kinda do too, because that means that I won't have to tweak it to fit, and that it'll go in as I intended it to... I'd say this one actually had less completely custom work than the other two did (as the others had the towers, flags, and shields). Since Yeti suggested that I tie the battle template and statsheet together more, I used the name box from the statsheet for the name boxes on here (with the trim above and below being custom, as well as the pattern on the box, as I dramatically tweaked it from the side patterns in the statsheet). The gold trimming at the top and bottom of the class/level/etc. pane was used and cropped for the silver fancy trim at the bottom of the outside of the name box. To get the circles to be so perfect, I cheated a bit and switched from a 1-px Square brush to a larger-px Circle brush and then turned the outer two pixels of radius into the silver trim. The "holding" trim on the left and right was scratch which I just had to play around with for a while to get something that looked right. The knot was custom and referenced from the image that I linked to above. The borders of the HP boxes are taken from the side trim for the circles with the top and bottom pieces just added in by hand. The pattern was again taken from the side patterns around the portrait from the statsheet, only less modified this time. And, the angel was mostly custom, though I used the circle trick to get the basic idea for what shape I wanted the wings to have. All in all though, it's really more a matter of either kind of having an idea of what you want the template to look like and/or just trying a bunch of things until you find something you like and stick with it. Do that for each piece that's required, and you're good to go.

Possibly the final version, at least as I envisioned it. Knowing my luck and how annoying the tiling is, I'll likely have to make alterations to make it fit. But, I feel good about it for now. And since you asked VASM, have a handy demo scene as well (though, no palette changes for stuff like the HP ticks or the numbers): (Yes, it's boring and bland, but it's more for the concept of what it would actually look like in-game.)

Saturation is basically the intensity of the color. Something that has low saturation is relatively muted, while something with high saturation is generally very vibrant and colorful. (NOTE: Saturation =/= Brightness. Brightness handles the intensity of the *light* on a color. A red color with high brightness is more pink, while a red color with low brightness might be "blood red" in color.)

You know, for someone who claims to have been spriting for 8 years as you did on FEU, you sure don't act like it. You see, there lies within our majestic hobby a hidden "Spriter's Code," for lack of a better term. And, one of the "tenets" of said "Code" basically boils down to the old axiom of "If you don't have anything nice (constructive) to say, don't say anything at all (shut the fuck up)" (my emphasis added in parenthesis). For the most part, spriters strive to continually make their works better. Ripping on someone and not even giving a reason why (or suggestions for improvement) basically falls under the latter category of the old axiom and, consequently, it makes you look, as Trent said, like an ass. You see, when you become a "veteran" in the hobby (and I use that term extremely loosely, since there is no real defined manner of becoming a veteran), the expectations to "adhere" to the "Code" become greater as we are expected to use our knowledge to aid the fledgeling recruits of our pursuits and help them improve as other "veteran" spriters did the same for us. We don't want to set a bad image or bad precedent for future spriters, now do we? (blunt tl;dr summary: C/C is meant to be positive and helpful. If you want people continually thinking of you as an ungrateful, unhelpful ass, keep going with how you're doing things.) Anyway, since you've said you'll make a video with trim, I think we can drop the above for the time being. And, enough threadjacking on my part. -------------- For the Daein Captain, the armor still needs to be reshaded, GBA style. The back of the helmet is better now than it was before though. And, the trim is definitely better with that width than with the width before. Since Nickt is compiling his suggestions for the trim, I'll hold off on making any for the time being. Not sure if it's just me, but the blue undershirt shading seems off (too much darker shade/pillowy?). Anyone else agree? For Christmas Lady, I think the hat needs brought down. It seems like it's sitting a bit too high on her head. Either that, or I wear my Santa Hat down too low. (But, even then, with the way the hat is constructed, if it's up that high, I would think that it wouldn't be as upright above the hair, since there isn't a head to support it up that high...)

Hell, since I just got done posting about ALS's Miku, I might as well post about yours too. I like the way the hair shading gives the hair a bit more volume or full feeling. The only suggestions I could give are that, IMHO, the face either feels a bit cramped or the head's too small (can't compare to actual sprites at the moment, so the latter might possibly be moot) and I'd probably darken or add some shading to where the collar comes down on the shirt. The ref has that area kinda dark, and without the shading, it just kinda seems attached to the shirt instead of "above" it.