Raven's general Sprites Thread

[Raven]

Maps

From to

Mugs

Credits to AstraLunaSol for fixing the hair, and a number of other people for advice.

[Anouleth]

It sucks all the balls. ALL of them.

More seriously, try to make it more varied. You might say that it being boring is intentional, but that doesn't make it any better. You say that it's meant to be fiery and damaged... but the entire interior is completely clean and smooth, even very near the huge pit.

In general, your tiles look like of... rough. They don't line up with each other in places. Trying to make realistic looking ground with no sharp edges is really boring and tedious and takes forever, but otherwise it looks horrible. For example, you can't use a light gray earth tile next to a pit tile. You need to transition into a dark grey earth tile (which you did correctly in the upper RHS on the map).

[Raven]

Would it be alright if you pointed out problem areas visually?

When you just put it in text like that it's really not much help to me, sadly.

[Jubby]

I'll give it a try, visually. I think this is what he's saying... (I added some of my own, too)

Green- this is personal opinion but I think this could be more raggedy looking instead of essentially being a giant triangle. I like how the other fiery gaps turned out; it's better to do sort of normal shapes if they're in corners or something, but if it's a more defining feature, make it sort of uneven, unless of course you have the story to tell why it's a perfect triangle. Moving on....

Red- I think this is what he's saying you did right; the grey tiles blend better here, as opposed to just going from BLACK CHASM to light gray.

Yellow- These could do with some fiery damage, maybe even just scorch marks on the ground or smaller, lesser chasms.

Blue- This is just personal preference, but they seem a tad empty. The bottom one you could even add another little corner pit or something, I dunno.

Overall I really like the concept, you've just gotta make it look more natural. Also, when you have open areas, it helps to use different tiles that look similar; for example, most FE tilesets have like 10 different grasses that look almost the same, but it splits up the pattern of having all the same ones. I don't really have any experience with that tileset, so I don't know if my suggestions are plausible or not, that's just what I see from looking at it :P Anyway, if you fix that up, you'll have a pretty interesting map!

P.S. Sorry for attaching the image, I need to get an imageshack or photobucket or somethinggggg Dx

[Raven]

That's great - thanks.

When I've got time I'll try to get in the edits.

[Celice]

Generally, kill out a lot of the repetition that makes the make look bland. Make a few details here and there, but don't overload it. Just enough to balance out a lot of blank area. You want the hallway to not look so... artificial and painted.

[Jubby]

Anytime - I'm quite interested to see how it turns out, cause it's a neat design that I've never really seen before. I agree with what Celice said, too; it just needs a little more... Randomness.

[Raven]

Well I downsized it, cutting 10 rows off it so now it's 15 x 20). I also tried following the advice given in this thread.

To me, it looks much better than the map of old.

Thoughts?

Edit: I've also turned this thread into my general sprites thread, so all my work will be shoved into here from now on.

[Primefusion]

Downsizing the map definitely helps even out the space and it looks better from the previous version. However, it still feels very clean cut. From what I gather, it seems like you're trying to make a ruined or desolate map. But, a lot of your dirt sections are really straight (Especially to the right of the long wall and also where the path turns to the East).

When outdoors, try to think round. Maybe break up the long dirt section into chunks to help give it a more natural look.

Also, some sections of the right most lava portion are cut off. Specifically:

[Raven]

I see, thanks.

Lava really is a weakness of mine. Hate the stuff.

[Jubby]

It does look looooads better though :)

[Celice]

I still suggest smushing the path edges so it does look like the hallway was filled with frosting. That doesn't mean, like, overcompensate and make every path tile touching the walls be some intricate spiral. But right now it looks really artificial :< Some of the edges near the lava are also jarring--there's a lot of light gray which suddenly drops into all dark gray. You're lacking a gradient. This tileset can be a bit confusing to navigate, but the pieces are all there. I'd personally also not have walls directly next to many of the gorges, as what happens (especially the middle-right part) is it looks like they suddenly break perspective and dip directily into the abyss.

Overall, it just needs some tidying and sculpting to get the graphical twitches out of the way.