Isometric character advice

[Cino]

Hey, long time since I posted anything on Critics' Lounge, but I still trust the advice that people give here.

I've been working on a base sprites for isometric characters and at this point I'm quite satisfied how the front side turned out (though I'll still take any advice regarding that as well), but the back side has been giving me problems. Any advice how I could improve it?

[imgzoom]http://tulevik.eu/om101/om101_eve_backside_wip.png[/imgzoom] [imgzoom]http://tulevik.eu/om101/eve_backside_flip.gif[/imgzoom]

Also made a simple 4 frame walkcycle - keeping the framecount low, so the amount of sprites I have to do don't overwhelm me.
[imgzoom]http://tulevik.eu/om101/om101_eve_walkcycle.gif[/imgzoom]

I'd be thankful for any tips you can provide me.

[cat]

• I'd reduce the noise in the hair
• In the walkcycle I really like the arm movement, but the leg movement looks like she's ice skating or something. I think in the center frame the legs have to be closer to each other.

[Matt Frith]

I think the sprite itself is mostly fine.  Maybe the hair could do with some work, although it doesn't really bother me.  I agree with Cat that the character looks as if she's skating.  I had a look at the frames and I think this is due to frames 1 and 3 not reflecting how the legs pass each other. I did a quick (sloppy) edit of how it may be improved by lifting the passing leg a bit. The arms are fine though

[Cino]

The walkcycle definitely does look better this way. I did consider making leg raising frames, but on the other that would double the amount of frames I'd have to draw per each character. The "skating" is less apparent when the character is actually moving around, instead of staying in one place, but maybe having 3 different frames per side is just not enough after all.

Any tips on the back side though?

EDIT:
Cleared up the noise in hair and added the two new frames to the walkcycle. Any better?
[imgzoom]http://tulevik.eu/om101/om101_eve_walkcycle2.gif[/imgzoom]

EDIT 2:
Made some minor edits to the back side too, but still not sure about it:
[imgzoom]http://tulevik.eu/om101/om101_eve_backside2.png[/imgzoom]

[Shane 'ProgZmax' Stevens]

Here's a quick edit to the NW version, mainly to give her a more feminine curve and add some hips.

[imgzoom]http://s27.postimg.org/3op0cdevj/om101_eve_backside2.png[/imgzoom]

[Cino]

Thanks!

I tried to include your edits without losing too much of readability and the style. It may not look as feminine as yours, but better than the earlier version for sure.
[imgzoom]http://tulevik.eu/om101/om101_eve_backside3.png[/imgzoom]
Also made a walkcycle:
[imgzoom]http://tulevik.eu/om101/om101_eve_NW_walkcycle.gif[/imgzoom]
Are there any glaring problems with it?

[xil]

No glaring problems in my opinion!

The only other tiny bit of adjustment could be the left leg going forward, I felt it was a tad too far, and the foot on the NW going forward I felt wouldn't be quite so vertical perhaps?

Trouble with the foot is you can't really replicate that movement in so little pixels in the other directions so I would probably leave it as is.

Here's a very rough example of both the bits I talked about just so you can see what I mean. No changes elsewhere, all looks good to me!

[imgzoom]http://www.bwdhosting.com/ags/om101_eve_NW_walkcycle_xil.gif[/imgzoom]

[Cino]

I see what you mean, so I tried several iterations with that in mind, but the leg somehow ended up looking twisted.

So I went back to the previous version and only changed the boots.
[imgzoom]http://tulevik.eu/om101/om101_eve_walkcycle3.gif[/imgzoom] [imgzoom]http://tulevik.eu/om101/om101_eve_NW_walk2.gif[/imgzoom]

[Cino]

A big thanks to everyone for taking the time to give your opinions, makeovers and advice. This helped me a lot and I'm pretty happy with the results.

Click the image for an ingame gif demonstrating the final animations and it's spinoffs:

[Adeel]

Oh, I love these types of game. Btw, will you be developing this game on AGS?

[Cino]

No, not this one. I'm developing it in Java instead. But our other game-in-works is being made with AGS though.

[Adeel]

Ah, okay. Make sure to let me know when this game is released.

[Cino]

Thanks for being interested!

You're more than welcome to sign up to our newsletter. I'll try to post any major updates on the game there.
Or you could keep an eye on our twitter or facebook page.

[Adeel]

Done!

Subscribed to your newsletter. Followed you on twitter and liked your Facebook page. If there's something left, let me know and I'll do that too.

[Cino]

Oh wow. This topic has totally derailed

But since you're asking so nicely... there's also IndieDB, GameJolt and TigSource.

[Shane 'ProgZmax' Stevens]

Looking good.  I like the clean style.

[Sslaxx]

Oh wow. This topic has totally derailed

But since you're asking so nicely... there's also IndieDB, GameJolt and TigSource.

Talked to the guys making Secluded? http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/forums/index.php?topic=49231.0

[Cino]

Looking good.  I like the clean style.

Thanks, means a lot!

Talked to the guys making Secluded? http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/forums/index.php?topic=49231.0

Haven't had the pleasure yet, but we do follow each other on twitter.

To draw all this to a close I wrote a feature article about how I'm using the graphics you guys helped to refine to combine random sprites in the game:
http://www.indiedb.com/games/office-management-101/features/random-isometric-character-generation

[straydogstrut]

To draw all this to a close I wrote a feature article about how I'm using the graphics you guys helped to refine to combine random sprites in the game:
http://www.indiedb.com/games/office-management-101/features/random-isometric-character-generation

Just saw your article on IndieDB myself and came back to post it here Really interesting approach.

Loving the graphics. Reminds me a lot of one of my all time favourites, Theme Hospital