Messages

Thanks for the paint-overs! Seeing ProgZ's made me realize that she really needed a bob. Originally I had made a conscious decision not to add one to emulate the Double Dragon sprite, but I think it she really needed it. I guess I've kinda gotten away from the style of the reference, but for the better, I think. The final(?) result:

(x1) (x3)  reference: (x1) (x3)



Changes:
1. Redid some of the shading on her face.
2. Reversed the swing of her tie (again).
3. Added a bob to her step.

I decided not to change her skirt in frame 1. I experimented with SpacePirate's and ProgZ's edits, but I decided I liked the more dramatic motion I originally had. I liked the idea of varying the motion of her hair to give her upper body a sense of twisting, but again, I decided to stick with the more dramatic motion. Also, I left her back swing alone. I worked with ProgZ's edit, but it seemed like her arm kind of bent back on itself when I increased her back swing.

It seems a lot of tutorials talk about adding "floppiness" in the hands. But I don't know, when I walk my hands pretty much continue the line of my lower arm. Looking at ProgZ's edit does make me think I may need to lengthen her hands one pixel, but for now I left them.

It might behoove you to darken some of the outer pixels on her loose-socks, as they don't show up very well on lighter backgrounds.

Yeah, I see what you mean. I think I'll leave them for now, but I'll keep this in mind if I start running into problems once I start working the backgrounds (*shudder*).

Boy, I never thought it would be possible to spend so much time fussing over a couple pixels. All in the learning process I suppose. Anyway, time to get her fighting! I'm sure I'll be back for more help soon ....

... if she's furyou, she's more likely to wear a long skirt ...

No, she's a good girl, just trying to get her Hello Kitty bag back from yakuza!

While I'll admit they're entertaining to watch (at times), dramatically they're just train wrecks. The 3rd movie, with all of its "big moments" is the worst of the three, though it's really just the final gasp of a disappointing (and pointless) build up.

Let's do some quick numbers here:
Ep 1: pod-race scene - 30-45 minutes in length - relevance to plot: none
Ep 3: rescuing Palpatine from the robot guy - 60 minutes or so in length - relevance to plot: none
Ep 3: massacre of all the Jedi - 5-10 minute montage - relevance to plot: central

Really, Lucas should have started the new trilogy where the 3rd movie picks up. And Anakin's "turn to evil" ... forced much? There was nothing convicing, genuine, or tragic about it. He begame evil because, well, he needed to be evil by the 4th movie, right?

Some of my favorite laughable moments:

Moments after Anakin cuts off Samuel Jackson's arm allowing Palpatine to kill him:
Anakin: Oh no! What have I done! I guess I'm evil now! I'll do whatever you want, just save Padme!
Palpatine (who's randomly changing voice sounds like he's got an uber-loogie stuck in his throat): Uh, OK. Go kill all the children.
Anakin: On it!

After a ridiculous fight over lava, Obi-Wan has the high ground, and Anakin's thinking about jumping for it:
Obi-Wan: Don't try it!
Anakin: I'm better than you think!
*ZAP* Anakin's limbs go flying everywhere ....

After Yoda gives up fighting the Emperor:
Yoda: I failed. I guess I better go hide for a while.

After Anakin's still-smoking body has been "Vader-ized":
Anakin: Where's Padme?
Emperor: Looks like you killed her in your rage.
Anakin: Nooooo!

And on, and on .... And did anyone else get tired of seeing how fast they could progressively animate each CGI sword fights? Talk about boring.

But, to his credit, I guess Lucas accomplished what he set out to do. Making glitzy but empty movies that appealed to kids and allowed him to rake it in on the merchandizing.

Anyway, that's what I think. Apologies for the rant ....   :

Thanks for the suggestions everybody. I've fought and fought to give her upper body some motion. But ... well, I guess you'll just have to see:

(x1) (x3)

Changes from the original:
1. Made her collar a little smaller.
2. Gave her arm a back swing.
3. Redid some of the shading on her right leg.
4. v1: reversed the swing of her tie.
5. v2: Added upper body "motion."

Anyway, I'm note sure what I like better. The motion in v2 looks ok I guess, but her body kind of distorts itself. I don't know, this is about as good as I could get it after numerous attempts. Suggestions?

Anata hentai!

Chigau yo! 

Actually if you really wanted you could keep the big lip sprite, and when she gets beat up too much she gets a fat lip.

Heh, heh. Not a bad idea. I've thought about making a "beat-up" sprite, but I'll see how motivated I can stay. I'm having a hard enough time just making her look normal!

Instead of having her lips frozen into the kissing position, why not make the colour of them a little less....red? Make them more "skin-coloured".

Are you talking about going back to the "fat lip"? I think I've gotten it about as good as I can. I've experimented with different skin-tones on her lip, and nothing really looked right. Besides, would it be so horrible if she really was trying to give everyone a smooch?

Inca was just the name of the King, anyway, it would be like calling the British, the "Queens". 

I wonder if this was ever the case with the term "American." Obviously, everybody now takes it to mean "from the USA". But it seems like, technically, it should refer to anyone from North/South/Central America (much like "European" or "Asian"). I wonder if it ever meant that, or always just referred to the USA.

In five years laughter will be obsolete and officially replaced by the acronym "lol".

LOL! 

I'd like a jelly baby, thank you!

Looks good. Will you be simulating the spraying "shaving cream" effect when a Dalek dies? 

My only comment: the Doctor never really wore his hat that much, did he? It seems like he'd always crumple it up and stuff it in one of his pockets.

Wow. That screenshot of the town is amazing. In addition to all the other stuff you're going to provide, I don't suppose there's any chance you could put up some background tutorials?

Also, it seems like your web page for the game is down. What's up?

Anyway, good luck on finishing this. It looks really promising!

Kind of makes a joke out of the NBA and their so-called "World Champions." Of course, one might argue that the NBA was kind of a joke to begin with.

I wonder if this means we can get away with cutting down on some of their over-priced salaries?

It was just an example. Don't take it the wrong way.

Don't worry, no hard feelings! I guess the loss of Pluto has everyone on emotional edge. Poor, poor Pluto.Ã, 

Keep in mind, that the definition of a planet (or any other celestial body) will necessarily be arbitrary.

Which is exactly what all the hub-bub's about!Ã, 

I did a little reading on my own, and came across this article on Wikipedia about the definition of planets. It's a bit technical in parts, but I thought it was a good summary of all the issues, and it definitely shows that there's far from agreement on this issue. Traveler, unfortunately a lot smarter(?) people than you and I are having troubles resolving this.Ã, 

What Mr. Colossal said about the public is unfortunately true. Many people will see this reclassifying as an act of incompetence and this is magnified by the media.

I agree. I think the lesson here should be a little eye-opening to everyone. I tend to have faith that a global community of specialists (not all of whom are in agreement and will continue to work towards some resolution) tend to know what they're doing. But I think the media - perhaps in trying to simplify this for the general public - has mis-portrayed the whole issue.

The media has framed this as: Scientists think there are too many planets in our solar system. Since Pluto has a different orbit than the other planets (specfically, it overlaps with Neptune's), they've decided it's no longer a planet.

But anyone who does a little digging on their own (and how many people do that?) will discover that this doesn't appear to be the case at all. Pluto's orbit in relation to Neptune doesn't seem to have anything to do with this. Instead, it appears that new discoveries have placed Pluto in a field of objects of similar composition, some of which are bigger than Pluto itself. So, does this mean that Pluto is really a planet, or just another object in this field of stuff? Certainly a valid question in light of new evidence. This is a perfect model of how the scientific process is supposed to work.

In short: don't necessarily take for granted everything the press is trying to feed you!

What I care about is that now there is a clear, logical (and wonderfully simple) definition for what a planet is.

I'll agree that the new definition seems reasonable. I think the problem is (as I just discussed) that it hasn't been put into its correct context.

The internet is a great tool, but here we are arguing about (almost) nothing, which is usually the case in most forums. Heck the internet costs a lot of money to maintain, no? But here we are wasting it.

Nikolas, I think everyone respects your opinion that this isn't an important issue for average bubba. Heck, I'll wholeheartedly agree that whether we call Pluto a "planet" or "dwarf planet" has no impact on my life - but I do think it makes for an interesting discussion.

But I'm not sure how you can call this a waste of time/money? Especially in the context of a community that's focused on the discussion and creation of a genre of games that has been defunct for 15+ years. (I don't mean adventure games as a whole, but rather the low-res, 2D Sierra/Lucasfilm games that we specifically focus on). Hopefully you don't think this whole community is a waste of time?Ã, 

Hopefully you can see we're not really just talking about whether we call Pluto an apple or an orange. But we've gotten into the nature of the scientific process itself and the role/behavior of the media. I think these are certainly important issues to everybody!

I can tell you that the logic behind owning an original (true) artpiece (besides the obvious aesthetics) is that it can be a reference point in the art history, that was or that is to be. This is something exeptional (owning a piece of art history).

Is it possible to identify this "real time?" It seems like you could only define a reference point after-the-fact, based on how art evolves over time. I'm not sure you can ever justify paying a lot for new piece of art (especially at a street fair!). Although I guess what art is worth is a totally subjective decision, and also dependent on how much money you've got to burn.

I'm no expert, but from what little you've described, it sounds like you might have a rootkit on your system. I'd guess that there's actually another hidden folder somewhere else containing the program that's downloading to this folder that you've found.

Two things I'd try:
1) Open a command prompt and change to the parent directory containing '_'. Once there, type "del _", which will delete everything in the directory. Then type "rmdir _" which will delete the directory itself. Then you can see if it comes back.

2) Download Rootkit Revealer and see if it turns up anything. The output might be a little technical, but it's supposed to be able to find all the rootkits that are out there. If you're having problems deciphering the results, you can post your results to see if anyone else can make sense of it.

EDIT: Just out of curiosity, how did you end up finding this?

I'm starting to get the feeling that there's more to the story here than has been let on. Don't get me wrong, I'm not necessarily disagreeing with reclassifying Pluto, I'm just trying to understand the reasoning behind it. Traveler, you've provided the best reasons that I've seen so far.

But consider the news article that was originally linked to. It stated that the main impetus for the reclassification was to prevent having 50 planets in our solar system. But (as the article also states) if we're trying to describe the solar system "as it really is, not as we would like it to be," why would the number of planets in our solar system be any concern? Simply having too many planets seems like a bad reason, because than any distinction we make to keep the number down will be arbitrary. Discovering some new information or new understanding of our solar system that reveals some fundamental difference between Pluto and the rest of the planets seems like a good reason.

There also seems to be problem with the new definition. One of the requirements is for a planet to have "cleared its orbit of other objects," and Pluto is eliminated because it overlaps with Neptune. But doesn't the door swing both ways? Can't we say Neptune hasn't cleared Pluto from it's orbit, and therefore isn't a planet either? There must be a piece missing here.

Yeah, it does seem like a strange exercise .... Talk about arbitrary.

Nothing is arbitrary here.

I wasn't actually referring to the definitions themselves being arbitrary, but I may not have made that clear. My comment was referring to the fact that there are different definitions for planets and intersolar planets, with Wikipedia suggesting that there isn't even an agreed upon definition for intersolar planets. Functionally these definitions may be the same, but it implies to me that, realistically, we're approaching this from different angles.

Surely, it's reasonable to assume that whether we're talking about our own solar system or anyÃ, number of others, we're comparing apples with apples. Of all the uncountable number of solar systems in the galaxy, why should we assume ours is special, especially with how little we actually know? Let's get down to one definition and start trying to prove (or disprove) it.

I think you misunderstand it - no one is classifying celestial bodies based on their orbits. They're classified based on their mass ....

The problem with Pluto's orbit is that it crosses the ecliptic plane of the solar system ... which tells us that Pluto didn't form the same way.

This seems reasonable, and certainly points out something fundamentally different about Pluto from the rest of the planets. But I'm having a hard time seeing the connection to mass, or that this is the intention of the new definition. If this is the case, it would imply the following:
1. There's a relation between how big something is and its ability to wander through space (i.e. planets can't wander).
2. Pluto's orbit doesn't match the other planets', so it must have wandered in.

But if this is our intention - to define planets as something that was originally formed in the system in which it currently orbits - why not just make that the definition?

I went ahead and made a rough draft new gui ... .... Stop the negativity and start the creativity! ^_^

Does this signify a relaunching of the demo quest project?

I hope this isn't a dumb question, but is the source available somewhere? I guess a working version isn't around anymore. I might be willing to help out a bit, if I could see what I was getting myself into.

So, I was at an art fair yesterday. I thought there was a lot of good stuff, but I was a little surprised by the prices. There wasn't a painting under $1000, and there was quite a bit of stuff that was over $10,000. One piece that I really liked was over $13,000.

Then I stepped into a booth with some fantastic photographic stills, and his most expensive piece was $950 (most were between $400-$600). As I thought about it, it seemed to me that the creative process that he went through was no less impressive than that of a painter (or sculptor, metalworker, etc.), and I thought his photos were just as visually gripping and stimulating as any painting. I found it hard to justify paying 3-10 times more for something that I thought had equal artistic value.

I guess my thinking was, for a medium that seems to carry the stigma of being "inaccessible", or that people feel they "can't understand," it seems like pricing paintings in this price range just reinforces that notion. And for a profession that carries the "starving artist" stereotype (which I realize is just a stereotype), at those prices, I can't imagine they were in any hurry to sell their work.

Certainly I appreciate and recognize the hard-learned skill, natural talent, creative vision, and "practice, practice, practice" behind the work. But like any other skill/talent/profession, how much is it worth over the cost of raw materials?

I don't know, am I out of touch with the art world? Am I just a cheap bastard (which I've certainly been accused of in the past)? Was I just at the "wrong" art fair? I'm curious as to what other people think - assuming that anyone else cares! 

[source]

... if you actually go to the source rather than rely on watered down soundbites on news pages ...

Yeah, it does seem like a strange exercise. One thing that caught my attention is that this definition only applies to stuff in our solar system (since it explicity requires orbit around our Sun). This would imply that "planet"-like objects orbiting other stars have a different name, and are presumably described by a different definition. Indeed, Wikipedia describes them as "extrasolar planets" and their definition seems to depend on whether they're big enough to cause fusion (i.e. "they're not a star"). Talk about arbitrary.

It also seems strange that they're trying to classify these objects based on how they orbit the sun. It seems akin to classifing birds based on how they fly. I would think a more "scientific" method would be some physical critera that distinguishes planets from other objects. A quick search of Wikipedia would seem to indicate that all planets have a distinguishable core, as opposed to comets and asteriods which are basically rocks in space. Of course, this definition would seem to still leave out Pluto, but it seems like more solid reasoning to me than the fact that Pluto has a different orbit from the other planets.

What about Lucasfan and his Maniac Mansion remake and Zak McKracken sequel? He was shut down less than a year ago.

Says who?

Well, the web site says "Recent events have forced us to shut down our web appearance." I thought this was around the time other fan games were shut down. If he wasn't shut down, I guess I made a false assumption. My apologies. 

Previously to this, there was no scientific definition of the word "planet". That was the whole point of the exercise. According to the one they decided on, it's not one in the scientific sense, since they couldn't come up with a sane (i.e. not ridiculously gerrymandered) one that limited our solar system to the nine classical planets.

It sounds like they could have used the assistance of some of those people that negotiate athletes' salaries. I'm sure they could have come up with some sort of "Pluto clause" or something .... 

The article linked in the first post originally had a comment about "erasing" Pluto out of the textbooks. Makes you kind of wonder how this is done: will they in fact "erase" Pluto, or just add a blurb about it being "reclassified?" Makes you kind of wonder what's been "erased" in our textbooks before now ....

Mmmm ... strawberries ... *drool* 

I've seen United 93 (but not Snakes on a Plane (yet)). Really well done. It deserved to do much better than it did. There was a made-for-TV movie that was similar (Flight 93, I think), but I haven't seen that.

It seems a little hypocritical to me that people criticized United 93 for being too soon to revisit 9/11 (especially considering Flight 93 had already been on TV), but just a few months later World Trade Center is a box-office hit. But I guess that's another topic ....

In general I like the style and colors you're using here. But I think from a purely technical standpoint, you may want to put these into photoshop and look at how many colors you're using. It's looks like you're using an awful lot, and if you're going to use these in a game, I think you're going to want get her down to some defined color palette. (At least, that's what I keep reading!  ) You may want to do something along the lines of what Krysis was doing.

As for the problems with her looking like a man:
If you take a look at the face in your original drawing, it's curvy with soft/subtle features. You lost some of this as you "sprite-ized" it. You kind of fixed it in your last side-view version. But her face was completely flat, with a beaky nose, and square jaw. I'd suggest trying to get back to your orignal.

You may also want to check out her proportions. I might look at moving her waist a little higher and giving her longer legs - kind of hinting at her feminity. I'm not sure though. But your last side-view is a good improvement.

For the front view (and, actually, the side-view as well) the eyes need to be lower. They should line up with the top of the ear - right about 1/2 way between the top and bottom of her head. (There's plenty of information on the internet about human proportions if you need a reference - I've used them a lot myself!).

Also, people tend to lean "against" the load they're carried (to maintain their balance). The way she's leaning, the camera(?) kind of looks it should be on the other shoulder. Also, given it's just a camera, the lean looks a little exagerated.

I don't know, hopefully this helps!

Thanks for the complements everyone!

If you wanted to move the shoulders a bit as she walks, then that would generate a bit more upper body motion.

Yeah, I've been wrestling with how exactly to do this. I've been trying to notice how people move when they walk - and watch myself in the mirror. There's definitely some kind of motion going on, but it's kind of imperceptible (as least to me). I'm afraid if I put in an explicit counter-twist in her upper body, it will be too much. I guess I should just start trying things out ... 

... the way you have the position would suggest that the right leg would have her body shadow coming across it ...

I noticed specifically in frame 3 that I could use some shading where the legs cross over each other. But are you talking about mimicking the reference sprite, where the entire leg is in shadow?

You should lower the shoulders a lot. Now she looks like she's got a pole up in her arse. check out aussie's paintover and you'll see what I mean.

I'm afraid I'm not sure what you mean, unless you're referring to my original sprite. The current sprite has already incorporated suggestions from aussie's (and other's) paintover. Are you saying it needs to be changed some more?

I really like the sprites, but I do have some critic on the skirt: 
- It looks like it's about to fall off her hips. Is this intentional?
- The skirt is VERY small compared to other schoolskirts I ever saw...

It's kind of funny you mentioned this. After I made the sprite shorter, I was kind of wondering if the skirt looked like it was sitting a little high, since it's so close to her belly button. I guess I needn't worry! I was going for something a little sexy/suggestive, but I didn't think I had reached "falling off her hips."

I guess I have to confess membership in short skirt fanclub (along with Theeph!).  I've debated whether to lengthen it a pixel or two. I finally figured I'd just start animating her and lengthen it if necessary. But like I mentioned earlier, I don't mean to be off-putting to anyone. I guess you're saying I should lengthen it?