Author Topic: For the Frog the Bell Tolls DX (WIP) (Read 125407 times)

MathUser2929 · « **Reply #60 on:** July 05, 2016, 07:55:32 am »

I'd definately go for brighter colors. Unless you want gritty and realistic.

VicVergil · « **Reply #61 on:** July 05, 2016, 03:32:11 pm »

Why not crop the original cover art and use that for the border (after heavy dithering, of course)?
TLOZ:LA DX did something similar with some concept art from the manual.

Spoiler:

But with this:

Scapetti · « **Reply #62 on:** July 05, 2016, 08:20:02 pm »

I also think brighter colours are better. I understand the want for smoother transitions but I don't think the colours should suffer for it. The box art shows it to be a bright, colourful and cartoony game and otherwise it's going to end up looking like Gears of War which is most definitely the wrong mood for the game. Personally I would like to see you sticking as close to the Link's Awakening palette as possible

toruzz · « **Reply #63 on:** July 06, 2016, 12:15:14 am »

Quote from: Scapetti on July 05, 2016, 08:20:02 pm

I also think brighter colours are better. I understand the want for smoother transitions but I don't think the colours should suffer for it. The box art shows it to be a bright, colourful and cartoony game and otherwise it's going to end up looking like Gears of War which is most definitely the wrong mood for the game. Personally I would like to see you sticking as close to the Link's Awakening palette as possible

That's pretty much what everybody is saying to me, so I suppose that's the only way to go. I've been exploring several ways to avoid the artifacts and keep the colors bright, and I think I've finally found a satisfactory solution.

I've been trying to use just one set of palettes per section and I've finally managed to do it properly by giving up to some colors and making small changes per screen to the base palette set - because you know, small changes can make huge differences. For example, if you pay attention to the wall's border you'll see that the bottom is brown and the top is black:

And you may think this is a stupid change, but this is how it looks if I switch the palettes:

So from now on I'm going to stick to a base palette per section and make some tweaks here and there.

Quote from: GHANMI on July 05, 2016, 03:32:11 pm

Why not crop the original cover art and use that for the border (after heavy dithering, of course)?
TLOZ:LA DX did something similar with some concept art from the manual.

Spoiler:

But with this:

I love the idea, but I think it would require an artist to redraw the background or to remove the characters in order to look good.

Zoinkity · « **Reply #64 on:** July 06, 2016, 08:37:05 am »

I like what you've been doing up to this point.
The upper of those two is definitely the better. Besides the "leading" edge of the wall being better defined by a softer brown, and the way that contrasts with the interior being the darker, pure black, switching the two has a massive impact on the shadows in the houses.

Bright colors are more important for the sprites than the enviroment honestly. Bright, pure colors can look heavy-handed or gaudy if applied everywhere. Contrast is more important than hue. Heavily contrasting pastels not only look nice on their own, but if the background is primarily pastel and foreground elements use richer colors they will stand out better in the end.

M-Tee · « **Reply #65 on:** July 08, 2016, 08:47:21 pm »

I'm honestly surprised that there's such opposition to the palette choices. The muted palette is what I find so very visually appealing about this project. Having a subtle palette has nothing to do with grit, realism or anything else alluded to by previous posters. These screenshots are all well-keyed in terms of both value and saturation.

Quite honestly, LoZ DX has an abhorrently garish palette, (possibly so to compensate for the GBC's weak lighting?) and I don't think anyone should want to follow that.

Midna · « **Reply #66 on:** July 08, 2016, 10:41:10 pm »

You're right, it shouldn't be too garish, but the official artwork uses bright cartoonish colors and I think it would be best if the in-game graphics reflect that to a degree. If the palette is too muted it makes it seem like the entire game is perpetually overcast, which makes the graphics visually uninteresting.

MathUser2929 · « **Reply #67 on:** July 09, 2016, 02:51:21 am »

Quote from: M-Tee on July 08, 2016, 08:47:21 pm

I'm honestly surprised that there's such opposition to the palette choices. The muted palette is what I find so very visually appealing about this project. Having a subtle palette has nothing to do with grit, realism or anything else alluded to by previous posters. These screenshots are all well-keyed in terms of both value and saturation.

Quite honestly, LoZ DX has an abhorrently garish palette, (possibly so to compensate for the GBC's weak lighting?) and I don't think anyone should want to follow that.

As long as he don't use yellow/white for the grass all is good.

FCandChill · « **Reply #68 on:** July 09, 2016, 04:00:45 am »

Comment removed because reasons...

toruzz · « **Reply #69 on:** July 09, 2016, 05:09:33 am »

Choosing the correct colors is proving to be really difficult, but keep in mind that there's nothing final yet. I wanted to experiment a bit and see how good can I make it, and that's why I've been constantly giving you concepts and implementing stuff. After the rewriting I've been a bit more ambitious and now I want to completely remove the artifacts. That's why I put the bright vs muted palette face to face - not for artistic reasons but for the technical limitations involved. Fortunately I solved that so I don't have to choose anymore.

As for now, I have to make the editing tools, fix a lot of things and implement a lot of code. The colors and the style will be discussed later, but I can tell you that I'll try to please as much people as possible.

BTW, I finally started with the palette editor. It's extremely rudimentary, but it's better than doing it manually:

Panzer88 · « **Reply #70 on:** July 12, 2016, 12:00:54 pm »

I prefer the muted colors, they suit the sprites more. There could always be two different patches .

You also have to consider what it will look like on a Gameboy player, gbc, gba gba so, GB micro, etc.

Satoshi_Matrix · « **Reply #71 on:** July 12, 2016, 12:43:15 pm »

Brighter Colors are probably better because they would feel more authentic to what a real GBC game would use since it wasn't backlit and I'm not sure about you guys, but I definitely want to play this on my GB Everdrive and my real GBC.

Panzer88 · « **Reply #72 on:** July 12, 2016, 12:59:37 pm »

I'm up for playing it on the Game Boy Player.

Scapetti · « **Reply #73 on:** July 12, 2016, 06:40:03 pm »

I think the character (NPC) sprites should have a black outline. I've said this before. But comparing these characters to the houses you can really see the problem. These characters should stand out. Perhaps it's just the grey that you should make black. If you look at Link's Awakening you can see that everything has a strong cartoony black outline with the exception of ground tiles. Basically anything interactive has strong blacks. It's a good way to tell the player what they can touch so I really think you should consider it from a gameplay perspective.

I'm still not sure why you don't just use the same palettes as Link's Awakening considering the game runs on the same engine. I think it would be cool to have that connection. But hey, it's up to you I guess

toruzz · « **Reply #74 on:** July 12, 2016, 09:20:00 pm »

Quote from: Scapetti on July 12, 2016, 06:40:03 pm

I think the character (NPC) sprites should have a black outline. I've said this before. But comparing these characters to the houses you can really see the problem. These characters should stand out. Perhaps it's just the grey that you should make black. If you look at Link's Awakening you can see that everything has a strong cartoony black outline with the exception of ground tiles. Basically anything interactive has strong blacks. It's a good way to tell the player what they can touch so I really think you should consider it from a gameplay perspective.

I'm still not sure why you don't just use the same palettes as Link's Awakening considering the game runs on the same engine. I think it would be cool to have that connection. But hey, it's up to you I guess

Okay guys, please stop with the Link's Awakening uses the same engine therefore you should use the same colors. The art direction is different in each game. For example, For the Frog the Bell Tolls uses a white outline on every sprite while Link's Awakening does not, so there are a lot of contrast problems that didn't exist on LA. And in my opinion it just doesn't look good:

I'm going to make the colors a bit brighter, but I don't want them to be as oversaturated as LA's.

Regarding the black outlines - I tried that at first, but there are contrast issues because of the dark doors. Maybe I'll make the doors greyer and use black outlines, we'll see.

Grimlock · « **Reply #75 on:** July 12, 2016, 10:11:41 pm »

I agree, the palette choice on the left looks very nice! The variation on the right looks obnoxiously vibrant. Your original palette concept is very easy on the eyes and just feels right.

Edit: I personally don't see the need for the black outlines....

MathUser2929 · « **Reply #76 on:** July 12, 2016, 11:13:47 pm »

Quote from: Grimlock on July 12, 2016, 10:11:41 pm

Edit: I personally don't see the need for the black outlines....

See what I mean? People want gritty and realistic. That's why the boring palette has so much support now.They wanna pretend it's a PS3 game in disguise.

ShadowOne333 · « **Reply #77 on:** July 12, 2016, 11:16:54 pm »

I sy the right image looks the best.
The left one is not appealing for a GBC game.
We need colour variety, not the lower portion of the colour palette only.

Made in China · « **Reply #78 on:** July 13, 2016, 12:07:17 am »

The image on the right does look best on modern screens, but keep in mind that this is a GB game - and the GB/GBC didn't have backlight. Sprites were made oversaturated to compensate for the general darkness of the screen.

This probably isn't going to matter much to most players, as playing it on the original GBC is probably not an option - but if you want to create an authentic-feeling GBC game, you might want to consider that.

John Enigma · « **Reply #79 on:** July 13, 2016, 12:51:27 am »

Yep.

The one on the right looks pretty and bright.