Author Topic: Before Crisis Remake  (Read 38053 times)

obesebear

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Re: Before Crisis game
« Reply #25 on: 2020-05-25 16:06:18 »
Yeah, the original Sprite work leaves a lot to the imagination as well. I think it looks good, my only criticism may be to make it look a little more dirty or grungy.  That's the right size for it in game, it just looks a lot more clean than the rest of the backgrounds.  Maybe like a noise filter would do the trick.  I could also easily do that though if you just want to focus on what you're doing.  It won't take much to screenshot the rest of the sprites

Devina

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Re: Before Crisis game
« Reply #26 on: 2020-05-25 21:48:09 »
Sure, you can find a way to make grungier, just going to need some time on this sprite sheet so I can polish the animations.

Here's the running animation I have so far:



And here's what it would look like if you stopped running for a second, then kept going:


obesebear

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Re: Before Crisis game
« Reply #27 on: 2020-05-26 19:38:56 »
Looks good!  I'll keep the 4x4 frames, it shouldn't be hard to switch to an 8x4 in the future if you ever feel like smoothing them out.  What's the pixel size?

Wish I had some update to show, but I'm mostly just figuring out RPG maker and how to script events.  I basically just have a smoother beginning cutscene, but I'm learning how to move characters and not create indefinite loops.  Trying some experiments with a few things so the game will look like it should.  So far so good!

obesebear

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Re: Before Crisis game
« Reply #28 on: 2020-05-28 02:12:13 »
Come one, come all
A DECENT UPDATE!

Opening cinematic is done, as well as a very slight amount of gameplay.   I only just realized that I'm using a wider screen than the original games boxy 320x320, but I'm unsure if I'll change it or not.  Please comment on the video or here as to your opinion on the matter.  I really want this to be as close to a 1:1 recreation as possible, but that will greatly limit the screen size and show the game's age.
Once Devina finishes some sprites it will probably take a little work to get them in the game since I haven't had to mess with that plugin yet (nor have I tried to find a battle system).  But all of the event scripting and scrolling and movement is pretty much figured out now.  I could easily make this into a playable cutscene where you auto win all battles.

Moving forward updates should be happening a lot quicker.
« Last Edit: 2020-05-28 02:14:28 by obesebear »

Kuraudo.

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Re: Before Crisis game
« Reply #29 on: 2020-05-28 19:30:30 »
Fantastic idea, if that might be useful https://www.famitsu.com/news/202005/03197424.html

there's a cloud avatar pretty neat on the above link

obesebear

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Re: Before Crisis game
« Reply #30 on: 2020-05-29 00:21:12 »
Thanks! I actually already have all of the avatars and have them mostly resized to their original specs.

Devina

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Re: Before Crisis game
« Reply #31 on: 2020-05-29 11:02:19 »


Finally finished this sprite sheet, it'll be good for female characters in the future.
Once you've got it working in-game, I think it'd be a good idea for me to do Reno next to build a basic male base (since the men in the game should be a tiny bit taller, so you may need to do some pixel adjustments to get the proportions.

There really isn't a fixed pixel size I've come up with yet, but I think they should be scaled down by at least 50 percent.
I'm not sure if it's something RPG Maker automatically does on its own, or if it's necessary to do it beforehand (I can easily do that in Photoshop).

The running poses should go in a 12321 order, not a 123123 order.
Really eager to see what it'll look like in-game!

obesebear

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Re: Before Crisis game
« Reply #32 on: 2020-05-29 20:43:12 »
Dude, that's great.  It might take me a minute to find a good plugin for animations but I'll upload something as soon as I get it done

obesebear

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Re: Before Crisis game
« Reply #33 on: 2020-06-01 01:05:34 »
Haven't had a ton of time but I'm working on Cissnei now.   I'll send you the photoshop .psd for future use once I get it set, that way you'll be able to create and properly place the sprites within the image

obesebear

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Re: Before Crisis game
« Reply #34 on: 2020-06-01 02:34:37 »
EDIT:  You might also notice I've gone with the original box resolution instead of widescreen.   I'll try this out for a bit and see if I like it.

New sprite in action !
https://youtu.be/TaCeAW2Q1mI

Devina, here is the psd.  I'm not sure what you're using to place the sprites on the sheets, but I had to manually move them around so they weren't clipping into other animation frames https://www.mediafire.com/file/c3ayattv65qt4e5/Cissnei.psd/file  I also cant make it loop 12321, It has to go from beginning to end.  Well, it can go 123212321232, but on the upward and downward animations it looks weird because that middle frame she is actually looking left, so her face goes left left right left, left left right left.  So the 4th frame she should be made to look right

It could still be better optimized.  I don't know jack about sprites but these should be aligned to the bottom or center instead of the top.  And centering them within photoshop isn't ideal because when her arm is out, the center of the image is her armpit instead of her chest, so it looks like she's wobbling around.

Also, I shrank the image down from 1030px width (with the 5 columns) down to 500px to get her to the size you see in the video.  Probably still  needs to be slightly smaller, and maybe some noise added to fit in better with the background, but I wanted to get this done so you could see the fruits of your labors.

I've got a pretty full work week this week, so I won't be able to get too much done unfortunately.

Also, RichterW subscribed to the channel, so that's kind of cool
« Last Edit: 2020-06-01 02:37:57 by obesebear »

Devina

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Re: Before Crisis game
« Reply #35 on: 2020-06-01 14:40:17 »
I vastly prefer the wider screen and the wider field of view, it's way more immersive, imo. I know you want to be accurate to the original game, although I feel this is one of those things that should be dropped. Playing a narrow cellphone resolution on my widescreen TV makes me feel claustrophobic and wishes for something more. It also reminds me that this originates from a flip phone game and feels dated from 15 years ago. I think there are many times when being too purist is a bad thing, sort of like how some fans get hot and bothered over literally any change the FF7 remake had over the original ("how dare Aerith's dress is more of a white tone instead of a hot pink tone! Rawrrrr!").

The main reason why people would play our version instead of Richter's is basically for a visual novel (for now, unless we get skippable optional battles as you said), higher fidelity feel with some better graphics, so we're already sort of appealing to the "higher graphics" crowd anyway.

The sprite actually looks good! Which sort of shocks me a bit because I've never actually done anything like this before. And yeah, as you said, they're a liiiiitle big and maybe should be reduced about 80% in height. If you pause at 9 seconds in the video when Cissnei is standing by the window, I think the best height would be where the top of her head reaches the top of the window.

Do you know if there's a way to disable 8 directions for now? The swerve between 8-9 seconds bugs me, and 8 directions is more of a stretch goal for now. Doing all the sprites in the game for me is daunting enough, but something I can do. 8 directions of top of that makes me feel overloaded.

https://www.mediafire.com/view/pr7kw61aukgn372/CissneiEdit.psd/file

Here's an edited psd where the fourth sprites are flipped, so her running up/down animation should look more even.

For now, I think I'm going to skip Reno and do the Soldier/Avalanche guys next. Reno has a lot of unique animations (for example, he has an attacking sprite and unconscious-on-floor sprite) and he carries a rod behind his back. I don't want to betray quirks like that so stuff like that will take a bit of effort.

I know there's going to be times where we're both busy. I think ideally, we could try to release the final game before the end of the year. And of course, I don't want to bottleneck you, so you can add chibi sprites as placeholders like you've been doing. I can pump out a spritesheet about once a week, so by the end of the year, I'd have 25 sheets done at that rate which should be enough to cover the whole game or so.

obesebear

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Re: Before Crisis game
« Reply #36 on: 2020-06-01 17:48:25 »
I think I agree with keeping the widescreen. It's more work to do widescreen, but it's almost nothing to go back and change it to a smaller resolution after the fact.  You don't have to do 8 directions. It would maybe look cleaner, but there aren't many wide open places that you could really notice it, and the original game doesn't use them. A much better use of time would be adding frames to the 4 main directions, or just getting other characters done.  I was just commenting about it because the plugin I use to get 8 directional movement has an option for it if you wanted to.
As for sprite sheets, just do it however you want. As long as they are properly aligned within the sheet, it only takes me maybe 10 minutes to switch them out.  That includes if you want to add those other poses like answering the phone or fainting into the existing Sprite sheet. It doesn't take much time at all
I'll keep the eight directional movement, doesn't really matter if there are sprites to represent those diagonal movements. Though, I think I can change the character movements speed, so maybe we'll look a little better

obesebear

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Re: Before Crisis game
« Reply #37 on: 2020-06-03 20:28:41 »
So, I'm most of the way through chapter one. I've scripted everything up to the part where you go through the reactor entrance. The only thing that may need some touch-ups are the sprites when Devina finishes, and some background photo shopping. I'll also need to figure out the battle system. I'll likely also create a "story mode" item that instantly wins all battles. And leave someone else to make a well-rounded battle system.

 Should be done with chapter one this week. Then I'll probably get a full playthrough uploaded on YouTube of the first chapter once Davina gets a few more sprites done. From there it'll be just cranking out chapters two through five. And then doing an alpha release
« Last Edit: 2020-06-03 20:30:17 by obesebear »

Devina

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Re: Before Crisis game
« Reply #38 on: 2020-06-06 18:27:24 »
Sprites are coming along, might take a bit longer because I have to adjust for male proportions, here's a preview of an Avalanche member:



Like I said, I don't want to bottleneck you so if you want to do chapter 2 and beyond, you totally should.

Do you know if there's any body shots of Shears?
I might have to guess and create my own detail if there isn't...

obesebear

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Re: Before Crisis game
« Reply #39 on: 2020-06-06 21:58:54 »
Oh, don't worry.  I've been chugging along slowly but surely.  Clocked in 50 hours at work this week so I didn't get a lot done.  But I've pretty well figured out the mechanics of RPG maker, so the rest is just getting everything scripted in.

If you check the chapters folder, there should be some screenshots of Shears in the folders.  I know there are some of him facing sideways and up, but they are in game only. I don't think there's any concept art of him, but I'll look around

Devina

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Re: Before Crisis game
« Reply #40 on: 2020-06-07 20:26:34 »
Edit: Nvm, fixed my issue.

Thanks, that should help with my art direction.
« Last Edit: 2020-06-07 21:05:25 by Devina »

obesebear

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Re: Before Crisis game
« Reply #41 on: 2020-06-08 03:34:01 »
Digging the avatar by the way.  Where did you get that from? Don't think I've seen that artwork before unless you created it?

BIG NEWS!!
New vid!
https://youtu.be/3IZoirzymGk

Chapter 1 is done.  It still needs some tweaks here and there.  But the core of it is finished.  Well, excluding battles :P   This took a lot longer than I thought it would to finish out today.  Good news is RichterW contacted me on youtube and thinks he may have some assets backed up on DVD that he used for his game.   Depending on what he has, that may save weeks of time.  I'll be keeping my fingers crossed!

obesebear

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Re: Before Crisis Remake
« Reply #42 on: 2020-06-09 15:09:54 »
Less big news
A discord channel
https://discord.gg/C4arJpB

Going to go ahead and start looping all the music
« Last Edit: 2020-06-09 15:51:06 by obesebear »

Devina

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Re: Before Crisis Remake
« Reply #43 on: 2020-06-15 10:48:20 »
Just finished my basic Avalanche spritesheet:

https://www.mediafire.com/view/ag0vmck9cnljz3s/Avalanche.psd/file

I kinda skipped a little detail which I can always add later, I just want you to test it out first and see how it looks.
Once I know it looks fine, I'll continue making more male characters.

The video you posted looks really good and makes me feel optimistic about the project!

Do you need help fixing the backgrounds at 4:30 and so on?
If so, I can help out with that and making it look believable by copying and pasting textures over the grey blocks.

The battle system looks like it's off to a good start too. When you enter battles, you plan on adding the battle backgrounds, right?
Since the blurry in-game freeze frame looks strange.

I'll probably join the Discord later, I'm just a little lazy now to make a new account since my previous one got hacked.
I got my avatar online while looking for Cissnei art, so it's official art by Nomura. I wish I was that talented of an artist...

obesebear

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Re: Before Crisis Remake
« Reply #44 on: 2020-06-15 14:11:13 »
I'm leaving the backgrounds for now in hopes that someone else will want to join in and help.  Like you said it's mostly just copy and pasting over the existing texture.

The battle system is just the default that comes with RPG Maker.  The only changes I've made to it are to allow one hit kills.  I've been busy with work and vacation this past week, so I haven't made really any progress since uploading the video, but this week I'll be able to get back to it and work on chapter 2.

Kuraudo.

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Re: Before Crisis Remake
« Reply #45 on: 2020-06-19 17:19:21 »
It's really an interesting project.

If in case anybody will be brave to translate this into another language or to upscale it, would be there any data uploaded to do so?

BTW there is an animated video as well, would that be reinstated as well?
« Last Edit: 2020-06-19 18:56:28 by Kuraudo. »

obesebear

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Re: Before Crisis Remake
« Reply #46 on: 2020-06-19 19:30:39 »
Yes, I've got the scripts and assets uploaded to a Google drive. All of it will be accessible to the public on release. 

Unfortunately with real life and the forum drama I haven't had much chance to work on it.  Next is to go through the script for the upcoming chapters so I don't  program all of that dialogue in and then have to go back and change it.  I should also probably take 5 minutes to go ahead and get those avalanche sprites in

The video is just a trailer for the game.  I don't believe it actually would play at any point. I've scoured the internet for as much information as I can find, but if someone knows something I don't by all means please let me know
« Last Edit: 2020-06-19 19:32:20 by obesebear »

Kuraudo.

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Re: Before Crisis Remake
« Reply #47 on: 2020-06-20 05:54:38 »
Cool.
I guess you are right, it's a trailer. However, it might be a nice addition as an intro before the new game screen.

Cheers

obesebear

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Re: Before Crisis Remake
« Reply #48 on: 2020-06-20 17:28:18 »
I know Richter used it in his game, and I guess you could be right, I just got sick of seeing it as I was going through his multiple times for inspiration. I guess anyone else playing would only see it once...

I don't know. For now it's not a priority. I need to get the basics down and completed first.

obesebear

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Re: Before Crisis Remake
« Reply #49 on: 2020-06-21 02:59:42 »
Chapter 2's script is marginally better, now.  Tomorrow is Father's day, but I'll try to find some time to begin getting it all into rpg maker.
If anyone's interested in improving the script... the more help the better