What's up, RMers?

[Kain Nobel]

@yamina-chan : A choice box with a time limit? For XP? Rather like the idea, if some quiet time is granted to me I'll look into making the script. It's a mod to one of the interpreter methods, I think command_102 or something, is what you'll need.

Update: Proving difficult indeed. Looked through Interpreter and Window_Message, haven't figured out what angle to approach it at. You already have some of the code laid out that almost does the job? I could look at it and try to see what else can be done.

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Been busy with a bunch of graphics work, revising older pieces, mostly character face graphics (especially the leading ladies ;D) Assuming my avatar is the blonde hair, blue eye girl, that's the one I've had to do the most work with. Still kinda tweakin' it, getting closer to satisfied with the look. Might start the Hellraizer animations next. Procrastination. He's a big sprite, they always tend to be the most work. If I don't start him tonight, might detail the other tier 1 monsters, or start tier 2. Anything goes I suppose.

Update : Yeah, I did decide to start the 2nd tier of enemies after all!


There is going to be lots of rough work, will probably have a whole series of battlers in cycle 1 (drafting) before I actually apply detail. Not pictured with the scorpion is the fact that I've got a skeleton connecting all the legs to the central part underneath the body, and each limb and joint has their own layer so it can get individual attention in the shading and detailing stage. Here is an older but more detailed sprite from a year or so ago.



^The downfall of this particular battler is that, from the very first frame, the whole thing was completely fleshed out from the start. which makes it a pain in the ass to create new animation frames. Taking the much simpler approach I've been doing lately (and keeping layers for each limb) gives me the freedom to focus on motion without having to mentally stress about immediately fixing details for each frame as that can be done at a later stage.

With that said, even though I've not had much luck with the third dimension of graphic design, watching animation rigging tutorials has done wonders for my own personal techniques. The more and more I work at it, I've kept samples and notes on various build stages which I plan to one day organize into a proper style guide for 2D animated detailing. Still, need to get more comfortable with complex movement and anatomy before I go teaching/preaching these methods.

Also did upload some new music to soundcloud. Just clicking the top one ("Gang Lands") should auto-play them all. I've got nearly six hours of tunes now, can't be bothered to upload them all @_@





Other recent tracks are "Into the Void", "Midnight Hour", "Cyberkill" and some others.

Tomorrow (today o.o !!!) is another day, might keep it brief in IRC tonight so I don't lose momentum.

[yamina-chan]

That scorpion looks good =D
But I can see why it with the way you did it, it would be a pain to animate. Still looks good =)
And...code? What code? XD I have never been a scripter and I'll probably never be. If I understand a piece of code and am able to tweak it to my advantage. that's a rare achievement Xb
As such, my first go to is always trying to set something up via events. Not the most efficient way probably, but if I find something that works, it will most likely be usuable most of the makers. Allthough I think a scripted version would be more efficient.

[Kain Nobel]

Okay, slight update. Seems it took an embarrassingly long time to get snake movement down, still not sure what to think of it. Also created a new spider! Might add some kind of cacti monster since these are all desert dwellers, perhaps a big ugly lizard too. A bad ass animated chimera is in the plans, but gotta get at least six months more practice in before I even attempt that! Then again, anything goes, just glad that this much has been made.



Update : Big ugly lizard now added! Thinking for some crazy reason that this will probably be one of the easier sprites to animate, but actual shading and detail will be a pain in the ass.

While Belly of the Beast is going to remain faithful to the use of old RTP graphics for hero battlers, I do have a more ambitious project which requires fuck all new assets, so the human battler 'template' has been drafted. Will keep working at it until it (hopefully) becomes sexier and more diverse than the Kaizer variety.



Came across an old but neat idea from concept notes that could be neat to roll with...

Egg Monsters

Once in awhile, the player will encounter a wild egg, sometimes by itself or accompanied with a guardian or two. Each one varies in size, shape, texture or color, but the player should eventually get to recognize what is what. You can either steal the egg (use the Steal command as if you were stealing an item ;D), destroy it or leave it alone. Different actions for each egg have different consequences too, such as lowering encounter rating or immediately triggering dangerous reinforcements to come at you.

Lastly, while destroying an egg won't net you an item, the stolen ones can be eaten from the item menu for restoring health and boosting certain attributes. Matter of fact, there is one egg that is made of a super hard shell which cannot be eaten, it would be a "Key Item" egg. Finding some way to crack the damn near impenetrable exterior of the shell would probably neat you a new battle companion or something.

[Steel Beast 6Beets]

The boxer template looks pretty awesome. I particularly like the "put up your dukes" pose.

The desert baddies also look pretty nice. The snake's animation is good.

[JayRay]

I like how that's being setup. Gives me a few ideas for animation starts for DaVinci

[Kain Nobel]

Now the allosaur has idle and approach frames! My son requested it because apparently it's a monster in Half Life / Garry's Mod, so I rolled with the concept.




DerVVulfman says starting the Chimera next would actually be a good idea, so long as I first focus on making the base-body (which would be a giant lion, because of course it would.) No, I haven't started an animated chimera yet, but here is an old one I designed which the new one will be (loosely) based off of. This guy was the third major boss in the classic version of Echoside which I no longer have :(

[Yin]

That looks really good Kain! I'll be waiting to see what you do with that dinosaur! :)

[Kain Nobel]

Yin, you got me checking out MUGEN stuff now! I also notice you're using some of my desert resources, can you please update your intro credits on a future release? Thank you! :D

Now I've got the Ready, Approach (as well as Return) and Attack done. I've cleaned up most of the rough pixels but there are still minor things to be addressed.


Sick of the "Kermit the Frog" color scheme, but it will only be that way until each action frame is ready. Teeth, claws, scales, color application and all that good stuff will have to wait, but it will look less like a Muppet and more like a bad ass dinosaur once I'm done with it. Also, something tells me that some crazy humanoid somewhere is going to be breaking and riding one of these bad boys... just a hunch o.o

[Ahzoh]

Yin, you got me checking out MUGEN stuff now! I also notice you're using some of my desert resources, can you please update your intro credits on a future release? Thank you! :D

Now I've got the Ready, Approach (as well as Return) and Attack done. I've cleaned up most of the rough pixels but there are still minor things to be addressed.


Sick of the "Kermit the Frog" color scheme, but it will only be that way until each action frame is ready. Teeth, claws, scales, color application and all that good stuff will have to wait, but it will look less like a Muppet and more like a bad ass dinosaur once I'm done with it. Also, something tells me that some crazy humanoid somewhere is going to be breaking and riding one of these bad boys... just a hunch o.o

I find something really awkward about your dino's approach mmovements...

[KasperKalamity]

on the chimera- is the goat head just supposed to stick out of the lion's back like that? chimeras always look weird like that to me