Stendhal is an open source 2-dimensional multiplayer online role-playing game. It is developed by the Arianne Project & licensed under the GNU General Public License (GPL) version 2.0.
A Short History: The Arianne project began in 1999. It was created by Miguel Angel Blanch Lardin, a high school computer sciences teacher in the city of Cueta on the north end of Africa. The project started with the goal to create an RPG for Linux, a genre that was extremely sparse on the platform at the time. Miguel eventually resigned from the lead developer role but stayed on as a member. He later created the Marauroa engine & implemented it into the project. Work then began on the Stendhal server & client, built using the engine. In March of 2010, Arianne was selected as SourceForge's Project of the Month. The project is currently headed by Hendrik Brummermann & has multiple facets:
- The Marauroa engine & multiple associated softwares, including Stendhal.
- Faiumoni e. V. - An association to support education in the area of Free Software.
For a more detailed history read here.
The Dilemma: Over the years, art assets from many different sources have been added to the game. Some were created specifically for Stendhal, while others were obtained from universal resource projects like the Charas Project. It was recently brought to light that many of the art assets added to the game were not licensed in such a way that is compatible with the GPL or open source software in general. Because of this, we have had to remove sprites & tilesets without yet having replacements. We have been working hard at creating & finding new compatible assets. But the list of missing files is still relatively long & we have yet to find & remove all incompatible tiles & sprites. So the list is growing as well.
How to Help Out:
- What We Need:
- Our growing list of missing graphics assets can be found on the Stendhal Wiki. Assets that are currently being worked on by various artists/developers will list their name in the "Assigned" column. If nobody is yet working on an asset, this column will usually be red. Finished assets will have "done" written in the "Status" column & will usually be marked green. Under the column labelled "Git" you will find a link to the previously used image, which could be used as a guide for creating the new asset.
- Graphics Style:
- Stendhal uses 2-dimensional orthogonal, top-down view graphics.
- Tiles are 32x32 pixels & maps are created with Tiled Map Editor.
- Sprites have 4 facing directions, & are ordered top to bottom; north, east, south, west. Each facing direction has three frames, & are generally ordered left to right; step1, idle, step2 (see the recently created minotaur sprite for an example).
- Most sprites are 48x64 pixels in dimension (single frame, 144x256 for entire sheet), but are not limited (as far as I understand). They can be just about any dimensions. But, a pixel ratio of 3:4 is commonly used, so that sprites do not appear distorted on the Stendhal web page. Looking over the list of creatures, you may notice that some of the images, such as the cobra & king cobra, appear stretched. That is because they were drawn with a different dimensions ratio. This page, however, seems to be the only thing affected & may be fixed in the future to support images of any ratio.
- Wiki pages:
- Special notes on human-like sprites:
- In the current release, most human sprites (players, NPC, & enemies) use artwork from the Charas Project sprite generator. However, I have opted to replace these (hopefully in the next release) with sprites based on the bases created by Cabbit & derivatives, including those by diamonddmgirl. If you would like to create a human/human-like sprite, I would suggest using these bases. It is not required however. There are sprites that I myself have added that were not based on these. Some examples are chaos_sorceror, a scaled version of one of Redshrike's RPG sprites, & chaos_lord, derived from Redshrike's Dark Soldier.
- Because Cabbit's bases & sprites are 24x32 pixels, they must be scaled up for use in Stendhal (unless there is a specific reason not to do so). The preferred method is to use the scale2x algorithm. The command line tool can be downloaded from the previously mentioned homepage or through your OS distribution's package manager if available. It is also available as a plugin for GIMP. The Arianne project has also released a Java program for automating scaling & background removal of sprites (intended for sprites obtained from Charas Project). It is somewhat dated & I personally have not used it. I recommend using the GIMP plugin.
- It is NOT required to use Cabbit's sprites for bases. I decided to base my work on them for a varity of reasons. But the project is happy to receive assets of many different sources. So long as it fits & looks decent in the game.
- Contacting Us:
- If you are interested in creating assets, or perhaps you already have something posted that you think might be useful, there are a few different ways to contact project developers: You can contact me directly here on OpenGameArt.org. The project also has IRC chat rooms available on the Freenode network. You can use an IRC client (I recommend HexChat) or Freenode's own webchat. The project's channels are #arianne (the main support & development channel) & #arianne-chat (off-topic channel). Please be patient if you attempt to contact us via chat. Project developers are limited & most have full-time jobs. So they are often unable to respond immediately. Also, check the chat logs for responses.
- Let us know which assets you want to work on. That way we can mark that asset as assigned on our list so that another won't begin work on the same thing.
- Licensing:
- All licenses supported by OGA are compatible. So you are free to upload any work here even if it is designed specifically for Stendhal. I would recommend doing so.
- Submitting Work Directly to the Project:
- If you do not want to submit your work to OpenGameArt.org (for whatever reasons that might be is beyond me) there are a few different options:
- SourceForge tickets: You can create a new ticket in the feature requests or patches categories. List any details in the description that might be needed such as which character/creature/tileset the asset belongs to. Either upload the artwork as an attachment or link to a page where it can be downloaded in the description.
- GitHub issues: Similarly, you can create a new issue on the GitHub project page to submit your work.
- GitHub pull request: If you are familiar with using Git, you can fork Stendhal's source code repository on GitHub, add your new assets to your fork, then create a new pull request to have your changes merged into the main repository (if you are unfamiliar with Git, GitHub also supports Subversion for repository access).
Which Assets from OpenGameArt.org Have Been Used: I have created a collection that list assets that have been added to Stendhal (may not be 100% accurate as it may not have been updated as assets have changed).
Compensation: Unfortunately, Arianne is unable to compensate monetarily for any contributions.
Associated sites & social media pages:
I apologize if I have made any mistakes in information or misrepresented Arianne or Faiumoni e. V. in any way, & did so unintentionally.
These are just a few of the animal/creature sprites that I am currently looking to replace:
Edit: The attached images have been finished.
Very interested in contributing to this. I've got tilesets in the LPC style for many of the things on this list, either original or reworked from other assets on this site. I'll try and prioritizing finishing things which could be of use.
One question: any particular reason you chose to go with Cabbit's bases rather than the rich set of LPC characters (since Cabbit's are not the size of your assets anyway)? Personally seems like an odd choice to standardize around a set of assets which will all need to be scaled up (and therefore lose their pixel art quality).
A good question. And it makes me realize that I should clarify something in the original post. It isn't required to use Cabbit's bases for creating sprites. That's just a personal choice that I went with because I was replacing many of the sprites myself. There have already been additions that are from a completely different source. One example is this old man sprite.
As to why I went with Cabbit's sprites & bases. Now that you've really made me think about it, I can narrow it down to this:
I agree with you about the resizing & losing quality. I would prefer crisper, cleaner images. And actually, when I first played Stendhal, I was almost turned off to it because I didn't like the look of the sprites. While the project does list specifications for creating assets, there aren't many active contributors. And I think there is pressure to get the assets replaced quickly or we may not be able to have a new release anytime soon. So we're not as worried about perfection (at least, that's how I feel about it). Touch-ups can always be done later.
I wasn't very active during the most recent release, but they got by using a placeholder image for sprites that had been removed. But the number of deleted images has probably more than doubled since then. And if we have a game where players, characters, & enemies all look like a bunch of floating sparkles, it will have an impact on gameplay quality (in my opinion) & players will lose interest.
So, with the urgency to replace the assets, & the fact that it was done with the previous sprite sets, scaling them for quick, dirty fixes is accepted. Personally, I'm not a fan of the scale2x look. But, it does make things quick & easy. And it does look better than other scaling methods.
I'd like to take Cabbit's bases, scale them, then clean them up to post here on OpenGameArt. I just haven't had much opportunity to do a lot of sprite work over the past few weeks.
About using the LPC resources, I actually suggested to the project developers a few years ago to switch to sprites based on them. But, it would have been a huge task with the limited number of members & there wasn't pressure to replace what we already had. So it just wasn't a priority at the time.
One of the main reasons I didn't go with LPC this round, I think, was that I thought those resources were more commonly used. I thought Cabbit's sprites would feel more unique. But it was also a question of amount of time spent on editing the sprites. Because the LPC sprites were arranged differently, I felt I would end up spending more time on re-ording the images.
I actually wish that I could have used more of the LPC farm animals. But by the time I got to it, those assets were already being worked on (or completed) by someond else. I did use your horses though.
If anyone does decide to use Cabbit's bases, it's not required of you to scale the images. If you just want to submit/upload the 24x32 spritesheets, I can scale them myself. But again, it's not required to use a specific source. Just as long as it looks decent in the game.
I am glad you found this forum post bluecarrot16. I knew that I had spoken with someone about creating assets for the project, but I didn't remember with whom or where. :)
I started reworking Cabbit's & diamonddmgirl's bases into a package for easier integration into Stendhal: https://opengameart.org/node/79237
I should also mention, if anyone is interested in grinding through Stendhal's resources to check for assets that are not GPL compatible & should be removed, that too would be very much appreciated. Even finding one single unusable asset & reporting it is helpful to us. And more eyes looking through them means fixing these licensing issues quicker.
Stendhal assets (GitHub):
Update: The Arianne Project released a new version of Stendhal on June 5. And now most of our sprites & tilesets have been replaced thanks to direct contributions from project members & assets made available here on OpenGameArt.org.
By my count, we still have 99 character/enemy sprites & 8 tilesets left to do. Thank you to everyone who has directly or indirectly contributed.
Just wanted to say this is awesome! OGA's stated purpose is the provide high quality art work for free/open source projects, so it's really cool to see the site doing just that!
https://withthelove.itch.io/
getting curious about what this stendahl game is actually about...