Hi! Great job!
Hi! Great job!
Friday, January 1, 2010 - 18:52
Hi!
My name is Alexandre and I'm a Computer Science student.
Great job! I've been looking for a place like this for ages! In the past few years, I knew only a few websites with free graphics, most of them containing lots of broken links and small databases. The best of the few free graphics package for games I knew was the Spritelib GPL (Ari Feldman).
Open Game Art changes everything. It's a well made website, with a decent database and a lot of potential. It's nice, very nice!
It's great to join a community where developers and artists can meet and work together in order to make open source games.
Also, please take a look at the project I'm working on. We need artists to help us, and there's a demo available.
...and welcome aboard!
You've got a cool project there. The demo looks extremely solid. That said, OGA can't officially throw its weight behind your project, as it makes use of a copyrighted character.
Mind you, I realize you're planning on replacing the Sega art with original art, which is a good start, but as long as the main character is recognizeable as Sonic (even if you, say, make him green and creatively misspell his name), you're not on safe legal ground. If you're willing to rename your project and create original characters, there's a good chance we can officially offer you some assistance. If you'd rather not, you're still free to discuss your project on our forum, and even look for artists here -- it's just that, as it stands, it's outside of our official scope.
Anyway, we're glad to have you here. Stick around, and feel free to drop by our IRC channel too. :)
Bart
You're right, bart. We plan to change the characters and their names. One of our goals is that this game becomes available in the repositories of most popular Linux distributions. The only way we can achieve that is if this game becomes fully original (characters and art and music).
SuperTux is based on Super Mario. SuperTuxKart is similar to Mario Kart. These games use many concepts of their "parent" games, yet they are fully original. The same idea applies to this game: it's similar to Sonic the Hedgehog, but with our own different gameplay style. The only thing that is missing in this game is the "fully original" part, but that's why we're here requesting your help, people.
The characters will be replaced. What will they look like? I have no idea. We need people to assist us on that (I lack drawing skills). All I know is that they'll have similar skills compared to the original characters (running, flying, gliding, etc), plus some original abilities we can make up.
I also don't know how the final game will look like, but I already know the mechanics: there will be slopes, loopings, item boxes, shields, bonus stages, bosses, and of course, cooperative play.
We also have a small plot written here. ...and there's no Eggman.
It's the same idea of SuperTux, but applied to Sonic, plus some original features.
Hi,
I'm not a creative person, but your comparison to SuperTux, SuperTuxCart, ... gave me an idea you may like - or not :)
You could take tux as the main character and name your game something that makes ppl think of the sonic games, but with tux in the name, for example Tux the hedgedog (I know this won't do, just an example to show you what I mean).
Hope my toughts will activate some creative people here ;-)
This already has been discussed in this thread: http://opensnc.sourceforge.net/forum/viewtopic.php?id=72
According to our users,
"Using Tux and his friends would be a horrible idea. Inventing original characters, similar to what the Secret Maryo Chronicles did, would be a far better choice. The problem with using Tux and friends is that Tux is somewhat implying a horribly strong bias towards Linux, which you don't really want in a game, unless it is a tech demo of some kind."
Anyway, thank you for your comments, Pompei2 :)
Amazing project!
Are you still searching contributors for redesigning? How many artists are working on this and in which positions (lead, concept, pixel artist, 3D)? Is it possible to change the graphics of the game by hand (to try things out)?
Currently, no artists are working on the game. Our team is composed of one programmer, one musician and a few translators. We're still looking for artists.
You can change the graphics of the game by modifying the files located at the images/ folder. If you want to change the dimensions and/or the files of the sprites as well, you must update config/sprite.def accordingly (it's a simple text file).
Ok, nice! I'll give it a try.
So... Is anyone interested? This is a real project, with real people and real progress.
Stop by the #opengameart IRC channel on Freenode. There's a link to a web client in the upper right corner of the site. :)
Bart
Its pretty easy to change to sprites and tiles. Im interested in contributing to the project. But i've a daily job so i can only spend an hour or two max a day. Do you have a timescale?
You should also know that im a 3D artist (thats my job), although im creating tiny 2D renderings with varying style most of the time.
Do you found an artist already? I thought of making a ninja rabbit as the main character, takes some days tho.
I am pretty sure they don't mind you contributing! Lets see what you can do!
A ninja rabbit sound a bit too much like
1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jazz_Jackrabbit_%28video_game%29
2. Lugaru / Overgrowth
though :(
So how about a animal that isn't so overused? Maybe a Kiwi? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kiwi
Since that is a running bird it might fit well to the fast running game-play of sonic. For the other characters you can maye use other animals native to Newseeland (or Australia)? Or maybe just strange animals like a http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Platypus and a http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dodo
Edit: Or make it birds only, with a kiwi, a penguin (hey it doesn't have to look like tux) and a parrot?
Edit2: If you are rendering it from a 3D model please make sure to also release the mesh for later possible modifications!
--
http://freegamedev.net
Thank you for your opinion about that.
But if i use a kiwi i have two other problems, firstly Kirby was a kiwi - and he is much more remarkable than Jazz or Lugaru, and secondly a kiwi has not much details to play with - which makes it rather hard (for me) to make it interesting. I also find the Kirby character rather boring (not the game tho).
Though you are right about the rabbit and i know at least one more ninja rabbit in games. But the style and art can make the difference. And the abilities/moves in the Open Sonic game seem to fit perfectly for animal ninja characters. I already have pictures in mind else maybe i would not apply for this ;)
The 3D models and environments i create for this will be open and published here whether possible. However, if Alexandre already found a match i better help somewhere else.
Edit: I meant not Kirby but Tiki from "New Zealand Story" - though they are very similar...
Uhmm, never played New Zealand Story but after checking some pictures it seems really strange that that yellow "thing" is supposed to be a kiwi ;)
But never the less I am lookig forward to your Ninja Rabbit then! Any ideas on the side characters already?
--
http://freegamedev.net
Thanks! The other characters could also be rabbits, but im not sure about it now ...
Thank you all for your comments. I really enjoyed the rabbit idea :)
As we had discussed on the IRC, I've written a brief Art Specification Document:
http://opensnc.sourceforge.net/wiki/index.php/Art_Specification_Document
While this thread is great for brainstorming, we must create art in a more organized fashion. In this sense, the project needs someone who can be a Lead Artist. We will decentralize the work as much as possible. More information can be found at:
http://opensnc.sourceforge.net/forum/viewtopic.php?id=196
This is how we're organizing our team: http://opensnc.sourceforge.net/wiki/index.php/Work_Positions