Unfortunately, Dwapook makes a good point. The shadow soul and the Gnu man are both CC-By-SA. Normally I like to license all of my work as CC-By/OGA-By, but these two are based on work by other artists, and the original pieces were CC-By-SA so I have no ability to relicense. I don't like to cause licensing trouble, especially for such a flattering set as this, but unfortunately those particular pieces would have to be removed from this submission and put into another one licensed under CC-By-SA. Clint Bellanger and Ben Potter (Cookiez) also deserve credit for their original designs on the shadow soul and Gnu man, respectively.
I don't know why I didn't notice this before. I do apologize for that.
The link similarity is less an issue of copyright and more one of trademark. We did get a very nice female Link sprite in the style of the Nes games submitted, but I had to flag it since we can't host art in the gallery which has trademark encumbrances--everything has got to be usable by devs without any fear of being prosecuted.
However, while the file download itself isn't available, the preview has the full spritesheet: http://opengameart.org/content/overhead-action-rpg-characters while we can't host it in its current form without some changes, for the purposes of your jam you can feel confident that the artist is fine with you using them. Obviously they're not in the style you're after, but it might be a starting point to develop what you're after.
I'm really sorry, I had to go ahead and mark this as having a licensing issue. I'll remove it once the trademark issue is sorted out. Again, I apologize that I have to do this--I like your work and I appreciate your generous licensing.
I'm afraid Capbros is right. I was hoping an admin would come by, but it looks like it won't happen. Anyway, the facts on this one are pretty straightforward. We don't want to expose game developers to legal risk by offering assets which might get them in trouble with trademark or copyright regulations. The best course of action would probably be to modify the character sprites to no longer resemble Link so closely (and any others that might be dangerously close if applicable--I'm no LoZ expert, though I played the heck out of Link's Awakening).
This looks like a significant improvement to me. Better proportions and overall look. Here's a quick edit that pokes at a few things:
You can go much bolder on the shading without making it less bright. You have a lot of space to convey detail there--if you treat it like it's being lit by a very bright light from directly in front of it (known as pillow shading) you don't get to convey form in the same way you can if you move the light source to be a big above. Banding is an issue that you'll pick up on as you pixel more, but it's probably best to be aware of it as early as possible. There's a great overview from Pixelation: http://www.pixel.schlet.net/#C2
I made his body a bit broader to better match his shoulder span and head size.
I removed a bit of the internal outlining on the sleeves, and also changed the belt around to match the perspective better (dark perfectly horizonal lines or boundaries like that will tend to flatten your image).
Anyway, there's more that can be done on it, and I'm sure you'll disagree with some of what I've done or want to take it in a different direciton. It's just a sample of one way you can push it and some of the technical stuff you can do.
Sorry to do this, but I had to flag a licensing issue. These are clearly a mixture of assets from Halflife 3 and Commander Keen 7: The Universe is Toast!
If I didn't like it, I would have already tagged it. Delaying tagging it because I like it is probably bad policy, but I like it enough that I'd much rather we sort it out without that. And anyway, I'm just a volunteer mod. But as undesired said (if perhaps a bit bluntly) the point of this site is to offer game art which is free of copyright and trademark encumbrances. The entire point is that this is art you can use with permission from all rightsholders with no legal issues, provided you follow the license as specified. Is that the case here? As submitted, I hate to say it but it isn't.
I doubt Nintendo would mind a game jam enough to officially notice it. But art here should be usable in any kind of project, including commerical ones. If someone used it in that context there's no way they wouldn't be cease-and-desisted, and rightfully so.
But I think there's enough original work here that it isn't unfixable by any means. (I assume that these are entirely by you, just based on the external concept work?) Is there any way you could edit the Link-like sprites to not be so explicit?
First: it's good to see people going into pixel art. It's a great medium and a whole lot of fun too. I'm answering your question a bit directly here--I really don't mean to discourage you, I just think you're not taking the easiest approach here.
One important factor here is that the original sprites are making simplifications which work well at a low resolution but do not at a high resolution. Look for instance at your interpretation of his hair; with no offense to you, it's clear that you're kind of just copying the forms without really understanding what the original artist was conveying, and it doesn't really work. Some study of anatomy and lighting would definitely be beneficial; you don't need to do anything as drastic as a professional artist would, but take some time to look at some pictures and do some real life observation. Take a look at things like head shape; your guy there has a very square forehead, not much like what you'll see in real life.
Lower res sprites also often cheat on the perspective--you can get away with it, and it's more important to look good and be readable than to be technically correct. That does not work quite as well at a higher resolution.
Animations also won't translate nearly as well, in part because the framecount is too low for a larger sprite. If you look at the LPC sprites I had to do 8 frames in the walking animation for it to look decent (I might possibly be able to get away with 6 now that I'm a bit better at animation but not less).
On an even more general note, higher resolution pixel art is also a lot harder and a lot more work, so it's much less suitable for a beginner. I'd really recommend starting smaller.
I can't say that I really agree with you, Surt. There is a big difference between a request and a demand. "Would you consider tweaking the licensing to deal with this weird issue so I can be 100% sure that I can use it in my game" is completely different from the more aggravating type of "I need this but all animated and in 32x32 resolution for my game, no pay but you can put it in your portfolio" 'request.' Even a straight up license-alteration request ("Any chance you'd be willing to CC-By this so I can use it in my project?) isn't unreasonable as long as you're polite about it. It's also not unfair to assume that people are unaware of OGA-By (unless they're a well-known FOSS creator or OGA regular like you). Frankly, the DRM clause of CC-By was not properly disclosed and hasn't been well known for long. And most artists really aren't aware of the intricacies of FOSS licensing issues.
Unfortunately, Dwapook makes a good point. The shadow soul and the Gnu man are both CC-By-SA. Normally I like to license all of my work as CC-By/OGA-By, but these two are based on work by other artists, and the original pieces were CC-By-SA so I have no ability to relicense. I don't like to cause licensing trouble, especially for such a flattering set as this, but unfortunately those particular pieces would have to be removed from this submission and put into another one licensed under CC-By-SA. Clint Bellanger and Ben Potter (Cookiez) also deserve credit for their original designs on the shadow soul and Gnu man, respectively.
I don't know why I didn't notice this before. I do apologize for that.
The link similarity is less an issue of copyright and more one of trademark. We did get a very nice female Link sprite in the style of the Nes games submitted, but I had to flag it since we can't host art in the gallery which has trademark encumbrances--everything has got to be usable by devs without any fear of being prosecuted.
However, while the file download itself isn't available, the preview has the full spritesheet: http://opengameart.org/content/overhead-action-rpg-characters while we can't host it in its current form without some changes, for the purposes of your jam you can feel confident that the artist is fine with you using them. Obviously they're not in the style you're after, but it might be a starting point to develop what you're after.
Hello again,
I'm really sorry, I had to go ahead and mark this as having a licensing issue. I'll remove it once the trademark issue is sorted out. Again, I apologize that I have to do this--I like your work and I appreciate your generous licensing.
I'm afraid Capbros is right. I was hoping an admin would come by, but it looks like it won't happen. Anyway, the facts on this one are pretty straightforward. We don't want to expose game developers to legal risk by offering assets which might get them in trouble with trademark or copyright regulations. The best course of action would probably be to modify the character sprites to no longer resemble Link so closely (and any others that might be dangerously close if applicable--I'm no LoZ expert, though I played the heck out of Link's Awakening).
This looks like a significant improvement to me. Better proportions and overall look. Here's a quick edit that pokes at a few things:
You can go much bolder on the shading without making it less bright. You have a lot of space to convey detail there--if you treat it like it's being lit by a very bright light from directly in front of it (known as pillow shading) you don't get to convey form in the same way you can if you move the light source to be a big above.
Banding is an issue that you'll pick up on as you pixel more, but it's probably best to be aware of it as early as possible. There's a great overview from Pixelation: http://www.pixel.schlet.net/#C2
I made his body a bit broader to better match his shoulder span and head size.
I removed a bit of the internal outlining on the sleeves, and also changed the belt around to match the perspective better (dark perfectly horizonal lines or boundaries like that will tend to flatten your image).
Anyway, there's more that can be done on it, and I'm sure you'll disagree with some of what I've done or want to take it in a different direciton. It's just a sample of one way you can push it and some of the technical stuff you can do.
Sorry to do this, but I had to flag a licensing issue. These are clearly a mixture of assets from Halflife 3 and Commander Keen 7: The Universe is Toast!
If I didn't like it, I would have already tagged it. Delaying tagging it because I like it is probably bad policy, but I like it enough that I'd much rather we sort it out without that. And anyway, I'm just a volunteer mod. But as undesired said (if perhaps a bit bluntly) the point of this site is to offer game art which is free of copyright and trademark encumbrances. The entire point is that this is art you can use with permission from all rightsholders with no legal issues, provided you follow the license as specified. Is that the case here? As submitted, I hate to say it but it isn't.
I doubt Nintendo would mind a game jam enough to officially notice it. But art here should be usable in any kind of project, including commerical ones. If someone used it in that context there's no way they wouldn't be cease-and-desisted, and rightfully so.
But I think there's enough original work here that it isn't unfixable by any means. (I assume that these are entirely by you, just based on the external concept work?) Is there any way you could edit the Link-like sprites to not be so explicit?
I suspect there is a potential for trademark issues here. I'm not going to tag it myself but it probably merits some further examination.
First: it's good to see people going into pixel art. It's a great medium and a whole lot of fun too. I'm answering your question a bit directly here--I really don't mean to discourage you, I just think you're not taking the easiest approach here.
One important factor here is that the original sprites are making simplifications which work well at a low resolution but do not at a high resolution. Look for instance at your interpretation of his hair; with no offense to you, it's clear that you're kind of just copying the forms without really understanding what the original artist was conveying, and it doesn't really work. Some study of anatomy and lighting would definitely be beneficial; you don't need to do anything as drastic as a professional artist would, but take some time to look at some pictures and do some real life observation. Take a look at things like head shape; your guy there has a very square forehead, not much like what you'll see in real life.
Lower res sprites also often cheat on the perspective--you can get away with it, and it's more important to look good and be readable than to be technically correct. That does not work quite as well at a higher resolution.
Animations also won't translate nearly as well, in part because the framecount is too low for a larger sprite. If you look at the LPC sprites I had to do 8 frames in the walking animation for it to look decent (I might possibly be able to get away with 6 now that I'm a bit better at animation but not less).
On an even more general note, higher resolution pixel art is also a lot harder and a lot more work, so it's much less suitable for a beginner. I'd really recommend starting smaller.
I can't say that I really agree with you, Surt. There is a big difference between a request and a demand. "Would you consider tweaking the licensing to deal with this weird issue so I can be 100% sure that I can use it in my game" is completely different from the more aggravating type of "I need this but all animated and in 32x32 resolution for my game, no pay but you can put it in your portfolio" 'request.' Even a straight up license-alteration request ("Any chance you'd be willing to CC-By this so I can use it in my project?) isn't unreasonable as long as you're polite about it. It's also not unfair to assume that people are unaware of OGA-By (unless they're a well-known FOSS creator or OGA regular like you). Frankly, the DRM clause of CC-By was not properly disclosed and hasn't been well known for long. And most artists really aren't aware of the intricacies of FOSS licensing issues.
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