Tileset Practice (WIP)

[Jason]

Wow that looks amazingly good, however, on the left side of the cliff, I'd put a darker outline, because as you may be able to see on the right side of the screenshot, the rocks on the cliff seem like they're merging into each other and it's hard to define where the edge of the curve is.

Great work once again !

 

[TheInquisitor]

The cliffs look great. The tree, however, I'm still unconvinced by. (I'm sure I wrote more about the tree yesterday, maybe I dreamed it?). The texture of it looks more leafy than before, definitely, however, I just feel that there's a lack of contrast and perspective on the tree to make it seem rounded. The trunk doesn't look rounded enough at the bottom to give it the proper effect. You're not far away from a good result but I feel you could use the shading far more effectively. There's no harm in struggling on trees though, they're the hardest part of a set by a long shot.

I'm also unconvinced by the log and the grey rocks. These are inferior to the rest like the tree is. The rocks are suffering from the same problem as the tree but the log just seems to be a colour palette problem. It's inconsistently weakly shaded compared with the rest of the stuff on the tileset.

 

[coyotecraft]

The rocks looks great, I could cry.

I think you're putting too much detail into the tree compared to the stuff around it. If you use less of the highlight to break up space I think it'll look much better.
The shape of the tree bugs me, not all trees are symmetrical but if you're going to use the tree a lot then seeing the same tree that's symmetrical won't be as weird as seeing the same tree that's not.
It doesn't have to be completely symmetrical, but one side is bumpier then the other.

 

[piggman77]

I haven't gotten a chance (or rather I just didn't feel like it) to alter the tree or other objects yet. I started on the log, but then started on something else and forgot about it, so it's probably worse than it was before.

I made some new cliff pieces, however. A cliff variation, a cave entrance, and some stairs. And a waterfall!


The waterfall may move too slow for some; I'd recommend a script that increases auto-tile refresh rate.

I'm not going to post the new cliff pieces twice, look at the map or scroll up to the first post to see them.

Map Example:

Spoiler

 

[Fenris]

YOUR THAT GUY FROM DEVIANTART! =D

Hello again! ( SapphiraHiro )

 

[silver wind]

Wow, it's coming out great! I really like your waterfall.

 

[SteelReserve]

I think it's fantastic.
You should really keep going with this. :cheers:

 

[Twin Matrix]

This looks infinitely better than my stuff. (Except the tree, let's be honest. : d The swirly shape is very un-tree-like.)

 

[GothFreak]

It all looks quite good. Great Job Piggman77 :biggrin:

 

[The Panda]

This is quite nice, I actually have very few things to say, there are just a few things I'd like to comment on though.
Number one is the tree, no I'm not gonna complain about the swirlyness of it like everyone else, I actually like the swirly pattern! Sure it makes it look non-tree like but it adds a nice artistic sort of touch to the tileset :grin:

Right where I've circled the shading is off in such a way that it makes a sort of "line." You should look into making that small area a little smoother is all.
The only other things I see have already been mentioned. If I were you I would completely remake the rock, since it looks nothing like a rock, and I would shade the log to look like it fits with the other trees.

Overall nice work! We don't see many completely original tilesets like this and it's really nice to see one of such nice quality! I especially love the cliffs, they're beautifully done :thumb:
Any plans to make a template to fit this? If not I could probably do one that would work with this :smile:

 

[boon]

I've just got to point out, that in my opinion it's all a little dull/unsaturated and perhaps a bit flat looking. The shading doesn't really make objects pop out, but actually makes everything the same dullness and is a bit of a pain on the eye.

If you have GraphicsGale, acquire your entire palette to the palette tool and saturate them a bit, I feel it would make it look a lot better. Also, the tree is bugging me about how 2D it looks.

However, it's a great start to making tile-sets.

~Boon

 

[Makasu]

PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE update your first post with what you have so far. Its just way easier to manage and for users to look. But yeah the tree seems to be everyone's problem. Its also a bit tilted to the right imo. BUT! I feel that for this style which does look good a bigger outline would be necessary. Because the pallete is more light in tone darker outlines would surely make make things pop more. Great work so far though.

 

[piggman77]

Lots of new posts since I last replied to this! Sorry guys, I read everything but was holding off on a response until I had gotten some more work done on this.

@Makasu: It should be updated in the first post? I started doing that two updates ago. I haven't experimented with the darker/thinker outline yet, but I'll do that when I get a chance. I can see where that could make a big difference.

@Boon: I've started out my colors slightly unsaturated on purpose, I kind of wanted that sort of look to it. I was playing around with the saturation though, and I do think your right, it is overdone just slightly. I haven't uploaded this version here, but just upping the entire palette by +17, did make it sharper without being overwhelmingly bright. So I think that might be something I'll go with at some point, mostly though I'm not too concentrated on palette changes until near the end.

@The Panda: I'm glad you like the swirlyness of the tree, I like it too! (although it's not perfect). I worked on the tree some more, but it's still got some issues, even in the area that you pointed out. Hopefully though, it at least looks a little better.

I don't have any plans to make a template for this anytime soon. Maybe eventually I would, but that would be pretty far off. So, if you want to make a template that fits with this, go for it! I'd love to see what you come up with.

@GothFreak: Thanks! It's not too terrible for my first try.

@Twin Matrix: I like my swirly tree :sad: (actually, I'd like it if I could get it working right, it's still kind of flat)

@LucyBomb: Thanks, I'll try not to randomly drop work on it.

@Silver wind: Thanks, the waterfall took me a bit of time to figure out.
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Okay, and now here's the updates, which should be in the first post now as well:


Map Example:

Spoiler

The house isn't finished, there's still a ton of different additions and extra pieces I need to add so the house can be built into different shapes. I think I'm going to have to go up to four colors on the wood pieces associated with the house, I'm just having too much trouble shading stuff like the door without having four colors. (because of this, it looks to me at least, like some of the pieces don't really fit in with the style of the rest of the tileset). I also should have planned out the design better, as using all that space in the tileset for the windows is pretty laughable. Oh well, efficient use of the tileset isn't one of my major concerns.

Some more (small) amount of work was done on the tree, I remade the rock, remade the stumps, and tried again on the log. That log is giving me more trouble than it should, I'm just having trouble shading what is essentially just a rectangle, and making it match with the wood on the stumps. (I can't seem to find a good way to get the perspective shading, and the texture of wood, at the same time).

Okay, yeah...I think that's it. Long post is long.

 

[Perihelion]

Don't have time for an in-depth critique right now, but there is one thing I wanna point out. It looks like you're basically just remaking the RTP in your own style; the environment itself gave me that vibe before, but I'm getting it even stronger now with the house. If you're gonna do custom graphics, why not go all out? Why not make something that looks more than slightly different from every other RM game? Play around! Experiment with crazy architectural styles and things! Look at photos! Most especially, look at pixel art and tilesets and such besides the RTP! I feel like you're wasting an opportunity to innovate here.

 

[silver wind]

This is amazing, I don't know if I could pull of something like that. There are several things you can improve:
The purple roof has high contrast compared to the tile set.
The grass is a bit dull and pale, and doesn't fit the characters.
The tree/wood has too much detail.
I think adding a shadow below the rock/plants/flowers/house would dramatically improve them.

 

[piggman77]

Wow, it has been awhile since I updated this. Actually, it has been awhile since I even posted, time to turn lurking mode off. I've been devoting most of my free time to other things, but I've got some new stuff to share. Unfortunately, it's not going to be very organized, I've kind of just made a mishmash of all of the stuff I'm working on. So it's not formatted to be used yet.

Click for unorganized mess

Spoiler

Some Obvious palette issues. Though I am surprised how much I actualy like that purple dungeon set.

WIP House

Spoiler

Some Test Maps

Spoiler

There's some stuff in there that's not original, so I didn't add it in the tileset compilation above.

I should have more stuff coming soon, and some stuff that I just didn't bother uploading. I think I've officially decided to try and make the tilesets in my game 90% original, so expect to see some more.

The feedback thus far has been very helpful, although as you can see I haven't gotten a chance to fix everything. so thanks again for that!

 

[TheInquisitor]

I think this work is a classic example of trying to walk before you can crawl. You've got good potential, piggman and some of the word (providing it's not edits, I don't know) look more than promising, let the grass, the dirt and the cliffs. Then there are other bits that just seem significantly below in qualiy. Your houses don't match your cliffs in terms of brightness. They look very bright with a rather flimsy amount of contrast. You should try adding in more strength to the colours and making them a little darker. Also, they don't seem to have much shading on them. The flower boxes on the windows, for example, don't cast shadows and consequently don't have any depth to them. This applies to other things all over your tileset.

The trees that I mentioned before still need work. I don't think you followed through with my critique from before. You should make the darker colours darker - and I mean clearly visibly darker. You don't have to detail shadowed areas as much as bright areas so it shouldn't be too difficult.

Overall, I think you're biting off more than you can chew at the moment with this work. What you should focus on is doing far more simplified, ideally cartoony, work. This would help you completely understand the basics of where the light should go to flesh out a shape, understanding colours whilst also being easy enough to work with that it doesn't get out of your control. I urge you to do this and build yourself up steadily to a standard that can handle these sort of graphics.

What I see here is a lot of potential. Looking at quite a bit of the graphics here, you're better than many of the aspiring pixel artists here so don't get frustrated by my critical words. You just need to channel your efforts in a direction that I think would be most beneficial to you.

 

[Showkaizer]

Don't have time for an in-depth critique right now, but there is one thing I wanna point out. It looks like you're basically just remaking the RTP in your own style; the environment itself gave me that vibe before, but I'm getting it even stronger now with the house. If you're gonna do custom graphics, why not go all out? Why not make something that looks more than slightly different from every other RM game? Play around! Experiment with crazy architectural styles and things! Look at photos! Most especially, look at pixel art and tilesets and such besides the RTP! I feel like you're wasting an opportunity to innovate here.

I totally agree with this statement. Though it is a cut above a lot of the stuff that gets posted here. Though I must say I'm a bit iffy on his pastel palette everyone seems to be so fond of.

 

[Barchetta]

I must favorite this thread. I love what you're doing here but I have to agree with Inq here. You're definately showing some promise and I understand it's a work in progress so there is always room for improvement. I still think the grass is lacking in detail compared to everything else. I would really like to see some improvement in the grass and the water. The water still seems to be lacking something. Maybe you could add in some seaweed auto-tiles and stuff. Something that would flow with the river. Seeing as to how many character sprites out there for such things aren't made in regards to custom tilesets, it would be hard to find something by someone else that would fit your environment.

Anyway, Keep up the good work and I'll be watching this very closely =]

 

[piggman77]

@Barchetta

Hopefully the new grass tile looks better to you. The water tile itself is probably not going to change, though your seaweed idea is pretty good, maybe I'll make it as a character set or something.

@Showkaizer

The palette can definately use some work, I know that I liked it when I tried adjusting the grass and a few other pieces to be a bit brighter. However I'm going to stick to the pastel type look unless I decide it just isn't working. As far as much of this looking like remade RTP, I'm definately guilty of that.

@TheInquisitor

I realize I should probably be starting off with doing some simpler stuff, but I'm just more interested in spending my time working on this. Some of the pieces may be inconsistent in quality, but I can always just get rid of or spend some extra time on those pieces.

I'm pretty sure the houses that you are talking about are the ones that I scrapped, unless you're talking about the WIP one in my last post. I really need to clean up the first post to show the current tilesets. The tree of course has been an issue for me since I've made it, I have tried to fix it based on your advice, but I always end up messing it up even more. Its probably a case where I should just make a new tree If I really want to get it correct. There is an edit of it I'm posting in this update, but I don't care for how it looks when I put it with the rest of the tileset.

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Updates
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I will update the first post with the actual new tilesets and autotiles within the next couple days. For now, here's just the new stuff.


Updated grass tile. I had been putting it off because of the work needed to go through and add the change to the rest of the tileset pieces.

Map example with new tile:

Spoiler

New Pieces:

Some example maps:

Spoiler

And lastly, even though this isn't a tileset piece I'll throw this in here. It's meant to be a skeleton base, to match with the character sets. It still has some issues, as I'm sure the pixelers and anatomical experts will notice.