New Units Feedback Request

[Saber Cherry]

Hello!

I've been drawing some new units, and would appreciate some feedback (good or bad). Particularly things like brightness, relative size, unit border thickness, and coloration are important, because those can all be changed easily... also, I'm curious whether the "size" values seem appropriate for the physical size of the sprites.

You can download them here, or if that does not work, go here:
http://www.geocities.com/saber_marionette_cherry/Files/

Unzip it to the mod directory, enable the mod, start a game with it (replaces Ulm), and attack some indies to see the units in combat...

Thanks!

-Cherry

Do you want unflinching constructive critism? Or nerfwrapped constructive critism?

Either way. I think the Gators are too bright still. A more murky green I feel would be better, at least for the dorsal portion with the ridges. A good color to use might be the color of the "Cold Blooded" icon. Tone it down to a deeper yellow on the underbelly and they should look better.

I prefer the Gator with the long tail, but I don't see it as being a Size 3 Creature that big. I don't know if there is a way to scrunch him up a little, or maybe make him in a different position. And if you are making them "Gators" as in "Alligators" or Gators as in "Crocodiles" then you shouldn't show the teeth (in their base sprite) if they are gators, and if they are crocs, only show the upper row. Right now they remind me of Crocodile Smile's with their big grins.

The snakes still stick out their tongue when they are biting. I also don't know if the wiggly snake is the best bet. Is it supposed to be an overhead view of a snake 'sidewinding' or you didn't just want to draw a flat line? If so, maybe you can have them the classic "Snake wrapped in a pile with it's upper portion and head up and poised to strike" position.

Jellyfish seem about right, though you may want to add a little more white or transparency to them. Jellyfish when scubaing are hard to differentiate from the backdrop and only really with light to reflect back their membranes. On land they look like a dead pLastic bag almost.

The Bison ... well. I don't really want to go into it. Sufficied to say I thought "Yak" or "Bull" when I saw it, and not bison. Bison wern't longhorns by any means.

The Eels look pretty snazzy underwater. Though they look like they are smiling. The border might be a hair thick on them. I prefer the small one.

The Purple Slasher looks slightly askew with his mouth opening. Also I don't know if his 'eye' is right. Maybe you could remove it entirely.

The Magna Ant I like. I don't know if his pincers should be quite that big, maybe smaller?

[ February 04, 2004, 08:46: Message edited by: Zen ]

[Ragnarok-X]

no offense, but those units look uglish. They seem to be drawn with painbrush and they need more "subcolor" i.e. different kinds of green for the alligator etc.

I tried making new units on my own, too, BUT drawing is terribly hard unless you have existing work to edit.

[Argitoth]

The jellyfish are perfect right now, maybe more transparency if that's possible. The sea anemone is good except the view of the unit in battle is a bit tilted.

The rest don't look good next to dominions units, but you have a great start.

[ February 05, 2004, 01:43: Message edited by: Argitoth ]

[Saber Cherry]

A ranking from best to worst might be helpful, so I know which ones need improvements the most...

As for transparancy, I'm not really sure how to make an alpha layer, but I'll try it. Jellyfish (and the eel's fin) are supposed to be transparant.

[ February 04, 2004, 19:12: Message edited by: Saber Cherry ]

[void]

cant access to geocities(*slogan my ISP, cant connect to ulm.illwinter.com,and geo,and xhome,and...)

how big is it? mail to dancing_faery@hotmail when you are free...thanks ^^"

[Strages Sanctus]

best is jellyfish imho
then the anmone & snakes
then ants
then the others
least favourite is probably the bison from those that I looked at.

When it comes to animals and humans it is very hard since people know what they look like so perceive things more critically.

[Saber Cherry]

Hmmm... well, thanks for the feedback, everyone! I would really like Bison in the game, so maybe I'll redraw it, looking at a picture this time=) I know they have short horns, BTW, Zen=) I also want alligators in the game. I saw both of them at close range in the wild this year (no fences or anything) and they're quite intimidating... so I'll try again

You wanted the feedback! I think it's a valiant effort. I have absolutely no skill with using computer programs for artistic purposes (while with a brush I'm average) so you are surpassing me by quite a bit

I don't know the exact specification for pixels but I know it's small so it's hard to make anything look like anything remotely resembling what we know.

One suggestion about the Bison might make it the very dark, black Version who is shaggy with a barrel chest.

Maybe you could make the alligator have it's tail whipping around on it's back to shorten him up a little.

I have been trying to think of a good way to do a snake, but I'm coming up short. Maybe if you were making more than just a snake you could modify it, but just a snake is hard. If you want to keep the sidewinding aspect, try to make an underbelly and not so much of a waving aspect to them so they look like they are moving and not an ariel view.