Pixel Extravaganza
Dear Ludum Darerers,
Are you tired of programmer art? Don’t you hate making sprites? Well, here’s the Solution: Pixel Extravaganza! PEx is an application which creates EVERY possible sprite EVER possible with 4×4 Pixels! All you have to do is press SPACE when you see one you want! PEx will save 3 different sizes of the selected sprite and put it in the \sprites folder! :O If you want a completely different sprite, press ENTER to randomize all colours! If you think it’s going to slow or to fast just press the UP or DOWN arrow key to adjust the speed! Marvellous isn’t it?
Okay, the shouty-add part is over. Now a little more serious. I found Dr Petter’s SFXR which can be used to create any retro game sound you want. So I thought…Mmmm, can’t that be done with sprites too? Well, the answer is obviously no. Still, this is what I made and I wanted to share it just for the fun of it’s ridiculousness. Maybe it could be used to inspire graphix or ideas for a Mini-LD? But mostly it should be used to laugh at and then be forgotten again! ^^
Cheers,
~Igor
Haha, Nice.
Thanks! XD
Yay?!
I lack alleg42.dll, sadly.
alleg42.dll can be downloaded like any .dll =D
http://jadendreamer.wordpress.com/2008/03/18/alleg42dll/
Hooray! ^^
Well, it may be a good idea after all… Maybe I’ll try my hand at something similar.
Actually, it’d probably be best as a community thing, so here’s my proposal:
gfxr
You just need to expand the idea and identify rules for creating a useful sprite. It’s a lot like AI. Teach the computer how to draw a sprite (vector drawing instructions are the way to go for this). You do have to restrict it a bit in the way of perspective.
* First of all, 4×4 is too small. With the right rules, the sprite can be scaled however you want.
* Second, “sprite” is too generic. Consider a selection for ‘person’, ‘box’, or ‘tree’.
* Use this option to decide how to draw it. A person has a face, body, and limbs… A box seems easy… A tree has a green part and a brown part…
* Each type of object can have a set of colors defined by the user (e.g. For a person: skin, hair, body, arms, legs, shoes)
* Each drawn feature (head, etc.) should have specific parameters that can be adjusted (a la sfxr) and mutated.
* A tile-based perspective (combo of top and side) seems to have the most potential.
Anyone interested? Igor? Send me an email.
If I understand correctly, Petri (KlooniGames, Crayon Physics) has been experimenting with this sort of thing for creating Space Invader’esc art.
http://www.kloonigames.com/blog/
He was dropping some cool “art bombs” on his twitter during development.
Wow! It was nothing more than a stupid idea XD
But if anyone’s interesting in something more serious then that would of course be awesome! =D
I have to say I’m not a very good programmer (yet). I know a lot of AS (but flash kinda sucks…) I know some C++ (with Allegro) which I used for this and I’d love to work on something like you described, but I won’t work fast cause I’m not that skilled (yet).
If anyone else wants to help with this project, please say so! =D
I did however still find a use for PEx! =D I decided that it should be possible to use the sprites as tiles for a game. The game will (probably) be called World of Wallpaper (WoW XD) but has nothing to do with the actual WoW. The idea is that you are a person (Bod) in a world made out of Wallpaper. Because everything is made out of Wallpaper there’s no difference between walls and non-walls. To orient yourself in this world you gain different skills to alter the background, which will make the foreground stand out, so you can see the platforms. It won’t be a really big or prestigious game, but it WILL drive you INSANE! XD
Alright, here’s some basecode:
http://code.google.com/p/gfxr/
It’s in SDL with Sprig, of course. I haven’t used Allegro…
Wow! Awesome you started! =D
It’s a pity I have no clue on how to see what it does right now…
Hope other people will help with this project! ^^