Tuesday, April 21, 2009

Graphic Style to Undergo Further Refinement

Howdy everyone.
Thanks for the support. For the time being, I will definitely keep this project running.
I have been contemplating adjusting the graphical style of Ballad of the Wind Fish. At first, I really wanted a cross between Wind Waker and Ocarina of Time, but leaning more towards OoT's realism and more structurally sound look, but after examining Wind Fish, I've decided to try and lean a little bit more towards Wind Waker / Phantom Hourglass's exaggerated, wobbly stuff graphical style.

My reasoning for this is due to the Wind Fish's texture style, which is a hand drawn / coloured penciled look. In my opinion, the overally look of Wind Fish might jive better, and seem more fitting if I just exaggerated proportions a tiny bit. I will post screenshots tomorrow and see what y'alls think.

It will take a painstaking amount of time and adjusting beforeI find just the right balance between Wind Waker and Ocarina of Time graphical styles.

Also, I will be re-texturing Link tomorrow so his hair is a closer color to his standard yellow (since I based the model off only one game art), and I will 'try' to get his eyes to look more like OoT / TP.

I have been studying WW / Phantom Hourglass and Oracles of Seasons tonight, trying to think of a way to fine tune Wind Fish so it feels as close to a real Zelda game as possible. This is just my rant, but the Oracle games for the GBC aremost blatantly the black sheep of the Zelda series (the CD-i games DO NOT COUNT!!). The development team behind OoA and OoS obviously did not study Zelda as closely as they should have. The story-telling was completely out of style, the game features were painfully uncharacteristic to the Zelda series, and the overally structure and design made me feel like I was playing a bastardized fan game using Link's Awakening Graphics.

^ This is what happens when you hand a very specific series, such as Zelda, to a foreign game development team and expect them to get it all right.

The Oracle Effect, as I will dub the aforementioned "let's have a completely different team make our game and see what happens" is what I would like to avoid AT ALL COSTS. If there are any fans of the Silent Hill series, they might know what I mean when I say that we can also call this The Homecoming Effect.

On a lighter note, I will be modeling, animating and incorporating the first NPCs very soon possibly tomorrow.

Thanks for tuning in, and check back soon for further developments.

Jerrel

10 comments:

  1. Yay! The project lives on! Also, THANK YOU for paying attention to making the game as close to a real Zelda game as possible, instead of some other homebrew game makers who just program whatever the hell they want, use the Nintendo graphics, and call it a Zelda game.

    Excellent work so far; can't wait to see what lies in store for us!

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  2. You're attention to detail is greatly appreciated. Even though I prefer the OoT graphics over the cell shaded WW graphics, you probable know what is best for the game. Keep up the good work and thanks for the frequent updates!

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  3. Link actually looks really good the way he is, it's just the overworld that could use some tweaking. Right now he has a unique look that feels like he could be in an actual Zelda game while also adding a new flavor to the mix. My vote goes to leaving Link and overhauling the overworld.

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  4. This looks great--as simple as the graphics are, I think this is my favorite graphical style of all of the 3D games. It stays closest to Link's Awakening because it transfers over the playfulness in architecture/general design style. Keep up the good work.

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  5. If you permmit me to say this I think Link should be a little smaller, not as a child but smaller than that one you've made.

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  6. i think that most should stay as is, but some dungeons be made even darker, if you understand what i mean by that

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  7. Imust thank you for doing this, i played link´s awakening when i was a child and it´s awesome, go on with the proyect, thx for bringing back memories.
    For me one of the strongest Zelda storylines.
    Thx very much and keep up the great work!!!

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  8. I would strongly suggest that you don't make him look like TWW Link. TWW was for the most part a lighthearted game, while LA is like MM in the sense that they're the darkest games in the series.

    I actually like the current graphical style for Link. The overworld is bland, but that's merely because of the current textures. That's easily fixable. If you really want to change it, go for the OoT style.

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  9. Looking good mate but I have to say that I disagree with you about the Oracle series. While they were definitely departures from the "classic" Zelda style they were two of my favorite games behind Majora's Mask and Wind Waker. Seasons was better in my opinion but Ages was excellent as well. Not attacking your views or anything mind you, we Zelda fans are notorious for our dedication to certain iterations of the series but I just thought I'd throw in my two cents. Looking forward to the final release.

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  10. ^Agree

    I loved the Oracle Series, aswell alot of fans do. Different strokes for different folks I guess.

    And, yeah, the overworld needs some tweaks.

    kudos! you're doing an awesome job here

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