Fangames and Sprites, What is your opinion about them?

[Sploder]

I almost always use custom graphics for my games. That's why none of them survive very long, too...

[Techokami]

Consistency is key. Namely, the reason why Black Squirrel's tilesets are actually bad to use is because there are no matching Mario or enemy graphics that exist for public use.

[Guinea]

I'm currently developping a new engine for a new game and I'm using recolored MPA sprites for Mario and custom tilesets.
Enemies from random games, but also recolored the same way as Mario.
You'll see what I mean when the time has come.

[xhedgehogx]

It sucks when people mix Sonic Advance sprites with Sonic Genesis sprites.

[Black Squirrel]

Practically every sprite can match if the user actually bothers to do something with them, but they don't, hence I practically had to enforce it on my last big tileset, and interestingly less people have used that one than my 2006 one, which may or may not be a good thing.

For example, all the SNES Mario titles bar the YI sprites with a thicker outline are compatible with each other. Easily. Granted even if they're left in their current state it's not an obvious clash, but give them a recolour and they might just look as though they're from the same game. Likewise most of them can convert down to NES limitations through quick recolouring, the problem is nobody ever does. You could stick a gameboy palette in there and they'd all match (although obviously some stuff like Yoshi's Island wouldn't physically work on GB hardware since it would probably exceed the amount of tiles that could be loaded at one time). It is not difficult.

Almost all of the custom Mario sprites at MFGG will work with each other without clashing if given a bit of a palette change. Okay some of them would look stupid due to heights and the spritework themselves but that's not a major concern. I can search for custom Mario sprites on MFGG and half of them would work with Super Mario World backgrounds (or my tileset). The problem is people are too lazy to recolour stuff in paint (unless of course they want to submit crappy sheets, but that's a different story). It's why custom sprite sheets should really come with a palette next to it. I find it easier working with handy palettes next to the sprite, so why bother getting rid of it later when it could benifit others as well?

If making a game is an easy job, you can't be making a good game.

[Xgoff]

i love seeing custom sprites in games, but unless the programmer has spriting skills and a ton of patience, it's practically impossible to juggle both programming/level design and graphics. hell, it can be hard enough just to stay motivated as it is

ripped graphics provide the benefit of already existing, so it's not hard to find a program to make those sprites ready to drop into a game without modification, which is great for programmers. not only is it easier, but it also takes much less time

a better way to handle this is to finish the game first, then replace all the graphics later (of course, this can be unbelievably tedious), but most people who finish a game want it released right now just so they don't have to worry about it anymore; they aren't as likely to take the time to do anything about the graphics

there's also the opposite of the above: get all the sprites you want, then start the game. of course, there's a chance you'll end up canning your game for some reason. most people don't want to waste their time getting the foundation for a game set up, then canning it.

you could avoid this by "hiring" someone to do the sprites, but good luck getting this to happen unless a lot of people are interested in your game, you're friends with the spriter, the spriter owes you something, it's a collaborative project etc.

the site does have a ton of custom sprites, but frankly, most of them aren't that great. the sprites that are decent are usually the ones you see in every fangame, and those being overused are just as bad as ripped sprites being overused. everybody wants their fangame to have unique graphics, but this is pretty much impossible since there's too many games and not enough spriting skill to go around

while custom sprites are great and everybody should be using them, like i said earlier, it's a lot easier to just use what's there, so you're always going to see "unoriginality" graphics-wise. not everybody gets the chance to team up, especially if their game has no hype behind it

same thing can be said about using music/sounds/etc

[Weston404]

ANY game with MPA or SPP sprites, I keep away.

[theKK]

I absolutely hate it when they clash of course, and I REALLY hate it, A: When they use completely unediteded SMB sprites and use nostalgia as a little cheat. and B: When theyu se Mario and Luigi Sprites for sidescrollers. THey're already overused in sprite comics, do we have to see them overused for games, too? (Luckily, they don't show up much)
Also, I gotta say, particle effects do NOT belong in Mario games. They clash and look really weird and distracting.
Seriously, we should see more Mario Bros. 2 sprites. They mix the best things about the SMB3 and SMW sprites.

This post has been edited by theKK on Dec 1 2007, 08:46 PM

[Mewizkuit]

I dont really care about the sprites. I hate it when people dislike your game just because the sprites suck *cough Mewizkuits Story cough*

This post has been edited by Mewizkuit on Dec 2 2007, 04:52 PM