Just got a quick question, it’s quite hard to explain though, so I’ll try my best.
Basically, I want to create a 2D side-scroller like you would have got on SNES, Mega-Drive etc
This seems easy enough, I could do it in Blender no problem.
However, Im wanting to try and get the same pixelated graphics you used to see in SNES/ Megadrive games.
Im trying to learn Python at the moment, and the only way I can think of doing this would be to use spritesheets, which although I don’t know how to do yet, can learn.
So I have two questions please –
1.I presume you cannot create pixelated images in Blender?
2Presuming the answer to the above is no, how would I create these pixelated images to use on spritesheets. I cannot even see how you would do it in GIMP/ paint.net
I’ve made a pixely game before (however not in blender) but I am familiar with the workflow for getting animated sprites. Ask away!
Oh missed the reply… hmm… I don’t think any program uses sprite sheets… animated sprites are really a sequence of images, such as gifs or pngs whatever, the program then loads them in succession. I believe a sprite sheet is merely a visual layout so human’s can see all the individual frames.
hey mancity… I know this thread is old… but I realized that I gave you some very wrong information about sprite sheets. MANY programs use them.
I learned this when I was trying to figure how to use an animated texture in the BGE… oddly enough, you have to use a sprite sheet
To understand how they are interpreted by the BGE, check out this video from project apricot:
Its about creating an animated normal map, but the information later in the video is the relevant part.
I don’t understand you question “but how do I make them low rez?” I think that if 16x16, 32x32 etc. are already low rez. Please define what you mean by ‘low rez’
Well you are in luck because blender automatically blurs pixel art. You just scale (in gimp click no interpolation) to get the right amout of blurring by trial and error. You actually cant turn the blurring which halted a project I was working on.
In gimp if you want to create pixel art you use the pencil tool and a square brush. If you are a purist you turn on the grid and zoom in all the way, drawing with a 1 pixel wide brush
I might add that Blender is a 3D engine… not a 2D one. Of course, this doesn’t mean that you can’t make a 2D game on it… just that it’s not really optimized for something like that.
Gamemaker might be a better choice for a game like this.
it’s true that if you create a 2d minigame it’s going to be strange… with all the dll’s for the 3d engine, bigger in size then the actual game, but if you create a pack of 20 games, it’s another story!
as for the pixels thing, why not use planes lol. more polygons, but hey, you can move them around real time have fun with them
ah grasshopper, you forget we do not all use windows
Blender is actually the only drag and drop game maker for Linux that lets you create runtime games. Game editor runs on Linux but doesn’t let you make runtimes (grr…)
Hmm… funny that you say Genesis and Snes games were a little blurry, because I find pixel art to be incredibly sharp!
So here are two examples:
One is a screenshot from an RPG (I scaled it up - click the image) taken directly from an emulator (notice, despite the ability to see pixels, the image is very sharp)
And the second image is taken from a Mega Man game. This picture was taken from a television. Notice that due to the RF cable plugging into the TV, the image is blurry.
Which blurry do you mean?
Pixel art is inherently “low rez” (low resolution).
You can preserve the crisp pixels in Blender if you pull down the preferences window, in under “System and OpenGL” click the “Mipmaps” button so it is off. Suddenly, you have clean and clear pixel art!
I didn’t say that Blender couldn’t do them, it’s just not made for those kind of games. It’s perfectly capable of making them… you can use animated textured Sprites, set your camera to ortho mode, and limit your character’s movement along the x and z axis.
You just waste a lot of resources in all the 3d stuff that’s not being utilized. This isn’t going to be visible if your game is simple, but a 2d game on a 2d engine is going to run much faster than a 2d game on Blender.
In terms of other platforms… I’m currently working on learning Pygame, and it’s really fun! I’ve already made an asteroids clone after about 10ish hours of work/reading tutorials. Obviously this is programming, not the simplicity that logic-brick only users of Blender, but it makes you feel much more skilled as a game developer :p.
as far as i know
have fun with them
