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New Tileset Art discussion


LordJulian

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Well, someone has to start this somewhere, better to try even if it eventually might die out due to lack of interest. And supposely everyone likes new map types.

For the people that just happen to stumble by and notice this, this is what you have missed out so far:

Jungle

Cyt90E7.jpg

Tundra

attachment.php?attachmentid=4264&d=1402961127&thumb=1

Cute little Farm Bridge with water

attachment.php?attachmentid=1671&d=1352421147

I believe that the modders that had made thes tilesets have now abandoned their respective projects, which is a shame because the quality of their works are almost comparable or even better to the vanilla assets. I've also seen requests from people who wanted Asian and Middle-East Urban tileset(although I cant remember if there are terror sites there) So the modders have a similiar idea to re-ignite the fire, and so I'd decide to start something here and give it a shot, considering that more maps varieties are universally wanted by the community.

This is what I have made so far as a sample for the Asian Tileset:

AsianWallSample.jpg

It's not refined yet as I have to add 2D shadings and tweaks here and there to give it some 'lighting' properties.

Reference Pic

IMG_1459s.jpg

This was the reference for say... an Asian Temple site. My country has a more colonial outlook so I'm kinda out of ideas for other Asian tilesets(considering that I'm Asian lol) Any suggestions for suitable tiles for Xenonauts would be nice.

Ok, out of my shameless plug nonsense there, any modders with old tileset content or anyone that can find in links can just throw into the pot. I'll edit the post and paste on whatever content that we have in the thread. Any suggestions/ideas/content/feedback would be encouraged.

AsianWallSample.jpg

AsianWallSample.jpg.eeff141da13c948c3530

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Nice start with those wall tiles :)

Yeah, to me the question is, too, what actually to include in a tile-set for Asia (or ME).

Do you plan to have completely new buildings (at least outside walls and roof)? Because that would be quite ambitious I guess. Otoh, those typical buildings like the one in your pic are the 1st things that come to my mind when I think of Asian style. What else would be characteristic, if we leave out modern stuff that looks similar all over the world (office buildings, industry, etc.)?

BTW - are you actually drawing all this in PS (or similar) or do you model this stuff in 3d to render those tiles from there?

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@UfoTubby

3D Modelling into 2D. Funny enough that was how the process of making the 2.5D games back in the 90s as a graphically pretty option when polygonal games were at it's ugliest. You print the models in 3D, before lighting them in a way to make them fit the 2D backdrop.

I'm planning to add in temple walls, a temple building and rural homes for the cultural asian sites like China, Japan, Hong Kong, Mongolia etc. Usually most Asian countries are somewhat modernised at the 80s, but still have alot of buildings retaining their cultural backgrounds. So for instance in a Chinese rural home in China, you'd expect alot of homes in rural towns that still looked ancient, but are refurbished modern looking windows and such.

http://news.cultural-china.com/chinaWH/upload/heshun1.jpg

The images are quite inconsistent, this is what I can understand that's most coherent so far. Although it won't only be limited to rural areas. In most Asian towns there are always some cultural buildings mixed with modern flats and such.

So I think the possible maps could be:

Rural Suburbs (some houses, open rural area)

Rural Temple (lone temple in the middle of an Asian forest)

City Temple (temple in the middle of the city)

Town (a mix of cultural homes and modern flats)

Gardens(asian garden with walls around it)

Although I did read the mention of the hardcoded tilesets. I persume that it's still possible to create multiple custom tilesets that would vary depending on the region of the geoscape? And that there is only an unreleased tileset that we're going to shove all the content in since we cannot make new tilesets?

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Hm, the last questions would be crucial I guess - we'd need input from the coder's side to clarify this.

Personally - I can work in 3d too, but it can get quite time-consuming.

I'm wondering whether it would be worth to model a building, then render the whole thing in the game's viewing angle (seems to be typical iso-view) into one pic, then cut it into parts that are usable as tiles (could need several runs to render inner and outer parts separately, unless we're limiting ourselves to the outer appearance first)

Maybe that saves some work...dunno if this would work though or if there's something I'm missing here.

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Although I did read the mention of the hardcoded tilesets. I persume that it's still possible to create multiple custom tilesets that would vary depending on the region of the geoscape? And that there is only an unreleased tileset that we're going to shove all the content in since we cannot make new tilesets?

The game currently knows only several hardcoded tilesets, out of which only 'tundra' is unused, which is why every of the new tilesets uses it. If you want to create yet another tileset, make it as another (separate) tundra and do not mix them. After the game becomes extensible WRT tilesets, each of the different tilesets can be easily converted to a proper tileset matching its name.

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Eiweilsei that I'm still working on the Asian tiles, only problem that I foresee is that some architectual designs have to follow suit to the Xenonauts engine.

Questions I want to ask:

1. Say, there is 1x1 wall I want to make, but the size of the wall is larger than the tile size itself, I take it that Xenonauts won't crop the extra texture out and that the wall will overlap whatever it has placed over?

2. Are there multi-storey building props that arent 1x1? Like buildings without the dissected tiles, but just one big prop that is multi-storey?

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Eiweilsei that I'm still working on the Asian tiles, only problem that I foresee is that some architectual designs have to follow suit to the Xenonauts engine.

Questions I want to ask:

1. Say, there is 1x1 wall I want to make, but the size of the wall is larger than the tile size itself, I take it that Xenonauts won't crop the extra texture out and that the wall will overlap whatever it has placed over?

2. Are there multi-storey building props that arent 1x1? Like buildings without the dissected tiles, but just one big prop that is multi-storey?

The answer to 1 is complicated and depends on various things. I'd recommend using the existing wall tile props as a base in terms of size as they're already perfect for the game. (If nothing else, having overlap will create issues with corners). In fact, if you've not done so already I strongly recommend downloading the mapping tiles so you can see how they work (or look at the tile atlases, I guess).

Regarding 2, Max is right. There's a few larger props (e.g. cars, the farm irrigator props, etc.) but things like buildings are made up entirely from 1x1 wall sections.

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@Kabill & Max

Thanks for the advice guys.

Ok, here's an update to what I've did so far:

untitled.jpg

untitled2.jpg

Again, not 2D edited, so it looks kindof crap at the moment. But pointers would be nice.

So I now have a goal in mind to make a very primitive tileset first that would fuifill the first map in the Asian tileset: Rural Temple.

I should start with making Temple Walls, a few rural Asian Signs, some Asian Houses, An Asian Temple, Asian Signboard, Ancient Asian Tables and chairs, Asian Statues, Asian Pillars, Asian Barrels and Asian Shrine, based on what my understanding for say, a UFO has crashed into rural China that was still communistic and their village areas are still as undeveloped in the 80s.

I probably could mix-n-match a few other vanilla tiles to complement it and also to 80s-fy the place so as not to look like as if Xenonauts are time travellers. :P

Next is research. It would be appreciated if the community would help me in this research on making tilesets. Right now, I'm still filling out ideas of the list of things for the Asian/Urban Middle Easter/Jungle tileset. I'll need a researcher for various objects that can are symbolic to be identifiable as what they are in the game, and should be practical enough to fit within the game engine limits. If anyone can contribute to the ideas it will make my job easier to speed up the tileset creation process. I'll have to focus my time on making things rather than researching.

Also, if you guys feel the need to point out the things I need to correct, feel free to do so.

untitled.jpg

untitled2.jpg

untitled.jpg.399521641bea99fd6a0decd5b90

untitled2.jpg.d0a5c47570c2668b5a8d064968

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Nice work with the wall. :) Maybe should be judged finally in comparison to vanilla stuff to see if contrast or so matches? Just an idea of course.

BTW, would you think a house like this would fit? Could be less complex than in that pic, but esp. the stuff seen on the front could provide a nice touch (red window frames having some more traditional look for example)

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:China_Street,_Jan_06.JPG

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Nice work with the wall. :) Maybe should be judged finally in comparison to vanilla stuff to see if contrast or so matches? Just an idea of course.

BTW, would you think a house like this would fit? Could be less complex than in that pic, but esp. the stuff seen on the front could provide a nice touch (red window frames having some more traditional look for example)

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:China_Street,_Jan_06.JPG

I was thinking that it would stand out as something different on it's own if it has some contrast from other tilesets. But keep in mind that it's not yet 2D edited so it might look lacking at this time.

Well, technically, it would be hard to distinct what is oriental and what is not. And......you got that picture from my country, and it's called China Street -.-. Normally, that picture you took is from South East Asia, which most of the countries there were colonised by the Europeans, hence the hybrid style that has some traditional influence from it. Even China has some European townhouses back in the days of their 'modernisation' in 1911.

However, it's a more rare sight when it comes to other Asian counties like Taiwan, Japan, Mongolia. They tend to keep their traditional buildings even today. and since I'm trying to make this stand out than the other tilesets so it would definitely bring out it's 'eye-candy' value when compared to other tilesets.

And it's the 80s. Asia was still a developing modernisation of it's former cultural shell, so there are bound to have alot of Asian/Modern buildings combos that make it look as Asian as it is.

Someone would lament about boring ol' industrial and sickening dumb farm before whining about mundane Soviet town if they played Xenonauts to death. I intend to rocket-propel Asian/Urban ME/Jungle in between those map sets so they don't look like your grandfather's old housing collection.

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However, it's a more rare sight when it comes to other Asian counties like Taiwan, Japan, Mongolia. They tend to keep their traditional buildings even today. and since I'm trying to make this stand out than the other tilesets so it would definitely bring out it's 'eye-candy' value when compared to other tilesets.

And it's the 80s. Asia was still a developing modernisation of it's former cultural shell, so there are bound to have alot of Asian/Modern buildings combos that make it look as Asian as it is.

Someone would lament about boring ol' industrial and sickening dumb farm before whining about mundane Soviet town if they played Xenonauts to death. I intend to rocket-propel Asian/Urban ME/Jungle in between those map sets so they don't look like your grandfather's old housing collection.

The Forbidden City may give you some more ideas: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forbidden_City

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The Forbidden City may give you some more ideas: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forbidden_City

Yep, exactly what I was thinking. The forbidden city as a terror mission. :D But that might have to come for later. The forbidden city itself will be a huge undertaking of custom tilesets and I intend to save that for the last. But I'll look into it for ideas if I have the time. Thanks for pointing it out.

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...

Next is research. It would be appreciated if the community would help me in this research on making tilesets. Right now, I'm still filling out ideas of the list of things for the Asian/Urban Middle Easter/Jungle tileset. I'll need a researcher for various objects that can are symbolic to be identifiable as what they are in the game, and should be practical enough to fit within the game engine limits. If anyone can contribute to the ideas it will make my job easier to speed up the tileset creation process. I'll have to focus my time on making things rather than researching.

I am no asian expert in any way, but I felt compelled to help...

Here you can see a collection of street views of different asian cities that should give you a lot examples to choose from.

When using any one nation, for instance "Thai", and "street" in google for pictures you get lots of them:

Beijing, Tokyo, Kyoto, Kuala Lumpur and so on. I guess you get my drift here :).

If you can't remember all the different asian cities look here.

Though, I don't know if you can verify if those houses in the streets are from 1970-1980.

The only thing I have found that is typically 1980 (and it is labeled so is this here).

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Ok, I'll need something that can be consistently visualized, I'll need a more organised form of references and a map example with the map props needed in said map. Considering that for a tileset that I'll be making hundreds of different tiles, I believe the approach to filling up the tileset list is to identify the types of tiles needed for each Asian style map.

For E.G: Asian Temple Map

rural Asian Signs

Asian Temple walls

Asian Houses

Asian Temple

Asian Signboard

Ancient Asian Tables and chairs

Asian Statues

Asian Pillars

Asian Barrels

Asian Shrine

link to reference picture for each object, has to be clear.

This is what I have thought out so far for the first map to be done. Now, I'll need you guys to think of what props are need for these maps and the specific reference pictures that come along it, or if you have ideas for new maps

Rural Suburbs (some houses, open rural area)

City Temple (temple in the middle of the city)

Town (a mix of cultural homes and modern flats)

Gardens(asian garden with walls around it)

Rural Temple (lone temple in the middle of an Asian forest)

I can do all of this myself, but 3D modelling is sort of time consuming, and real life stuff has caught up with me, so I'll just concentrate on making them

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I think your ideas for maps sound good, but having pics/references would be critical indeed.

If you already found *some* pics/references for the list of the Asian Temple Map I could see to help creating the in-game gfx for this, but I'm afraid I'm not that big of an help for digging out stuff or determining what exactly should be included.

The prob for non-Asians like me is mostly that we can surely do pic searches, but often are not sure if what we get is useable for a consistent asian tileset, since we lack the cultural background.

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@UfoTubby

Ironically enough, I am Asian and I do have an understanding with the cultural background of Asian architecture. Only problem is that 3D modelling is a slog and I do not want to spend more time looking up for proper references. But I do believe with enough effort anyone can make a reasonable deduction on how should other architectural cultures look like. I dare say that I can make a cultural European tileset with enough research to make it believable,(aibeit not realistic).

If you can help me with this Asian Tileset I would gladly accept the help. Making just a single tile object is about an hour, if I have less things to do then certainly I will be more focused on the quality of the models, so delegating the work with you would be greatly appreciated.

But I believe that you're altering with 2D pixel-editing software rather than making them with 3D software?

Anyway, I need a question from everyone for this particular pic:

untitled3.jpg

I'm done with an arch for the Asian walls, and I'm pretty sure that Xenonauts will allow 2 x 1 arch objects that the roof will overlap over units. Question is, would the arch go translucent if there is a unit behind from the 2.5D camera view if the arch is more than 1 storey?

untitled3.jpg

untitled3.jpg.17b66a173e1063f710ae38cd22

Edited by LordJulian
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I can do 3d stuff too, but so far have not done any for Xenonauts, as the car mod I am doing for now was mostly based on existing gfx anyway. I plan to add some new cars using 3d models, then editing the resulting pics in 2d heavily to match the style of vanilla gfx.

In the end it depends on the task and the end result I want to achieve whether I'd use 2d or 3d.

Long story short, if you have a pic of some element you think I could try to add to this asian style set, pls. post it (or link to it) and I see whether I can pull it off...

Unfortunately, I don't know the answer to your other question regarding that arch's roof.

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I'm done with an arch for the Asian walls, and I'm pretty sure that Xenonauts will allow 2 x 1 arch objects that the roof will overlap over units. Question is, would the arch go translucent if there is a unit behind from the 2.5D camera view if the arch is more than 1 storey?

If understand you correctly, then I wouldn't be so sure. I'm not a mapper, but I think no object can be higher than one tile, and everything needs to be split by levels. The only exception I can think of are UFO hulls and those are treated specially.

So the arch part above would be a level higher and treated normally (that means it'd either not be visible in the normal case, or it would cover soldiers).

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If understand you correctly, then I wouldn't be so sure. I'm not a mapper, but I think no object can be higher than one tile, and everything needs to be split by levels. The only exception I can think of are UFO hulls and those are treated specially.

So the arch part above would be a level higher and treated normally (that means it'd either not be visible in the normal case, or it would cover soldiers).

Yeah, no prop can occupy more than one level. The *image* can (although it will come with layering issues, no doubt) but in game-mechanics terms it can't. So you'd need to split it across multiple spectres.

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Yeah, no prop can occupy more than one level. The *image* can (although it will come with layering issues, no doubt) but in game-mechanics terms it can't. So you'd need to split it across multiple spectres.

Damn, I thought that would give it more visual impact if it's allowed to be see-through as a stand-alone prop. If I'm going to split it there isn't the idea of a grand entrance but just split off pillars.

@UfoTubby

I'll see what I can dig up if I have the time,

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Damn, I thought that would give it more visual impact if it's allowed to be see-through as a stand-alone prop. If I'm going to split it there isn't the idea of a grand entrance but just split off pillars.

Bear in mind that there is the "display roof" option in game for people who want to use it. Whether it's worth your time for that or not I don't know, but I thought I'd mention anyway.

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