Hand-Drawn Games?

Has anybody made an entirely hand- drawn game with C2? I don't mean a game made with pixel graphics, but one that was actually drawn on paper or tablet and imported into C2. I'm thinking about doing this as a secondary project, and I was wondering if this is a common practice?

I'll probably end up using a tool like Spriter to help animate the sprites and give a dynamic feel to things like hair and clothing. What do you all think?

I've done one, you can check it out http://www.dakoogame.com or on Twitterhttps://twitter.com/DaKooDragon. trailer is pinned at the top of the page. I think they're awesome. But they are time consuming. Very rewarding to see the end result imo.

That's a good looking game there! It looks like something like I would want to make. Did you use Spriter or any tools like that?

I made pencil platformer, but i finished only one level:

http://alfateam.cal.pl/platformowka/

I started the project with individually drawn frames. All of the animations are done like that, then I convert then to spriter. this saves on memory. with the amount of animations needed for just DaKoo, it really makes a huge difference in memory. With the exception of the studio logo(which will be optimized) the entire game only uses 68 Mb!

Spriter is a must have with C2, they really work well together imo. Haven't tested it on Nintendo yet. But for Tablet and PC it's great.

hobibit

I like what I see. Sketch games are cool and can have a lot of personality! gj so far:)

hobibit

That is very cool! I've never seen anything made that way. I like it!

MelVin

I've been curious about the file size differences between exporting an animation in .png frames or exporting in a Spriter animation file. Is one more efficient for keeping a game's file size smaller than the other?

I made a hand drawn game along with my 5 year old for Ludum Dare and it was surprisingly easy to work with (http://www.kongregate.com/games/8bitThi ... are-34-jam). I scanned in the drawings and used gimp to cut them out, resize and add the simple animations. We are working on another much bigger game now and it is really fun watching drawings on paper turn into a playable video game.

spriter is a bunch of combined parts. they can have a very small file sizes, were as the png files can add up when all animations are added together(run, jump etc).

For png files, think 11 frames (for the slowest fluid movement) per animation. Then say each png is about .5 - 1 Mb well you get the difference can add up (6 -11 Mb per anim) if each animation needs to be loaded into memory for each level.

For spriter you just need to load the parts only. This means you can make the initial image larger and still save memory cause only they are loaded. the Anim is really just a set of cords and rotations, like any bone animation for 3d games.

Thirstyy

it very cool what you two have done:)

That's very interesting! So basically by using Spriter, C2 will save overall space by loading movement data from the Spriter files instead of image data?

LDC Studios, good topic!

all sprites of my game "jumpin around" (that is on scirra arcade) is hand drawn. there are not a lot of sprites, but it is something.

https://www.scirra.com/arcade/action-ga ... round-5606

I was thinking in a game ad like "no pixel art used", because I saw some games that say "excelent pixel art used" and other things related to pixel art.

hobibit, very funny your game. I liked the graphics.

MelVin, spriter is good, but I am still learning how to use it. Just saying <img src="{SMILIES_PATH}/icon_e_ugeek.gif" alt=":ugeek:" title="Uber Geek">

nemezes

A tag like "no pixel art used" does seem like something that could almost be seen as a draw in the market right now.

Not saying that I have any issues with pixel art in games. It's something I grew up with, so I can definitely appreciate it for its classical feel.

But there is a very very high volume of these types of games being made now too. It would be a breath of fresh air to see some more variety in our games' aesthetics. I mean I love the look of my pre-rendered graphics I use in my current project, but if all games were being developed like that it wouldn't really be all that special anymore. We should try stepping out of our comfort zones, whether it's pixel art or 3D graphics, and make something different from time to time. That's the only way we'll get better in our art as devs.

Does cloning a drawing with Photoshop count?

I know Aquaria has a lot of hand drawn images.

Another new one is Guns, Gore and Canoll. Game looks beautiful, has excellent sound effects and music. Gameplay is ok but nothing too special.

I'm sure the answer to that will vary from person to person. In my opinion, if you draw it by hand yourself then it counts.

That's very interesting! So basically by using Spriter, C2 will save overall space by loading movement data from the Spriter files instead of image data?

yes.

You can do the animations with template images so they can be set to a certain postions you have in your hand drawn image. This allows for "true" hand drawn style you mentioned. Spriter is really just a tool, you can do a lot or a little when it comes to complexity. You can reproduce any animation sequence in spriter, the advantage is the memory that you save. The less complicated the spriter anim, the less demanding it is on the CPU. But they can look identical, as long as you cover all the angle changes in the animation when breaking it into parts.

Also, in my experience, Spriter seems to be more fluid or smooth compared to animation frames.

I'm sure the answer to that will vary from person to person. In my opinion, if you draw it by hand yourself then it counts.

Because that's what I do with all of my Inkscape art. Being amateur at Inkscape, I can't really capture that "drawing" look though. The lines are way too smooth in Inkscape. I haven't tried other photoshops because can't afford them