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View Full Version : Worms Renegade, Seeking Artists!


Mablak
3 Dec 2006, 09:04
Greetings fan arters, as you may have gathered, WR is seeking artists. Worms Renegade is a MMORPG in production, myself, Marc (aka Flamie), Mini, Wyvern and some others have been working on the game for about one year now, and finally most of the groundwork has been done. The game is going to be a full length RPG, and surely the biggest game coded in PHP. Although you simply click to move your worm around and there's no animation in-game thus far (though there shall be GIF cutscenes when we get to them), the art for this game is essential, and a huge undertaking.

The game isn't entirely related to the worms series, for example the worm designs are not that much like team17 worms. However, our intention is certainly to capture some of the wackiness of the worms series, the art is generally one part old school RPG, one part cartoon, and another part charming strangeness. To see what the game looks like, here are some screenshots of 2 towns so far:

http://img221.imageshack.us/img221/3049/screen1mc9.png (http://imageshack.us)
http://img221.imageshack.us/img221/1655/screen2ao4.png (http://imageshack.us)
http://img83.imageshack.us/img83/8376/screen3ja5.png (http://imageshack.us)
http://img152.imageshack.us/img152/7577/screen4hj1.png (http://imageshack.us)
http://img179.imageshack.us/img179/9277/screen5vr3.png (http://imageshack.us)

Basically, you begin in the aptly-named town of Startsville, selecting a worm from one of six races, simply named the Girl, Fat, Regular, Evil, Crazy, or Emo race. Set nearly 100 years after Armageddon crippled the worms population, you will progress through a bizarre, hilarious and mysterious journey throughout Lumbria (the worms world), and in traditional RPG style you will fight many enemies along the way using a slew of weaponry and items.

There are numerous different sections of the game for an artist to focus on, and we certainly need artists in every category to make the production faster. First the map aspect of the game is pretty important, it would include creating textures and outlines of cities, areas, towns, etc. Separately but similarly would be object design, mapmaking becomes easier with a selection of objects to choose from, beds, houses, trees, etc, and we do appreciate reasonable detail for all objects. And next, we need clothing artists for the avatar system (pics below in a moment), which can also include facial expressions. Lastly we could use artists for both enemy design and NPC design (the non-player characters), these definitely require some innovation and creative thinking.

WR is seeking artists who above all else are inventive, the style of the game alone is crucial, it can create the atmosphere for every aspect of it. As for the range of skill that we're looking for, hopefully you can draw almost anything needed without too much trouble, with shading and a bit of detail, and the medium you use isn't a big deal, MS Paint, Photoshop, it's not too consequential. And of course, we need you to be responsible, reliable, trustworthy, mature, and to really enjoy drawing. If any of this interests you fan artists, respond in this thread, PM me, add me to msn (amikn@hotmail.com), or even come to my house where you'll be treated to cookies. Don't worry about how time consuming this is, we encourage you to work only when you feel inspired, though trying to get some stuff done on a weekly basis is a good goal. The WR team so far has worked entirely in their free time, so there's not a huge time commitment here, we only ask that you do what you can. :]

Now, some more screenshots below!

Mablak
3 Dec 2006, 09:05
Here are some of the enemies created thus far, and screens of the fashion shop menu for 3 of the races.
http://www.wormsrenegade.com/worms/images/mablak/GirlAvatar1.PNG
http://www.wormsrenegade.com/worms/images/mablak/RegularAvatar1.PNG
http://www.wormsrenegade.com/worms/images/mablak/EmoAvatar1.PNG
http://www.wormsrenegade.com/worms/images/mablak/BunchOfEnemies.PNG

Plasma
3 Dec 2006, 11:12
Well, barely anyone new has come to this forum since artists for this game was last requested, so I have my doubts that you'll get any this time.

Mablak
3 Dec 2006, 11:14
Encouraging, but I wasn't aware there was ever a request made :)

Plasma
3 Dec 2006, 11:17
Encouraging, but I wasn't aware there was ever a request made :)
I think it was around half a year ago. I can't remember too good...

SupSuper
3 Dec 2006, 17:07
I think it was around half a year ago. I can't remember too good...It was for pixel artists for the city backgrounds and it was posted on Online Orgy, so it is different. :p

Cisken1
4 Dec 2006, 08:20
Hm, I'll be keeping my eyes on this!

Liketyspli
4 Dec 2006, 14:09
It all looks quite nice, but i think the worms look awfull, they look like weenies with blobs on em.

But pretty good job on the world. I'd be lacking experience to help you.

Mablak
4 Dec 2006, 22:34
They're not t17 worms, they're more like actual worms, the style is only partly cartoon or else the heads would be far more exaggerated. But hell, experience isn't that necessary. If you're at all interested maybe you can do a test-draw of an enemy, an item, a worm character of your own design, something like that, if it's pretty good and you want to, you can be part of the WR team. :)

Paul.Power
4 Dec 2006, 23:19
The graphics certainly seem to be improving - heck, the one with the trees in a park is awesome - but that first one still looks off. I think it's the way you have the café and hospital "visible sides" pointing in different directions. You need to work out where your vanishing point is there.

But still, good effort, and I like the sense of humour there.

Mablak
5 Dec 2006, 06:03
The perspective difference is intentional/ intended to change oddly (e.g. the entrance road goes from wide to narrow but then levels out), Startsville is probably going to be one of the weirder towns. If you move through it it probably looks less confusing, but as the first town I wanted to make it quaint, underdeveloped, offbeat, and uneven. The differing points of view in Startsville are one thing I must keep for the town to be charming! But at least that is noticed. :)

WormOfFire
5 Dec 2006, 15:41
I like pink sausages :rolleyes:

AndrewTaylor
5 Dec 2006, 15:58
The perspective difference is intentional/ intended to change oddly

Be that as it may, it doesn't look intentional. It just looks like you got it wrong -- or more accurately, like you drew each building seperately without considering how they would work together on one screen (which I believe to be the case, whatever you say).

That said, defective perspective images is nothing we can't criticze The Legend Of Zelda for, so don't be too put off (although Zelda's "perspective" was consistent throughout each level, throughout each game, and throughout the entire 2D series, whereas Startsville contains single buildings with at least two different perspectives in them, so it's not quite the same thing -- for reference, that is why Zelda's looks intentional and yours looks accidental).

But yes, it's looking a lot better than it was. Some of those later screens are very nice. Good luck with the rest of the project.

Mablak
6 Dec 2006, 03:39
Considering any grade schooler can draw shapes with proper perspective, I would think people would only focus on whether the image looks interesting! That is the only thing that matters and I accept any criticism regarding that :eek: For something normally as plain as a town map there are only so many things to tamper with, so I chose to change the perspective as I thought suited the road or exposed as much of the side of the buildings as I wanted. I'm confident most people will enjoy moving about startsville once they can traverse the whole map, but I'm guessing the first openly playable version of WR won't be available quite a while, unless perhaps we get more artists to speed it up.

Startsville as it is, expect more detail in the future!
http://img292.imageshack.us/img292/9742/startsvillesmallut6.png (http://imageshack.us)

Alien King
6 Dec 2006, 21:07
Considering any grade schooler can draw shapes with proper perspective, I would think people would only focus on whether the image looks interesting! That is the only thing that matters and I accept any criticism regarding that :eek:

Two things:

1. You're showing that you lack the drawing capability of a grade schooler.

2. People can be fooled, but not when very basic things are wrong. Basic perspective is important. Without it, images look crap. With a roughly accurate perspective, your images and backgrounds will become much better. Nobody wants to play a game with badly drawn and inconsistant backgrounds.

Also, instead of using accurate perspective, you could deliberatly use an incorrect perspective (like Zelda or Pokemon), that's deliberatly incorrect but is consistant.

The image needs to look interesting, but it also needs to look Right!
Right doesn't need to mean accurate.

Mablak
6 Dec 2006, 21:52
I disagree that anything has to look 'right' unless you're trying to draw something realistically. But regardless, I'll continually add more detail and surrounding features to the buildings that should thoroughly distract any perspective nitpickers from the foolish angles that haunt their dreams.

Did you ever play WA Alien King? I might be thinking of some other guy, alien elite.

Alien King
6 Dec 2006, 22:33
I disagree that anything has to look 'right' unless you're trying to draw something realistically. But regardless, I'll continually add more detail and surrounding features to the buildings that should thoroughly distract any perspective nitpickers from the foolish angles that haunt their dreams.

Did you ever play WA Alien King? I might be thinking of some other guy, alien elite.

My W:A name is AlienKing.

Looking 'right' does not neccessarily mean 'accurate'. Something can look right without being accurate. It just needs consistancy and some small other things.

If it looks wrong, (which things always do when they lack consistancy), then it will forever look wrong, no matter how much detail you throw in.

Mablak
7 Dec 2006, 02:43
Don't think I've ever played with you, but anyway, I'm open to making the perspective consistent, but for now I like the way it looks and have no qualms, but usually I am bugged by little things. If the perspective was completely consistent I would find the town a bit more bland, but I really don't think the perspective affects the general feel of the town. I'm guessing if anyone finds it too odd it won't be because of the perspective. And also, I don't consider something looking 'wrong' a valid criticism unless you're presumptuous about my intentions, looking too weird, too varied for its own good, or too inconsistent to be aesthetically pleasing to the human mind, being accustomed to shapes that agree with each other, I would think about, though the town is not nearly that extremely weird. But my motive is only to capture interest and sustain it, that is the only thing I've thought about for the art, mainly the enemy design, nothing is worth looking at for pleasure unless it is different and surprising.

As I've said though the town is underdeveloped and offbeat, I don't see why a normal perspective would suit that better as there shouldn't be much if anything geometric about it, and I wanted the town far from perfect. There is in fact so much 'wrong' with the town I'm not sure why some have only noticed the perspective is off, haha.

AndrewTaylor
7 Dec 2006, 22:51
Look, this is very, very simple. If you want to do deliberately cooky perspective then you have to make it clear that that is what you are doing. This is usually done by putting lines at ridiculous angles -- just far out enough from where they should be that they're strange to the eye, but near enough that the object's shape is clear. For a good effect the lines should be angled to fit with the general dynamic of the picture. It's a very fluid way of drawing, and it needs practice to make it work because you can't work out where a line should go from first principles, but it looks good if you can do it.

What you have done, though, is used a very rigid and precise projection for every building, but used a different one for each building, with the front face always being flat to the screen and the other faces jutting out at whatever angle they please. It really looks as though it's trying and failing to be a technically correct drawing. I don't know what you were going for, so I don't know really if you hit it. But I do know that it looks for all the world like you tried to do a precise and technical drawing, and got it wrong.

But none of this is important, because the simple fact of the matter is that there are graphics in there. That's good enough for the time being. Now you can go and build the game infrastructure, and get the missions or whatever you're having in place, and then, once you have a playable game, you can worry about improving the graphics.

Plasma
7 Dec 2006, 23:36
As I've said though the town is underdeveloped and offbeat, I don't see why a normal perspective would suit that better as there shouldn't be much if anything geometric about it, and I wanted the town far from perfect.
The problem with that is that perspectives depend on the universe, not the town; so it still looks extrememly wrong.
But as Andrew said, you can do something about that later. Just don't forget to come back to it!

farazparsa
9 Dec 2006, 06:48
I have to say, the game's design is pretty solid, but the worm sprites are bogging it down. Since this is graphics, I'm not going to mention the thing that i don't like about this...

_Kilburn
9 Dec 2006, 20:41
I made some sprites for a Worms game project on a calculator, maybe it can help. :p

Liketyspli
9 Dec 2006, 22:40
I made some sprites for a Worms game project on a calculator, maybe it can help. :p

Myes, it are nice sprites but you should take a look at the screenshots.

wormthingy
16 Dec 2006, 14:56
[QUOTE=Mablak;546889The game isn't entirely related to the worms series, for example the worm designs are not that much like team17 worms. However, our intention is certainly to capture some of the wackiness of the worms series, the art is generally one part old school RPG, one part cartoon, and another part charming strangeness. [/QUOTE]

just to remind that they arent making a worms fan game and thus I dont think they have need for sprites based on the worms by team 17.


I could give you a set of new health/energy spheres, they are renders though so I doubt it would fit in.

Liketyspli
16 Dec 2006, 17:23
Actually if it isnt a worms(TEAM17) fan game, what does it in the Fan art section of the TEAM17 forum? mhhh :rolleyes:

wormthingy
16 Dec 2006, 17:27
Actually if it isnt a worms(TEAM17) fan game, what does it in the Fan art section of the TEAM17 forum? mhhh :rolleyes:

looking for people that can draw worm-like creatures. :p

*idea*
I'm sure agent_luke can help you out, mablak. he uses the same colours as you use on your worms and his "worms" are kinda shaped the same way.

Error404
16 Dec 2006, 17:29
looking for people that can draw worm-like creatures. :p

*idea*
I'm sure agent_luke can help you out, mablak. he uses the same colours as you use on your worms and his "worms" are kinda shaped the same way.
It took 13 days for someone to finally make the link... congrats! :p

farazparsa
17 Dec 2006, 04:09
Too bad Agent_Luke only hangs out at the Games Discussion.

MtlAngelus
17 Dec 2006, 07:35
Wow the day where agent luke's "talent" is needed. That's a bad omen isn't it?
*hides under rock*

Slick
18 Dec 2006, 02:20
Mablark, could you draw me in ur worms style? but only give me one eye. I think it looks cool that way.:)

wormthingy
18 Dec 2006, 09:32
Too bad Agent_Luke only hangs out at the Games Discussion.

I dont really see how Agent_luke not being in the fanart section could be a bad thing :p

farazparsa
23 Dec 2006, 21:58
Mablark, could you draw me in ur worms style? but only give me one eye. I think it looks cool that way.:)
Like the emo worm?

Liketyspli
23 Dec 2006, 22:25
Like the emo worm?

No, Emos don't look cool, remember?

farazparsa
24 Dec 2006, 21:10
It's Slick, remember?