Sprite help needed for the project: (UPDATED 04/20/13)

This thread is being put up because I am always in constant need of sprite help for the engine. I will be putting up any and all things that I need assistance with graphically in here. If anyone wants to help with anything listed below, please leave me a comment, and I will reply ASAP. This thread is ONLY for sprite help related things!

 

If you volunteer, please be serious about completing whatever it is you start on. I only say this because a LOT of people in the past have volunteered, but then all many come up with is 101 excuses why they never finish what they start; which doesn’t do anyone any good.

 

Please write me before attempting to make any sprites; this way I can let you know EXACTLY what I need and make things much quicker and easier for you. I know how hard making sprites can be, so this way I can let you know what I need in greater detail.

 

I appreciate any and all help that I get, and will gladly give you full credit for your work. Thanks.

 

Now on to the list (listed from newest to oldest). There are many more things that I can use help with besides these but here are a few of the older things I still need:

 

7/30/12

There is also an animation for one of Alucard’s critical arts that I need help with: a standing uppercut. This amazing animation was made by one of our own forum members here. Sadly I asked for a minor tweak to it almost 6 weeks ago, and haven’t heard back from the artist in a bit so I am forced to put it here.

 

For this one all I need is one or 2 frames added after frame 7 that are the same as it EXCEPT that his cape and hair are at rest and no longer still in motion. The last of the new frames will be where his animation stops for a short time after the move is done, BEFORE transitioning to the last 2 frames which put him back in idle stance.

 

Here is the current uppercut critical sprite sheet: http://i143.photobucket.com/albums/r160/Esco1979/alu_fist_crit2_strip9.png

 

Here is an actual animation of it; as you can see the issue is on the frame where it pauses the cape and hair are not at rest and look like they are frozen in mid air: http://i143.photobucket.com/albums/r160/Esco1979/alu_fist_crit2.gif

 

And here is the author’s original sheet; please note that sprites 8 and 9 on this sheet are NOT used in my animation above as the fist on them just does not stop in the right place. But since it shows the cape and hair transitoning to no longer being in motion I figured I would include them: http://i143.photobucket.com/albums/r160/Esco1979/uppercut-sheet.gif

 

As usual PM me if anyone wants to assist me. It would be greatly appreciated guys. 

 

 

7/27/12

1)I am in need of someone to redo the cyclops from Castlevania: Harmony of dissonance (his sprite sheet is found here: http://i143.photobucket.com/albums/r160/Esco1979/cyclops2.png ).

• He needs to have his colors tweaked slightly to be darker and fit better into SOTN. An example of one that was done already for Serios’ game that is pretty good can be found here, but I want to see if anyone can come up with something better: http://i143.photobucket.com/albums/r160/Esco1979/cyclops.png .   For this request, I recommend looking at the lesser demon’s colors, or the blue axe knights colors, as something close to either of them from SOTN would probably fit him very well (though I think something like lesser demon’s might work best). Both sets of sprites can be found here: http://www.spriters-resource.com/psx_ps2/cvsotn/index.html
• He needs to have his hammer edited out of all of his frames and made a separate single frame sprite; the shade of greenish silver used in the above pic works fine for it, but you can feel free to experiment some if you want.
• I am in need of several new animations to be done for him: a new one for when walking where he walks while upright, similar to in castlevania III. A video of this can be found here at the 5:00 mark (note that it doesn’t have to be this EXACT walk; the artist can be a bit creative here I just want him to walk upright and be tall enough that he cannot be cleared with a single jump): NES – Castlevania 3 – Mad Forest + Meeting Sypha Belnades
• I also need an animation for him where he throws his hammer straight up above him. This will probably be a fairly simple one.
• I need a new death animation for him; something where he drops his hammer, and holds his eye while falling to his knees. There is an animation somewhat like this found here near the bottom (though it is in major need of editing to fit into SOTN): http://i143.photobucket.com/albums/r160/Esco1979/CyclopsFinal3.png .  My intention is that when killed, his eye will burst in a bloody mess, and flames will begin spewing forth from it. So he then tries to hold it in pain, as he falls to his knees. Then he pulls his arms back out to his side as flames spew out of his mouth too, and the rest of him burns up. But I will program all that myself, I just need the animation for the cyclops
• Lastly, I would also like a short turning around animation, and one for when he does a hop backwards. These two animations can be found on the sheet I linked to above, but they are both in need of major work (the author did a great job, but it just doesn’t fit into SOTN as is and wasn’t originally drawn with that intention in mind).

Please note that the animations requested above can be as many or as few frames as you choose. As long as they look good I do not care. 

 

I am willing to offer a reasonable amount of pay for this above work (since it is SUCH a big request). Leave me a comment to volunteer please. If anyone has any questions or needs anything clarified, please feel free to leave me a comment as well.

The Castlevania: Symphony of the Night Hacked Blog – F.A.Q. & important information

Welcome to my blog for the Casltevania: SOTN – Hacked project. Seeing as how I seem to get asked the SAME questions, over and over again, I figured I would create this quick little FAQ to answer the most common ones about what my goal is with my project, as well as addressing many of the commonly asked questions about it.

Please be sure to read this before asking any questions because anyone who asks one of the questions that is located and answered in this faq, runs the risk of basically being ignored on here.

First some quick rules:

1. Do not put up more than one post in a row on any topic UNLESS the post is over 3 days old; if you have something extra to add please edit your old post rather than double posting. The first time this is done, I will merely delete the post. The second time you will be called out on it, the third time you get blocked. Please do not spam me; nice and simple.
   

2. Do not say things about me losing interest in the hack and dropping it, or the project getting shut down, blocked, taken over by aliens, etc. That is my problem not yours, and the negativity is not welcome.

3. Do not ask for updates or demos for the hack….. PERIOD! You will get them when everyone else does.

4. Do not try to add me on MSN, Yahoo, AIM, Facebook, Myspcace, etc. without speaking to me first. Unless you are assisting with the hack, or you are a personal friend to me I will not even consider doing so. You can communicate with me on here; that is what the blog is for. If you attempt to add me anywhere else and you do not fit into the criteria I mentioned above, you will be blocked on the spot without warning. Sorry if this sounds negative, but it is what it is.

The goal of the Castlevania: Symphony of the Night Hacked Engine:

1. To reproduce Castlevania: Symphony of the Night using Gamemaker

2. To add in FULL GAMES for Maria & Richter; equippables, relics, levels, and all.

3. To increase the difficulty of the original game in a way that is about the same as Castlevania III for the Nes; tweaking the game in a way that the player has to use all of his/her options to survive. and cannot just level grind to gain an edge. This also includes things like increasing the amount of enemies, better enemy placements, better enemy AI, etc.

4. To make the game a bit more linear. This is Castlevania; not world of wordcraft, or dragon quest, or diablo. If you want open exploration, go play an RPG.

5. To greatly balance all 3 characters, all attacks, and remove a lot of redundant trash! Some examples of this would be the tons of backtracking, trying to get one item to drop from an enemy for HOURS, having 40 (YES, there are this many for the base one) of the same sword animation with the only difference being a minor stat change, etc.

6. To help cut down how often the player has to go into the menu, and set the player’s weapons up so that more can be used at once and more often (who the hell wants to spend 30000 gold buying 10 shurikens that run out in the blink of an eye?)

7. To add in some new age and old school Castlevania surprises and tricks; things like hidden money items, enemies that drop in from above, locking rooms, etc.

8. To improve on the 2nd castle; anyone who thinks that the reverse castle ideas was a “creative” one on Konami’s part is WRONG! In actuality it was just a quick, and lazy way for Konami to increase the length of the game, and simultaneously minimize cost.

Now on to the questions:

1. I want to contribute: is there some way that I can assist with the hack?

   ANSWER: There absolutely is: I need people to rip sounds, put sprites into gamemaker, and I could always use anyone who has artistic skills, or is really good with gamemaker in general. I don’t really need coders (I am the only one who will be coding the game, since besides myself only the developers of the game have all of the extensive knowledge necessary to duplicate all of the stuff in SOTN) but if you have a lot of C++ coding skill you can contact me, and I am sure that there would be many things we could come up with together.

   If you want to contribute and are SERIOUS about it, feel free to send me a message here. Not to sound rude, because I appreciate any help that I get (I am actually a very gracious man) but if you volunteer and do not produce, you will no longer be asked for assistance. I have just had too many people offer to help, and then never even finish a single thing and just have excuses

2. How is this hack being made?

   ANSWER: Initially I was utilizing memhack to find and change things in ram for the PSX version of the game . I graduated to also making ASM changes, and changing things directly in the ISO file from there. However, after over 4 years of working on the thing, it had become apparent that I wasn’t making much ground and that it could take YEARS before the hack could be done.

   This was obviously unacceptable; so I began searching for alternatives and found one: recreating the game in gamemaker. This would not only make it possible for me to do WHATEVER I want, but it would also speed things up enormously, greatly improve compatibility and use less resources.

3. But Esco, I thought gamemaker was too limited to do a game like this?

   ANSWER: absolutle rubbish; it has joystick support, can do 3d models, has much butter particle control, as well as better collision possibilities, scaling, rotation, transparencies, can use mp3′s, etc. etc. Sadly it seems that the reason most of the games out there for GM don’t seem too good is due to a lack of dedication on the game designer’s part or a lack of understanding how to properly use all of GM’s features.

4. Will I be redoing/using any of the Saturn things?

   ANSWER: I will not be redoing the garden, but I may use the cursed prison. I will not be using Richter’s sprite from the game; it is god awful. As for Maria, she will include all of her stuff from the PSP version, and some stuff from the Saturn version. I will not be including any of the new enemies from the Saturn; 99% of them are god awful and the port sucked in general.

5. Will Maria be included in the game?

   ANSWER: Yes

6. Will there be Japanese voice overs in the game in addition to English ones, or will you use the voices from the PSP game?

   ANSWER: As of right now, YES! Thanks to Serio, maker of the amazing Castlevania fighting game (http://serio.piiym-net.com/CVBla/). After spending 10 hours trying to figure out and how to play the at3 files from the PSP game, I spoke with him and he generously provided me ALL OF THE ENGLISH AND JAPANESE DIALOGUE!

   Note that although I will use the sounds, I will NEVER actually do Japanese text in game.

7. Will I be able to play the “hack” on **insert system name here?**

   ANSWER: if your system can run a normal PC gamemaker exe file… then yes. I do not know if there will be a mac version at this time.

8. Will I be providing bug fixes/updates after the hack is released?

   ANSWER: Definitely! Although I will try my best to find all the bugs that I can, I am not perfect and I recognize that people will probably find stuff that I missed. I see no point in releasing a game if I am not going to be responsible and maintain it.

9. Will there be any new areas in the castle?

   ANSWER: Yes. I will be attempting to put some in, as well as giving it an upgrade in the effects department. But first thing is first: I want to duplicate and complete the original game before adding in stuff like this that will take time to do.

10. Will there be any new items/weapons/bosses?

    ANSWER: Yes

11. Will Richter and Maria have a whole playable game?

    ANSWER: Yes; they will both have an inventory, equipables, relics, and their own unique abilities and spells. They will also be able to fight all of the same bosses that Alucard can fight.

12. When will the hack be released?

    ANSWER: as I have always said: when it is done

13. Can I have an update on **insert something here**

    ANSWER: asking for updates, mentioning my project being shutdown by whatever or whoever, or being a troll in general will get you automatically blocked!!!!! All updates are put up on here, and if you are a personal friend then you know of other more private ways to ask me stuff.

14. Esco, can you put **insert item here* into your game? I think it would be sooooo cool and I would love you forever, LOLOLOL!

    ANSWER: I only take suggestions and requests from people who have contributed to the project and will assist me with making it. If you are not one of them, then the answer is hell no. lol

15. Can I be a bugtester for you?

    ANSWER: NO…… HELL NO….. HELL MOTHERFUCK NO!!!! Lol. I say this because the majority of you who ask me this are just hoping to get your hands on the game before everyone else, and will not provide me any real play testing data.

    In the future, when I do need bug testers, they will only be provided the portion of the game that they are testing. And that will be all, to ensure that they focus on actual TESTING and not on just PLAYING! lol

More questions to come as I get them and deem it necessary to place them up here. Thanks for reading.

THE SOURCE CODE IS OUT, along with release A15 R1 of the Castlevania: SOTN Hacked engine!

Hey everyone, this is version A15R1 of the engine; it contains a few gameplay tweaks and 2 very minor bug fixes. This is the full version for those of you who did not have A14R3: http://www.mediafire.com/?b4v9r67c9lyiydi

If you already downloaded A14 R1-A14R3  here is the link for the A15 R1 EXE only (simply delete the old exe and replace it with this one to upgrade):http://www.mediafire.com/?3dbxylqsa18zfx4

The source code is found here: http://www.mediafire.com/?emc312szkft54y2

NOTE :if you choose to use this source in your project, I ask that you give me the proper credit for it.

To use the source code YOU must have the full version of the game installed, and place the source code file in the same location as the exe. You will need Gamemaker 8.1 and up to use the source.

As usual please place all bug reports here: http://sotnhacked.wordpress.com/2011/11/22/place-all-bug-reports-here/

And all ARTISTIC suggestions go here: http://sotnhacked.wordpress.com/2011/11/22/artistic-suggestions-post-place-all-of-your-artistic-suggestionscritiques-here/

Controls (NOTE: xbox360 pad users will need to use joy2key for some buttons):

• Movement is done with the d-pad (there is no analog support at this time, and probably never will be) or with the keyboard (TO USE THE KEYBOARD “USE JOYPAD” IN THE EXTRA,INI MUST BE SET TO OFF!)
• Square: whip
• X: Jump/Confirm
• Triangle: Backflip (on ground, or in air before falling downward)
• Circle: Cancel (in menus)
• L1: switch sub on or off (let’s you power up whip if you want)
• R1: item crash (there is a delay after each crash is used; you know if you can use it if the hearts counter is blinking)
• Hold L2 and hit square (frenzy whip, costs 10 MP)
• Hold Up and hit Triangle (high jump, costs 10 MP)
• Start: Pauses Game and Skips Videos
• Hold Start, and Select for about 2-3 seconds for a soft Reset
• Hit ESC or click X button to exit the game
• F4 goes full screen
• Crash costs: 20 hearts
• NOTE: these are the only controls at the moment that are completed, although more appear in the extra.ini. Double jumping is disabled also.

Bug fixes:

• fixed bug where you could hold down at the end of a ground frenzy whip and the animation would repeat partially
• If you quickly pressed up then down (this must be done EXTREMELY fast and with the right timing), Richter was be unable to move left and right until you whip or throw a sub weapon
• More code cleanup was done, and the source code was more thoroughly notated.

New Features and Changes:

• High Jump now costs 8 MP and does 48 dmg instead of 24
• All crashes now cost 20 hearts
• Candles no longer refresh if leave a room and come back
• if a statue is hit, even if you don’t pick up the money and come back, it will NOT respawn
• You now have only 3:10 minutes to beat the stage to get the best score (since you no longer need to grind hearts I had to lower this slightly).
• It is easier to get B & C rank
• Using more then 10 hearts now has a smaller negative overall impact on your rank
• To get the top score for hearts you still can only use 10 hearts; but you no longer need to run back and forth “grinding” for hearts. You can just grab all available hearts once instead (that brings you to 55, allowing you to use 10 without an impact to rank/stat bonus)

Place all bug reports here! (Updated 1/7/12)

READ ME BEFORE POSTING:

This post is made for any and all bug reports; please make sure that you are playing the most current version before submitting a report, and that you have attempted to reproduce the bug at least 5-10 times. Also before posting, check the comments below and the updates in this blog post to ensure that the bug was not already addressed. You may also link to a video of recreating the bug if you don’t mind making one; if you do so then I obviously do not need you to type out the issue, but I would still want your basic system specs, and anything else relevant that I couldn’t see in the video, please.

Please not that comments in this thread will regularly be deleted once the bug is listed in the list (resolved or unsresolved) so that things just do not get too cluttered. Bugs will actually be removed from the list after a new release is put out that solves the issue. Also if you do not follow directions when submitting a bug report (listed below), or submit a post about a bug that is already listed in this blog post, your comment WILL be ignored.

 THIS POST IS FOR BUG REPORTS ONLY! NOT COMMENTS, SUGGESTIONS, ETC. ANY POSTS MADE THAT ARE NOT IN REFERENCE TO A BUG REPORT WILL BE DELETED, AND THE USER WILL BE BLOCKED. THERE IS A SEPARATE POST FOR ANY AND ALL ARTISTIC SUGGESTIONS/CRITIQUES AND IT IS FOUND HERE:

http://sotnhacked.wordpress.com/2011/11/22/artistic-suggestions-post-place-all-of-your-artistic-suggestionscritiques-here/

ALSO PLEASE NOTE THAT SLOW DOWN IS NOT A BUG! SLOW DOWN MEANS YOUR SYSTEM CANNOT HANDLE THE GAMES RESOURCES! DISABLE AND EXIT ANYTHING EXTRA RUNNING, AND THEN TRY IT AGAIN. IF YOUR GAME HAS SLOWDOWN ISSUES LIKE ANY GAME, THE MUSIC AND DIALOGUE SLOW DOWN TOO AND BECOME CHOPPY!

I have ran this game on a PC with a 2.8 GHZ Dual core CPU, with 2 GB of DDR2, and a 128 bit video card with no speed issues so this game only needs a mid level system to run right.. But if your system cannot handle the game all I can recommend is that you set interpolate colors and synchronize both to off. These may give a slight speed increase. In the future, I will probably include a FPS display option as well.

Make sure that you are using the most current release version of the engine (A15 R1) as old versions are no longer supported when a new version comes out. This is because many times I find tiny bugs on my own between releases and correct them.

Bug reports should be submitted in this format:

1. Which version you are using (any reports from old versions will not added)

2. If there was an error message include a copy and paste of it, or a screenshot.

3. What you were doing, where you were doing it, and how many times you attempted to reproduce the bug and any details associated with doing so.

4. What OS you are using (Windows 7, XP, etc.)

5. Was it a bug (I.E. a fireball vanishes), or did the game crash (I.E. when you tried to run it windows gives a serious error message)

6. If it is a gfx glitch please include what video card you are using as well please.
   

Here is an example of a great bug report:

Using Version A10 R1, when I jumped up and whipped dracula1, the game gave me an error message and crashes. A pic of the message is included below. After further attempts, I found that it crashes every time if I throw a cross first, and then whip his head as he is teleporting out. I am using windows XP.

CURRENT KNOWN BUGS LIST

1/7/12

• FIXED BUG: if you quickly press up then down (this must be done EXTREMELY fast and with the right timing), Richter will be unable to move left and right until you whip or throw a sub weapon.

11/24/11

• UNRESOLVED DLL BUG: When trying to run the game in windows 7 you receive this error:

  ”ERROR in
  action number 1
  of Other Event: Game Start
  for object start_and_end_game:
  Error defining an external function.”

  This is a bug in the sinbass audio DLL that VERY RARELY shows up for some people who use windows 7 when running the engine. At this time the cause is unknown by the maker of the DLL, but he has stated his desire to make it into an extension which would fix the problem.. I have also been told that running it in Admin mode may get it to work, but that it then runs slow and buggy.

  For some users when GM updates and game creator releases another version of their game, it then works, for others it does nothing. At this time there is no fix for this bug. Reinstalling Windows may help but I cannot guarantee that. If you can run XP on your machine, try that and it should work fine. Here is the thread about sinbass: http://gmc.yoyogames.com/index.php?showtopic=460201&st=60&gopid=3866947&#entry3866947

11/22/11:

• Possible GM Limitation bug: I have been told on several occasions that surfaces (these are used for effects like the blinking overlays on Richter when he takes damage, or powers up the whip) may not show up on some older model video cards. I have tested this engine with a 4 year old card and had no issues. Nonetheless, if you encounter this bug please check the game maker forums, as I cannot assist you with it. To date, I have honestly never seen ANYONE on a PC made in the last 6 years have an issue with this.

Artistic Suggestions Post: place all of your graphics suggestions/critiques here.

This post is for anyone who sees something in the SOTN: Hacked engine and thinks “Ooooh, I know a way to make that look cooler” or “Oh, I can think of a neat effect to put here instead.” Feel free to put up any of your ARTISTIC comments, critiques, and suggestions here. It is for suggestion things like effects, changing colors, sprite editing, etc, text editing.

THIS THREAD IS NOT FOR PROGRAMMATIC SUGGESTIONS; AN EXAMPLE OF THIS WOULD BE HIGH JUMP SHOULD DO MORE DAMAGE. IT IS ALSO NOT FOR PEOPLE TO PUT UP REQUESTS FOR NEW FEATURES IN THE GAME, I.E. SKIN SUPPORT, OR A HARD MODE. IT IS ALSO NOT THE PLACE TO ASK WHAT EFFECTS I PLAN TO PUT IN ALREADY; YOU WILL FIND OUT WHEN EVERYONE ELSE DOES.

If you have BUG REPORTS please place them here: http://sotnhacked.wordpress.com/2011/11/22/place-all-bug-reports-here/?preview=true

Any posts made like this will automatically result in the user having their comments ignored. Please follow directions everyone and there won’t be an issue.

 

Before posting, please read these rules:

 

• If you are going to make an artistic suggestion, a pic must be included of what you are suggesting. Telling me that the text color should be darker, or that the score screen lettering should be red doesn’t help for obvious reasons: there are millions of darker colors, and thousands of shades of red. Also I am not an artistic person, so I cannot just picture these things in my head. Please be descriptive and specific.Any artistic edit suggestions made without a pic will be deleted, and the user will receive a warning.

• If you suggest an effect (I.E. blur the screen) please include a link to a video that uses the effect so I can see what you mean. If you have links to Game maker scripts that can duplicate the effects, by all means include them too. Remember, I am not psychic, and while your idea may be an outstanding one, I cannot picture what you are thinking and won’t know how great it is unless you show me.

• Do NOT put up the same post more than once; I will not be able to respond to every post I see on here, so if I do not reply, do NOT post the same suggestion again. If I see a suggestion I like and choose to use it, I will give full credit for it (I do not steal ideas). Please understand that everybody has ideas that they feel are good, but there are countless reasons why some of them may not be feasible, or just might not be what I am looking for.

• If you truly want something done, be ready to contribute. Telling me something like “Oh, I think hi-res sprites would look great” but not being willing to work on them will without a doubt get your request ignored, while the person who writes me and says “hey what about a sprite edit for gaibon, I made this frame as an example” will definitely get a response from me.

Other than that, feel free to post away. Who knows, your stuff could end up in the next release of the hack. And believe me when I say I am always very appreciative and supportive of anyone who assists me, or makes a worthwhile contribution. Just ask anyone who has done so in the past.

UPDATE 4/17/13: Puppet/Skeletal/Modular/etc. Animating (what Galamoth is animated with)

Well…………… I had been dreading it for ever……….. but I knew it had to be done. The day that I would actually attempt to imitate one of the enemies that uses “puppet animating.” Some examples of enemies from SOTN that use this are:

• Red Slasher a.k.a. Blade
• Hammer Shaker a.k.a. Hammer
• Galamoth
• Gurkha Master a.k.a. gurkha
• Plate Lord
• Archer
• Gorgon
• Olrox form 2

The list goes on. I have actually been working on this for almost 3 weeks now, between work, university courses, my online business, family time, working out, cooking, cleaning, studying, etc. So I haven’t had a LOT of time to dedicate to it all at once (though there were a few late nights where I was up until between 6 and 9 AM!!!!). However, I recently buckled down…..

And I managed to complete an engine that will let me quickly and EASILY code in these enemies!

Yes, you read right: I CAN NOW CODE IN ENEMIES THAT USE PUPPET ANIMATIONS, and they actually look even BETTER than they did in SOTN. This is something that I was told would be next to impossible to do in GM, and that it would actually take forever to code each enemy…… but I DID IT!!!!!!!!!

With the way I have it set up:

1. I can easily glue one piece to another, by just changing 2 values per piece
2. I can set one piece to move around another (like hammer/blade/gurkha’s hands do around the elbow joint) or even constantly orbit around them (like frozen half’s ice sparkle does).
3. By just setting 2 offset values in a sprite, I can set up HOW I want each piece to rotate (ex. the shoulder rotates around it’s x & y center, but each hand rotates around it’s middle TOP spot instead).
4. I can ensure that the feet of the enemy ALWAYS stay planted flat on a solid object when needed
5. Each piece has it’s own hitbox
6. I can easily mirror all the frames of animation in game without extra work, by changing just one value: image_xscale for the main piece.

In short: all I have to do for each animation is copy the original values from SOTN for each key frame (I  have and view these easily via memhack), put these values in for each piece of each animation (most animations are just 6-8 key frames at most), then just find what offset each hand must be placed around it’s elbow for each key frame (easily done via the GM debugger in a minute or two) and a new animation is done! The engine handles all rotations, x and y positioning, etc. between each key frame of animation and makes it look sooooooooooooo smooth!

If I even want to go so far as make new animations, I just go into spriter, make the key frames in a few minutes for it, then duplicate the angle values, and offset for each hand in GM, and it is DONE! Some may require some fine tuning afterwards, but this is also pretty quick and very simple. If I need to correct values, I just edit them in the debugger to look right, then copy the numeric values into the code.

Right now I am working on Red Slasher (aka Blade). This is in addition to the new gfx I have ripped from the game over the last 2 months (though I haven’t updated the sprite thread yet). I may also go back later on and make some tweaks to alucard’s wolf form with my new engine. But for now, I want to practice with making these types of enemies, as well as ripping more sprites from the game. I can hopefully upload a video some time soon of this in action, as well as release another gfx file with THIS guy included as an example.

This…………… has been a good day for me. And a major accomplishment towards completing the engine!

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!! Monster+ Graphics release.

Feliz Navidad everyone! This is a GM 8.1 file that contains not just all of the graphics that were included in the demo & it’s source, but also includes all of the candle sprites up until the end of the marble gallery, as well as more than 16 monsters from SOTN. Each monster also includes all of the effects that it uses in SOTN (ex. the unique “blood” effect used by the bloody zombie) with all transparency, rotation, and scaling off.

 

If anyone wants to take the time to make sprite sheets for these monsters go right ahead, but I did not do so because this file has HUNDREDS of sprites in it! And this is AFTER I deleted all of the duplicate ones that were used in more than one animation. But this is something that I know a good # of people in the Castlevania community, as well as hopefully some in the GM community will really be able to put to good use.

 

The monster sprites are all assembled, with each UNIQUE frame separated into a separate sprite in most cases so that each sprite has it’s own hitbox/mask setup (the exception to this is things that won’t be hittable by the player or can’t run into him like some death animations or fragments of a killed enemy) and also saves space since I don’t have the same sprite repeated in multiple sprite sheet animations. Each sprite is cropped and has it’s x and y offsets centered, and I also included a script that details the order that each of the sprites go in for each monsters set of animations. This way if anyone who wants to use these in their own game, doesn’t have to spend HOURS figuring out which sprites go in what order and in which animation.

 

THINGS TO BE DONE: I need to align the sprites for each animation (x and y offset) wise in game, rather than just centering them all. But this in many cases will need to be done via draw statements since some sprites can be used in more than one animation so I didn’t do it here yet.

 

A QUICK SIDE NOTE: there is a red hitbox sprite in most of the monsters folders; this is to be used later by me for collision with solid objects and that particular monster only. You will also notice that for some enemies like the bloody zombie, and warg rider that a separate sprite for their attack is included; this sprite is for hitbox purposes only when they use their attack (like biting, stabbing, etc) with a close range weapon.

 

This release includes the following monsters:

1. Skeleton & Golden Bones
2. Blood Skeleton (only the red one; the other colors will not be used by me. Also has new death animation which is to be completed with particle effects in game)
3. Bat
4. Zombie (all 3 palettes from the entrance, and 3 more new ones to be used later)
5. Warg (all 3 types; the armored one now has some new animations)
6. Warg rider (has a new animation too)
7. Bone Scimitar (2 palettes that will be used)
8. Spittle Bone
9. Axe Armor (both palettes; charging animation is new and improved)
10. Bloody Zombie
11. Merman
12. Fishman (only one of the two palettes, since they both look almost exactly the same)
13. Bone Slinger
14. Ouija Table
15. Marionette (there is actually one final useless frame omitted here)

The file can be downloaded here: http://www.mediafire.com/?e2d4nypl99mav8r

 

If anyone uses this file or a good amount of sprites in it I only ask that you give me a tiny amount of credit for it at least. I intend to release another one of these files every so often as I add some new enemies to it as well. Hopefully a good # of people out there will find use for this. Enjoy.

Ripping out enemy graphics: progress log and information (UPDATED 1/21/13)

UPDATE: 1/20/13: I have begun the arduous task of setting up the image speed for each sprite, as well as aligning them all. Due to a N00b error on my part, I am going to have align the sprites for each animation thru re-combining them into strips together, centering them, then breaking them into separate sprite files again. This will give me a few extra hours of work, but it’s not an earth shattering mistake.

UPDATE: 12/03/12: instead of using sprite strips for each enemy, I have begun instead making each frame of the enemies a separate sprite in itself. This actually saves disk space since I then do not have to waste space with having some frames in 5 or 6 different strips multiples times and allows me more control over the hitboxes for each frame. Those hitboxes are only used for collisions with the player and his/her weapons. A separate hitbox is also made for collision with tiles and solid objects for each enemy; most enemies have just one, some may have 2. I have also been ripping out ALL of the candles and breakable objects for each stage (with transparencies off) but those will not be listed in my progress log below. Each candle and light source is usually a different sprite too. I am also coding in most of the animation date for each enemy as I rip them. AI will be done later.

As I stated in my last post, I planned on focusing on level creation while I was at work, because it was something that I could do in my spare time there. However, before beginning on that, there was an even LARGER task that needed to be tackled: the task of ripping all of the necessary sprites from the game. This means all non-tile based sprites like explosions, enemies, projectiles, switches, barriers, effects, etc.

…………. and before some smart/dumb ass mentions “spriters-resource” or any such site, let me save you the suspense and tell you now that EVERY site I have seen either:

a)has them in pieces (a fucking waste)

b)is missing several sprites

or c)just plain has them incorrect in some way(usually color wise)

So rather than using stuff that is only half correct, I just choose to rip them myself from the game frame by frame. I will not bore you all to tears with how I do this, but I can assure you it is fast and simple to do, and that the animations I get are not only 100% correct, but so are the colors, the alignment of each sprite, as well as ensuring that I get ALL of the effects used. The other good news about this is that hopefully in my next release, I will also be able to include most (if not) all of the sprites and animations and release them to the community with it as well.

On a side note, I have to say how truly AMAZING it is the # of times this game uses the small and medium flame puffs (shown below) in this game for things from dust, to blood, to water splashes…. and yet each effect STILL looks AMAZING! It’s amazing how far a little scaling, rotation, additive, and subtractive blending can go (they also don’t double the # of frames by mirroring them they way they do for the flames; which is shown below).

Small:

Medium:

Progress Thus Far:

1/21/13: the following enemies have their animation code completed (including image speed for each frame) and all sprites for each animation aligned: merman, fishman, bat, zombie.

12/03/12: bone slinger, ouija table and marionette are completed. Marionette in particular required a little creativity on my part because of HOW she dies. In SOTN, there are 2 types of enemies: Normal 2d controlled ones who are tons of small pieces glued together to make each frame, and 3d controlled ones which are just tons of little pieces glued together and rotated, scaled, etc. They sound similar, but are quite different. The marionette is the ONLY 2d controlled sprite that actually has her pieces “unglued” in game when she dies. Suffice to say that figuring out how to reproduce this in GM without having to position each piece for 49 unique frames took a little creativity on my part. But I figured out a way.

11/17/12: completed fire warg, armored fire warg (now has biting and fire breath animations), warg rider (including one new animation), 3 new zombie palette swaps, bone scimitar palette swap, blue axe armor palette swap, and a NEW third axe armor palette swap. I got the fire warg’s fire breath sprite from the sheet on spriters-resource (I have no idea how the ripper got it). Though his palette was totally wrong (which I corrected), I would really love to know how this particular sprite was pulled out of the game.

10/31/12: Completed: Skeleton, blood skeleton, zombie (all 3 palettes), bat, warg, bone scimitar, spittle bone, axe armor, merman, fishman (both of their water splashes use the small flame above but with additive blending and recolored), bloody zombie (the blood splashes for him are a combo of each of the above 2 flames, but all red, angled, and scaled, and the smaller flame one is scaled vertically and rotated until sideways). An interesting one was the FISMAN, whose skin flakes off when he is killed. The skin pieces were actually each just 6 objects, who are created while colors were just erased from the sprite itself every few frames.

More to come soon………….. stay tuned.

10/20/12: Stage & Boss Planning:

With my current schedule being what it is, I do not have a lot of time to program. Mostly because when programming something I am not good at just stopping in the middle of it and coming back to it later. The end result: me staying up late to EXTREME hours of the night, determined to finish something. With my lifestyle being what it is, I cannot afford to be doing that.

 

Stage design however, is something that can EASILY be done in small spurts, room by room, and easily picked up again later after being left alone for a few days WITHOUT the person feeling lost. So I have decide to work on that for now. This of course, requires me ripping a lot of gfx from the game myself (there are THANKFULLY a lot on spriters resource already that I can use, but there are also quite a few that are incorrect or in pieces that it would be easier for me to do myself) but that is again, something that I can do during my downtime at work.

 

NOTE: if you have any artistic skills and feel you can help contribute by editing some GBA Castlevania tiles, or have suggestions for tilesets that can be used for the sewer area in castle one, OR ANY OF THE AREAS in castle 2, even from other games (as long as it is not obvious they come from some other game of course) feel free to send me a comment. The tiles should fit in just as well with the rest of the ones in SOTN. This is an area of making the game that I will be in DIRE need of help with.

With that being said, here are the current stages planned for both castles with their bosses listed:

 

Castlevania:

1. Graveyard & bridge, but mostly a Forest (a sort of tribute to the path leading to the castle in Simon’s Quest) – Cyclops
2. Castle Entrance – Wyvern
3. Alchemy Lab – Slogra & Gaibon
4. Marble Gallery – Behemoth (mid-boss at end)
5. Outer Wall – N/A (Doppelganger room now leads to nightmare area)
6. Nightmare (several screens long now)- Succubus
7. Library – Lesser Demon (leap stone & mist needed to reach him)
8. Chapel – Hippogryph (there will now be a save point right before him instead of after; which was lousy design in the original SOTN)
9. Castle Keep – Richter Belmont or Alucard (depends on player used)
10. Underground Caverns – Scylla
11. Sewer (located where the garden is in the saturn version) – Beezelbub
12. Colosseum (to be made a larger area) – Minotaur & Werewolf
13. Clock Tower (to be made larger and MUCH more hazardous) – Malphas (a.k.a. Karasuman)
14. Underground Mine – Cerebus (now found at end of stage)
15. Catacombs – Legion (a.k.a. granfaloon)
16. Olrox’s Keep – Olrox
17. Castle Center – Maria or Alucard (depends on player used)

Shaft’s Castle:

1. Sky walkway – Darkwing Bat
2. Garden of Madness – Camilla’s Mask
3. Muddy Tombs – Mummy Twins
4. Phantom Village – Dragon Zombie
5. Ghost Ship – Medusa (another minor CV3 reference here)
6. Cursed Prison – The Creature
7. Skeleton Cave – Death
8. Entrance to Castle Center – Doppelganger (based on which character you use)
9. Castle Center – Shaft & Lord Dracula
10. Treasury – Mummy, Cyclops, Pazuzu (a tribute to CV3)
11. Arena (vastly expanded and changed) – Grant, Sypha, & Trevor.
12. Unknown Portal – Galamoth
13. ????????? – SECRET

NOTE: as much as I have tried to finalize this list, it is possibly subject to change at a later date as needed.

Update 10/1/12: a few things that everyone should read:

Since I changed over from trying to hack the original game in Memhack, for the past year or so, I have been diligently and CONSTANTLY working on the SOTN Hacked Engine in game maker. Day after day, after day, AFTER day, for hours at a time. The reason being that at the time, other than a small Ebay business I have going, I had been unemployed. Thus I had a LOT more free time.

 …………… that has changed as of the end of August. In addition to now taking 2 classes, having my online business, going to the gym, going out with my peoples, seeing my fam, spending time with my girl AND STILL doing all the usual stuff like cleaning my place, cooking, laundry etc. (I have my own place and live solo….. and it is so FUCKING GREAT) I now have a full time job again. The only saving grace is that it is a work at home position. But that is still 8 HOURS LESS A DAY, 5 DAYS A WEEK that I have to spend working on the engine.

 So to be blunt, that is why there haven’t been any updates on here. I have been too busy with making my $$$, and making sure that I don’t end up like the average American (who BTW, only reads at a 5th grade level; a proven and PATHETIC statistic if I may say so) who works their whole life, and then has LITTLE TO NOTHING to show for it. And so far, considering the fact that I make about $20 an hours just SITTING at home WITHOUT my accounting degree finished (less than 2 years to go)…. I don’t seem to be doing too bad at it. But to be blunt I want more out of life.

 With that all being said, I could either

a) focus on living life

or

b) on coding an engine that while it WILL turn out amazing, will still be forgotten after a few months (which is normal and to be expected).

……………… my choice is obviously A.

 What does this mean for all of the fans out there?

• It means that the engine will still be worked on, but just at a slower pace. Just like when I was working before.
• It means that you all will not see as many updates on here. Does that mean some of you should start panicking and thinking “OMG, the project is dead?” Only if you are a fucking idiot. But otherwise, NO it absolutely is not, and probably NEVER will be.
• It means now is the PERFECT TIME to have people helping me to complete the things involving graphics and special effects that I can’t do by myself anyway
• It means that anyone who is helping me, won’t hear from me as much. Which is exactly why I try to ONLY work with people who are intelligent, self-sufficient, reliable, and motivated. That way if they don’t hear from me for 2 weeks, and I then ask for an update I don’t end up getting only a screen full of excuses. But instead actually get shown progress.

That’s all there is to it. The engine is nowhere near dead, and is still WIP. But as I have said to ANYONE who has ever assisted me: real life comes first. A fact that everyone here just has to deal with. Simple.

UPDATE 7/24/12: Alucard’s Knife weapons are completed (Knuckles too now – updated 7/26)!

Yup! Like the title says, I have completed ALL of Alucard’s normal knife weapon attacks.

 

The normal critical art for the knife is the holbein dagger’s normal attack: a multi-hitting move that does about 1.5 normal damage, is holy element, is faster than a normal knife attack, and has much better range than in the original game. However, it can no longer be used while walking. While the sword’s critical art (a valmanway attack) may have better range, the knife weapon’s critical art is faster, stuns more, and does more damage. Especially if used up close over and over again, the way knives are meant to be used.

 

NOTE: I am still in need of someone to do some sprite editing on the Katar’s and Cinqueda’s sprites. More specifics can be found in bullet points 1 and 2 near the top here: http://sotnhacked.wordpress.com/2012/06/26/sprite-help-needed-for-the-project/

 

The knife weapon set has been expanded from the original game, and greatly improved so that it is much more useful. For one thing, knives will do full damage against armored enemies (unlike swords) and now includes the following ones (please note: any knives that had the special where you could swing them like a normal sword have been removed, as the attack was useless, redundant, and was actually slower while doing normal damage):

 

1. Basilard: your most basic knife type weapon
2. Combat Knife: now just has a stabbing motion
3. Terminus Est: a dagger that drips poison from it’s tip, and can poison enemies with a stab
4. Katar: has a wider blade and better range than the terminus est, and can hit two times
5. Cinqueda: a jewel encrusted dagger that can strike three times.
6. Holbein Dagger: Same as the critical art, EXCEPT it’s attack power is lower, and it has a VERY small chance of randomly draining a soul (one per swing but ONLY if it hits an enemy, and it will only do so again if you then kill a few more enemies afterwards. Or, in the case of a boss, it will only happen again if you hit them a few more times with the weapon first) that restores 1% of your max hp. It also has no critical art. This is the ultimate knife type weapon and it is VERY powerful; there may even be a way of increasing the rare chance of it draining a soul if….
   (on a side note, this effect actually didn’t use 3d at all in SOTN; just multiple color palettes, scaling and rotation)

EDIT: normal Knuckle weapons are now completed, and have also been balanced out and given more range. Knuckles weapons have two critical arts: a multi hit strike, and also a massively damaging uppercut that has a short range. The knuckle weapons in game are as follows:

 

1. Empty Fist
2. Brass Knuckles
3. Iron Fist
4. Jewel Knuckle: now uses a yellow color instead for the animation
5. Fist of Tulkas (it’s second critical is a powerful blue fireball instead of the uppercut)
6. Blue Knuckles: powerful knuckles that give off a powerful blast of frost with each swing that does more damage the closer the enemy is to Alucard. It has much better horizontal AND vertical range now, does much more damage, but you can no longer walk while using it. The blue energy uses its animation from when alucard ducked and used it in the original game, instead of the standing one (which will be used for the critical art). This was another attack that used a 3d texture in SOTN.

With those all done, my next goal will be to handle club weapons. Stay tuned for more updates coming soon!

UPDATE 6/12/12: Alucard’s Weapons (video included) and some info on how elements now work

For the last few days I have been hard at work completing all of Alucard’s sword animations. As I said some time ago, in the original SOTN there are literally 40+ swords that use just one animation. For the most part very very few of them had unique animations; that was something that I wanted to change, and have succeeded in doing. I also wanted to remove a lot of redundant ones and minimize how often you have to go into the menu to change weapons. To be straight up, nobody wants to keep having to go in and out of a menu, just to change to the same weapon again with just another point of damage added on. It disrupts the game play and is just plain annoying.

 

Keep in mind that great swords, knives, and katanas fall into their own category and are not considered swords. THIS LIST IS FOR THE NORMAL SWORD TYPES ONLY!

 

I succeeded in minimizing the # of swords Alucard will have to 12; before any moans and groans start let me assure you guys that while some of the swords with neat effects weren’t included, the effects on them will still be used, just for other weapons. Thus allowing me to expand on Alucard’s other weapon sets more. To list some of these as an example:

 

• Instead of an icebrand sword you now have a frost flail
• There is no thunderbrand sword; instead there is the gungnir spear
• The terminus est is now a dagger weapon
• The rune sword and sword familiar are now considered great swords, and thus not included in the list below.
• Gurthang: it’s special effect when bloodied has been added to a katana and improved upon
• The holy sword is gone; it’s effect and special ability were added to the holy rod and improved upon.
• The mourneblade is now gone; it was definitely a game breaking item. However when using the critical art for the holbein dagger (which costs MP) there is a % chance that it will steal a soul and recover some health for you with each hit.

I also removed all of what I call the “downgrade weapons” (the firebrand sword which is a poor man’s levaetian, the vorpal blade which is a low quality valmanway, and the alucart sword as well) as they just cannot compare with their full powered versions.

I also removed useless weapons like the tyrfing and the werebane. And sadly there were one or two unique weapons that I just did not include in any form at all for various reasons:

 

• There is no badelaire: it would have been game breaking if I left it in as is! The only alternative would be to put some limits on it, which thus negates the purpose of having a sword whose attack goes up with game time. I also wanted the ultimate sword to be the Alucard sword.
• The mablung sword is gone: Alucard no longer uses shield spells (which will be used by someone else). Thus making this a pointless weapon.

And lastly, here are the 12 swords that I DID include (AGAIN, keep in mind that katanas, great swords, and knives have their own category and are not listed here). The base critical art for every sword is to do a single valmanway attack that does about 2x normal damage, and is an excellent defensive move:

 

1. Short sword: lowest range of all swords
2. Shotel: has more range, and a unique critical art where he throws the shotel like a boomerang
3. Gladius: slightly better range and attack than the previous one.
4. Broadsword: yet even more range and attack (YAWN!)
5. Mormegil: a dark elemental sword with a great range that is almost a necessity against one particular adversary….
6. Milican’s Sword: a sword with lass range than the mormegil, but that can petrify with a touch
7. Joyeuse: the remade jewel sword basically; a sword made of pure gold, that spit 1-8 coins out every time it hits an enemy and increases the chances of enemies dropping more gold when killed (note: jewels were removed from the game).
8. Damascus Sword: a powerful sword with a great range, that can actually do critical hits (25% chance)
9. Leavatain: a sword that spews out gouts of flames and has a 2nd critical art that will incinerate enemies all around you.
10. Alucard Sword: a devastating weapon, and the ultimate sword. It’s 2nd critical art is powerful and teleports you out of danger. Alucard my even be able to make this sword even more terrifying if he unleashes the darkness within him…..
11. Heaven Sword: a sword that will always return to it’s thrower; it’s critical art is the old special that was done with both attack buttons when you had 2 heavens swords equipped.
12. Valmanway: unleashes 4 slashes that will do more damage the closer you are to Alucard when they hit, but still do pretty weak damage overall. It has been remade, 3d primitives and all, and balanced to be a useful weapon, but not overpowered anymore. It also has NO critical art.

Another subject I want to discuss is elemental damage. The be blunt, the system used in the metroidvanias is shitty. It makes no sense hitting a frozen shades with an ice sword for example, and her being invulnerable to it or recovering health. The sword itself should still lop a tit right the hell off! It is also annoying as hell having to switch between say a club, and a sword, over and over, NON-STOP, just because some enemies are strong to strike, and others are strong to cut.

 

With that in mind I have revamped the system to include a # of changes to it when it comes to damaging enemies. Here are some of them:

 

• There are 3 base weapon types: cut, strike & pierce. Enemies are very rarely strong to any of them (the exception being some unique spiritual enemies who are designed to be killed with magic or subs, and armored enemies which have special attributes)
• There are 7  magic types: fire, ice, lit, dark, holy, spirit, and explosion
• Holy water and the dive kick have their own unique type.
• for strike, cut, and pierce, if the enemy takes normal damage we then look at the element attached to the weapon: if weak to it, they take 1.5 or 1.25 dmg. If strong, immune or absorb this element, they take normal dmg. 
• If an enemy is weak to strike, cut or pierce they just take 1.25 dmg or 1.5 dmg based on how weak they are to weapons and the element attached is ignored.
• If strong to strike, cut or pierce, we look at the element attached again; if weak to the element they take 1.25 or 1.5 dmg; if strong or absorb they take 0.5 dmg.
• If immune to cut, strike, or pierce, the element attached is irrelevant.
• The damage levels are normal, weak to (1.25 dmg), very weak to (1.5 dmg), strong (0.5 dmg), immune, and absorb. This was inspired by the damage system in lords of shadow.
• Status effects are no longer elements; enemies can either be afflicted with them, immune to them, or EXTREMELY affected by them (ex. for stone normal is to be petrified once and un-petrify after a set time; for weak to it, they stay as stone forever. AND NO… you will not still take damage if you run into them, lol). The current status effects are stone, curse, poison, armor shatter, stopwatch effect, and a special type of stun called paralyze.
• Enemies with armored status have unique properties: they are strong to some attacks (cut type attacks, some pierce type attacks, some subs, etc.) by a % based on an armor level that goes from 1-3. Also some sub weapons will bounce off them or shatter on impact (bwaka knife, cross, daggers, axes, etc). Armor status CAN be removed however with certain attacks.

As you can all hopefully tell, the system above is designed to make attacking enemies much less tedious, but also allow me to implement some strategic type mini-boss & boss battles as well.

 

Last but not least, here is a video of Alucard using each of his swords (sorry about the lack of sound), as well as a demo of one weapon of every other type being used (except katanas, which are still WIP). Enjoy!