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[jecowa]

Just another small update - only raw/graphics/graphics_creatures.txt was changed. Bay12 changed the name of some giant-sized creatures in v0.42.05, so I just changed those to the correct names for v0.42.05 and up.

Download link here again for convenience: http://dffd.bay12games.com/file.php?id=12056

These were the creatures affected (listed with the new names):

• GIANT_EAGLE (Line 373)
• GIANT_LION (Line 1249)
• GIANT_LEOPARD (Line 1255)
• GIANT_JAGUAR (Line 1261)
• GIANT_TIGER (Line 1267)
• GIANT_CHEETAH (Line 1273)
• TOAD_GIANT_CAVE (Line 1698)

Also of note: The old subterranean "TOAD_GIANT" has been renamed as "TOAD_GIANT_CAVE", but now there is a new pond-dwelling "GIANT_TOAD". So the new Giant_Toad is in need of some graphics.

[jecowa]

Mike Mayday gave us all permission to release updated versions of his graphics pack, but I was wondering, Tallcastle and Habbadax, are both of you are okay with your updates to Mayday being included in Lazy Newb Packs?

[Tallcastle]

Absolutely!  (At least on my end) And for future reference, anyone out there that wants to use anything I make, you are all most welcome to use my material.  This goes for all graphics sets, mods, or whatever.

Also while I’m online.  Sorry about being so checked out lately.
I’ve got … more … life issues ... sort of .  It’s kind of kept me from getting to those bird men I’ve needed to do.
Hopefully you guys will see it ... eventually. 

[jecowa]

Absolutely!  (At least on my end) And for future reference, anyone out there that wants to use anything I make, you are all most welcome to use my material.  This goes for all graphics sets, mods, or whatever.

Also while I’m online.  Sorry about being so checked out lately.
I’ve got … more … life issues ... sort of .  It’s kind of kept me from getting to those bird men I’ve needed to do.
Hopefully you guys will see it ... eventually. 

Thanks! So are you saying that you are fine with your Dwarf Fortress art being integrated into other graphics packs (e.g. Phoebus, Obsidian, Ironhand, etc)?

[jecowa]

Here is the next one.
creture_bug_slug_new.png

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

I'm considering opening a new topic exclusively for these files.  Mostly because they could easily be used in any number of graphics sets that do not themselves contain these images, and as its own topic it would reach a larger audience.  haven't decided one way or the other thoe.  Next up, a few more birdmen to complete the creature_birds.png from before.

I'm guessing brown_recluse_spider_man and jumping_spider_man are both intended to share tiles. And then moon_snail_man and snail_man both share tiles.

Then maybe louse_man can use tick_man's tiles, and thrips_man can use mosquito_man's tiles? Or should thrips_man use damselfly_man's tiles?

Edit: I got this taken care of.

I think it'd be cool if you had your own post. That way you could update the OP and stuff.

[Habbadax]

Updated to latest Dorfs, split into two downloads as requested

Prepacked and pack only

[Iamblichos]

{{ Removed by poster due to issue being non-graphics related }}

[jecowa]

Updated to latest Dorfs, split into two downloads as requested

Prepacked and pack only

Thanks for the update. I just double-checked it, and the objects files look compatible with v0.43.04 of Dwarf Fortress. The graphics folder is still using some old v0.42.04 definitions that I had fixed in the post at the top of this page, but that won't cause any game corruption.

Also, does anyone have any thoughts/opinions on the "highlights" (partially-transparent backgrounds) of the creatures? I've noticed that some of the creatures have partially-transparent backgrounds and others have completely-transparent backgrounds. Should the backgrounds of all creatures be the same, or is it better for some creatures to have different backgrounds than others?

If they should all be the same, is it better for them to all have highlights or for them all to not have highlights?

In this picture, you can see the difference between highlights and no highlights. (Dwarves have highlights; farm animals don't have any.)


The black background might clash a bit, but it makes the animals stand out better. The dwarves kind of blend in with the terrain.

It might look better with a darker creature background. Phoebus uses a darker color as seen below.

Spoiler: "Phoebus example" (click to show/hide)

Would something similar to Phoebus' background would be good? Maybe a bit darker and less brown than Phoebus' creature background.

[jecowa]

Getting a little off-topic, but I was having fun with comparison screenshots. Here's a couple more.

Spoiler: "Spacefox example" (click to show/hide)

Spoiler: "Obsidian example" (click to show/hide)

[CLA]

The issue is always how much you want the creatures to stand out vs how much you want the image as a whole be consistent/look good. From a gameplay perspective, it would certainly be more beneficial to have them stand out more, but it's not a black&white either-or problem, and moreover a matter of taste.
So to answer your question I don't think either of the shown examples is better or worse, in fact their difference is barely noticeable.

[nitus]

jecowa - One of the main reasons why I prefer mayday to tilesets like phoebus or obsidian is that mayday's is very bright and colorful compared to most others, on account of the highlight. Other sets just seem to be dim, dark, gloomy, and headache-inducing.
 
It stands to reason that, if the tileset is highlighted, the creature graphics should be too. Having a black background on creature tiles makes them seem wrong, jarringly so as you say. It doesn't do much good to compare it with a tileset that isn't highlighted, because a black background doesn't stand out nearly as much with those - it iis much more distracting with a set like mayday's.

The objective, it seems to me, is to have it as immersive as possible. Ideal would be if the tranparency actually worked in-game, so the background was whatever tile the creature was standing on, but the next best thing is for it to blend as much as possible with the background. Black doesn't blend at all. The clarity of a given tile is more important to the artist or compiler than to players

I'd suggest taking a selection of creature tiles that cover a wide range of sizes and colors, and combining them on a single image, then experimenting with background colors and alphas see if there's a  combination that allows them to blend in yet sacrifices nothing. I doubt there's one combination that serves every tile equally, but that's not to say the existing ones are the best possible choices.

I have noticed with my own, personal game modding and tweaking that there is not much consistency as far as the background colors go, and it's hard to tell whether any of them were chosen deliberately or whether they're just whatever color the artist happened to click on.

[jecowa]

While testing different background I noticed that the background currently being used for dwarves is not the same background as what Mike Mayday was using. It looks like the background color may have changed when someone drew some new dwarves for it. The partially transparent backgrounds are kind of hard to work with, so I'm not sure if this change was on purpose or not.

This first picture is testing Mike Mayday's dwarf background reapplied to dwarves and applied to animals:



I think his background looks pretty nice. Somehow the background of the dwarves is almost identical to the background of the armor stand; this is kind of strange since the armorstand (located on the main tilesheet) uses a completely different background color than the dwarves. At first I thought he just chose the background colors kind of randomly, but now I'm wondering if Mayday picked these colors specifically to work together.

Here's some other background tests too:

Spoiler: "fully transparent background" (click to show/hide)

Spoiler: "dorfsmod (new dwarf) background" (click to show/hide)

Spoiler: "main tilesheet background" (click to show/hide)

[jecowa]

Has anyone gotten far enough to see a caravan wagon in Mayday? They don't look anything like this, do they?




There's some bits that point to this being the caravan wagon graphics:

Code: [Select]

[CREATURE_GRAPHICS:EQUIPMENT_WAGON]
[DEFAULT:CREATURES:0:0:AS_IS:DEFAULT]
[CHILD:CREATURES:1:0:AS_IS:DEFAULT]
[STANDARD:CREATURES:2:0:AS_IS:ANIMATED]
[STANDARD:CREATURES:3:0:AS_IS:GHOST]
Am I misunderstanding something?

[Dibuk]

Just want to say THANK YOU for doing this, I can't play DF without mayday and my old hack job from ages ago started to look pretty weird.

Would you consider making a "full" DL of DF with Mayday-gfx already in it like Mayday did?

Again, Thank you.

[jecowa]

Just want to say THANK YOU for doing this, I can't play DF without mayday and my old hack job from ages ago started to look pretty weird.

Would you consider making a "full" DL of DF with Mayday-gfx already in it like Mayday did?

Again, Thank you.

Habbadax posted a release of Mayday graphics bundled with DF v0.43.04 a few posts back. Here it is again:

Updated to latest Dorfs, split into two downloads as requested

Prepacked and pack only