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[Mike Mayday]

Sharks! (doo doo doo doo doo doo)

Today I've noticed that my pixelart has (IMO) noticeably improved since I started working on this project. So... that's nice.

[Manveru Taurënér]

Sharks! (doo doo doo doo doo doo)

Today I've noticed that my pixelart has (IMO) noticeably improved since I started working on this project. So... that's nice.

Soo, clearly you need to start over so as to have everything be at this new improved quality?  (joking ofc!) Nice work as always, any room left to make the bigger sharks have a slightly longer "tail"? Feels a tad squished, but not too badly.

[Mike Mayday]

I was trying to draw them with somewhat of foreshortening to fit in the 32px square. There's not a single pixel left, unfortunately. The great white is definitely longer / less squashed.

[Manveru Taurënér]

Ach, is what it is then ^^

Edit: I guess you can kinda see them curving slightly it if you try to yeah

[Mike Mayday]

The nurse shark doesn't look quite right, I keep trying to improve it but... it's a very weird fish!

[Inarius]

Octopus is really good, though

[Manveru Taurënér]

Gray langur tails curve upwards rather than down (if I'm correct in assuming that's what it is) ^^ The limbs feel kinda weird as well without the hands/feet, not sure some faint bit of it could be worked in? (same for the capuchin). Would help a lot with giving it more of a monkey feel.

[voliol]

The nurse shark doesn't look quite right, I keep trying to improve it but... it's a very weird fish!

Are the seals here (in order left to right) elephant seal, leopard seal, harp seal? Elephant seals are not only ”elephant” for their proboscises, but also for their size (duckduckgo search). All the seals are, in fact, larger than a dwarf, though by a varying amount. The elephant seal could also use a female variant, as they don’t have the proboscis and are considerably smaller (relatively, they still weigh ~900 kg).

What’s the difference between this squid and the one from before?

[Manveru Taurënér]

Do you have any guidelines you use for whether to make a creature stick within the one tile size or not? Like a size cutoff for when something can be considered huge and thus should be reflected as bigger than a tile? Obviously things can't all be made to reflect their true relative sizes, but unless there's some issues with using this new stuff that was gonna be added I'd say don't shy away from making things that are actually huge look huge (or at least look larger to the extent that one can tell it's something large). That something is many many times the size of a humanoid is more important to have be apparent than how big it is compared to other big animals or mythical beasts imo. Ie, agree with voliol on the male elephant seals, those things are massive.

[Mike Mayday]

I admit I might have been a bit too strict when creating the shark icons.
The guidelines are as follows:
-without specific need, the sprite should not exceed 32x32px
-when it does exceed, it should not obscure sprites on neighbouring tiles (so far the Colossus is the only exception, the giant elephant is probably going to be another one)
-small pieces sticking out are ok (horns, tails etc. - things that don't obscure much. This is why I was able to make the giraffe so tall, its neck and head are conveniently placed along the tile border).

I think the elephant seal is actually fine in this case? In this position it should be not much higher than a human. So if we just consider the two, obviously I'd need to make the seal bigger. But if we consider the whole range of creatures in the game, (and how little space we have for the hugest ones) I believe keeping it in the 32px tile is the good solution.

Once we put the creatures in the game I'll be making further adjustments, of course. So anything that looks unnecessarily squashed will most likely be corrected.

[Manveru Taurënér]

I think the elephant seal is actually perfectly fine in this case? In this position it should be roughly the height of a human.

While kinda true, it does make it it seem misleadingly small. And as long as DF makes things with a lot of bulk really dangerous it probably helps to have it visible that this is one of the biggest "animals" in the game (6th biggest unaltered animal in fact, tied with the rhino, ahead of giraffes, great whites etc).

Edit: Using it's iconic half upright pose would be a nice compromise I guess, letting it fill up most of the tile. I'm sort of also thinking from the standpoint that less people probably instantly know what an elephant seal is than say a rhino or elephant, so while those are apparent to be large creatures no matter what the sprite shows, this one would be more likely to trick someone into thinking it's just a seal.

[Mike Mayday]

Well, it is much bigger than the other seals though! For now I've made it 1px taller (to fill the square). Like I said, I'm not opposed to doing revisions later, for now I want to have all the 385 base creatures ready.

[Manveru Taurënér]

Well, it is much bigger than the other seals though! For now I've made it 1px taller (to fill the square). Like I said, I'm not opposed to doing revisions later, for now I want to have all the 385 base creatures ready.

Oh, right, I was talking about the wrong sprite xD (completely missed that the male was in that other picture). I assumed the one to the right of that was the elephant seal male, that one tho is perfectly good in giving the illusion of size ^^ Sorry for all the confusion.

[Mike Mayday]

Haha, ok! That was a child! I don't think seals have castes?

[Manveru Taurënér]

Haha, ok! That was a child! I don't think seals have castes?

"[CASTE:FEMALE]
      [FEMALE]
   [BODY_SIZE:0:0:91000]
   [BODY_SIZE:2:0:455000]
   [BODY_SIZE:5:0:910000]
   [CASTE:MALE]
      [MALE]
      [SET_BP_GROUP:BY_TYPE:LOWERBODY][BP_ADD_TYPE:GELDABLE]
   [BODY_SIZE:0:0:300000]
   [BODY_SIZE:2:0:1500000]
   [BODY_SIZE:5:0:3000000]"

You mean size differences like that (from the wiki), or something else?

Edit: Seemingly the other seals don't but the elephant seal does.