ROM Hack Oldies Project Tiny Toons Adventures DX for Game Boy : colorization project

[lordelan]

May i suggest a color scheme more akin to this to save on palette memory?

View attachment 464194

It lacks the nice shadowing though.

 

[Brand Newman]

May i suggest a color scheme more akin to this to save on palette memory?

View attachment 464194

Hello.

Thank you for your suggestion, but to achieve having white eyes and black outlines, I need to use two palettes anyway : so I figured I might as well keep the shadows, which are more proeminent with Hamton's sprites than they are with others'.

In your suggestion, the colors counter would be of 4, which can only be achieved by using two palettes, since the brighter color is always transparent (leaving 3 colors for one palette).

Mine is of six, as evidenced below :
first palette has pink + green + black
second palette has white + darker pink + blue.

So you see, in any case, the same amount of palettes will be used : don't worry though, every time you select a character, the first two palettes are updated, leaving 5 more for other sprites anytime.

 

[Brand Newman]

Overlayed main sprites are finished. Had to make the hard decision to remove Hamton's shade, so I can have a common 2nd palette for the 3 of them, based on Plucky. This saves 1 palette for the vegetables, and gives me 1 more for other sprites. But look, Buster got his tooth back!

 

[MeXen]

Overlayed main sprites are finished. Had to make the hard decision to remove Hamton's shade, so I can have a common 2nd palette for the 3 of them, based on Plucky. This saves 1 palette for the vegetables, and gives me 1 more for other sprites. But look, Buster got his tooth back!

View attachment 466838

How about giving Hamtom's pants the same color as Buster's fur so that you save another pallette

 

[Brand Newman]

How about giving Hamtom's pants the same color as Buster's fur so that you save another pallette

I need two palettes anyway (one is green + orange + black, and the other one depends on the character - for example Hamton is pink, but Buster needs red).

That being said, I was suggested to use orange for Hamton's shadow, which could actually blend in quite well : I'll make some tests this WE.

 

[lordelan]

Overlayed main sprites are finished. Had to make the hard decision to remove Hamton's shade, so I can have a common 2nd palette for the 3 of them, based on Plucky. This saves 1 palette for the vegetables, and gives me 1 more for other sprites. But look, Buster got his tooth back!

View attachment 466838

Great compromise I guess. They look superb!

 

[Brand Newman]

It may not look like much, but the GUI at the bottom of the screen is now entirely white! (The faces are not set yet, since they depend on who you're playing, so I have to add some more tricks now that I'm replacing tiles).

 

[lordelan]

It may not look like much, but the GUI at the bottom of the screen is now entirely white! (The faces are not set yet, since they depend on who you're playing, so I have to add some more tricks now that I'm replacing tiles).

View attachment 469026

Bet u're learning a lot along the way.

 

[marc_max]

Awesome @Brand Newman !!

 

[SDA]

It may not look like much, but the GUI at the bottom of the screen is now entirely white! (The faces are not set yet, since they depend on who you're playing, so I have to add some more tricks now that I'm replacing tiles).

View attachment 469026

I would suggest to make the status bar black, since now every colorization out there does that.

By doing so, you can redraw the faces on the HUD so they blend with the black color for outlines, and the rest of them use three different colors.

In Buster's case, his face on the HUD can use blue, white and pink for his nose, while details like the outlines and eyes are basically transparent.

 

[Brand Newman]

I would suggest to make the status bar black, since now every colorization out there does that.

By doing so, you can redraw the faces on the HUD so they blend with the black color for outlines, and the rest of them use three different colors.

In Buster's case, his face on the HUD can use blue, white and pink for his nose, while details like the outlines and eyes are basically transparent.

I'll admit it's a neat idea, especially since I've been fighting against the game for weeks to update the faces' colors : it's very weird, as the palette gets updated (I can see the specification changing), but the colors don't.

I suspect it's because the face displayed is actually copied from another tile with a slight offset, but knowing it doesn't help me much : which means I might have to cope with a single palette, instead of switching between two, as I intended to.

That being said, a black status bar feels... a bit out of place for this game (whereas I have no trouble with it for Megaman, for example) : I was thinking about altering the faces a bit to give them the same "stylized" visual Hamton's has (I always thought his to be cooler than the others).

I'll make some more tests, and see what suits better.

 

[SDA]

I'll admit it's a neat idea, especially since I've been fighting against the game for weeks to update the faces' colors : it's very weird, as the palette gets updated (I can see the specification changing), but the colors don't.

I suspect it's because the face displayed is actually copied from another tile with a slight offset, but knowing it doesn't help me much : which means I might have to cope with a single palette, instead of switching between two, as I intended to.

That being said, a black status bar feels... a bit out of place for this game (whereas I have no trouble with it for Megaman, for example) : I was thinking about altering the faces a bit to give them the same "stylized" visual Hamton's has (I always thought his to be cooler than the others).

I'll make some more tests, and see what suits better.

Even the Tiny Toons game on the NES does a similar thing, and not only with the HUD. This image is an example, which, coincidentally, sees Hamton himself.

 

[Brand Newman]

Even the Tiny Toons game on the NES does a similar thing, and not only with the HUD. This image is an example, which, coincidentally, sees Hamton himself.
View attachment 472350

I know, but that's the thing : the Nes version is using black for pretty much everything, but first there are some technical limitations I've met earlier that prevent me to do so (for example the credits at the beginning, which only loads tiles where text is, meaning I can't change the palette of the rest of the screen unless I really dive into ASM).
And to be honest, I like the fact that the game boy version of a game has a different style which makes it recognizable from its nes counterpart. Many games did that in their time, even after game boy color was released.
If I decide to go for black, I'll have to harmonize a lot of things, and I'm not even sure I will be able to.

 

[SDA]

I know, but that's the thing : the Nes version is using black for pretty much everything, but first there are some technical limitations I've met earlier that prevent me to do so (for example the credits at the beginning, which only loads tiles where text is, meaning I can't change the palette of the rest of the screen unless I really dive into ASM).
And to be honest, I like the fact that the game boy version of a game has a different style which makes it recognizable from its nes counterpart. Many games did that in their time, even after game boy color was released.
If I decide to go for black, I'll have to harmonize a lot of things, and I'm not even sure I will be able to.

You can also do the same process with white color on the HUD, only that the eyes will usually be the ones that need to be transparent. As such, all characters' portraits will share the black color used for outlines.

 

[Brand Newman]

Went silent for weeks because I couldn't update the heroes' face when selecting another character... still can't do, so I'll have to cope with one palette, and give their portraits a "pastel" look for some illusion. Anyway, I made a GIF of the diamonds animation!

 

[Maeson]

That looks entirely reasonable to me!

It's shaping up great, I can't imagine the work needed to be done up to now...

 

[Brand Newman]

One very exciting thing with my TinyToons colorization project for gameboy color, is that things are getting easier, now that the code has been implemented in some parts. Altough I had to cheat with the pause menu a bit... and these numbers are hidden for some reason... Still happy with the result

 

[SDA]

One very exciting thing with my TinyToons colorization project for gameboy color, is that things are getting easier, now that the code has been implemented in some parts. Altough I had to cheat with the pause menu a bit... and these numbers are hidden for some reason... Still happy with the result
View attachment 473830

The score numbers being partially hidden remind me of a similar issue in the Mega Man World color hack, where a chunk of the bosses' healthbar is blacked out.

In other words, it's there, but it's invisible.

 

[Jayro]

Looking really good so far. The bushes and trees need a bit of work to fill in the gaps, but otherwise your color choices are very good.

 

[Brand Newman]

The score numbers being partially hidden remind me of a similar issue in the Mega Man World color hack, where a chunk of the bosses' healthbar is blacked out.

In other words, it's there, but it's invisible.

This issue has since been solved, thanks to Andrew who did MM 1 and 2.
Below is the technical explanation, if you're interested.