VN Ren'Py Babysitting Cream: BetaMix Edition [v0.3.5] [Novilon]

[adonabe]

Eyy if you finally have the chance to create a forum for the remake/reimagine etc.
Do hit us up. No pressure tho there's no need to rush, better have a n actual in working game than once again make it rushed and stress you out.

 

[Shadow Word: Porn]

Eyy if you finally have the chance to create a forum for the remake/reimagine etc.
Do hit us up. No pressure tho there's no need to rush, better have a n actual in working game than once again make it rushed and stress you out.

Thanks! I did consider making a separate space somewhere to discuss it, but I just don't know if there's enough to talk about right now. It would mostly be useful for getting input and suggestions, and frankly, I don't need too much of that right now. I'm not short on ideas, I'm short on time/energy.

Although that said, I do actually have a question for people: how do you guys feel about me redoing the backgrounds? To me, Aval0nX's original backgrounds are nostalgic as hell and they give the game a kind of charm. But...

1) Some of them are butt-ugly
2) They clash, sometimes to an extreme level, with the cartoony art of the characters. For example, check out this post, where Cream's posing art is basically ruined by the background.
3) They don't technically fit the lore: Vanilla+Cream canonically live in a place called Floral Forest Village, not some American suburbs. This is the least important point, but it does bug me a tiny bit, and will probably start bugging me even more if I start writing new events and stuff.

So I'm sort of wondering, should I replace the backgrounds? Or would that be changing too much? I could maybe keep them and just lower the brightness/contrast on the more terrible ones, so the character images don't get lost in a hideous super-loud background.

 

[shmurfer]

Might as well after you went for AI upgrades anyway. The crusty art was at home with the crusty backgrounds now half of that equation is missing.

 

[FoxyTails]

Although that said, I do actually have a question for people: how do you guys feel about me redoing the backgrounds? To me, Aval0nX's original backgrounds are nostalgic as hell and they give the game a kind of charm. But...

1) Some of them are butt-ugly

Yes they are

2) They clash, sometimes to an extreme level, with the cartoony art of the characters. For example, check out this post, where Cream's posing art is basically ruined by the background.

Personally in the example you posted I don't think it's all that bad considering the more 'realistic' AI generated Cream you've done, however with the original Cream graphics it does look bad - so your idea of keeping & altering them to reduce the details shown may work - some of the worse culprits I would think maybe deserve a better background than what's given already.

3) They don't technically fit the lore: Vanilla+Cream canonically live in a place called Floral Forest Village, not some American suburbs. This is the least important point, but it does bug me a tiny bit, and will probably start bugging me even more if I start writing new events and stuff.

Actually it depends on which 'version' of Sonic you're basing your version on.

If you look at the different Cartoons (Sonic X for example), Games (eg Sonic Adventure 2) & Movies of Sonic, there are some versions of the Sonic franchise that are based in 'Human' environments - so 'Floral Forest Village' could actually be a costal village based in a human world. There are

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that state that the village is based on Sonic's world, it doesn't actually state where Sonic's world actually is - only that it's called

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Doesn't necessarily mean Sonic is based in the USA either, he could be based in places like the UK where's there are costal villages that are in easy reach (via Trains & Motorways etc) to a nearby city or town.
- I wouldn't think/worry too much on this point though.. there's always a 'creative license' involved with any type of story development whether Games, Movies books etc

So I'm sort of wondering, should I replace the backgrounds? Or would that be changing too much? I could maybe keep them and just lower the brightness/contrast on the more terrible ones, so the character images don't get lost in a hideous super-loud background.

I definitely thing 'something' needs doing with the backgrounds as I agree they can be a little too distracting from the main foreground - just not sure what

 

[seronis]

how do you guys feel about me redoing the backgrounds?

Anything that helps you feel motivated and productive. Id love to see new BGs that have a consistent style. And if you get to a point where something code related is your bottleneck instead of art feel free to find me in the renpy discord. either the official one linked from the website or the subreddit discord is fine as I'm in both.

 

[DarkLink]

I'm not short on ideas, I'm short on time/energy.
How do you guys feel about me redoing the backgrounds?

I'm fairly neutral on changing the backgrounds vs keeping the original art, though I would probably lean slightly towards keeping them as is (or just simple adjustments like lowering brightness/contrast) both for the nostalgia/charm factor from the original game like you mentioned, and more importantly, because the current backgrounds don't seem all that bad to me, and if you're already short on time/energy I'd much rather see a finished prototype build with your amazing new character art sooner rather than wait on background changes.

That said, if you find yourself really being bothered by them, and improving backgrounds would help you stay motivated and enjoying working on the project, I'd be totally fine with seeing them updated too.

 

[Ermollo]

Thanks! I did consider making a separate space somewhere to discuss it, but I just don't know if there's enough to talk about right now. It would mostly be useful for getting input and suggestions, and frankly, I don't need too much of that right now. I'm not short on ideas, I'm short on time/energy.

Although that said, I do actually have a question for people: how do you guys feel about me redoing the backgrounds? To me, Aval0nX's original backgrounds are nostalgic as hell and they give the game a kind of charm. But...

1) Some of them are butt-ugly
2) They clash, sometimes to an extreme level, with the cartoony art of the characters. For example, check out this post, where Cream's posing art is basically ruined by the background.
3) They don't technically fit the lore: Vanilla+Cream canonically live in a place called Floral Forest Village, not some American suburbs. This is the least important point, but it does bug me a tiny bit, and will probably start bugging me even more if I start writing new events and stuff.

So I'm sort of wondering, should I replace the backgrounds? Or would that be changing too much? I could maybe keep them and just lower the brightness/contrast on the more terrible ones, so the character images don't get lost in a hideous super-loud background.

Regarding updating the background images.
I think it depends a lot on what you want to do with the game in the future.

Do you want to release a whole product or do you want to gradually update it?


If the first option, then of course you should replace the background images.
If you plan a long release of updates, then you can ignore the backgrounds for now and focus on the characters. Besides, it's likely that by then there will be someone willing to help you with the images.