TheBryanJZX90
Member
Oh sweet, the main character fights with a barbell. Very FF7. Every time I hold one of those I think about how much it would hurt to get smacked with it.
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Zeboyd Games announces Cosmic Star Heroine (Suikoden/PhantasyStar-inspired Unity RPG)
- Thread starter cj_iwakura
- Start date
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SavoyPrime
Member
Gonna be getting this for sure when it drops on the PS4!
SatelliteOfLove
Member
That Used Car Salesbot on the right is a new fave alongside old fave Gun Mage Gal.
YoYo Switch
Banned
New artwork of the playable cast.
We got a request to do a trailer for E3 so we've been working hard on that and the beta got delayed. Should be soon though. And the trailer is shaping up to be pretty awesome.
right there
Robert at Zeboyd Games
Banned
Loved Cthulu, Breath of Death, and the Penny-Arcade games, so definitely want this. Was hoping it might get an n3DS release (Unity works there, right? Just depends on the features, I guess.), but Steam still works.
It'd be great to get it on 3DS but it was hard enough to get it performing well on the Vita. Maybe on whatever portable option the NX offers.
Fushichou187
Member
Having seen it at PSX last year where is was both playable on a large TV as well as Vita I can say both look great but holy shit does it look phenomenal on Vita's OLED.
Dash Kappei
Not actually that important
It looks so much better when playing on an HD TV tho with just a simple, non heavy, scanline filter.
Why not give the option? Just asking, it's your game of course.
I was super disappointed that Freedom Planet didn't have it either on WiiU and it looked much worse than on my PC emumachine hooked up to a CRT monitor. I wish all pixel art games offered one.
Guess I'll have to play CSH like that too.
Robert at Zeboyd Games
Banned
It looks so much better when playing on an HD TV tho with just a simple, non heavy, scanline filter.
Why not give the option? Just asking, it's your game of course.
Because I don't know how to make quality filters (I tried briefly for curiosity's sake after reading some articles and the results were not good) and if I'm going to spend time learning how to program something new, there are other things higher up on my priority list, and because the game was designed to be viewed on modern screens (unlike many older games that were designed with CRT limitations in mind). Also CRT filters are at odds with our fundamental game design philosophy of combining the best features of old-school RPGs with the best of modern games - stuff like scanlines, pixel bleeding, and blurry images are artifacts of an older age that are best forgotten. If you want to add those effects yourself for the nostalgia factor, more power to you, but it's not something I want to invest time on.
Conversely, I love playing Cosmic Star Heroine on the Vita because it has just a hint of retro nostalgia, but mostly it just looks like a cool new portable RPG.
Fine Ham Abounds
Member
Where's ma beta, bruh
socksfelloff
Member
Scanlines with an intensity setting are really all that's required. Forget the CRT filters.
You have my respect for your straight up answer. I'll be there day 1 regardless.
Robert at Zeboyd Games
Banned
If there's enough demand, I'll consider it after release.
I need this game now on my vita. LIKE NOW! Q_Q
OniBarubary
Banned
Where's my spider DLC? PreLC?
socksfelloff
Member
I'll just leave these here.
These are just quick and dirty. I'm no photoshop pro.
Original
Fat BVM style(...sort of)
Thin and Dense
Morrigan Stark
Arrogant Smirk
I prefer version #1... *shrugs*
Scanlines work for super-pixellated art, but when it's not that blocky I prefer without.
Scanlines work for super-pixellated art, but when it's not that blocky I prefer without.
I'll just leave these here.
These are just quick and dirty. I'm no photoshop pro.
Original
Fat BVM style(...sort of)
Thin and Dense
That second one is perfect. I would love if that was included.
exmachina64
Banned
I'll just leave these here.
These are just quick and dirty. I'm no photoshop pro.
Original
Fat BVM style(...sort of)
Thin and Dense
I prefer #2 and #3.
I'll just leave these here.
These are just quick and dirty. I'm no photoshop pro.
Original
Fat BVM style(...sort of)
Thin and Dense
Prefer 1 infinitely more.
RadicalVelocity
Member
Lovin' it so far!
And absolutely do not understand the obsession with scan lines and other retro artifacts, but I'll leave it at that.
And absolutely do not understand the obsession with scan lines and other retro artifacts, but I'll leave it at that.
Dice
Pokémon Parentage Conspiracy Theorist
Scanlines make sense if the original content was made for SD, but only if it is far more than scanlines and actually emulates the original screens for a proper handling of the individual pixels. Aside from the fact this game was made for modern displays, I have no idea how you'd properly emulate the effect if the game does its own pixel doubling, which I assume it would have to since modern displays won't want to run in 480x270. So unless you actually hacked the game to emulate itself, I don't know how you'd get a real process on the pixels. Even if you could just fake it without that, you'd not only have to program whatever filter you're using to treat 4x4 blocks (if going for 1080p) as though they're a single pixel, but then there wouldn't be any room left between the virtual pixels for the subpixel effects of a proper CRT emulation. Maybe 4k could do it but otherwise I think you'd just be screwing something up. A sweetfx layer or whatever else you might conventionally try certainly wouldn't do the trick. It'd only be painting over stuff that needs to be there, resulting in detail or fidelity loss, not enhancing the presentation of what would be a flat multiplied pixel.
StarCreator
Member
There's basically no way to fill any modern screen with a scanlined image without scaling making it look like crap. The simplest "scanliner" filter is simply one that doubles the vertical size of an original by adding a blank line in between each original line (which has to be scaled appropriately horizontally). This means, with the original image being 270 lines then the filtered output is 540 lines (as seen in the screens above - this is the "Thin and Dense" sample). No modern screen has only 540 lines of resolution, so this has to be scaled to the target resolution, which ruins the effect.
socksfelloff
Member
It's all just a matter of preference.
Just to be devils advocate I scaled the Image to 4k. Looks great IMO
Please view full size(open it in a new tab even)
Dash Kappei
Not actually that important
Thanks for the detailed answer. But honestly all that is needed is a simple scanlines filter with a slider to reduce/augment the effect, forget about all the other stuff the serves only for the nostalgia factor (and honestly to me it's not even that since I was used to play my Megadrive/SFC/etc in RGB, modded to play JPN/US 60Hz games and a nice TV even back in the '90s and not with the crappy RF/composite AV cables hooked up to a 14" Mivar playing crappy PAL versions with squashed image, slow ass gameplay and botched music, lol) and to crap on the IQ for the sake of "play it like it was back in the old day". For most folks like me, scanlines in low-res pixel art serve to increase the IQ by increasing the definition of the sprites, so it's really the opposite philosophy from all that other stuff you memtion which just degrades it (CA, color bleeding, convex-screen effect, composite color grading and so on) and imo it's unnecessary fluff. I'll be there day 1 regardless, just wanted to chime in with my 2 cents on the matter, wish you guys the best on the project!
Pellegri Testament
Member
I'd honestly just rather see the game finished than have time wasted on filters that appeal to a very small niche nowadays. I was fine with games having said filters 15+ years ago because that's how every game looked at the time, but they really do just look terrible compared to what engines are capable of today.
orthodoxy1095
Banned
I'll just leave these here.
These are just quick and dirty. I'm no photoshop pro.
Original
Fat BVM style(...sort of)
Thin and Dense
#2
Reluctant-Hero
Member
So... can I give extra money to join the beta? I foolishly only backed at $30 back in 2013. Then I passed up my chance to try the game at PSX because I wanted to go in "fresh". But I just can't be patient anymore. I'm ready to play and maybe even help squash a few bugs.
StarCreator
Member
1080p and 4K are pretty much the only two resolutions that work because the native resolution of the game is designed to be scaled to those resolutions. It's 720p, 800p, 1050p, 1440p and whatever other myriad screen resolutions exist that pose the problem.
socksfelloff
Member
I think you are misunderstanding what we are asking for. We are NOT asking the dev to actually output every other line to create scanlines. We are just asking for a filter slapped ontop of the game like I'm doing in the photos. It scales just fine to any resolution.
Robert at Zeboyd Games
Banned
When I tried just slapping on a filter to emulate scanlines, it made camera scrolling look really bad. There's definitely more to it than that.
Most pixel art games cheat at how they scroll. While they might emulate the look of say, 320x240, they are still internally scrolling at 1080p or whatever... and layering a scanline effect on top kills the effect.
You'd have to force your scroll to lock at proper pixel intervals (divide current float scroll by target pixel dimension, cast to int, then multiply it by original float scroll). It'd of course make the scroll seem more jittery, like true retro consoles, but then the layered scanlines should work.
Like Robert says, there's a lot more to it than simply layering a scaline image on top. I personally love scanlines, but the original artwork needs to be brightened up to accommodate for the darkening caused by the filter. It's why 8/16-bit games on modern screens look much brighter than originally intended. It's an art.
socksfelloff
Member
Why Does it work well with emulators? I'm pretty sure a framiester does it via software as well.
Morrigan Stark
Arrogant Smirk
Seriously.
StarCreator
Member
So you want a filter that blanks lines indescriminitely without regard for whether it lines up correctly to the pixel art? Because that's not scan lines, that's utter nonsense.
I'd say a scan line filter is something for patch v1.5 or something similar, after release, when the game is stable, bugs have been squished and the guys at Zeboyd games have rested up a bit. Fucking around with additional features this late in development when the deadline is approaching sounds like a recipe for disaster to me.
Then again, I wouldn't enable the filter even if my life depended on it. It would be a different matter if the game had been designed from the ground up with this in mind, and even then you'd probably hear me whine about the artificial image quality degradation. 😬
Also, those pics are looking gorgeous, hot damn. So glad I backed this.
Then again, I wouldn't enable the filter even if my life depended on it. It would be a different matter if the game had been designed from the ground up with this in mind, and even then you'd probably hear me whine about the artificial image quality degradation. 😬
Also, those pics are looking gorgeous, hot damn. So glad I backed this.
Robert at Zeboyd Games
Banned
The E3 trailer is coming along very nicely. Just gotta make a few minor tweaks & it should be done. If you're not hyped after watching it, there's a serious problem.
The E3 trailer is coming along very nicely. Just gotta make a few minor tweaks & it should be done. If you're not hyped after watching it, there's a serious problem.
Is that problem the release date? :b
The E3 trailer is coming along very nicely. Just gotta make a few minor tweaks & it should be done. If you're not hyped after watching it, there's a serious problem.
Just release the trailer already!...
Shifty1897
Member
Really excited for this, Robert. Zeboyd's releases improve by leaps and bounds with every game and I can't wait to pick this up for Vita.
See the reason in my post above... emulators are emulating the resolution of the original hardware, including the scroll speed in pixels. Few modern games, even pixel'y ones, scroll like that.
It looks fine thrown on a still screenshot. It won't work in motion unless that game specifically scrolls in desired visual pixel increments. It wouldn't be that hard to do, but it's not a matter of simply throwing scanlines on top. You'd notice the shimmering immediately.
Robert at Zeboyd Games
Banned
Trailer should come out tomorrow. I'm very pleased with how it's come out.
Jarod McChicken
Member
Trailer should come out tomorrow. I'm very pleased with how it's come out.
On the PlayStation channel or elsewhere ? In any case I guess we will find the link here ^^
Wolfgunblood Garopa
Member
I think I'm finally appropriately hyped.
Fine Ham Abounds
Member
Trailer should come out tomorrow. I'm very pleased with how it's come out.
Sweet
In other news I can't believe it's almost E3 time again
Morrigan Stark
Arrogant Smirk
Oh wow for some reason I thought "E3 trailer" meant it was gonna air at E3, not like, tomorrow. Nice.
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