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[Holammer]

Gonna have to check out more of this thread.

I was thinking of making a thread about 2d sprite creation and how it's been years since the last pure sprite pushing hardware AFAIK.

Here's the most recent example I know of, the Cave CV-1000:

A Last Gasp of 2D: The Cave CV1000

Two-dimensional video game hardware is often considered a solved problem. Things like hardware sprites and tilemaps are basically gone; everything is done in...

nicole.express

Would it be possible for a pure 2d environment/graphics HW booster to exist now, and would it be capable of, with today's fab tech, anything that today's 3d focused tech couldn't brute force?

I don't think there's a market or need for custom 2d monster hardware. Today a humble Raspberry Pi lords over everything we had in the past like a demon king.
That said, there's enthusiast hardware like the Pico-8 or Commander X16, they provide a platform with certain limitations that can be fun to work with from a developer point of view. Working on what would have been insanely powerful dream hardware back in 1992.

Looking forward a thread on sprite creation. Been pondering aspects of the workflow myself recently and wondering how 2D focused devs handle it. Do everyone use Aseprite nowadays? Are there any hardcore devs still using Deluxe Paint or other methods? AKIO posted a tweet two weeks ago where he mentioned how he switched to Aseprite.

 

[Con_Z_ǝdʇ]

 

[cartman414]

I don't think there's a market or need for custom 2d monster hardware. Today a humble Raspberry Pi lords over everything we had in the past like a demon king.
That said, there's enthusiast hardware like the Pico-8 or Commander X16, they provide a platform with certain limitations that can be fun to work with from a developer point of view. Working on what would have been insanely powerful dream hardware back in 1992.

Looking forward a thread on sprite creation. Been pondering aspects of the workflow myself recently and wondering how 2D focused devs handle it. Do everyone use Aseprite nowadays? Are there any hardcore devs still using Deluxe Paint or other methods? AKIO posted a tweet two weeks ago where he mentioned how he switched to Aseprite.

Everything? Including Sega Saturn?

 

[Feel Like I'm On 42]

I also love some good pixel art. What im realizing tho, more and more, is that I prefer classic pixel art to modern games. I def agree about Dead Cells, Blasphemous, and Valfaris being fantastic looking. Crosscode doesn't have the same fidelity imo but still looks nice.

Best pixel art though comes from the 16 bit consoles, arcades, and 32 bit (saturn mostly but ps1 had a few too). I love the way classic 16/32 bit shmups and fighting games look. Shmups, with all the transparency effects and explosions and vibrant colors and fighting games with their animation, backgrounds, and detail.

For example Battle Garegga, EspRade, Truxton, Zero Wing, Gaiares, Thunder Force 4, Lords of Thunder. I'm enamored by that look right now. For fighting games I love the way Neo Geo games look but then the 32 bit fg's are rediculously great looking- SF3rd strike, Darkstalkers series, SF alpha 2/3

 

[Feel Like I'm On 42]

A few more "modern" pixel art games that look amazing on tge Switch's oled screen- Sonic Mania looks awesome and i think Shredders Revenge looks really nice. Owlboy is gorgeous.

Upcoming rpg Sea of Stars seems like a looker

Btw. What ever happened to Metal Slug Tactics that was announced years ago?

 

[Feel Like I'm On 42]

Huh? I never said it was pixel art. I said it was an evolution of 2D graphics.

Most indies just do pixel art because:
1. It's cheaper and quicker
2. Less skill required for smaller pixel art (8x8, 16x16, 32x32), which is usually what they choose for their resolution
3. You can do some cheap 2~3 frame "snappy" animation and get away with it (i.e. NES and SNES type of animation)

Not saying you can't do amazing things with pixel art (e.g. Metal Slug and some PC-98 games), but high res pixel art requires skill and way too much effort, so most indies don't even try. And their excuse is usually "muh nostalgia retro graphix" to justify the low res pixel art.

Which leads to Wonder Boy Dragon's Trap.
High res sprites, hand drawn, more detailed animations, smoother shading, easier to animate (since it's similar to drawing in Photoshop, not pixel-by-pixel ).

This is the way to go. No need to limit artists because of pixel art, just go all out.
Ori and Cuphead are good examples of what talented artists (not indie hacks) can produce.

Good pixel art blows away hand drawn games imo. I dont know why but Ive gotten more and more turned off by hand drawn. There are some exeptions to that tho, Hollow Knight and Guacamelee 2, for whatever reason.

 

[Holammer]

Everything? Including Sega Saturn?

Everything, unless you speak of Saturn emulation on a Pi and don't count PC based hardware.

I also love some good pixel art. What im realizing tho, more and more, is that I prefer classic pixel art to modern games. I def agree about Dead Cells, Blasphemous, and Valfaris being fantastic looking. Crosscode doesn't have the same fidelity imo but still looks nice.

Best pixel art though comes from the 16 bit consoles, arcades, and 32 bit (saturn mostly but ps1 had a few too). I love the way classic 16/32 bit shmups and fighting games look. Shmups, with all the transparency effects and explosions and vibrant colors and fighting games with their animation, backgrounds, and detail.

For example Battle Garegga, EspRade, Truxton, Zero Wing, Gaiares, Thunder Force 4, Lords of Thunder. I'm enamored by that look right now. For fighting games I love the way Neo Geo games look but then the 32 bit fg's are rediculously great looking- SF3rd strike, Darkstalkers series, SF alpha 2/3

I do play the occasional modern game, just recently Rift Apart and it was good! However, I adore the craftsmanship behind pixel art games.
Compare it to theatre. Movies are technically better in every respect, but there's still an audience and appreciation for a craft with 2500 years of known history.

 

[VeganElduderino]

Pixel art is life , I'm loving this thread!

 

[cartman414]

Everything, unless you speak of Saturn emulation on a Pi and don't count PC based hardware.

Technically, it has more grunt power, but that's to be expected.

I'm talking about the hypothetical scenario where the old methods of 2d (i. e. vector quantization) were still used, which allowed the Sega Saturn to throw/manipulate more sprites/objects with the same amount of RAM.

 

[64gigabyteram]

This is why people who’ve never seen / don’t remember a CRT image and shit on pixel art make me irrationally angry.

Fuck raw pixels.

OTOH, if a method of graphics display needs to be viewed on a certain display in order to look good, it's kind of pretty damn flawed isn't it?

Hand Drawn looks good regardless of CRT or LCD, everyone can enjoy the beauty of the game equally as opposed to CRT guys getting the superior image.

 

[NeoIkaruGAF]

OTOH, if a method of graphics display needs to be viewed on a certain display in order to look good, it's kind of pretty damn flawed isn't it?

Hand Drawn looks good regardless of CRT or LCD, everyone can enjoy the beauty of the game equally as opposed to CRT guys getting the superior image.

This is like saying that printing is pretty damn flawed because it looks the best on high-gram quality paper than on cheap paper.

Old games developed taking advantage of CRT technology and composite video signal. Game making evolved specifically to do so. The first console games, consisting in a few raw pixels, look pretty much the same on LCD screens. Later 80s games and up to Gen 5 and even Gen 6, don’t, because devs learned to use that specific tech to achieve certain results.

Hand-drawn can look stunning on flat screens of course, but to do so it requires high resolution, high framerates, and a lot of animation frames. Much more than it would on CRTs, which is why it’s tremendously expensive and we don’t see it much these days that screen resolution has increased a lot.

 

[Con_Z_ǝdʇ]

Btw. What ever happened to Metal Slug Tactics that was announced years ago?

 

[64gigabyteram]

This is like saying that printing is pretty damn flawed because it looks the best on high-gram quality paper than on cheap paper.

No this is more like if the new printer you got to print better images some how spat out ugly messes because of the image you're printing requiring a printer made before 2007 to look good.

the new graphics card you bought with 4x the power of your old one ran games way worse because of optimization techniques for the older card and not the newer one

Or like of the audiophile grade headphones you bought played certain songs sounding worse because the techniques those songs used sound way better on a pair of apple wired earbuds.

Stuff that you can understand but still pisses you off because newer tech should = better and not the other way around

 

[64gigabyteram]

I don't hate pixel art either, i understand it's place in history and many games I love looking at use it as a method of display. But it does piss me off knowing that I have to use a filter or a CRT to get the true intended viewing experience

 

[Hendrick's]

It's a mixed bag. There is a lot of pixel trash out there, but if done really well, it not only works, but often looks better than many of the photo-realistic games out there. The good thing is that it allows for smaller studios to create great games without the required budget needed to chase AAA production values.

 

[CGNoire]

The most impressive Pixel Art Game is Noita.

 

[Hendrick's]

The most impressive Pixel Art Game is Noita.

Never heard of it, but looks good.

 

[mild sriracha]

Akio is the gentleman who came up with the core game design of Metal Slug.
When Nazca was trying to figure out what to make as its 1st game, Akio made this drawing for presenting at the preliminary designs meeting.

Before Nazca and Metal Slug, he was involved in many of the games made by Irem.






He was already making good games at Irem, so what caused the founding of Nazca?

Rewinding to 1994, before the founding of Nazca:
Irem ceased game design operations and told its designers to go work in factory jobs located in Hokuriku region.

(Opinion: I am guessing they were re-assigned to go work in manufacturing of CRT monitors & arcade equipments at eizo nanao?)

(This photo is from Eizo website. It is not posted by Akio.)


Game designers at Irem protested the corporate decision by stealing art supplies, stealing reference materials, and by destroying many years' worth of data (of game production? of sales & marketing? Akio does not specify), before leaving the company.

This is the stapler Akio "took home as a souvenir" at that time.

They quit Irem and started Nazca, which went on to making 2 games, Metal Slug and Big Tournament Golf (Neo Turf Masters), before M&A by SNK.
Akio also mentions that Nazca at its inception was funded by SNK.

Work schedule of "Metal Slug pixel art team" was insane.
Typical day consisted of work continuing late into the night.
At 5 AM, they would eat instant ramen cup noodles and go to sleep.
And then they would wake up at the time of morning assembly in the office, with other teams having shown up for work that day.

Akio and his team spent every night & day at the office, except for Sundays. That is how they made Metal Slug.


Tidbit:
Akio also mentions that during his early years at Irem (before starting Nazca), before he transitioned to using "pixel art editor" (software solution), he would make analog drawings on graph/quad paper, which served as the blueprint for building digital data of pixels. (through the usage of a clunky hardware input device)

NOTE: Photographs here showing the hardware input device (with red buttons) were posted by someone else, and are neither confirmed or denied as object originating from within Irem.
But Akio's descriptions verbatim are: "2 levers and missile launch button with clear safety cover"

Fast forward to today:

Some of the original designers of Metal Slug are teaming up again, this time to make a indie game.
It seems Akio is heavily involved.


Black Finger JET

I wish the pixel art in this game is at least as good as Metal Slug 1, but that may be a tall order when you consider the reality: the 90s were when every major game company was good at pixel art, and even in that situation, there was no other game that measured up to the level of Metal Slug.

But I do hope Black Finger JET proves me wrong.

 

[mild sriracha]

Black Finger JET

 

[SirTerry-T]

I don't think there's a market or need for custom 2d monster hardware. Today a humble Raspberry Pi lords over everything we had in the past like a demon king.
That said, there's enthusiast hardware like the Pico-8 or Commander X16, they provide a platform with certain limitations that can be fun to work with from a developer point of view. Working on what would have been insanely powerful dream hardware back in 1992.

Looking forward a thread on sprite creation. Been pondering aspects of the workflow myself recently and wondering how 2D focused devs handle it. Do everyone use Aseprite nowadays? Are there any hardcore devs still using Deluxe Paint or other methods? AKIO posted a tweet two weeks ago where he mentioned how he switched to Aseprite.

The old DOS version of Animator Pro was awesome for sprite work. It turned to shit once the windows version arrived .

 

[SirTerry-T]

Hey, looks like someone is still keeping that great little piece of software alive

GitHub - AnimatorPro/Animator-Pro: A classic paint program originally for dos

A classic paint program originally for dos. Contribute to AnimatorPro/Animator-Pro development by creating an account on GitHub.

github.com

Or maybe I spoke too soon .
"404"

 

[Con_Z_ǝdʇ]

Played through the demo of Sea of Stars from the Playstation Store. Pretty short and somewhat restricted but also a lot of fun and quite promising. It's nice to enter an RPG and not feel overwhelmed with it from the first second. If this opens up after the beginning and starts to bring more depth to the combat, exploration and puzzles it could be a stellar game. Artstyle and music was already top notch. Especially the music made me zone out instantly. Now i need to find time for this gem amongst all these games that are coming out.

 

[Feel Like I'm On 42]

No this is more like if the new printer you got to print better images some how spat out ugly messes because of the image you're printing requiring a printer made before 2007 to look good.

the new graphics card you bought with 4x the power of your old one ran games way worse because of optimization techniques for the older card and not the newer one

Or like of the audiophile grade headphones you bought played certain songs sounding worse because the techniques those songs used sound way better on a pair of apple wired earbuds.

Stuff that you can understand but still pisses you off because newer tech should = better and not the other way around

Good analogies but i find all these 16/32 bit games dont need a crt to look great, they just need a small screen. They all look fantastic on Switch oled for example.

I think the idea that you need a crt has been blown out in recent years. Maybe its just been too long since ive used one and forget i dunno. They def didnt produce the color that a modern display can.

 

[64gigabyteram]

Good analogies but i find all these 16/32 bit games dont need a crt to look great, they just need a small screen

this is my opinion

unless the game makes heavy use of pixel/color blending, like games with a lot of prerendered images, more often than not raw pixels still look quite fine IMO. Playing Sonic Mania on my Switch lite looks more cohesive than doing so on my 4k tv

That being said, CRT Royale is still a very good shader for smoothing that stuff out and making everything look like the fat tvs of back then

 

[cinnamonandgravy]

man, metal slug pixel art is still just so impressive.

here's a model from a friend's incomplete game, drawn the old way, pixel by pixel:

 

[mopspear]

I think pixel art in games loses a lot when the resolution is too high. I limit all my games to a vertical resolution of 240 or 270 pixels.

 

[Holammer]

Black Finger JET demo will be shown at TGS this September. If you haven't kept up with the news, it's a pixel art shooter in development by many of the OG Metal Slug devs.

 

[Ozzie666]

Anyone have any opinions on Kraut Buster? one of the last NG-Dev team Neo Geo titles? Heavily inspired by Metal Slug.

Can't wait to Black Finger Jet!

 

[mild sriracha]

Anyone have any opinions on Kraut Buster? one of the last NG-Dev team Neo Geo titles? Heavily inspired by Metal Slug.

Can't wait to Black Finger Jet!

I think it has plenty of good moments. The gameplay seems like a combination of Metal Slug and Turrican?

 

[mild sriracha]

I think it has plenty of good moments. The gameplay seems like a combination of Metal Slug and Turrican?

Ich möchte Bier und Dirndl und Jodeln in diesem Videospiel.

 

[Futaleufu]

Black Finger JET demo will be shown at TGS this September. If you haven't kept up with the news, it's a pixel art shooter in development by many of the OG Metal Slug devs.

I wonder if they have reached SNK for a publishing deal

 

[lyan]

I don't think there's a market or need for custom 2d monster hardware. Today a humble Raspberry Pi lords over everything we had in the past like a demon king.
That said, there's enthusiast hardware like the Pico-8 or Commander X16, they provide a platform with certain limitations that can be fun to work with from a developer point of view. Working on what would have been insanely powerful dream hardware back in 1992.

Looking forward a thread on sprite creation. Been pondering aspects of the workflow myself recently and wondering how 2D focused devs handle it. Do everyone use Aseprite nowadays? Are there any hardcore devs still using Deluxe Paint or other methods? AKIO posted a tweet two weeks ago where he mentioned how he switched to Aseprite.

It doesn't actually takes much to kill the fps on mobile hardware through sprites by sheer fill rate with texture swaps without applying some (widely known) optimization tricks.

 

[Holammer]

Here's an oddity, a platformer developed by Happymeal. The publisher is keen on letting us know that Manami Matsumae did the music, she composed the music for a bunch of Capcom arcade games and the first two Megaman.
Happymeal previously worked on a metric ton of Japanese mobile shite, so give them a hand when they do a *real* game.

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Originally released on Switch, PS4 & PC back in 2019, Retro Mystery Club Vol.1: The Ise-Shima Case finally got an English language release. A retro famicom style visual novel with choices, a genre we seldom saw in the west.

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Bitwave Games released four classic shmups on Steam. Hellfire, Slap Fight, Flying Shark and Fire Shark. They're masterworks all, you can't go wrong.
They are sold as individual games, but on PS4 & Switch there's a completly different form and branding. Flying Shark & Fire Shark for example can be bought in one of the 'Toaplan Arcade Garage' bundles.

 

[mild sriracha]

I am compelled to say that Nishimura Kinu was my favorite artist while she was working at Capcom.
She made the analog drawing here. I am not sure who did the pixel art conversion.


That makes me ask a question,
is it absolutely necessary to prepare a drawing, before making pixel art?

 

[Holammer]

I am compelled to say that Nishimura Kinu was my favorite artist while she was working at Capcom.
She made the analog drawing here. I am not sure who did the pixel art conversion.


That makes me ask a question,
is it absolutely necessary to prepare a drawing, before making pixel art?

Yes, I think so.
Japanese developers "traced" sketches drawn on graph paper for the longest time. Western devs used WYSIWYG editors like Deluxe Paint. Who did the better art? Well, the Japanese did, of course. Drawing on screen gave us much of the euro jank art we had on the Amiga & Megadrive.

A gross generalization, I saw interviews on Shmuplations where some Japanese studios imported Amigas and incorporated DP into their workflow. Never heard of a western dev use the graph paper method, except for in the very early 80's perhaps? I'm sure many scanned pictures and used frame grabbers from VHS.

 

[Holammer]

This one released on Steam today and is coming to everything else later, Switch + every flavour of Playstation and Xbox. It's a fighting game modelled after and inspired by the SNK's Neo Geo Pocket fighting games with their trademark super deformed style. Even the name suggests the connection.
Developed by Statera Studios, a mainly Brazil based developer.

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New action platformer released the other day. Out now on PC and coming to consoles later.
While there's no spriter flicker and a wide screen presentation, they have worked nicely within semi strict audio and art limitations to make it look like a proper NES game.

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Do note that the YT trailer is nine years old. This game is an open source project developed as a showcase for the Anura Engine and it's been around for 12 years now. Available on tons of devices and the PC version was previously sold on the Humble Store. Now you can get it on Steam if that's more convenient for you.

 

[Holammer]

Just saw this on Niche Gamer. Just a few seconds of early in-game footage. Looks kinda MEH, coming to PC and "unspecified consoles" 2024.
Needs some more time in the oven and just a pinch of shading IMO.

 

[Con_Z_ǝdʇ]

Thanks to S SlimeGooGoo for raising awareness.

 

[cireza]

euro jank

I wish this dumb generalization was banned. This is so disrespectful of the great artists we have in Europe, and of the people who loved and still love their art.

Europe had amazing skills, knowledge, composers and artists and they were creating fantastic games back then. Henk Nieborg is from Europe to name only one person.

 

[64gigabyteram]

I wish this dumb generalization was banned. This is so disrespectful of the great artists we have in Europe, and of the people who loved and still love their art.

Europe had amazing skills, knowledge, composers and artists and they were creating fantastic games back then. Henk Nieborg is from Europe to name only one person.

If Baldur's Gate 3 is any indication it seems to still be the case today....

 

[cireza]

If Baldur's Gate 3 is any indication it seems to still be the case today....

Of course, but I didn't want to make my post longer than necessary.

 

[Holammer]

Here's a game under development by Studio Pico, the guys behind the recent Shinobi non Grata and it's one helluva step up art wise. Clearly taking inspiration from 90's police themed mecha anime & manga like Patlabor & Appleseed. The protagonist even looks like a mashup between Noa and Deunan.
The sideboob flash in the YT trailer was removed on Steam (very important info!).

Coming 2024 for PC with no other version announced yet.

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Here is an interesting game, not so much for the actual game (which looks great), but PUNKCAKE Délicieux, the developers. It's a French gamedev duo and a Spanish composer churning out small games in an endless indie game Jam supported by a Patreon and direct sales. Not all of them are winners, but one of them, Shotgun King: The Final Checkmate from last year was a minor success and resulted in ports for Xbox, Switch & Playstation. >>insert joke about shotgun approach<<

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Team Ladybug's Touhou Luna Nights is finally coming to Playstation in January 2024.
It's a decent metroidvania and if are familiar with the Touhou universe it's a must play.

---

 

[Holammer]

Omega 6: The Video Game is odd, from the description it's based on a Manga by Takaya Imamura, the guy did a lot of art direction work at Nintendo. Some Zelda games, designed F-Zero's cars & characters, Fox McCloud. He retiried back in early 2021. This indie adventure game is about to be shown at TGS and will come to Switch and PC via Steam.
We're going to hear more about this one.

Star Fox artist’s new Switch game has secured a publisher | VGC

Takaya Imamura’s Omega 6 The Video Game will be shown at Tokyo Game Show this week…

www.videogameschronicle.com

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Assault Suit Leynos 2: Saturn Tribute is a remaster of the Saturn exclusive title in the Assault Suit series, you might remember one of them with Cybernator on the SNES, or Assault Suit Valken as it was known in Japan. Yes, localization was stupid even back then. This version includes some QoL improvements and comes to Consoles & PC in 2024.

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Bandle Tale was show at the recent Nintendo Direct, interesting because Riot Games, the developers of League of Legends follows the Games Workshop strategy by giving the LoL license to everyone and their dog. One of the takers is Lazy Bear Games the creators of Punch Club & Graveyard Keep, a Russian Studio currently located in Lithuania (leaving for Malta is sooo mainstream!).
The game is a farming sim taking place in Bandle City, a dimension/realm separate from the rest of Runeterra and is inhabited by a race of often furry [but not always] spirits known as Yordles. Real talk, pretty excited about this game and I haven't played LoL since Poppy had a pug face.

Coming 2024 to PC and Switch.

 

[Holammer]

Zenuvia Interactive, the developer behind Steel Assault been teasing a new game for a couple of month and it just got a name. Neon Inferno is a sidescrolling shooter with an additional depth plane where you shoot at enemies with a crosshair similar to Dick Tracy on the Megadrive.

 

[Trilobit]

​

Whoa! Coziness deluxe! I'd spend absurd amounts of time in the game just resting by the fireplace.

 

[Holammer]

Sonic Megamix Mania, a mod for Sonic Mania was just release a few hours ago. Includes new characters, stages and abilities. It requires the PC version and Encore DLC.

Sonic Hacking Contest :: The SHC2023 Contest :: Sonic Megamix Mania (v0.9) :: By Team Megamix Mania

Sonic Hacking Contest :: The SHC2023 Contest :: Sonic Megamix Mania (v0.9) :: By Team Megamix Mania

shc.zone

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Here's the trailer for a fan made Megadrive port of R-Type. It's looking pretty feature complete and they will soon release a three stage demo. Includes lots of additional options like a 'Mega' soundtrack and they are including the secret stage from the Master System version.

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This is the two week old trailer for an upcoming sequel to Petal Crash. They aim to upgrade the graphics to Sega Saturn levels and it's supposed to start crowd funding 2024.
The original Petal Crash is the product of a 2019 Kickstarter. A fine arcade puzzler, only brought down by an *overly* verbose writer incapable of writing snappy dialogue.

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I'm a sucker for indie games trying to emulate the look and feel of classic arcade games. So I had a lot of fun with this one, it's very simple but it does feel like something I could have played in the arcades back in 1983. Appropriate music and a good CRT effect enhances the experience, if only the overlay looked a little bit better, I havta dock a point because of it.

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Speaking of... Another arcade game release today. I wondered why it was released by Digital Eclipse without fanfare, but it turns out this is the Steam release and it came out on Itch last year. It's alright, great pixel art graphics and sound, but the gameplay is too visually busy and it's just chaos with unpredictable physics. Games of the era it tries to emulate never had such complex physics.

 

[Holammer]

Canadian developer Cheesemaster Games finally release Spirittea. It was meant to release last year, but was held back. It looks like a cross between Harvest Moon and Spirited Away where they player is capable of seeing Yokai and runs an inn/bathhouse for them. It's was just published and is avaliable on Xbox, Steam & Switch.
I'll get it if it gets a good reception, art snob in me is a little bit disappointed in the graphics.

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There are plenty of pixel art games I ignore mentioning because they're not "tall enough to ride", but this precision platformer created by a Czech solo dev makes the cut. It was just released for PC.

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Korean devs Asteroid-J tried and failed to kickstart Ninja Issen two years ago, but develoment continued and it's coming soon.

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Moist is a metroidvania, roguelike game coming 2025. I can't find anything about it, there's an article on Nichegamer and the Steam page. No Youtube or Twitter precense. Either way, it looks very good and I reckon it needs a less generic name.

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Octopus City Blues got a date recently and it's coming Q2 2024 for PC on Steam. The game was kickstarted back in 2013 and they recently released a demo for Steam NEXT where I tried it. It's all sorts of amazing with gameplay and artstyle you'd expect from an adventure game on the PC & PS1 ca 1995. A highly disturbing kafka'esque setting taking place on a giant tentacle in a frozen world.

 

[cireza]

Sonic Megamix Mania

Looks infinitely better than Superstars. Only thing I am wary of with these fan projects is the level-design.

 

[Trilobit]

Moist is a metroidvania, roguelike game coming 2025. I can't find anything about it, there's an article on Nichegamer and the Steam page. No Youtube or Twitter precense. Either way, it looks very good and I reckon it needs a less generic name.

 

[Holammer]

Developed by Kumi Souls Games, a team with members from Italy and UK. The Last Faith was kickstarted three years ago and was just released an hour ago on all the formats. A metroidvania leaning *heavily* in the soulslike direction and comparisons to Blasphemous are inevitable.

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Team ladybug is working on another metroidvania with the teams trademark clean pixel art look and gameplay gimmick. Blade Chimera will be released 2024 for PC and as a timed launch exclusive for Switch on the console side.

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Shantae Advance: Risky Revolution is Wayforward's next entry in the series, unique because it's based on a previously shelved prototype for a GBA game. I don't like the clean vectors of recent games so this is a welcome surprise. Coming 2024 for everything except Xbox.