backdrops or not

[RaverDave]

Should I spend time creating loads of backdrops, like the one shown, or should I simply keep the backdrop black? Its hard thinking of backdrops but if it looks better then its worth a go! P.S most of the gfx are still beta,like them horrid borders!

[Ian Price]

I personally wouldn't bother with tiled backdrops like that (no offence, but they are a bit, well...).

Why not search the interweb for some nice photos of places of interest or something? - they can really enhance a game and indicate changes in level (say have first four levels in England, next four in France - kind of like a World Tour - or something...).

A plain black background is incredibly dull. Either get a nice set of background tiles, or decent images.

Of course, that's just my humble opinion and may differ from everybody else's.

:)

[Digital Awakening]

I agree with Ian. And I find that background to be quite annoying when playing a game. It feels a bit in my face and it has that extreme tiled feeling. You need something with less contrast and a patern that look more natural when tiled.

[RaverDave]

Hmm,well is this any better??


I mean dont forget that this will be a fast paced game, not a work of art like..i dunno..some picasso

[Ian Price]

Just as a matter of interest, is there any reason why the blue panel down the right of the screen is so big? Is it necessary? If you wanted a smaller game screen, it would look better centred with borders of equal distance each side? I presume it's the scoreboard panel?

As for it being a fast paced game and not a work of art - you can have both you know ;)

[RaverDave]

yeh,on the right would be the score panel,as it is now its a debug panel!!
If i had them equal sides then some people would wonder what the point of the left panel was! anyhow the look of them needs improving,so does the bat..i need to blank out the bottom also..and so forth and so forth

[RaverDave]

How about this then??
And ignore the bloody panels for now!

[Ian Price]

That background is not as hard on the eyes as the brown one :)

[RaverDave]

Right, so if i either darken it like hell,or keep the shapes simple..it looks ok..this is the original "in your face" one but darkened! improvement??

[Ian Price]

No, that still looks pants. ;) Darker doesn't mean better. Keep it simple and subtle.

[Digital Awakening]

Yeah, the blue one is better. It doesn't have any sharp contrasts and it doesn't look so repeated as the red one, you can't see where the one starts and the next begins although the patern is quite easy to recognice as repeated. If you take a brick wall as an example it can be made of a single brick without looking so repeated because it's natural for a brick wall to look repeated. And as Ian says it doesn't have to be dark at all as long as it's quite subtle and doesn't interfere with the foreground.

[RaverDave]

Right,so if its too extravagant, like this 1,its a nono?  I just keep it as simple symmetrical kinda patterns with natural repeats?!

[Ian Price]

Actually I find this one less distracting than the brown ones - it's smoother and the edge colours between the swirls and the background are not severe - it's still very dark, but a very definite improvement over the harshness of the brown ones.

Try making a lighter version :)

[RaverDave]

It really makes ya feel queezy when the suckas scrolled!
I am gunna really, really!!!! get rid of them panels and design some more,those were just a mock up

[RaverDave]

ok,rather than doing it by hand, coz i have the artistic skillz of a slug obviously, the last few was done with the texture generator, and so was this one!! All I have to do is get the colour balance right and things should be ok