Tuesday, March 31, 2015

Ms. Pac-Man Twin Recreation

Since I'm still as much of a Pac-Man nut as I've always been, I thought I'd share this with you.

While looking through a list of un-dumped MAME titles, my eyes caught onto this unauthoritised pseudo-sequel to Ms. Pac-Man called Ms. Pac-Man Twin. It was created by a company known as "Susilu" and it allows two players to play the game simultaneously, with the second player operating a green-colored Ms. Pac-Man.


As opposed to the millions of other two-player Pac-Man games (such as Tengen's Ms. Pac-Man or Pac-Man Arrangement), there are two layers of pellets that have to be cleared from the maze; a red layer and a green layer. These layers can only be removed by the Ms. Pac-Man that matches the color of the layer (Power Pellets are universal, they can be eaten by either player and don't exist on a layer). Once both layers are gone, the players can advance.


So rather than giving you low-res distorted arcade screenshots, I went and made my own recreations, which includes layouts of the other three mazes.


Update: Here's V2 of the mazes, with a palette that replicates the original screens more closely.

Sunday, March 22, 2015

Details and References for aimed designs for WARMAN/WARWOMAN.



Since I'm seeing if others could maybe contribute the designs for the various WARMEN in my rather very young (in concept) WARMAN series, I'd prefer to list off better descriptions for each of the remaining WARMAN concepts.
http://aozoraadventure.wikia.com/wiki/WARMEN
As always you can find the currently-made content for the series above, which includes designs for M-10 and M-07 to show how detailed I need these guys to be (and yes their chests are intended to be shown), and a general synopsis of the series itself.

A bigger look at all the models can be seen below:


Initially, earlier models are based about raw power, thus they have slightly more bulky appearances than later models, which are geared towards a more balanced speed/power tradeoff. Though I since then decided having each model just vary in power and agility, with some later models having more of a power build than an agility build even if they don't have low ID numbers, especially M-10 who's considered a "balanced build" but favors strength slightly.

And just to refresh anyone's memory, models with higher numbers are considered "newer" than those with lower ones. They're also full, 100% artificial; and despite their very human-like anatomy and the material used to make their skin very life-like, they possess no sexual/reproductive organs whatsoever as they don't really have any reason to breed.

Additional notes:
*Every WARMAN is based on adult males 20-40 in age range. No younger, no older, and no abnormal modifications to make them into non-humanoids with stuff like additional limbs, a tail, etc. The rare WARWOMEN, which in official canon currently only includes M-07, are based on adult females in the 20-35 age range and follow the same design basis and restrictions as the men.
*All WARMEN and WARWOMEN's skin areas display muscles on the chest in varying sizes. Power-builds typically have thicker muscles than those that are themed off of agility, with balanced models sorting muscle sizes that are in-between, though there are subversions.
**The skin of the WARMEN is entirely flexible, thus is is not composed of individual parts of skin, with visible "cracks".
*A WARMAN and WARWOMAN's hair is mono-color, usually sporting an exotic design. The hair's color does not have to match or otherwise influence the color of the model's armor (However the armor cannot be completely black). No model is completely bald, and any parts where hair would've grown is instead shaved.
**No model wears helmets, collars, or other accessories, or has parts of armor on their faces (such as chin-guards), but they can wear glasses. If the hair is styled, in the case of a WARWOMAN's, the hair scrunch used to support the hair is made of a combination of metal and a very flexible latex.
**The armor on a WARMAN cannot produce light normally, and fumes/smoke can only erupt from a WARMAN's body while it is combat, with the purpose of venting out the amount of heat present with the WARMAN's body while it is firing off weapons. There are no holes on a WARMAN's body for this specific purpose.
***Small sources of light can be present on a model, though it isn't mandatory nor is encouraged to include own a model. These sources of light must be very small and not be present in large amounts around the model's whole armor.
*Every WARMAN has a bare chest with no armor covering it from any sides, WARWOMEN wear two pieces of armor on each of their large breasts that resembles a detached two-piece bra (with the cleavage in-between the breasts fully-shown), but it can wrap around the back of the WARWOMAN's chest.
**And yes, the breasts of a WARWOMAN are intended to be large in size compared to the standard female. On average they are about a size between an H-Cup and a J-Cup.
*The skin on the chest of a WARMAN must have some kind of tattoo pattern/markings painted on with lines that runs across the WARMAN's skin and is colored the WARMAN's signature color. The markings have a "painted-on" look, not a "burnt on" look. Markings on their faces that are also these colors must be present.
*Every model's limbs must be thick/bukly and detailed, and can not be made of only one large part. Because the more your body parts can last in battle, the better.
**The arm must always at least resemble and move like a traditional human's arm, it cannot be super-thin or super-simple in design. Nor can one arm be bigger than the other.
**Their arms cannot be made into or have the ability to shape-shift into something that isn't a hand, like a blade, hook, claw, or firearms. If desired (but not required), small blades and some types of tools and small ammunition can be installed into and used from the sides of the hand or arm or the tips of the fingers (like razor-sharp nails or lighters on the tips of the fingers or a medium-length blade that can be unsheathed from underneath the WARMAN's hands should they not have blades on the sides of their arms or want a stealthier approach).
**Certain types of guns that are manufactured can mount themselves onto the sides of the lower arms of a WARMAN through the use of magnets and are fired by the WARMAN's arm muscles and consciousness once attached (though no references of a WARMAN or WARWOMAN should include any of these types of guns). WARMEN and WARWOMEN are still capable of using guns and other handheld weapons normally by holding them with one or both hands.
**WARMEN cannot fire off beams of plasma or other hard-light weapons form their body; they must find a weapon with this specific purpose. to use or attach to their arms.
*The design of every WARMAN's foot area, while still robotic, resemble standard thick work or army boots, not naked, sock-less feet. It is strongly advised to divide the foot/boot into multiple parts that can be bent on the end of the boot, since outside of a few rare exceptions, a WARMAN's metal is not fully flexible.
*The legs of each model are generally thicker compared to a standard human's, and the entirety of it must be armored up completely. WARWOMEN generally sport thicker legs than a WARMAN to show off more of a curve.
*A posterior can be implemented onto the WARMAN's design on their backside, made of either metal (with thin folding lines across the buttocks that move along with the model as they walk or move their legs), skin (for WARWOMEN only), leather, or latex. The cleavage in-between the buttocks can vary in size, and If made of skin on a WARWOMAN, the area where the privates on a normal human female would be are covered up using metal, leather, or latex. Posteriors made of skin on a WARWOMAN are part of the skin on their backs.
**WARMEN take the metal/leather/latex buttocks and have realistically-sized rears, though there are exceptions where the buttocks are made slightly larger than a traditional man's, especially if the model has wide hips. WARWOMEN will (though not always, as shown with M-07) take using posteriors made of skin (as noted above) and (regardless of material) have buttocks that reach bigger, but still realistic sizes (usually with more of a cleavage).
*The bodies of the WARMEN themselves cannot hold any type of supplies like first aid, or food. They already have all the stuff and as they are robots, and injuries are "healed" via self-repairs and charging. As for food, while they can ingest human food and drinks; they do not need it to live and can simply get their energy by fueling or through receiving energy though their "backpacks". The only time food would become a necessity is if the model is on the verge of running out of energy and needs to burn up the food for reserve fuel, or decides to go for long periods of time without a backpack. The backpack is not made of fabric or any kind of material other than metals.
*While there can be a few electronical parts that are energized and powered by the model's fuel, such as small lights, there can be no monitors or other screens and complex electronics on the model's body. The model also cannot use electricity to attack directly, such as through electrical cannons/discharges or floating power cords.
*The thrusters for the jetpack the WARMEN use can be placed on either the direct bottom of the boots, on the sides/back of the boots, or on the back of the model's "backpack". If it is on the back, the model may need to sacrifice storage space for repair supplies or other goods the WARMAN may find essential to prevent damage to the goods while using the jetpack strapped on the WARMAN's back. Optionally, if the jetpack is on the model's backpack, they can be made to fold and expand out. WARMEN do not use propellers/helicopters to fly.
*WARMEN themselves should be very resistant to catching fire as their bodies frequently build up heat from all the weapons and utilities they can use at once.
*The "backpack" on the back of a WARMAN must be removable (No straps ala a traditional backpack worn around the model's arms). Models attach and lock their respective packs onto their backs when they go into battle to provide them extended life, armor, fuel, and energy. They're also necessary for fueling a model's jet boots if they do not sport a jet pack somewhere within their back packs. As detailed in the second bullet, a WARMAN can remove their backpack and still live, though they will be required to eat human food in order to sustain the energy needed to power them, or else they will become inactive.
*WARMEN are full 100% waterproof, and should be able to survive in any body of water even with all the bulk they may sport.
*Every Model has their ID number imprinted onto one of their robotic legs (either the left leg or right leg) and placed horizontally or vertically. The format is "M-##".


With that said, onto the list. All of the designs are both male and light-skinned (with the same skin tone as M-10 and M-07 unless otherwise noted, and their hair color is the same as their main color:


M-16: Light Blue (medium-range hair, is the only male of the WARWOMEN group, the "pretty boy" who acts slightly on the flamboyant side but doesn't play the trope completely straight)

M-15: Cream (Female, fits the "tough girl" architecture, sports a lot of battle damage and lack of visible pupils dup to her injuries that she never cares to get fixed)

M-14: Dark Grey (Female, Details unspecified, appearance, personality, and build type can be determined by designer)

M-13: Indigo (Female, Black skin, Frizzy long hair, wears lipstick that matches her signature color, the “bulky powerhouse” of the WARWOMEN, has the thickest legs and posterior area. Typically acts serious and direct when doing her job, though outside combat she’s more comfortable, laid-back, and supportive)
Her physical shape is based on a general dark-skinned stripper(sorry I had to say that)/performer and is very curvy like M-07, with strength that almost rivals those of "heavyweight" models 01, 02, and 06.


M-12: Bright Pink (Female, untrimmed and straight short hair on her head, longer hair is curled up into two large thick pigtails on the sides of her head, has a cheerful “Girly Girl” personality who likes cute things despite her occupation and role as a war machine, is somewhat clumsy and likes to make people and herself happy, but can snap if frustrated.)
She a slightly less curve to her figure than M-13 and is not as bulky, being based on a balanced power-agility model, leaning slightly towards agility, but still sports the WARWOMAN tradition of larger than normal breasts and (to a lesser extent) buttocks.


M-11: Teal (Female, balanced build, has medium-length hair that extends down to her neck in some kind of exotic style (like a pesudo-bobcut), shares some personality traits with M-10, being the heroic determinator who acts on the serious side and is a bit of a tomboy)
The only real inspiration regarding her that I could think of would be something along the lines of a more mature Ryuko Matoi from Kill la Kill in her late twenties (thus, acting like an adult), along with the basic mold of most other female protagonists in Shonen/Seinen anime. Thus she should display a lot of bad-assness much like M-10 with some of the other female models' sexiness.

M-10: Black (Already done)


M-09: Pink (Long Hair, dark skin, self dependent and moody at most times with 1/4th closed eyes)
Based on a particular male NSFW model that to prevent people being scarred for life, I had to crop more than I originally did (especially since all I wanted to show was the hairstyle and to a lesser extent the eyes)
M-08: Sky Blue (Short hair with a short spike trim in the front)
I don't really have any design or personality preference for him, probably a calm, supportive character with a bit of a smooth, and happy go lucky (though not too cheerful) personality.)

This is unfinished concept art of M-08 from artist Dedyk, if you want a bit more of an idea on what he should look like in the end


M-07: Orange (Female, Already done)

M-06: Green (Short, partially messy hair, Shaved on one side)
No design preference for this one either; though from what it feels like he'd have shades of a generic Shonen anime/manga protagonist.


M-05: Yellow (not blonde) (Long, somewhat-messy dirty blonde hair with a front bit that grows in front of his right eye, a lazy but confident fighter, has lazy eyes and mild freckles on his cheeks, has slimmest chest area, the design of his mechanical legs resemble baggy pants).
Again no real design basis for him, aside from his chest area being the most skinny (but still showing muscles) of the ten WARMEN. So expect him to have a bit of a "pear" shape when you go from his hip to his legs before it goes into the robotic legs, especially when viewing him from his side. Additionally, the yellows present on his body progress in the shading order of yellow to dark yellow to a darker yellow, not yellow to orange to red.

M-04: Violet (Shortest in height despite being a bit bulky, made to resemble a 21-year old, wild purple spiky hair [spikes extend a great distance], "crazy", impatient, and grumpy personality, shows pointed teeth)


M-03: Navy Blue (Long clean/smooth hair that drops below the face and covers one eye, falls under depression easily, but not as much or often as a generic "depressed" guy, and he is up to fighting and putting up his best efforts.)
Hair-design wise I had mostly Venom from Guilty Gear on the mind, but with one or two snippets trimmed to show the other eye. (leaning towards exposing his left eye)

M-02: Red (Long hair formed into an axe blade, "cool" and carefree personality,  likes fighting the most out of the others while smiling and providing positive influence, wears sunglasses)
I should point out that this guy likes to smile and is yet another design of mine to be loosely based on Johnny Bravo (mostly in his personality). The mohawk in his hair forms into an axe, with a razor-sharp blade forming the very top of the "blade" hair.

M-01: Brown (Most heavy and muscular of the pack, the only one with beige skin, the loyal one that always gets the job done.)
Perhaps based on a typical "bear" model, minus all the body hair and developed into a more bodybuilder shape than a "fat" shape. Also while he is larger, he's not super-huge or anything. He's a more natural height/shape.

And with that that's pretty much all.

Bonus: I also wanted to share a quick fun fact; here's the model that I took M-10's (facial) design from:



Monday, March 16, 2015

Bio Force Ape (NES Proto) Soundtrack

Here's a gamerip I had made a while ago of Seta's unreleased NES title Bio Force Ape, not to be confused with Bio Miracle Bokutte Upa. But hey it'd be awesome seeing a terrifying baby monkey swat a rattle at mutants to make them inflate before it knocks the mutants into their own kind, destroying them in the process.

I seriously have no idea what I'm talking about, so on with the OST itself.



These are direct recordings of every song used in the game: the three level themes, several of the shorter tunes used for things like stage completion, and the Records screen theme which you can only hear in full by triggering the Sound Test.

Friday, February 13, 2015

Bosu o warau no Chousenjo

AKA Laughing Boss' Challenge.

Almost thirty years later and this game is still ripped apart.

Also happy valentines' day.

Monday, December 1, 2014

EWW Smash Bros for 3DS/Wii U

Yep, it's finally out, and thanks to the Super Smash Bros for Wii U GameFAQs forums, I compiled up a list of potentially every known possible complaint the game has thus far.

*Characters:
**No additional Donkey Kong or Metroid representations due to lack of recognization of these series in Japan, despite their huge following outside Japan.
**Gannondorf remains a Captain Falcon clone with little to no effort to differentiate the two.
**Ice Climbers cut due to incompatibility with 3DS and to keep the roster between the two 100% identical.
**Kid Icarus and Fire Emblem having four representations due to overwhelming Japanese feedback for these characters and their home franchises, which explains why Palutena's Guidance is present.
*Bad/Poor clones, with not enough differences to make the two major and most criticized clones (Lucina and Dark Pit) unique.
*Characters cannot be customized directly from the Character Select screen, requiring you to traverse through the Custom menu to find it.
**Miis:
***Too much focus on Guest C for Mii Brawler, Guest B for Mii Swordfighter, and Guest F for Mii Gunner in artwork and in-game renders.
***Fighting Mii Team artwork does not edit in user’s Miis, and portraits show the above Guest Miis instead of the face of the actual Mii(s) used in-game.
***Trophies of the Mii Fighters as well as the ending images not altered to show the user’s Miis instead of the Guests.
***Lack of Voice Synchronizer ala Tomodachi Life to allow the Mii’s names to be said properly instead of “Mii”.
**amiibos
***Character Select and after-match results screen still shows the original character’s name (i.e. Villager instead of Vikkager) instead of the amiibo’s name.

Others:
*Menus cannot be navigated with the Wii U Gamepad's touch screen
**Menus could be better designed, such as not burying previous games' "Solo" modes (Classic and Stadium) in with "Games and More"
*Smash Tour is mediocre/bad (personally I dislike how you can't do it with less than 4 players) Smash Run is also very forgettable, with the massive number of Kid Icarus and Subspace Emissary enemies completely overshadowing the other series’ cast of enemies.
*Needs more diversity in trophies (plus Fewer/No errors in trophy descriptions and trophy sources, stating the EXACT debut of a character, Final Smashes used in non-Smash games included)
*Needs an Adventure Mode ala Melee's.
*Needs a better Classic Mode (could have the same path system as 3DS, but with the gameplay style/stage layout of Smash 64, Melee, and Brawl with at least 12 stages and several bonus events, plus the bonuses from Smash 64/Melee being brought back). It wouldn't overdo on 5+ player maps and "Intruder" opponents, and when a match occurs where you're up against a team of copies of one character, it never uses the Mii Fighters.
*All-Star should be like prior games, where you only fight the characters of one universe for one round, with the three boss characters (Metal Face, Ridley, and Yellow Devil) disabled on Gaur Plains, Pyrosphere, and Wily's Castle respectively.
**The inability to continue in All-Star.
*Shortened Music Tracks
*Too many "Mobile" stages (ones where you fly around then the stage "stops" in a certain location, like Isle Delfino, Wuhu Island, and Skyloft)
*Too many retro/past/familiar stages (especially from Brawl and Melee maps that were present in Brawl), with some of these Past stages being the ONLY maps of a certain franchise on one version (Green Hill Zone in 3DS, Onett in Wii U)
*Lack of "Battlefield" versions for maps which have small platforms arranged in various ways ala most maps in Project M.
*When you want to end a match with a four-button combination, it now gives you a prompt asking if you want to conform to end the match.
*No option to disable bosses in stages.
*Palutena's Guidance generally not being well-liked.
*Pausing is noticeably laggy, running at like 15 or 30 FPS on pause.
*The game not saving modified rulesets (Time, Stock, or Coins, and the time limit/starting lives) even though it saves item configuration.
*Stage Builder is a bit flawed, such as not being able to copy/paste and delete shapes, with poor grabbable ledge detection.
**No Player Spawn point configuration.
**Abscence of certain special parts from Brawl’s Stage Builder, such as no slippery surfaces, falling platforms, spikes, and conveyor belts.
**Inability to play Large custom stages in 8-Player Smash
*Poor online, with non-Tournament Legal settings in For Glory (Two stocks + 2 minutes instead of the preferred Three/Four stocks + 8 Minutes) and no 1 vs. 1 in For Fun
**Inability to play stages that lack hazards or camping/Cave of Life spots in For Glory, ala Battlefield
** Players getting banned for targeting a single player in Online, even if it's unintentional.
*When you fail an Event Match, no instant prompt to retry and the game just boots you back to the Challenges menu, forcing you to sit through loading screens.
*Lack of online rankings and lobbies, along with vocal chat when playing against anyone.
*System memory error 160-0103.

Please refer to this GameFAQs post for more things wrong with Sm4sh.

Wednesday, November 19, 2014

Old stuff related to Trainyard

I shouldn't need to bring up by now that I'm a huge follower of Matt Rix's Trainyard. Released in 2010 this was a really unique puzzle game with a concept that I adore to death (I'm a huge color nut).

Before the editor for the game was made, I came up with an idea that I had since abandoned; adding support for territory colors alongside the primary and secondary colors already found in the core game. Normally when you try to mix a primary-colored train with a secondary-colored train, you get a brown-colored "Garbage" train, which doesn't see much use outside of the plethora of user-made levels.

The original idea behind this concept: Instead of making a brown train when both a primary and a secondary were mixed, a territory color would be made instead. However not every primary +secondary combo would result in a tertiary color; if you were to try and mix red + green, yellow + blue, or yellow + purple, it would make brown instead of a territory color. Below is a diagram I made long ago that shows how the tertiary colors would function in-game:



I also did a few example levels that use tertiary colors as the main focus.




As you can probably tell the idea didn't really take off, since I was the only one interested in it and it would've made the game even more of a brain-wreck since according to Matt, most players didn't get the color-mixing concept, even having trouble with creating the secondary colors form the primaries.

Otaku-Ball Alpha Footage

Saturday, November 1, 2014

An ecchi story from a while back

Because of a certain incident that happened with a friend of mine, I have made this story private.

Tuesday, August 19, 2014

Diamonds - Complete Collection

I'm sure I may have hinted a while back that I'm a big fan of Dub Myers' and Oliver Dreer's rather unknown Diamonds game. And since it's "For Kids" spinoff is very much not available online, I decided to make a bundle of the Windows versions of both Diamonds and Diamonds for Kids.

You can download the collection here.
MEGA Mirror here.

Keep in mind these are 16-bit Windows games, so they will not work on anything running on 64-Bit or higher. So if you're one of those guys that still has a Windows XP (or a virtual machine) lying around, pop these in and go have some fun.

As a bonus, I included some level sets for Diamonds. "BONKERS" is a trimmed-down version of the nine levels from the "Go Bonkers" game in the Genesis/Mega Drive version of Action 52, "FORKIDS" is the levels from Diamonds for Kids converted back into the original Diamonds, and finally "MOMENTUM" is a conversion of Black Frog Industries' Diamonds clone Momentum.

On the topic of Diamonds, I wanted to bring up this sprite sheet I made a few adjustments to.

Now for quite the longest time I've been planning on cramming as many features from multiple games as possible into one game, as I did with Diamonds at one point. Mostly this was to introduce elements from Diamond Ball III (on DOS), Crillion (on C64) and Dudes with Attitude (on NES) into Diamonds, though since then I had a change in plans resulting in some of these features being dropped. Since then what this sheet basically allows would include:

*Being able to start a level off with another color besides Cyan
*Roster of colors expanded to 12 colors.
*Bricks, Boulders, Painters, Keys, Locks, and Gates are available in all 12 colors; compared to Cyan only existing as the brick (without any Painters) and Orange only having the painter, key, and lock. A colored brick can be set to respawn if the player is killed.
*Lighter painter blocks are removed when they are used, and are restored if the player dies. Their destruction is not required to enable destroying the Diamonds and passing the level.
*Boulders that shift one tile opposite the direction the player's ball hits it. They too (if desired) are restored into their original position if the player dies.
*Gates; The solid ones become hollow when the player becomes the color depicted on the gate, the hollow ones become solid when the player becomes the corresponding color.
*Gray Blocks and Gray Boulders can be destroyed/moved by the ball regardless of what color it is. They do not count towards level completion nor are worth any points, and are restored if the player dies.
*The Death block can be skinned into either the original Diamonds appearance (the Skull) or the DfK appearance (the red vortex).
*Arrow Tiles would block access through the direction the arrow points towards if the player attempts to enter through that direction. In other words it would be a one-way tile.
*The black balls with white outlines are based on the "Killer Ball" from Action 52 (Genesis/Megadrive)'s Go Bonkers. They bounce in one place endlessly (at about three-quarters the player ball's speed) and destroy the player if touched. However unlike Go Bonkers, the ball would also be removed if the player attempts to touch it.

Gone are the enhancement/powerup blocks, sand/water blocks, the random color painter, the ? block, and the electric gates. Simply because not only were they for the most part unnecessary since you can make just as good levels without them, but the graphics made for them looked for lack of a better word, a bit on the ugly side.

Friday, July 4, 2014

Based on a true story

Your guess is as good as mine as to why these two decided to get hitched in Tomodachi Life.


Sunday, June 1, 2014

Marihoe Karting Figure 8

Yes I made a video.

And yes it's at 50cc since I just started the game earlier today. I spent three hours on the sucker and got a temporary sore thumb after six GP's worth of racing.
Once I unlock more crap and get races that aren't just a "derp I can race" sequence, they'll exist.