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Sunday, July 10, 2011

FREE RPG - Tileset

<Updated 25/October, please read the bottom>
<Updated 25/July, added stairs, and cleaned a pair of things>

Hello, finally I'm back again!!, and that's what I've been working on:


RPG Tileset v1.0
License: GPL (Read below about nethack tileset licensing)

<Now I've got something to start working , it has taken me many , many time and i didn't had a big amount lately so what I've done to try to speed up the process was to start looking first at other's work...>

 <I watched many tilesets, found a few real impressives like the ones at lost Garden  but unfortunately they didn't were what i really need, then i started to search into the free to play rogue-like games, there are so many out there!, finally i saw the Nethack 32 graphical tileset>

<Now it is when i ran into problems , the tiles were 32x32 pixels, and i'm using 100x100 pixels tiles, so i have to adjust every tile i imported from the nethack into mine's, other problems is that the nethack tiles had a "brick"background so i had to clean it pixel a pixel, so i could paint them using the transparent pink color to overlap images (SDL_ColorKey).>

<I used the nethack tileset to import all the characters from the game, the players, the foes and the beasts too, and most of the items too, but i tried to draw the other things: i made the terrain and a few effects , there is still many work to do, but i really needed something to start working, promise I'll improve it!>

<VERY IMPORT: Tileset LICENSING:>

<Another important thing is i MUST give thanks to all the people that made posible to bring the nethack game to live and were so kind to share it to anyone (Please read the license), basically what it means is "You are permitted to modify NetHack, or otherwise use parts of NetHack, provided that you comply with the conditions specified above; in particular, your modified NetHack or program containing parts of NetHack must remain freely available as provided in this License Agreement. In other words, go ahead and share NetHack, but don't try to stop anyone else from sharing it farther. ", so thanks all the people again, remember that if you use the tileset for anything it MUST REMAIN under GPL, free to anyone..., that kind of things is what makes open source strong and made linux and so many programs to be available to the people....>

<now i think it is time to stop chatting and start to explain my fight against the gimp and how i actually made the tileset:>

I came from MS Windows , and my very first paint program was MS Paint, oh yes, the wonderful image editor!, since Windows 3.1 i have used it... ¿Time to upgrade right?

I started installing the Gimp , i wanted to work with the gpl tools so from all the software i chosen it, it's a powerful but not so easy to start learning, anyway there are hundreds of tutorials to learn using it, just google for "gimp-tutorial" and you will see, in Ubuntu i just went to software center and searched for it.

After installing the Gimp i created a new image, I made it 1000x1000 pixels in size, then i went to "Image" > "Configure grid" and i made a grid size of 100x100pixels (the size of an individual tile):



Now i selected "View" > "Show Grid" and "View" > "Snap to grid"


Then i filled everything with the transparent color (pink= FF00FF), notice we have the tileset ready to work, we just need to know how to organize the tiles:
  • I used the first two rows for terrain tiles
  • 3rd is used for a few terrain objects and magical effects
  • 4th is used for the players
  • 5th and 6th is used for misc. objects
  • 7th and 8th are monsters, and finally 
  • 9th and 10th are used for the gui icons
There are still many missing tiles, for example I need stairs, a portal and many other things, so probably i will enlarge the tileset

To draw the terrain tiles i just selected the tile and filled it with a texture, then i selected "Filters" > "Map" > "Make seamless" so they will fit correctly with each other.

I imported the nethack tiles selecting them with the "Rectangle select tool" one a time, then copied it and pasted it into my tileset, then i needed to "Tools" > "Transform tools" > "Scale" to the size 100x100 pixels (32x32 pixels in Nethack), finally with the "Pencil tool" i cleaned all the background to the color "FF00FF" (pink).

So basically that's how i filled 80% of the tileset, i drawed a few things, like GUI icons but explaining how i made them falls out of this tutorial....

I would really appreciate any comments about this tileset (what will you add/remove / upgrade) I really hope this helps other people than me..., I hope too to post more advances in the rpg game too soon.


A final Note: Many people has come here (in fact 100+ persons), for example you!, watched the tileset or downloaded it, but nobody has made any comment about it, it is a shame because if YOU don't say a word..

  • I don't know if people like it or find it useful.
  • I don't know if there are things that people would like to change /add / erase.
  • I'm not a magician , can't read minds, please help me to improve things.
Thanks!
JB

2 comments:

lowban said...

Hi, I'm really digging your tiles but sadly I was looking for 32x32 ones so I left yours alone. Just want you to know that your work is really appreciated even though I in particular didn't use it.

Unknown said...

Well, If you want use them, it's easy to resize from the original 1000x1000 size to 320x320, that would do the trick, but of course if you want something more finished the Nethack tileset (for example) is very good, unfortunately it is hard to find a tileset with all the desired images...

Thanks for the feedback!