Shmup Ship bundle for Unity devs

[jeffo]

Hey all!

It's been a while since I've been here, but I'm back in the development kick.

I wanted to share my first unity asset I've put together, which some of you developers may be interested in. It's a 7x spaceship bundle, made to be extremely light weight for mobile/web or just tons of them on screen.

You can check it out here: https://www.assetstore.unity3d.com/#/content/15155

Would love to hear any feedback, or questions you might have

Cheers and happy shootin'

Jeff

[Cagar]

They're definitely not bad for ships, but they look kind of too euroshmuppish / limited.

Those marks of .. being old? Do really not fit shoot em' up concept imo. The ships should look bright and good, like if they're straight from a factory instead of 'dirty', old, and damaged.
Also, you should use more colors instead of that washed out grey, just go for pretty bright colors and they would look much more alive and proper for a shmup; no need to look grumpy.
^ Especially for a player ship; the player ship shouldn't have any visible big cannons/guns, or it will look and feel very silly.

tl;dr: Remove that dirty and old texture, use more bright colors


some reference;

[Ghost Crab Games]

I think grunginess in shooters has its place. Shmups like Jets n' Guns and Sine Mora feature ships, enemies, and backgrounds that have a well-worn look to them. The ships in the OP's bundle specifically remind me of what 3D recreations of those from Raptor: Call of the Shadows might look like.

As a big fan of the Unity asset store more bundles and quality creations are always appreciated!

[n0rtygames]

People dislike euro shooters because of the gameplay - not the graphical style Cagar. Often the ships are gorgeous.

Sine Mora could've been an amazing game - it's pretty to look at but the gameplay sucked. Also it's pretty rude to shit on this guys work just because he hasn't recreated DoDonPachi.

I think some of the models are quite nice

[Kaiser]

People dislike euro shooters because of the gameplay - not the graphical style Cagar. Often the ships are gorgeous.

Sine Mora could've been an amazing game - it's pretty to look at but the gameplay sucked. Also it's pretty rude to shit on this guys work just because he hasn't recreated DoDonPachi.

I think some of the models are quite nice

What norty said, the ships look fairly nice, and who says we can't have variety in designs? Sci-fi from the grounds up is a genre whether literature, movies or games designed to HAVE variety. No restrictions whatsoever!

[Cagar]

People dislike euro shooters because of the gameplay - not the graphical style Cagar. Often the ships are gorgeous.

What the fuck man? When did I talk about "PEOPLE" or that euroshmups are mainly disliked because of the graphical style?
Stop pulling shit out of your ass just to annoy me.

I've never liked the looks nor gameplay of the average euroshmups, neither did I say that his models are bad:

I only stated my feedback which he asked, and my feedback was that they wouldn't fit an actual arcade shmup very well. No need to "recreate dodonpachi" (< what the hell was that anyways), sometimes I feel like negative criticism is not allowed here, even if it was constructive

I think some of the models are quite nice

Yep, me too.

[n0rtygames]

Well I sort of drew that conclusion from this:

They're definitely not bad for ships, but they look kind of too euroshmuppish / limited.

and as for this question:-

No need to "recreate dodonpachi" (< what the hell was that anyways),

This conclusion was drawn from not one... not two... not three... but the *four* Donpachi series images you linked to say how things should look!

Suggesting that gritty and dirty doesn't fit shmups is just fucking utterly ridiculous. It doesn't fit the shmups /you/ like - many of us do like a grittier look. When you're dealing with 3D models it's a lot easier to get these kind of details in compared to low resolution sprites.

[Cagar]

Well I sort of drew that conclusion from this:

They're definitely not bad for ships, but they look kind of too euroshmuppish / limited.

Yeah nice conclusions

and as for this question:-

No need to "recreate dodonpachi" (< what the hell was that anyways),

This conclusion was drawn from not one... not two... not three... but the *four* Donpachi series images you linked to say how things should look!

Yeah, should have used more variety of ships from other games to prevent this conclusion too.

Suggesting that gritty and dirty doesn't fit shmups is just fucking utterly ridiculous. It doesn't fit the shmups /you/ like

My opinion, my feedback, you do not have or need to care. I said what I think, do I have to separately state it in my future posts to make it clear?
I have my tastes and you have yours, and seeing many games with this kind of worn-out looking ships, I've come to conclusion that it doesn't work for me.

tl;dr: "ur opinion is fucking utterly ridiculous -.-" (C) n0rtygames

[mice]

War ftw!

Nice ships!

[n0rtygames]

How's the Marauder UV mapped? Could I easily edit the upper and lower sides of the ships texture? I have a bizarre idea in my head and I think it resembles Uridium.

[jeffo]

Thanks for the comments guys!

Yeah I tend to have a grungy/dirty style with my texturing. I should try and do a clean pass

Here's a newer/higher res ship I'm working on: https://www.facebook.com/tinytitangames ... =1&theater

How's the Marauder UV mapped? Could I easily edit the upper and lower sides of the ships texture? I have a bizarre idea in my head and I think it resembles Uridium.

Both top and bottom have unique textures, however sides are mirrored right down the middle.

Cheers!

[n0rtygames]

You know, I sort of have an idea looking at that...

Have you thought of doing some player ships with progressive damage textures?

This would certainly please the Euroshmup crowd (and despite what people here say - there are a lot of people out there who like 16:9 euro shmups) - but also it's got me thinking it could be a neat little bit of graphical polish for representing stuff like grazing and resetting to a 'clean' texture after each new life.

Plus you'd satisfy the nay-sayers who don't appreciate the beauty of a dogfighting ship covered in the finest farmyard shit money can buy.

[BareKnuckleRoo]

Yeah I tend to have a grungy/dirty style with my texturing.

Absolutely nothing wrong with that. Plenty of successful shmups out there have darker or more muted designs. Look at Battle Garegga, Batrider, Bakraid, Ibara (Yagawa loved his dark ships) or Ikaruga and Sine Mora (looks pretty, shit gameplay, such wasted potential). Even older DOS games like Raptor or Tyrian had some nice lookin ships that were not colourful in the slightest.

Just because the current craze is bright, contrasting ship colours does not mean your designs are bad. Though I do think it's important to choose ship colours, background colours and enemy colours all so that you don't have too much blending, it's good for bullets in particular to stand out well.

I also like that one of your ship designs is totally asymmetrical, I'm sick of seeing player ships that are always symmetrical! :p

Have you thought of doing some player ships with progressive damage textures?

This is something I've wanted to see too. Mars Matrix has your ship evolve as you level up which was pretty cool, I think it'd be neat for a game to have visible ship damage as you get hit (you don't need to use a lifebar, just have your ship look more damaged the fewer lives you have left, and instead of exploding on a hit your ship just gets momentarily staggered when hit, Espgaluda or Strania style).

It's a lot more work to do with actual from-scratch spirtes I'd imagine unless you're using prerendered sprites based on 3D models I'd imagine.

[jeffo]

Hi all,

Just a quick update. I decided to add a free asset to the unity store to help promote my bundle, so if anyone is interested you can find it here: https://www.assetstore.unity3d.com/en/#!/content/16360

Cheers!
Jeff

[laxa88]

Grabbing the asset in a bit. Thanks for the share!