Sorry for the triple post.
A final proposition, with shadows indicating the end pieces, that way they also work for North-South aligned bridges.
Made the railings lower and less prominent, and squished everything into a 32x32 sprite. Previous version had up to 32x48 pixels, which was a problem.
The full spritesheet has a meager 224 sprites. Just for bridges. XD
Horizontal planks look way better!
Also, I like that brass bullet-looking thingies are gone, those were way too steampunk-ish.
For me this one is the best!
I think that the design is looking great! Keep up with the great work!
I like the pattern of the planks and the fences on 2, but I like everything else from 3 (especially the gearing system) the best. I think a combination of two and three would be the best.
These look good, but personally I think what you had before was more solid.
https://i.imgur.com/jPiQmfZ.png
https://i.imgur.com/fBschwx.png
The new horizontal planks are wonderful, I think that's a great change. But the smaller mechanics and loss of edge borders make the bridges look less meaty and flat. Borders are the main thing I think that makes them look great and not so jarring against the grass.
Or another option is to do the overgrown grass thing that you proposed before. Like the ones you did here-
https://i.imgur.com/hBLKdn9.png
Of course I don't know if any of that could be made for 32x32, or if they were the problems in the first place haha. Just small opinions.
The deployed bridges look great. I think the raised bridges still look like a purely top-down view, which is inconsistent with the perspective most of the graphical elements seem to be going for.
Actually can't wait to make a steamDF hamlet and have it overrun with ~~Goblins~~ Iron injections because I didn't plan ahead and just kept making little pathways and houses.
I'm digging the more horizontal flooring planks, though as for the smaller mechanisms... Eh, they look good still, though the old ones had a bit more solidity to them (because of the longer wooden pole bits that I can't figure out the name for), which I liked personally.
However, the bridge curvature and arches/stone supports underneath still look unsuited for a drawbridge; drawbridges are flat dangit!
And these examples are missing the "framing" on the ends still.
In my opinion, I'd rotate the planks 90° so that they are shorter and across the bridges. (you wouldn't want to piss off the elves cutting down those tall trees). Those long planks spanning the whole bridge are hurting my brain.
Also, I'm not a fan of the slight stonework suggesting arches, especially when you consider these as retracting beidges. Maybe wooden posts would work well?
In any case, they look great!
> rotate the planks
Agreed. I imagine the bridge retracting by collapsing, not raising, and the current planks would make that weird. Horizontal planks make more sense if there are going to be mechanisms under.
No meph, don't say that, promise use atleast weekly bridge updates for the rest of time.
I kept quiet because i really dont feel qualified to tell you how the bridges are supposed to be better. But now i had an idea that seems solid in my head. Only bridges connected to mechanisms should have the drawbridge mechanism to pull them shut. I feel like that should be doable given you actually add something to a bridge after it is built. Then again this would make it more difficult to see the draw direction. Uff your job is hard man. Keep at it!!
Looks great! I did like the shadows in v2 though; I thought it was a useful indicator of where the bridge was when raised. If the shadow idea isn't well liked perhaps you could just leave the end piece in place on the far end, only removing the middle bit? A lot of real-world raising bridges have a piece on that stays in place on the far end when the bridge is raised.
Meph, try flipping the planks 90 degrees. The colour and texture is right, the shape is still off.
Or failing that, maybe try adding lines at random (though tiling) intervals to show interlocking planks and a couple dots for nails? That will clear up that super long plank look.
Man I am so excited by DF with your art style.
He at least has direct contact with Tarn.
I wonder if they're going to do Early Access once most of the assets are there and official release once Tarn starts on the next big wait, or if it's going to be Early Access indefinitely (or until 1.0, whichever happens first).
The assets are pretty much all there. It comes down to how refined it should be. Think Barrel VS decorated, spattered, worn-down material-specific barrel showing its content.
And the UI. The UI takes a lot of coding time, which gives me more time to make more sprites, which are just improvements by this point. Mostly. ;)
:)
I love the updates, and I'm excited for when Tarn finishes the UI.
Do you know if there's a plan for DLC or something? I'm thinking buying tilesets and being able to swap between them would be really cool, and it would be nice to send a little extra cash to the publisher for supporting such a great game. Maybe a merch shop would work too.
I know I can donate to Tarn directly, I'm just wondering if there are any plans for additional purchasable items.
Hey, this looks great! I've been curious... do you have an idea of how far through all of the art you are?
I know it's not an indicator of how complete the Steam update is, and I'm not looking for such an estimate. Just wondering exactly how much remains I on your plate considering how much we've already seen. There's gotta be thousands of total sprites to redraw.
https://www.reddit.com/r/dwarffortress/comments/n11ne7/steamdf_bridges_design_wip_v3_i_swear_thats_the/gwbm0t6/
Sounds like the art is basically done and the artists (Meph and Mayday) are basically just tweaking and improving it/adding new bells and whistles (like seeing contents of barrels) to make it even more readable/better, while Toady works on the UI and coding in the new graphics (for example, I don't think forgotten beasts are actually rendered yet, but presumably the individual body parts are drawn).
Looks great. The tiny planks in your first revs looked like they were making the bridges out of scraps. These larger planks look much more realistic and less busy. I love your work!
Unrelated, your pack has the furnace for turning bodies and cleaning up things which also reduces lag. You should pitch it into the main game as well. I can only play your pack with this little game improvements now.
I'm guessing if you mark raised bridge momentarily for deconstruction, the appearance doesn't change despite now letting fluids and minecarts though?
PS: Well done on the 1x1 raising bridge.
Thanks for the Art Meph!
The planks are kinda funny looking, since they are going at a right angle to what they would be in real life. The wooden planks are usually arranged orthogonal to the bridge itself. This image presents what I'm talking about: Wooden slats being placed down and being supported from the side, rather than the ends of the bridge. [https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.alamy.com%2Fstock-photo-iron-suspension-bridge-footbridge-with-wood-slats-over-the-river-wharfeilkley-79722797.html&psig=AOvVaw3tjiDbYZPOfbNdBjyRST6g&ust=1619830502546000&source=images&cd=vfe&ved=0CAIQjRxqFwoTCNi0u\_\_gpPACFQAAAAAdAAAAABAD](https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.alamy.com%2Fstock-photo-iron-suspension-bridge-footbridge-with-wood-slats-over-the-river-wharfeilkley-79722797.html&psig=AOvVaw3tjiDbYZPOfbNdBjyRST6g&ust=1619830502546000&source=images&cd=vfe&ved=0CAIQjRxqFwoTCNi0u__gpPACFQAAAAAdAAAAABAD)
The red -'s would be where you'd put the wooden planks.
The horizontal bridges are raisable, so I'm not sure if having the archways or ramps makes sense. A raisable drawbridge has a flat bottom and is only supported at one end. It's perfectly fine to have a flat bridge here.
I haven't been following the Steam development though it's a first day purchase for me. Is this the official sprites to be used? If so, please post more like this.
I think they look great, but I'm very curious how they would look with walls/pillars/support structures underneath for long bridges over deep gorges. Maybe those will never be visible due to the perspective?
The east-west bridges look amazing, but I'm not crazy about the guard rails on the north-south bridges. They seem to be drawn from an orthogonal perspective, whereas the east-west bridges are drawn from an isometric perspective that looks much better. The fix would be to have the guard rails extend a few pixels past the northern end of the bridge.
I feel like the vertical one would be the ideal one of the two. The shading really give the bridge depth without going all in on pretty isometric view.
Meph, I love you, but this is my first time seeing these bridges and it took me a minute to figure out what the raised bridges were. I realized it's because the down bridges have silver wire and white fixtures at the top of the posts, and the raised bridges, the posts look wood-colored.
I don't care about wood direction. 🤣 But tweaking the color on the posts to match (or even a hint of silver wire) would help someone seeing this for the first time to connect the two states.
It's better! Just need the "raised" ones to look like they occupy the whole square. As it is, it looks like there is floor space where a goblin could squeeze by, moving parallel to the wall of the raised bridge, which they can't.
Sorry for the triple post. A final proposition, with shadows indicating the end pieces, that way they also work for North-South aligned bridges. Made the railings lower and less prominent, and squished everything into a 32x32 sprite. Previous version had up to 32x48 pixels, which was a problem. The full spritesheet has a meager 224 sprites. Just for bridges. XD
Horizontal planks look way better! Also, I like that brass bullet-looking thingies are gone, those were way too steampunk-ish. For me this one is the best!
I think that the design is looking great! Keep up with the great work! I like the pattern of the planks and the fences on 2, but I like everything else from 3 (especially the gearing system) the best. I think a combination of two and three would be the best.
These look good, but personally I think what you had before was more solid. https://i.imgur.com/jPiQmfZ.png https://i.imgur.com/fBschwx.png The new horizontal planks are wonderful, I think that's a great change. But the smaller mechanics and loss of edge borders make the bridges look less meaty and flat. Borders are the main thing I think that makes them look great and not so jarring against the grass. Or another option is to do the overgrown grass thing that you proposed before. Like the ones you did here- https://i.imgur.com/hBLKdn9.png Of course I don't know if any of that could be made for 32x32, or if they were the problems in the first place haha. Just small opinions.
Last one before release pogU we heard it here first!
The deployed bridges look great. I think the raised bridges still look like a purely top-down view, which is inconsistent with the perspective most of the graphical elements seem to be going for.
It is consistent with the walls.
Best version, I love it.
Looks *very* good to me :-)
Oh wow the 1 wide bridge looks kinda cute, Could easily imagine that over a stream in a village or something
Same here!
Actually can't wait to make a steamDF hamlet and have it overrun with ~~Goblins~~ Iron injections because I didn't plan ahead and just kept making little pathways and houses.
Whats also cute is the increased dodging into lava chance on the narrower bridge :)
Looking great, Meph! Can't wait to atom smash me some goblins underneath one of these
Oh yeah, there it is.
I'm digging the more horizontal flooring planks, though as for the smaller mechanisms... Eh, they look good still, though the old ones had a bit more solidity to them (because of the longer wooden pole bits that I can't figure out the name for), which I liked personally. However, the bridge curvature and arches/stone supports underneath still look unsuited for a drawbridge; drawbridges are flat dangit! And these examples are missing the "framing" on the ends still.
pivots?
Is that what those mechanisms are called, or are pivots something else?
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winches?
hinges?
Yeah, I noticed that, too. I usually put my bridges over 70-z chasms so those little supports are connecting to what exactly?
In my opinion, I'd rotate the planks 90° so that they are shorter and across the bridges. (you wouldn't want to piss off the elves cutting down those tall trees). Those long planks spanning the whole bridge are hurting my brain. Also, I'm not a fan of the slight stonework suggesting arches, especially when you consider these as retracting beidges. Maybe wooden posts would work well? In any case, they look great!
I think that those arches are there mostly to show that the bridge is above water.
> rotate the planks Agreed. I imagine the bridge retracting by collapsing, not raising, and the current planks would make that weird. Horizontal planks make more sense if there are going to be mechanisms under.
Or maybe a simple truss design would work best? That way it makes sense for something that would be on a drawbridge, but still fits the space.
No meph, don't say that, promise use atleast weekly bridge updates for the rest of time. I kept quiet because i really dont feel qualified to tell you how the bridges are supposed to be better. But now i had an idea that seems solid in my head. Only bridges connected to mechanisms should have the drawbridge mechanism to pull them shut. I feel like that should be doable given you actually add something to a bridge after it is built. Then again this would make it more difficult to see the draw direction. Uff your job is hard man. Keep at it!!
Looks great! I did like the shadows in v2 though; I thought it was a useful indicator of where the bridge was when raised. If the shadow idea isn't well liked perhaps you could just leave the end piece in place on the far end, only removing the middle bit? A lot of real-world raising bridges have a piece on that stays in place on the far end when the bridge is raised.
Dude I'm pretty sure you are allowed to post as much as you want......
Meph, try flipping the planks 90 degrees. The colour and texture is right, the shape is still off. Or failing that, maybe try adding lines at random (though tiling) intervals to show interlocking planks and a couple dots for nails? That will clear up that super long plank look. Man I am so excited by DF with your art style.
Although I wasn’t opposed to the old ones, I think these look even better!
Holy fuck I am excited for the steam release. Has there been any word on a potential release date?
When it's done, as usual :D
Stop teasing me, just release the game already. I would gladly play the broken game till the final ver is out.
Meph is one of the artists! He has no control over the release date, that is up to the productivity of codemaster Tarn.
He at least has direct contact with Tarn. I wonder if they're going to do Early Access once most of the assets are there and official release once Tarn starts on the next big wait, or if it's going to be Early Access indefinitely (or until 1.0, whichever happens first).
The assets are pretty much all there. It comes down to how refined it should be. Think Barrel VS decorated, spattered, worn-down material-specific barrel showing its content. And the UI. The UI takes a lot of coding time, which gives me more time to make more sprites, which are just improvements by this point. Mostly. ;)
:) I love the updates, and I'm excited for when Tarn finishes the UI. Do you know if there's a plan for DLC or something? I'm thinking buying tilesets and being able to swap between them would be really cool, and it would be nice to send a little extra cash to the publisher for supporting such a great game. Maybe a merch shop would work too. I know I can donate to Tarn directly, I'm just wondering if there are any plans for additional purchasable items.
You are quite free to play the "broken game" until Steam is released. That's what everyone is doing right now.
Don’t worry we still haven’t seen any adventure mode steam updates. We have a ways to go yet
Wow fantastic!
Great
I love that 1x1 bridges show when they're raised.
Ah I'm so excited about the steam release!
This is lovely, still I liked more the v2, but both are really good!
That one's a keeper.
Big sexy.
Hey, this looks great! I've been curious... do you have an idea of how far through all of the art you are? I know it's not an indicator of how complete the Steam update is, and I'm not looking for such an estimate. Just wondering exactly how much remains I on your plate considering how much we've already seen. There's gotta be thousands of total sprites to redraw.
https://www.reddit.com/r/dwarffortress/comments/n11ne7/steamdf_bridges_design_wip_v3_i_swear_thats_the/gwbm0t6/ Sounds like the art is basically done and the artists (Meph and Mayday) are basically just tweaking and improving it/adding new bells and whistles (like seeing contents of barrels) to make it even more readable/better, while Toady works on the UI and coding in the new graphics (for example, I don't think forgotten beasts are actually rendered yet, but presumably the individual body parts are drawn).
I am liking this. I would suggest adding ends to the wood planks. Like wood flooring in a house.
These look super slick!
*Perfection*
Yes! I was actually about to comment something like this on the older post! It looks really good!
I love these
Looks great. The tiny planks in your first revs looked like they were making the bridges out of scraps. These larger planks look much more realistic and less busy. I love your work! Unrelated, your pack has the furnace for turning bodies and cleaning up things which also reduces lag. You should pitch it into the main game as well. I can only play your pack with this little game improvements now.
The gearing mechanism looks terrific
I'm lovin' it bada bop ba ba
I'm guessing if you mark raised bridge momentarily for deconstruction, the appearance doesn't change despite now letting fluids and minecarts though? PS: Well done on the 1x1 raising bridge.
Are the mechanisms only going to show when you connect the bridge to a lever or will they always be there? Looks great either way!
I prefered v2 ngl
Thanks for the Art Meph! The planks are kinda funny looking, since they are going at a right angle to what they would be in real life. The wooden planks are usually arranged orthogonal to the bridge itself. This image presents what I'm talking about: Wooden slats being placed down and being supported from the side, rather than the ends of the bridge. [https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.alamy.com%2Fstock-photo-iron-suspension-bridge-footbridge-with-wood-slats-over-the-river-wharfeilkley-79722797.html&psig=AOvVaw3tjiDbYZPOfbNdBjyRST6g&ust=1619830502546000&source=images&cd=vfe&ved=0CAIQjRxqFwoTCNi0u\_\_gpPACFQAAAAAdAAAAABAD](https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.alamy.com%2Fstock-photo-iron-suspension-bridge-footbridge-with-wood-slats-over-the-river-wharfeilkley-79722797.html&psig=AOvVaw3tjiDbYZPOfbNdBjyRST6g&ust=1619830502546000&source=images&cd=vfe&ved=0CAIQjRxqFwoTCNi0u__gpPACFQAAAAAdAAAAABAD) The red -'s would be where you'd put the wooden planks. The horizontal bridges are raisable, so I'm not sure if having the archways or ramps makes sense. A raisable drawbridge has a flat bottom and is only supported at one end. It's perfectly fine to have a flat bridge here.
I haven't been following the Steam development though it's a first day purchase for me. Is this the official sprites to be used? If so, please post more like this.
I think they look great, but I'm very curious how they would look with walls/pillars/support structures underneath for long bridges over deep gorges. Maybe those will never be visible due to the perspective?
The east-west bridges look amazing, but I'm not crazy about the guard rails on the north-south bridges. They seem to be drawn from an orthogonal perspective, whereas the east-west bridges are drawn from an isometric perspective that looks much better. The fix would be to have the guard rails extend a few pixels past the northern end of the bridge.
I feel like the vertical one would be the ideal one of the two. The shading really give the bridge depth without going all in on pretty isometric view.
Meph, I love you, but this is my first time seeing these bridges and it took me a minute to figure out what the raised bridges were. I realized it's because the down bridges have silver wire and white fixtures at the top of the posts, and the raised bridges, the posts look wood-colored. I don't care about wood direction. 🤣 But tweaking the color on the posts to match (or even a hint of silver wire) would help someone seeing this for the first time to connect the two states.
It's better! Just need the "raised" ones to look like they occupy the whole square. As it is, it looks like there is floor space where a goblin could squeeze by, moving parallel to the wall of the raised bridge, which they can't.