Topic: Mega Man (NES) Series - Intro & Ending maps

[TerraEsperZ]

I didn't want to derail the Mega Man thread, so I'm continuing my thing here. Long story short, I wanted to contribute to the mapping of the NES Mega Man games, and the only things left were the 'maps' for the intros and endings depending.



For some endings, namely Mega Man and Mega Man IV, the color palette changes as the map scrolls by, and the changes are not always smooth thanks to the limited NES color set. So I've tried a few different approaches to solve that problem, namely with smooth transitions with transparencies and two different types of dithering. Here are the results so far:



Mega Man -Ending-, Raw







Mega Man -Ending-, Transparencies







Mega Man -Ending-, 1-Stage Dithering







Mega Man -Ending-, 3-Stages Dithering







Mega Man II -Intro-







Mega Man IV -Ending-, Raw







Mega Man IV -Ending-, Transparencies







Mega Man IV -Ending-, 1-Stage Dithering







Mega Man IV -Ending-, 3-Stages Dithering







---

"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censored, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably." [...] The first time any man's freedom is trodden on, we're all damaged. - Captain Jean-Luc Picard



Current projects: Mega Man V (GB), Mega Man Zero (GBA), Battletoads (NES), Sonic CD (Sega CD)

[JonLeung]

Not sure which I like best, but I would say that the 3-stage dithering is better than 1-stage dithering.

[RT 55J]

Would there be any way to mix the 3-stage dithering with transparency somehow?

---

Dot? Dot. Dot!

[TerraEsperZ]

How about something like the 3-stages dithering, but instead of dithering, I'd use transparencies? Instead of ugly pixel clashes, you'd get three 16 pixels wide zones for every color change. In short, the same steps as the dithering but with pure colors instead of pixels? Let me see what I can come up with...



---

"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censored, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably." [...] The first time any man's freedom is trodden on, we're all damaged. - Captain Jean-Luc Picard



Current projects: Mega Man V (GB), Mega Man Zero (GBA), Battletoads (NES), Sonic CD (Sega CD)

[ReyVGM]

Ha! It never occurred to me... ending maps.

Cool.

[TerraEsperZ]

Good night ,greetings from mexico, i'm an user form the vg maps two weeks ago, i need more maps to megamanx x2 for the snes console the maps what i need are:

Overdrive ostrich stage

wire sponge stage

X-hunters level 1

X-hunters level 2

X-hunters level 3.



for megaman x4 (ps x)

sky lagoon area 1 & 2,

volcano area 1 & 2 (magma dragoon)

jungle area 1& 2 (web spider)

cyber sapce area 1 & 2 (cyber peacock)

air force area 1 & 2,(storm owl)

snow base area 1 & 2(frost walrus)

marine base area 1 & 2(jet stingray)

bio lab area 1 & 2(split mushroom)

military train area 1 & 2(slash beast)

main hall repliforce area(colonel vs x)

space port area (colonel against x or zero)

final weapon area (double/jello man vs x)

fianl weapon area (iris vs Zero)

final weapon area 2 (general vs x or zero)

final weapon area 3 (maverick reborn again)

final weapon area 4 (sigma against x or zero)

final weapon area (final battle with sigma)



megaman x 5 (ps x)

Training area,

eurasia attack stage,

chase the truck!(grizzly slash stage)

obliterate the battle ship(duff mcwhalen stage)

electric trap(squid adler stage)

fortress lab infiltration(izzy glow stage)

escape the space trap(dark dizzy stage)

destroy the time bombs!(the skiver stage)

red-hot world(mattrex stage)

into the jungle(axle the red stage)

dynamo strategy stage

virus stage blue(boss: shadow devil)

virus stage purple(boss: rangda bangda)

virus stage red (boss: zero or x)

virus stages final(bosses resurected and sigma, and giant sigma)



megaman x6 (ps x)

opening stage

amazon area(commander yammark stage)

central museum(ground scaravick stage)

magma area(blaze heatnix stage)

north pole area(blizzard wolfgang stage)

inami temple(rainy turtloid stage)

recycle lab(metal shark player stage)

laser institute(shield sheldon stage)

weapon center(infinity mijinion stage)

gate's lab level 1(twin cells)

gate's lab level 2(high max & gates)

gate's lab level 3(bosses reult and sigma)

sub stages 1:nightmare zero,

sub stages 2: high max

sub stages 3: dynamo



thanks for you cooperation, this is mya messenger in case of dosbts,i write in spanish: angel_negro3004hotmail.com

[marioman]

Click here.  Now.  

[Maxim]

One technique I've used is halfway between the true-colour gradients and the 3-stage dithering, which is to limit the smooth gradient to the system's palette. One way to do that is to get a paletted image in Paint Shop Pro and paste in the true-colour image, which gets you random dithering, but some people prefer using ancient tools like DPaint to make ordered dithering.



For example:

[TerraEsperZ]

Thanks for the tip Maxim. I'll have to look into DPaint in my spare time (out of which I currently am) because that dithering looks really good and smooth, which I doubt I could achieve purely by hand (and it's quite time consuming to boot).



---

"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censored, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably." [...] The first time any man's freedom is trodden on, we're all damaged. - Captain Jean-Luc Picard



Current projects: Sonic CD (Sega CD), Mega Man V (GB), Mega Man Zero (GBA), Battletoads (NES)

[Maxim]

My shot was PSP.

[TerraEsperZ]

Maxim, I just tried doing that with the latest trial of Paint Shop Pro 12 X2 or something and it didn't work at all. Even given the very limited number of colours to work with, there still should have been some dithering between similar colours like pink and red but instead all the colours were replaced by the closest palette equivalent, actually looking worse than ever.



I'm curious to know which version of PSP you used to achieve this. I tried making a pseudo-random dithering pattern using mathematics but I ended up with a sort of "circular ripples" that doesn't repeat itself well.



---

Current projects: Ristar-The Shooting Star (Gen), Sonic The Hedgehog (Gen), Sonic CD (Sega CD), Mega Man Zero (GBA), Battletoads (NES), Bucky O'Hare (NES)

[Maxim]

I use PSP7 - also known as Paint Shop Pro Before It Jumped The Shark. It dithers when you paste into a paletted image. Maybe there's an option for it somewhere.



Alternatively, if you have your paletted image, save the palette then apply it to the true-colour image; in PSP7 it asks if you want nearest colour matching or dithering.



Most software should at least be able to dither when reducing to a palette. Even Irfanview will do that, I think. The problem is modern image editors which are set up only for photo editing. I see Paint Shop Pro only exists as "Paint Shop Pro Photo X2" now

[Will]

I find the ending maps are interesting and good for any Mega Man fans. Do you have any intention of doing the Wily Wars endings and intros? I personally wonder why Mega Man 1 had no intro map, Mega Man 2 had no ending map and so on, but that's just the way things were designed, but imagine how Mega Man makes his entrances and exits in the games.



Another thing I wondered regarding the Wily Fortresses in the series is that the castles themselves are a lot larger than the mapped paths Mega Man takes. Probably Mega Man has no time or energy to raid and destroy everthing in the castles for the sake of ensuring Wily's progress is at a downfall.

[TerraEsperZ]

Considering I finally achieved what I would consider "acceptable" results a few weeks ago, I really should post them here once I'm off work.



Turns out that the dithering that happens when pasting a true color image over a palette one happens in PSP7 but not 8 which simply defaults to the nearest color in the palette, just like Paint does. It doesn't look too bad, but the dithering still doesn't look like it could belong to a NES game. I did some more smooth color transitions, but I limited the transition zones to 32 pixels in length which, to me, looks better than my first attempts in the first post which were way to gradual. I'll post them tonight.



I'm not sure about The Wily Wars; I was not interested in doing the same maps from WW until now because I simply didn't factor that game in my plans. Of course, if Wily Tower has its own intro and ending maps, you can definitely count me in; I'm just not that interested in re-threads.



---

Current projects: Ristar-The Shooting Star (Gen), Sonic The Hedgehog (Gen), Sonic CD (Sega CD), Mega Man Zero (GBA), Battletoads (NES), Bucky O'Hare (NES)