Gauging public interest in DIY 2

[ViolentBeetle]

DIY was a community project about solid colors that took place last year. Unfortunately we seem to have lost our project lead, but we still were able to bring it over the finish line. Personally I think this idea could use another try.

 

• Do you think we should try it again?
• Is it OK to just whip out a sequel to someone else's idea?
• Should we change anything about graphics? Some sprites like revenants were fairly ugly in my opinion. Others were hard to see.
• Should we have stricter quality control? I think original DIY was hampered a bit by not having anyone with real mandate to reject... some maps

[BeachThunder]

I'm keen.

 

Let me tell you about Plutonia 2, 3, 4 :P I'd say it's fine to do a sequel as long as you are giving credit to / acknowledging the original authors.

 

I honestly didn't know this was a thing until now. The concept seems cool, but, yeah, it does look a little rough. Just going through the wad now, everything feels very messy and inconsistent. Like, the sprites were clearly just run through an automatic colour reduction algorithm. Some look okay, but most are really unpleasant to look at.

 

My suggestion would be to just have one colour for the general silhouette. And then possible additional colours for important information - blood, glowing eyes, explosions, etc...

 

[TheNoob_Gamer]

Didn't know such a cool project existed (I guess I missed out a lot!), but I don't see why not for a sequel. It would definitely require new things (better palette coherency, unique enemy types - I'm thinking of one who could change polarity at will, and depending on its status could be immune to damage).

Aside from the multitude of Plutonia spinoffs BeachThunder have mentioned, there's also the Community Chests, which IIRC were led by different people. As long as you credit the original spearhead, I think all would be well. 

[Shepardus]

I love the solid color aesthetic and DIY had a bunch of cool uses of it, so I'd be down to see more. I personally didn't like DIY's sprite replacements, and thought 1 Bad Wad (the inspiration for DIY) was just fine without them. If you want to spice things up, maybe try a different selection of colors?

[Daytime Waitress]

1 hour ago, TheNoob_Gamer said:

unique enemy types - I'm thinking of one who could change polarity at will, and depending on its status could be immune to damage).

 

DIY2: Dikaruga.

[Maribo]

1) Yes. DIY had an excellent concept and it + 1badwad have been very influential towards my own mapping work.

2) If you're worried about this, then just change the project name and label it as a "spiritual successor" rather than a direct sequel. Since DIY was directly inspired by Spendoragon's 1badwad, though, I kind of doubt anyone would have any real problem if you just stuck with DIY anyway.

3) There either needs to be more contrast on the recolored monster sprites, or they need to be removed entirely, imo. Because of the mono-color nature of the textures, it can be very rough to distinguish them from walls. I agree with Shepardus, and I've seen quite a few other people who hold the same opinion.

4) Up to you.

[raddicted]

id recommend just changing the sprites and sound effects and stuff like that in order to where it is differentiated ENOUGH from DIY to where its not possibly seen as a "copy". as maribo stated, labeling it a spiritual successor is a good idea.

theres definitely a few sprites and stuff that definitely could be changed to where they arent so unpleasant to look at. maybe a black outline or something along the lines of that (if it looks good xdd)

also ya you could probably change the palette a bit to where the colors are a bit different to differentiate it even more from DIY. (ALSO just dont call it DIY 2 lol)
 

[Ravendesk]

DIY was very cool, but I feel like if there is a sequel it kinda needs to be different in some way so it's not "the same thing all over again". One way to go is the changed palette. I think that can work extremely well when you only have plain colours in your wad (and when you are planning to replace the sprites anyway) - you can literally go wild with palette changes. The other way is changed weapon/enemy roster although the latter may be controversial.

[SCF]

I enjoyed mapping for DIY and seeing what other people came up with, so I'd be interested in a sequel.

 

I definitely agree the monster sprites could use some work. The biggest issue I remember having is that it made some enemy types too difficult to tell apart in a chaotic fight. Besides than that I think it's fine to keep them monochromatic. It doesn't have to look great as long as it reads well.

[TheNoob_Gamer]

5 minutes ago, Ravendesk said:

although the latter may be controversial.

I fail to see how this would be the case, given that sequels are expected to change things up, and introducing variety could greatly open up creativity pathways.

[Ravendesk]

1 minute ago, TheNoob_Gamer said:

I fail to see how this would be the case, given that sequels are expected to change things up, and introducing variety could greatly open up creativity pathways.

No I mean the changes themselves might be controversial. There are a few universally loved dehacked enemies and weapons, sure, but on most of them opinions are very mixed.

[Andrea Rovenski]

Hi, I loved the first one and would love to participate in a sequel. 

 

As for the points, I was not active when the original was developed, but I did plenty of speed demos* for it somewhat recently and am familiar enough to comment on your bullet points a little:

1) sure,

2) but also try getting all the original folks involved too!

3) the horrendousness of the graphics is why i loved the original so much, so i would veto (if my opinion matters)

4) "low quality" is subjective, and for a wad like this, the jankier the better (in my opinion)

 

Either way, I'd definitely love to make a map for something like this regardless of if its a group project or my own selfish spinoff ;p

 

*be sure to watch the full-game run by Brainfreezzzzz btw, it's a killer watch!

[Mr. Alexander]

4 hours ago, Maribo said:

2) If you're worried about this, then just change the project name and label it as a "spiritual successor" rather than a direct sequel. Since DIY was directly inspired by Spendoragon's 1badwad, though, I kind of doubt anyone would have any real problem if you just stuck with DIY anyway.

This seems like a reasonable compromise. You could call it "Remodeling" or something else that evokes "DIY" home improvement.

 

1badwad and DIY use a great texture/palette replacement, and I'd love to see what else people could do with it. Plus MBF21 is cool and I'm always happy to see more MBF21 wads. I don't have any comment on the ideas of changing the sprites and exercising stricter quality control. Those seem like the project leads' prerogatives, whoever they happen to be. I personally prefer strong quality control to ensure the project has a consistent voice of its own, but part of the appeal of a community project, as opposed to a fixed team's collaboration, is the expression of the individual mappers' little quirks, so community-project leads always have to strike a balance.

[Master Medi]

I would be down for a DIY sequel and try not make an ultra hard secret fight, not entirely happy how that map ended and I also got more experience in mapping which could result in a better map overall, as for changes I'm not sure I honestly wasn't too keen on the sprite replacements I really liked how everything was in 1badwad

 

I will also annoy @Spendoragon and @Vortale to map for it 😌

[Meowgi]

DIY2 could be fun. IMO drop the sprites entirely (besides the HUD face). I tried to play it with them for all of maybe two minutes before ripping them out for the default ones.

[ViolentBeetle]

Ok, to recap

• There is interest
• Maybe I should change the name (Possibly, but I feel like I would prefer to make a true sequel)
• Maybe I should change the palette (Not sure to what exactly? I was consivering adding some patterns, but not sure if it would an improvement)
• There's some support for not using sprite replacement. I acctually was experimenting with shrinking the palette, but I'll probably need to redo some of them to be less dark.

 

In any case, right now I feel a little burnt out, so maybe later.

[ViolentBeetle]

I gave it a few more thoughts

• I can call it "Paint it Doom" which is either genius or tremendously dumb
• I can use Ancient Aliens palette, it's the most different palette I know

I may start working on rule outline and some other stuff at some point.