September 18th, 2016

When the 25th anniversary of Bare Knuckle’s debut in Japan hit, I didn’t have the time for a big update (plus, I’ve been kinda celebrating in stealth mode for the whole year, but it’s not too stealthy to say that), so I’m making up for it now, the 25th anniversary of the game’s U.S. debut under the Streets of Rage moniker.

Streets of Rage versions of Onihime & Yasha (a.k.a. Mona and Lisa), Signal, Haku-oh and Galsia (who also gets a SoR2 sprite) have been added to the Streets of Rage/Bare Knuckle custom sprite gallery and the GFX Generators (which got a HUGE overhaul in yesterday’s update).

Categories: ScrollBoss Updates, Site News, Updates by PrimeOp
Tags: Streets of Rage

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September 17th, 2016

♫… reflects a movie scene, often more than twice ♫

Enough progress has been made with the v.2 GFX Generator engine that I’ve put it on the site! One generator page, filled with (mostly) fighting game-scale game sprites, has most of the items from both the old Vs. Maker and Group Shot generator pages. There are also separate pages for Darkstalkers 3 and Marvel Super Heroes where each has characters who are 100% compatible with those Vs. Screens. A few things (like the secondary scene options) work a bit differently than before, but most of it is there. There’s still work to do on v.2 and the older generators will stay up until all their old functions and screens can be replicated with v.2. Rewriting this engine from (nearly) the ground up is something I’ve wanted to do for a lot of years, and it took a bit over a year (in-between making things for normal site updates and other work), but it feels good to have the new generator working this much. Effects like those shadows in the MSH Spider-Man stage windows were impossible with the old system (the same function can reflections there, too) and you can expect to see more effects and features added in future updates.

But that’s not all I have ready for the site this weekend! Come back tomorrow for a few new sprites of Streets of Rage/Bare Knuckle characters!

Categories: ScrollBoss Updates, Site News, Updates by PrimeOp
Tags: gfx generators

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August 22nd, 2016

Multiplayer 3D arena brawlers are even more rare than beat ’em ups right now, which makes it even more special that Combat Core, which had a successful Kickstarter last year, is now in Steam Early Access! It’s fun to play in this early state, and you can even test out the Create-a-character mode. The game should be breath of fresh air to any Power Stone fans out there who are fiending for kind of brawling experience. To celebrate that early access, I made a sprite of Ember, the game’s resident wrestler. She’s in the Games (Independent) Custom Sprite gallery, ready to brawl!

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I went back to work on the new engine for GFX Generators and got the reflections running (I still need to add the “color base” feature, though). The next step will be to get the text and text input going. This was a later addition to the old engine, so I’m hoping it’ll be an easier fit into the new engine. Finishing that will complete the basic features of the old generators and the next thing will be making a new version of the screenstyle options, those extra background options from the second menu. That, and a few other small things, will finish the new engine and last step will be converting a crapload of data files to the new format. That’s going to be a lot of work and I need to concentrate on that until it’s done. Except for a Streets of Rage-themed update in September, there won’t be any site content updates until the new generators are good enough to replace the original engine (and I won’t have deal with two versions characters’ data files and other tiring things from having two engines on the site). Getting the engine up to the old engine’s standards is only the beginning, but that’s a story for another time.

Categories: ScrollBoss Updates, Site News, Updates by PrimeOp
Tags: Combat Core, gfx generator

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August 9th, 2016

Today is the eighth month’s ninth day, which mean this site celebrates 1989, the greatest year in video game history*!

This site even has a sub-section dedicated to the year for reasons you’ll see mentioned there. Then again, you’ll probably figure out why once you see all the stuff I’m celebrating (and there’s still a lot left out). Everything in this update is linked to that magical year when many of this site’s favorite games, series, consoles and more debuted. Unfortunately, there’s so much stuff that I couldn’t even fit it into 3 screenshots, so, as a first, the sprite preview is a video!

Custom Sprites:
– Capcom: Quick Man added to Mega Man section.
– – Final Fight: two new scratch-made Cody sprites!
– – Strider (new separate section): (a new Tom Pooh sprite (and redone colors on the hand-up pose) in the Strider section

– Nintendo: Tatanga (Super Mario Land)

– Sega: scratch-made E-SWAT’s police ICE armor and enemy unknown/File 96 enemies
– – Golden Axe: resprited Tyris Flare fight stance
– – Shinobi: new scratch-made Pink Dragon and redone Kasumi sprites

– Sunsoft: Tuff Turf’s heroes and lady added.

– Technos: new standing sprites for Kunio, Riki, Hasebe, Alex and Ryan

– Games(other): Prince of Persia (original) added.

– DC Comics: the Joker in the 1989 NES Batman stance
– Music: new gallery starts with new Chuck D (Public Enemy) sprite and older sprites and sprite edits.
– Toys ‘n Toons: Marge, Lisa and Bart Simpson. The Simpsons cartoon started in 1989!
– G.I. JOE: Snake-Eyes in his version 3 (1989) outfit
– TMNT: Krang (in his standing pose from the 1989 beat ’em up)

Mini-Logos: Prince of Persia (Jordan Mechner), Public Enemy (Music) and the Simpsons (Television) added.

The new custom sprites and mini-logos have been added to the GFX Generators.

My apologies to any fans of 1989 games who were left out, like Mendel Palace/Quinty, Double Dragon 2(NES), Astyanax, Crime City, and dozens more. There are too many good 1989 games to celebrate and many of my older sprites needed to be redone. Let me know about your favorite 1989 games and characters in the comment section!

* – 1989 being the greatest game year is hyperbole mostly for fun, but also designed to drive disagreement-induced hits, but at least this website admits it.

Categories: ScrollBoss Updates, Site News, Updates by PrimeOp
Tags: Batman, dc comics, ESWAT, Final Fight, g.i. joe, Kunio-Kun, River City Ransom, Shinobi series, Super Mario Land, The Revenge of 1989, The Revenge of Shinobi, the Simpsons, tmnt, Tough Turf

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August 2nd, 2016

25 years ago, on this very, one of the greatest beat ’em up sagas began when Sega’s Bare Knuckle hit the Mega Drive system in Japan. Mixing the best elements of Technos’ Double Dragon and Capcom’s Final Fight (then the two most recent evolutionary steps in the walk ‘n brawl genre), flavor from Sega’s own Golden Axe system (complete with smart bomb attacks), and a heaping dose of their own style, Noriyoshi Ohba and his team created a solid classic. The game still outshines brawlers on far more powerful systems, especially the legendary soundtrack by Yuzo Koshiro.

Bare Knuckle made its way to the U.S. a few weeks later under the Streets of Rage moniker. Expect another ScrollBoss update dedicated to the game (and series) on that. For now…

check out these new fighting-scale sprites of SoR/BK 1 and 2 versions of Axel Stone’s fighting stance have been added to the SoR Custom Sprite gallery and GFX Generators (where he also has a bunch of palettes). I also added a Bare Knuckle mini-logo and made some slight improvements to the Nora sprite from the last round of updates.

Categories: ScrollBoss Updates, Site News, Updates by PrimeOp
Tags: Bare Knuckle, Streets of Rage

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July 22nd, 2016

We’ve had some fun during these anniversary updates, but it’s time to wrap it up, B!

Custom Sprites:
– Capcom: Protoman (with variant)
– Golden Axe: Longmoan
– IREM: Giant (Kung-Fu Master)
– Konami: Sledge (Vendetta/Crime Fighters 2)
– – Castlevania: Trevor Belmont, Sypha (SotN Cape up variant of the earlier sprite)
– IREM: Straw from Ninja Baseball Bat Man
– Sega: Sonic the Hedgehog, who decided to take off right as I took the pt.1 picture and that other sprite of his hasn’t shown up yet.

– Streets of Rage: Mr. X (all-new, sprited from scratch) and Nora
– Taito: Sayo-chan (a.k.a. Pocky) from Kiki Kai Kai, Zeke from Zoo Keeper (both in-game and cabinet art styles)
– Rare: the Dark Queen
– DC Comics: Black Canary (an early version was seen in the site promo videos)
– Marvel Comics: a new Wasp sprite. Don’t worry, I’ll make more outfits for her later!
– TMNT: Shredder (same pose as the 2013 sprite, but redrawn & resprited to look much better)
– G.I.JOE: Snake-Eyes and Scarlett. BTW: an early version of Scarlett’s sprite was in the unannounced new banner displayed only on July 4th this year.

All those sprites were added to the GFX Generators (the old GroupShot and Vs generators).

that Chun-Li pic I drew last month is now in the prints section of the site’s Shop page!

Well, I’m done waiting for Sonic, so now it’s to debut the brand-new mission statement video!

(edit: earlier version had a botched pixel ratio this is the fixed version)

… Hey, there’s the other Sonic sprite! It’s in the gallery and GFX Generator, too!

I hope you had fun with these updates!

Categories: ScrollBoss Updates by PrimeOp
Tags: 16th anniversary

2 Comments »

July 21st, 2016

You’re just in time to witness pure, unadulterated evil in pixel form!

Custom Sprites:
– Golden Axe: Longmoan
– IREM: Giant (Kung-Fu Master)
– Rare: the Dark Queen
– Streets of Rage: Mr. X (all-new, sprited from scratch) and Nora

All these sprites were added to the GFX Generators (the old GroupShot and Vs generators).

You know, I’m still waiting for that Sonic sprite from Tuesday’s update to show up. Maybe he’ll be in tomorrow’s wrap-up post…

Categories: ScrollBoss Updates by PrimeOp
Tags: Battletoads, Golden Axe, Kung-Fu Master, Streets of Rage

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July 20th, 2016

The first anniversary update was all gaming characters, but now it’s time give a few comic and toy license characters some love!

Custom Sprites:
– DC Comics: Black Canary (an early version was seen in the site promo videos)
– Marvel Comics: a new Wasp sprite. Don’t worry, I’ll make more outfits for her later!
– TMNT: Shredder (same pose as the 2013 sprite, but redrawn & resprited to look much better)
– G.I.JOE: Snake-Eyes and Scarlett. BTW: an early version of Scarlett’s sprite was in the unannounced new banner displayed only on July 4th this year.

All sprites were added to the aforementioned GFX Generators (the old GroupShot and Vs generators). Wasp’s new sprite has slightly different colors than her 2011-2012 sprites, but I remade all her old palettes, because Jan’s gotta switch things up. Snake-Eyes’ new sprite also has multiple palettes.

Also: that Chun-Li pic I drew last month is now in the prints section of the site’s Shop page!

So we saw video game heroes yesterday and 80s nostalgia today, but things take a turn for the sinister tomorrow with an all-villain update!

Categories: ScrollBoss Updates by PrimeOp
Tags: dc comics, g.i. joe, marvel comics, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles

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July 19th, 2016

To everyone who has checked out the site back in the days of Vs. Mode fights and Minus World madness (the site section, not the completely different website), those who just visited for the first time today and every party person who falls somewhere in between, thank you for stopping by and making these sixteen pixel-packed years fly by. Get ready for multiple days of anniversary updates, starting with a seven-sprite kickoff!

Custom Sprites:
– Capcom: Protoman (with variant)
– Konami: Sledge (Vendetta/Crime Fighters 2)
– – Castlevania: Trevor Belmont, Sypha (SotN Cape up variant of the earlier sprite)
– IREM: Straw from Ninja Baseball Bat Man
– Taito: Sayo-chan (a.k.a. Pocky) from Kiki Kai Kai, Zeke from Zoo Keeper (both in-game and cabinet art styles)
– Sega: Sonic the Hedgehog… decided to start running right as I clicked on the GFX Generator screenshot maker. See, that’s just rude. Maybe someone told him Protoman was the coolest person in the pic or perhaps he was scared off by the Zoo Keeper. Don’t worry, this isn’t the only update this week, so let’s see if I can get him to slow down for another sprite before the anniversary updates are done.

All sprites were added to the aforementioned GFX Generators (the old GroupShot and Vs generators).

Categories: ScrollBoss Updates, Site News, Updates by PrimeOp
Tags: 16th anniversary, anniversary, Castlevania, Kiki Kaikai, Mega Man, Ninja Baseball Bat Man, Pocky & Rocky, Sonic the Hedgehog, Vendetta, Zoo Keeper

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July 6th, 2016

Sorry for the lack of updates, but I’ve been getting ready for the the All AmeriCon convention in Warren, Ohio (click the link to find details on their Facebook page).

Part of that preparation was finally getting around to doing some line art for prints, but I also made two new pixel art prints and those prints have just been added to the shop page:

The Legend of Zelda pic is based on the NES ending and, well, you’ll see this in something else I’m working on for the site. The JLA print has sprites (or variations of them) I made from scratch before with a few all-new sprites and an all-new background. Again, they’re available in the site’s shop and I’ll have them with me at the All AmeriCon convention this weekend!

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It’s not on the site yet, but I’ve made a bit of progress with the new version of the generators:

I’ve got the oval and sprite-shaped shadows working and the reflections are next. It’s taking a lot of time to unravel my crappy old coding to replace with my current level of crappy coding, but it’s good to have it at 75% of what the original version does.

Categories: ScrollBoss Updates, Site News, Updates by PrimeOp
Tags: All AmeriCon, dc comics, gfx generators, the Legend of Zelda

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