Spriters changing everything

[InfiniteGalaxies]

the new solars look dope, but the gas canisters? nope they suck. They dont fit the environment at all, and overall look fat.

Are we trying to be "special" like goon? I like the older sprites better. There should be a option to use older sprites
whats your opinion

[BlueMemesauce]

Suit storage sprites were the worst. Other sprites just had minor changes but suit storages has been made completely different. For some reason they are 3d unlike any other sprite in the game. And the shading is way different from other sprites. They look so weird and idk why they were even added they look way worse than before.

[cacogen]

There needs to be a coherent artstyle and more quality control over sprite changes. The problem is not updating sprites to be more modern, the problem is replacing perfectly good sprites with ones that are worse or have a style that doesn't fit the rest of the game.

Canisters are a prime example of this, and if I remember the PR reactions correctly very few people preferred those sprites (yet for some mysterious reason they were merged anyway).

I feel more lenient towards people adding new sprites (because it's always an improvement) or updating ancient ones, but that hardly ever happens. It's always highly visible sprites that are either updated year after year or didn't need updating that are changed. Why do implanters, salt and pepper shakers and the implant pad all look the same as they did 12 years ago, when those sprites are all terrible?

Also, people who make sprite requests should be required to give full-size previews not only of their new sprites but of the old sprites they're replacing to provide a fair comparison so people actually know what they're voting for.

[InfiniteGalaxies]

There needs to be a coherent artstyle and more quality control over sprite changes. The problem is not updating sprites to be more modern, the problem is replacing perfectly good sprites with ones that are worse or have a style that doesn't fit the rest of the game.

I agree with this, there should be more control, and showcase how your sprite fits into the environment. Kinda like quality check

[Timberpoes]

Change happens incrementally. Developing or modernising the art direction and design of the sprites is long and very painful task.

We're explicitly merging things that fit what we want the game to look like, not what the game does or once did look like.

The art style and art direction are evolving as our spriting talent grows and changes. If you don't like the change in direction, you're gonna have to do more than complain about it on the forums.

If you can't contribue yourself, I suggest you do what goofball does and pay professional sprite artists to make assets for you that are better than what we have now and fit the future vision for the game our art leads have.

[cacogen]

This is the usual irritatingly glib response that certain maintainers or admins like to trot out when they're covering for themselves or other people. It does nothing to address the longstanding problems with how sprite PRs are handled, which I've already described above.

There is no plan here, just a hodgepodge of sprites getting pulled at a whim. Often seemingly out of spite for the people commenting or reacting to the PR negatively. You should let Twaticus speak for themselves, though.

[Farquaar]

Spriting can be hard work, takes a lot of time, and the few sprites I’ve uploaded over the years are amateurish at best (My crappy cowboy hats took me a whole weekend to make). That said, there’s something to be said about listening to feedback graciously.

Not every change one proposes is an improvement. Certain spriters reply to legitimate, actionable feedback with a snide quip and a handwave. I understand not scrapping a day’s work because some guy said “lul this is shite”, but seriously, newer is not always better, no matter how often you type “new sprites good” or “clear out goon folder” in the Why It’s Good For the Game subsection.

[InfiniteGalaxies]

I understand that sprites are heard work and time consuming, however I feel like there should be a basis of a quality check, or feedback for public opinion.

[NoxVS]

I understand that sprites are heard work and time consuming, however I feel like there should be a basis of a quality check, or feedback for public opinion.

If you sort merged github PRs by the most thumbs down, you will quickly find out how little value public opinion really has.

[InfiniteGalaxies]

I understand that sprites are heard work and time consuming, however I feel like there should be a basis of a quality check, or feedback for public opinion.

If you sort merged github PRs by the most thumbs down, you will quickly find out how little value public opinion really has.

thats kinda sad, most of the time good things can come out of the community though I can understand why higher ups wouldn't listen to the punlib, but only their peers since its: Organized, Quick. and easy

[Rohen_Tahir]

I understand that sprites are heard work and time consuming, however I feel like there should be a basis of a quality check, or feedback for public opinion.

If you sort merged github PRs by the most thumbs down, you will quickly find out how little value public opinion really has.

I don't think people get mad about OP sprites being nerfed all that often.

[Timberpoes]

There is a future art direction for the game as dictated by Twaticus and the sprite leads.

They're already doing what you're asking - Driving the art towards a single unified style so there's no more weird clashes between old and new. Their approach is replacing the old with new. You're very unlikely to find any sympathy by saying that the old is better, since the decision has already been made. There's probably reasons for it. I don't know those reasons. I never bothered to ask.

Feedback such as "Are we trying to be "special" like goon? I like the older sprites better. There should be a option to use older sprites" is useless. We're not going to require contributors to update multiple different sprites from different eras of tg if they ever want to make a change that requires updated sprites.

Feedback such as "There needs to be a coherent artstyle and more quality control over sprite changes. The problem is not updating sprites to be more modern, the problem is replacing perfectly good sprites with ones that are worse or have a style that doesn't fit the rest of the game" is basically saying "I like the old sprites better because they fit with the old sprites". The goal is to replace old with new. That is an incremental process. While it happens, sprites that conflict with the old will be introduced. And old sprites will be replaced.

Feedback such as "I understand that sprites are heard work and time consuming, however I feel like there should be a basis of a quality check, or feedback for public opinion" is useless because we already have basic quality checks in the fact we've got an art lead in Twaticus and art-focused maintainers. Sprites go into the game because they pass quality control, or alternatively coder-level sprites go in because a feature requires them and they can be improved in the future.

This feedback in general is not useful. And it's not actionable. The art leads cannot work towards a new art style as long as preserving the current art style must take priority. The old will die and the new will rise in its place.

If you want an avenue for public opinion, we have Discord channels to discuss that. If you want to give feedback, the main feedback that matters is how any given sprite doesn't fit with the current vision that the art lead and spriting team has for the game. You'd need to ask the sprite team for more information about that.

[TheFinalPotato]

The wheel turns. Our codebase has had inconsistent art direction for forever, at least this way it's inconsistent in service of a small team's goals.
Fucking headmins man

[Critawakets]

From what i've seen with sprite PRs (without examples mostly just because its discouraging to get told "this is shit" even indirectly), if a sprite is in the new art style and/or better is *not* factored into if its merged. I have a feeling like *certain maintainers* are kinda merging sprite PRs without actually checking if the sprite is better or fits into the new style in order to avoid the hassle of saying why a sprite is worse or even just why a sprite should get a few changes.

Heck i've even seen sprite PRs make code changes that were told to get reverted only for those *certain maintainers* to merge the PR before the changes were even done. I don't even know how that happens without a severe lack in communication between maintainers.

[Kendrickorium]

i liked the new canisters but if you guys want the art direction to change, maybe do it in bigger batches rather than a little here or a little there

cacogen was right when he described that it needs to be more coherent

things are starting to look kind of messy

[Jonathan Gupta]

I understand that sprites are heard work and time consuming, however I feel like there should be a basis of a quality check, or feedback for public opinion.

whats the quality check? we ask players and put it through the soul checker?

[InfiniteGalaxies]

damn, guess everyone's mad at me now

[Jonathan Gupta]

damn, guess everyone's mad at me now

well, it's cause you don't do shit about it and just complain, it's infuriating when people put a shit ton of work in to improve the codebase and people wanna scream about soul.

[massa]

I would like for aesthetics to clash a little less.

The artist is talented, but I think you could reconcile the visual differences a little bit while still making something you're happy with. Soul removal is an aesthetic matter, not a matter of quality. Plenty of new sprites I've found quite lovely and good looking.

[YBS]

Even as someone with a high number of DDPM (Dumb Doodles Per minute)

Spriting is a colossal pain in the ass.

When I look at the canisters and canister hookups, they are objectively an improved version of the canisters we had before to the point where they slightly clash with machinery that hasn't been made to look more 3-D. It might work to consider updating machines consistently seen together (ie Temp Control units and Canisters) simultaneously for a more coherent effect.

That being said, you shooting from the hip and just calling it dumb-suck is a limp take and you know it.

[Not-Dorsidarf]

My personal problem is when the new sprites suck fucking ass but have a better fit to the new style so they get pre-approved and quickmerged and then everyone moves on but the bad sprite stays being bad.

Or when a sprite gets changed but doesnt actually fit the newer aesthetics any better AND looks bad but hey it's new so its a gimme.

[iwishforducks]

when i see old sprites i dont like i dont have anyone to yell at, but with new sprites i have Thumbs Down Emoji and Angry Github Comment at my disposal. this is the world we live in.

[tjatpbnj]

Why wouldn't you like the old sprites???

[iwishforducks]

because some of them look ugly ass nasty but luckily we've cleaned them out with some new sprites. remember telebatons? nasty. disgusting little things. thank god to whoever re-sprited them.

[tjatpbnj]

They were FUN batons... before they changed the sprites.

[toemas]

i think the new sprites look fine and you are all a bunch of boomers

[Rohen_Tahir]

when i see old sprites i dont like i dont have anyone to yell at, but with new sprites i have Thumbs Down Emoji and Angry Github Comment at my disposal. this is the world we live in.

susciety...

[RaveRadbury]

damn, guess everyone's mad at me now

well, it's cause you don't do shit about it and just complain, it's infuriating when people put a shit ton of work in to improve the codebase and people wanna scream about soul.

wow gupta with the hard read

[Rageguy505]

I hope the ai camera sprite never ever change

[Vekter]

This is the usual irritatingly glib response that certain maintainers or admins like to trot out when they're covering for themselves or other people. It does nothing to address the longstanding problems with how sprite PRs are handled, which I've already described above.

There is no plan here, just a hodgepodge of sprites getting pulled at a whim. Often seemingly out of spite for the people commenting or reacting to the PR negatively. You should let Twaticus speak for themselves, though.

This is a very subjective opinion and genuinely not a great one. You're basically ignoring everything Timber says because you don't like the tone with which they said it.

The spriters are working as a team to determine how they want the game to look. If you have issue with that, you're welcome to post constructive criticism, but just saying "I don't like those sprites" doesn't really do anything but make people irritated.

You're basically saying "A few people in the PR didn't like this, including me, so it shouldn't be merged" when the vast majority either doesn't give a shit or likes that change. Not that said feedback even matters; if the spriters want to take it in that direction, that's what's happening. Just because /tg/ is open source doesn't mean everyone gets a say in how things are developed. You can voice your opinion, but if you're going to be mad about every little change that you don't like, you're going to have a bad time.

[cacogen]

The new medkit sprites are bad and a good example of changing something that already looked good and has been updated multiple times over the years already for no good reason.

The spriters are working as a team to determine how they want the game to look. If you have issue with that, you're welcome to post constructive criticism, but just saying "I don't like those sprites" doesn't really do anything but make people irritated.

No, somebody makes a sprite PR making an unnecessary change to an already decent sprite that makes it look like it's from a different game (and/or makes it look worse, which is a matter of taste), a bunch of people describe the problems with the sprite in the comments as well as vote it down and then it gets merged anyway. Bonus points if they've left out a comparison to the sprites they're changing. Not everybody knows about IconDiffBot and the previews are too small and not in-game. As I've already said, there's no plan there, but if there was it would be a bad one.

I've been pointing out the same problems on sprite PRs for a long time now. The main issues are changing good sprites for no reason and changing them to an artstyle that's inconsistent with each other and the rest of the game. As I've said before, if the style that the majority of the sprites are still drawn in looks outdated, then decide on a new one.

[Vekter]

The new medkit sprites are bad and a good example of changing something that already looked good and has been updated multiple times over the years already for no good reason.

The spriters are working as a team to determine how they want the game to look. If you have issue with that, you're welcome to post constructive criticism, but just saying "I don't like those sprites" doesn't really do anything but make people irritated.

No, somebody makes a sprite PR making an unnecessary change to an already decent sprite that makes it look like it's from a different game (and/or makes it look worse, which is a matter of taste), a bunch of people describe the problems with the sprite in the comments as well as vote it down and then it gets merged anyway. Bonus points if they've left out a comparison to the sprites they're changing (not everybody knows about IconDiffBot and the previews are too small and not in-game anyway). As I've already said, there's no plan there, but if there were it would be a bad one.

I've been pointing out the same problems on sprite PRs for a long time now. The main issues are changing good sprites for no reason and changing them to an inconsistent artstyle. As I've said before, if the style that the majority of the sprites are still drawn in looks outdated, then decide on a new one.

There is a plan there, you're just upset that you're not in on it. I'm not the biggest fan of the new medkit sprites myself, but I trust that the folks running the show know what they're doing to get everything on the same page design-wise.

[Super Aggro Crag]

i dont like some of the new sprites in medbay, i dont like starting wearing scrubs instead of a medical jumpsuit.

[Stickymayhem]

damn, guess everyone's mad at me now

well, it's cause you don't do shit about it and just complain, it's infuriating when people put a shit ton of work in to improve the codebase and people wanna scream about soul.

wow gupta with the hard read

stop humanizing gupta

[Agux909]

I like all the new sprites except the medkits. But you can't please everyone now can you?

[Rohen_Tahir]

The new medkit sprites are bad and a good example of changing something that already looked good and has been updated multiple times over the years already for no good reason.

The spriters are working as a team to determine how they want the game to look. If you have issue with that, you're welcome to post constructive criticism, but just saying "I don't like those sprites" doesn't really do anything but make people irritated.

No, somebody makes a sprite PR making an unnecessary change to an already decent sprite that makes it look like it's from a different game (and/or makes it look worse, which is a matter of taste), a bunch of people describe the problems with the sprite in the comments as well as vote it down and then it gets merged anyway. Bonus points if they've left out a comparison to the sprites they're changing (not everybody knows about IconDiffBot and the previews are too small and not in-game anyway). As I've already said, there's no plan there, but if there were it would be a bad one.

I've been pointing out the same problems on sprite PRs for a long time now. The main issues are changing good sprites for no reason and changing them to an inconsistent artstyle. As I've said before, if the style that the majority of the sprites are still drawn in looks outdated, then decide on a new one.

There is a plan there, you're just upset that you're not in on it. I'm not the biggest fan of the new medkit sprites myself, but I trust that the folks running the show know what they're doing to get everything on the same page design-wise.

𓃒37 362 63527 3625 262 4782 999 35287 4625 3883 253873 6745 1631 462 2092 362 1743 196884 35275 36207 537𓃕

[cacogen]

Feedback such as "There needs to be a coherent artstyle and more quality control over sprite changes. The problem is not updating sprites to be more modern, the problem is replacing perfectly good sprites with ones that are worse or have a style that doesn't fit the rest of the game" is basically saying "I like the old sprites better because they fit with the old sprites". The goal is to replace old with new. That is an incremental process. While it happens, sprites that conflict with the old will be introduced. And old sprites will be replaced.

This is more of making no attempt to understand or address what's actually being said and just doing your best to shill for whatever the other people in power are doing. It's not saying "I like the old sprites better because they fit with the old sprites," it's saying "I like this old sprite better because it looked better and fit the game better and the quality of this new sprite doesn't justify the change."

The new sprites don't even match each other. At least if Twaticus had a unifying artstyle in mind they could justify the changes.

[Timberpoes]

Change will come and in a year you'll have people fighting to keep the new sprites because a newer batch of sprites are taking away the soul of the game.

[Vekter]

The new sprites don't even match each other.

Prove it. Show me which sprites you're talking about.

[chocolate_bickie]

The new medkit sprites are bad and a good example of changing something that already looked good and has been updated multiple times over the years already for no good reason.

The spriters are working as a team to determine how they want the game to look. If you have issue with that, you're welcome to post constructive criticism, but just saying "I don't like those sprites" doesn't really do anything but make people irritated.

No, somebody makes a sprite PR making an unnecessary change to an already decent sprite that makes it look like it's from a different game (and/or makes it look worse, which is a matter of taste), a bunch of people describe the problems with the sprite in the comments as well as vote it down and then it gets merged anyway. Bonus points if they've left out a comparison to the sprites they're changing (not everybody knows about IconDiffBot and the previews are too small and not in-game anyway). As I've already said, there's no plan there, but if there were it would be a bad one.

I've been pointing out the same problems on sprite PRs for a long time now. The main issues are changing good sprites for no reason and changing them to an inconsistent artstyle. As I've said before, if the style that the majority of the sprites are still drawn in looks outdated, then decide on a new one.

There is a plan there, you're just upset that you're not in on it. I'm not the biggest fan of the new medkit sprites myself, but I trust that the folks running the show know what they're doing to get everything on the same page design-wise.

This has to be the worst take in the entire thread.

People don't know what the new art style is, but when they try to ask they got shot down by crap like this.

Open communication is a two-way street and half the reason players are ignorant and annoyed with coders is that they have no idea what decisions have been made and why. All design documents seem to be kept in coder-only channels.

I get why coders refuse to change things at the PR stage, as by that point all the work has already been done. But it's not clear what the actual channels are for talking about code decisions, it seems to be all internal, which just further alienates players.

EDIT: Before coders swoop in claiming I refuse to educate myself and that all the info is there here is the design docs I have been able to find;
-
Github regarding sprite updates
https://github.com/tgstation/tgstation/projects/6

Contact info for coders handling sprites;
IRC: ShizCalev

==Ask me about==

- Mapping / Map Balancing
- Spriting
- Sounds
- Preference Changes

Preferred contact method: IRC
viewtopic.php?f=5&t=18650

TG design docs;
https://hackmd.io/@tgstation

[Rohen_Tahir]

The new medkit sprites are bad and a good example of changing something that already looked good and has been updated multiple times over the years already for no good reason.

The spriters are working as a team to determine how they want the game to look. If you have issue with that, you're welcome to post constructive criticism, but just saying "I don't like those sprites" doesn't really do anything but make people irritated.

No, somebody makes a sprite PR making an unnecessary change to an already decent sprite that makes it look like it's from a different game (and/or makes it look worse, which is a matter of taste), a bunch of people describe the problems with the sprite in the comments as well as vote it down and then it gets merged anyway. Bonus points if they've left out a comparison to the sprites they're changing (not everybody knows about IconDiffBot and the previews are too small and not in-game anyway). As I've already said, there's no plan there, but if there were it would be a bad one.

I've been pointing out the same problems on sprite PRs for a long time now. The main issues are changing good sprites for no reason and changing them to an inconsistent artstyle. As I've said before, if the style that the majority of the sprites are still drawn in looks outdated, then decide on a new one.

There is a plan there, you're just upset that you're not in on it. I'm not the biggest fan of the new medkit sprites myself, but I trust that the folks running the show know what they're doing to get everything on the same page design-wise.

This has to be the worst take in the entire thread.

People don't know what the new art style is, but when they try to ask they got shot down by crap like this.

Open communication is a two-way street and half the reason players are ignorant and annoyed with coders is that they have no idea what decisions have been made and why. All design documents seem to be kept in coder-only channels.

I get why coders refuse to change things at the PR stage, as by that point all the work has already been done. But it's not clear what the actual channels are for talking about code decisions, it seems to be all internal, which just further alienates players.

EDIT: Before coders swoop in claiming I refuse to educate myself and that all the info is there here is the design docs I have been able to find;
-
Github regarding sprite updates
https://github.com/tgstation/tgstation/projects/6

Contact info for coders handling sprites;
IRC: ShizCalev

==Ask me about==

- Mapping / Map Balancing
- Spriting
- Sounds
- Preference Changes

Preferred contact method: IRC
viewtopic.php?f=5&t=18650

TG design docs;
https://hackmd.io/@tgstation

Trust the Plan

[BlueMemesauce]

The new sprites don't even match each other.

Prove it. Show me which sprites you're talking about.

these don't fit at all. its a completely different style compared to the rest of the game

idk anything about art to say why but they just look so different from everything else

[toemas]

The new sprites don't even match each other.

Prove it. Show me which sprites you're talking about.

suit.png

these don't fit at all. its a completely different style compared to the rest of the game

idk anything about art to say why but they just look so different from everything else

they look fine to me!

[Farquaar]

I think it’s just that 3/4 is jarring compared to regular sprites and the floor.

[Rohen_Tahir]

I think it’s just that 3/4 is jarring compared to regular sprites and the floor.

This post made me notice that the suit storage unit kind of looks like a jar.

[cacogen]

Change will come and in a year you'll have people fighting to keep the new sprites because a newer batch of sprites are taking away the soul of the game.

I keep trying to tell people it has nothing to do with soul and everything to do with quality and consistency but they don't seem to care. I do not think the game looked better ten years ago.

The new sprites don't even match each other.

Prove it. Show me which sprites you're talking about.

Canisters, as a recent example?

[Farquaar]

Trust the Plan

[Vekter]

Change will come and in a year you'll have people fighting to keep the new sprites because a newer batch of sprites are taking away the soul of the game.

I keep trying to tell people it has nothing to do with soul and everything to do with quality and consistency but they don't seem to care. I do not think the game looked better ten years ago.

The new sprites don't even match each other.

Prove it. Show me which sprites you're talking about.

Canisters, as a recent example?

As compared to what other new sprite?

[TheFinalPotato]

This has to be the worst take in the entire thread.

People don't know what the new art style is, but when they try to ask they got shot down by crap like this.

Open communication is a two-way street and half the reason players are ignorant and annoyed with coders is that they have no idea what decisions have been made and why. All design documents seem to be kept in coder-only channels.

I get why coders refuse to change things at the PR stage, as by that point all the work has already been done. But it's not clear what the actual channels are for talking about code decisions, it seems to be all internal, which just further alienates players.

There's exactly one (two?) coder only channels.
The maintainer and spritetainer github "teams" (How github lets you set permissions and categorize people) have discussion threads.
I ain't a spritetainer, so all I can tell you is most of what we talk about in the maintainer thread is github admin stuff

There's no hidden discord channel for development, outside event-bus, which we don't use.
Only thing that comes close is maintainerbus, which is visible by everyone but maintainer only.
If you scroll up in that channel to the start, to back when it was made secret so mso could get mad at us for dumb stuff in private, you'll see a lot of bellyaching about the INTERNAL DISCUSSIONS tower.

We value openness very highly, since we're a dev community almost totally sourced from players.
There are a few cases where a convo will start in admin channels, and they won't move it to coding general or similar, but that's mostly because the admin team is a bunch of cowards.

Most discussions either happen in maintainer bus, or coding general (4th from the top in the general tab, name keeps changing), or the spriting and mapping channels.

Design docs are held on hackmd, which you found. That's it, there's no like, secret coder only docs. There used to just be none, but we started using them maybe a year and a half back to doc what a feature was intended to be, to try and hold back creep.

I can't speak for everyone, but in general I trust my own gut over the standard github commenter, and will not act on opinions I don't agree with/become convinced of.

Similarly, our art style is what our spritetainers think looks right. That's why the position exists, to provide some through-line to our fucked up game.
They're likely to brush off criticism because they're very used to people malding about the changes they want.

People get upset by changes to things they're used to, and art is a large part of that. See: This thread.

Can't really speak for them, but I have a feeling if you ask targeted questions like "why does this look so ""smooth""" or something, rather then "this is bad", things will go better.
That or they'll ignore you, as is their right. S why we have em in the first place after all.

[oranges]

trust the plan