PALETTE SWAP FIGHTING GAME CHARACTERS SOFTWARE

Characters couldn’t really have text, or graphics on one side of their costumes, because they would be reversed when facing the opposite direction. From an artistic standpoint this was a problem. They were secure in the knowledge with sprite mirroring they would move the same whether facing left or right. A developer could focus on making a boxer look, and move like a boxer, or a ninja look, and move like a ninja. This came in handy when presenting different styles.

A fighter would never have their back turned, and their strikes hidden from view. Sprite mirroring ensured that characters always faced the player. It was easy to track punches, and kicks because players had a clear view at the arms, and legs of the characters. In this way it would be easy for players to see who was who on screen. The white, and red karate uniforms were pallet swaps. Karate Champ was different from action games because two players could go against each other. In the earliest days of the fighting genre sprite mirroring allowed characters to face left, or right. The limitations of hardware turned out to be a blessing in disguise. Solid color characters, and sprite mirroring would be used by other studios to create the illusion of movement in their games. Iwatani used a bright yellow for Pac-Man, and other solid colors to represent the ghosts Pinky (pink), Blinky (red), Inky (sky blue), and Clyde (orange). It also limited the colors the game could exploit. The hardware limited the number of sprites, sizes, and frames of animation. As the character moved left, right, up, and down across the maze it was a simple task of flipping the sprite to save on excess turning animations. Figuring that he could contain the open, and closed mouth animation across 28x36 tiles, and three frames of data. Toru plotted out the proportions of Pac-Man in the game on graph paper. The actual sprite of Pac-Man was another story. You could see this in the official character art, cabinet, and marquee art. The character was fairly three dimensional in the eyes of creator Toru Iwatani. While the game was not the first breakout hit, the character could be considered the original gaming mascot. Despite the memory constraints the limited animation brought games to life. Simple shapes, and two, or three frames of data were all they could apply on characters, and enemies. Studios like Atari, and Namco created animation through the use of sprites, instead of paint, on cells.

PALETTE SWAP FIGHTING GAME CHARACTERS SOFTWARE

In the late ‘70s, and early ‘80s game designers fought the limitations of hardware, and software to bring their ideas to life. This goes back to the birth of the genre. To expand on the idea, the stronger the color scheme, the bigger the impact it will have on audiences. If you take away anything today I want you to remember that the use of color may be the most important thing when designing fighting game characters. This entry is written with fighting game fans, and budding game designers in mind.

Palette swap fighting game characters