Original Pixel Art in TASmania


play in browser


The default tilesets provided by RPG Maker MZ dominate the game, making full use of them as I discovered the castle colors for instance worked for the eras that had castles written into them--everything comes from Taylor Swift’s world in this game, even when it's iconically RPG Maker. At the same time, I've been making my own pixel assets to live amidst the others:

                       

The bag of glitter is my favorite (read more about that quest here). I made the cats and the caticorn from the standard RPG Maker cat, a black cat (not pictured), which I decided would populate the labyrinths throughout the eras, and petting them gives you hearts and Tay Points (TP).



For the cat faces I went with the original pixel art I made in Scratch, where my tiles were 16 x 16 pixels, differing greatly from RPG Maker MZ's 48 x 48. I think the reduced pixel count here is clearly a stylistic choice as the resolution is not an issue. I prefer the pixelated closeup to the smooth line of the suddenly high definition character portrait but I came to terms with this as I decided to also use RPG Maker's stock characters (more on that next). Adopting Meredith, Olivia, and Benjamin makes you a cat lady. It's one of several badges you can earn:

I will make another post about this process if necessary but I have been making players in wheelchairs, which is to say the wheelchair user is the same player with or without the disability, however playing the game will differ as accessibility is an issue in every town. Below I've shared a tileset that has as many default RPG Maker tiles as my own, such as the easter eggs, the trampolines, and the packages.


I've circled the wheelchairs because they are default RPG Maker tiles I’m using with their default characters to make disabled players.

I've also started making custom players, some of them by choice of features like the one above, and some by using the "randomize" button in the RPG Maker MZ character engine. Lastly, I thought I'd share the icon set. I've made several, I think it's clear which are my originals, but I've also utilized the default icons somewhat when it comes to items--the library books, poems, bonfires, lives, Tay Points... tbh I so dislike them I might end up making all of my own icons but it's not much of a priority, and I default to my contentment with RPG Maker providing enough to cover so many ideas, narratives, and their components.


Leave a comment

Log in with itch.io to leave a comment.