Jumpman84's Skin Mod WIPs

[Jumpman84]

So, I finally can have my own topic. Don't I feel special? 

But this is where I'll keep record of my current and future skin projects. I actually do have a couple right now, which I had revealed in the old topic. But doesn't hurt to go over the facts again.

I guess I should start with two things that I actually "completed": the revamp of Ninji to 0.31 and the revamp of MM9 Roll to 0.4. These weren't meant to be taken as real projects. I was just fixing the skins so I could use them in MKF, which was mostly sprite realignment. For Roll, though, she needed sprites of her shooting while ducking. So I frankensprited some. It was actually a minor adjustment on most of them. Bass was more difficult to figure out, but I succeeded, despite the fact Roll's bass suit doesn't even use it. But I'm a completionist, I guess. Mind you, those adjustments were to make them playable for those specific versions. That's why Ninji is only 0.31 compatible. I didn't add the Soldier suit for him since I felt I would need permission from StarsimsUniverse to do that. After I finish a few of my current projects, I might send him a PM and ask for permission to make Ninji and MM9 Roll compatible with future versions.

You can find the downloads in the Release thread. Proper credit goes to StarsimsUniverse for the original skins.

With that out of the way, onto discussion of my first WIP:



This is, without a doubt, the reason that people know of me. It started innocently with a simple suggestion in the Mario and Luigi alt contest. But since I couldn't get anyone else on board with it, when the time came to start spriting, I decided to do it myself. Admittedly, I had no clue on how to sprite and my first attempt at a small Jumpman were crappy recolors. This was before I had discovered that the NES Jumpman sprites were the same size as small Mario. Once I discovered that, I took to using those as a base and creating new sprites for poses that I didn't have. And that's how it all began. From there, I started work on the rest of the forms, improving my skills enough that I created a custom suit for him. And now, I'm working on a Retro version of Jumpman at the insistence of others. Heck, Jumpman was so well-known that Obreck considered Jumpman as a possible alt for R.O.B.! Of course, he lost to Professor Hector and Daisy, but I was still honored and even came up with a concept for how Jumpman could imitate R.O.B.'s hover.



Yeah, I'm a bit crazy. But I figured you knew that already coming here. So anyway, here are the sprites for small Jumpman.



The sprites are mostly the originals with a few exceptions. Skid, hold, carry, goal, and stun among others. Jumpman's stand facing front and win are edits by me as well. Originally, Jumpman's runjump was the same sprite as the jump, since I thought it would look retro. Then one day, I tried to sprite him in a SMB3-style runjump and it came out well. As for the dead animation, this was back when alts were around, so I thought it could be used as opposed to the regular death. Now that those plans are scrapped, only the first sprite will be used. The purse and umbrella are different skins for 1up Mushroom. Finally, those map sprites were made by my good friend Del. Thanks, bud.



These were the Modern version sprites for Jumpman. These are actually edited from Mario's Super Mario All-Stars sprites (the ones used in the original and Lost Levels). See for yourself.



At first, I had only edited the color palette on his clothes. Then Obreck made the suggestion to give him Jumpman's more distinct nose and cowlick hair, which I did. And it was liked, so I kept it. And yes, there are a few sprites here that I made myself as well, such as the run, hold, and carry sprites, which are abilities he lacked in that game. Fun fact: I made the runjump before I realized that one of his swim sprites is the same style. However, Mario's swimming sprites are actually a bit smaller than his others, so my sprited version of runjump is a better match ingame. Also, this Mario has no back sprites. Hence I created some based on the SMB3. That includes the climbing ones, too. And of course, I created a stun sprite in the same vein as Mario's in MKF, but with Jumpman's halo on it (which sadly doesn't fit in small Jumpman's stun). That sprite on the end of the comparison was a reshading experiment that didn't turn out how I liked.



Not much to say about Fire Jumpman here. I think the first fireball throwing pose wasn't in the original sheet, but everything else was a recolor. The sheet includes blue fireballs since I figured that if the devs added Jumpman as an alt, they'd be able to have him shoot blue fireballs. If we ever get to skin projectiles, that's something I'd like to do.



For these sprites, I merely transplanted the ears and tail from Raccoon Mario from his original MKF sprites. The blue Super Leaf is actually pretty cool in my opinion. The only other notable thing about these is that their completion allowed me to record my first video of MKF (using Jumpman in Entryway).



Ah, my most experimental work thus far on this project thus far. It actually started off with a comment from Del about how Big Jumpman's nose made him look like a parrot. Before that, I had just planned on sticking Jumpman in a Tanooki suit (real unoriginal, I know.) But with that comment, I got to thinking "what if I made Parrot Jumpman"? Of course, that'd be pretty silly and have no basis in the video games... but then I thought back to Donkey Kong Jr. and then discovered this guy:

http://www.mariowiki.com/Nitpicker

And the rest was history. My creative juices went running and resulted in this new costume. The most notable features are the flapping arms to stimulate flight, the sweat bars on the runjump flight (because he's fat), and the most awkward duck pose known to man (known as the "What the Duck?!" pose). Also, an alternative to the regular spin jump, I sprited him with his arms out to simulate a spin attack. It was actually an idea from Poppants, if I recall correctly. He had an idea for a Costumes Mario, which featured Mario in different outfits for his suits. One of his suits was Red Star Mario, who had a spin attack due to a lack of tail (plus the Galaxy reference). So I used that concept as well, as a bird's tail isn't as sturdy as a raccoon. I even created two winning poses: a standard one and then him in the crane pose (as seen in Karate Kid). Oh, and the statue is Stanley the Bugman standing on a beehive. Because that's the only thing he's good for.

And now, some other stuff to go with Jumpman:

(click to show/hide)

That was my original start screen, back when they all used the Mario letters. Then on a whim, I decided to create a screen using the letters from Epyx's Jumpman game and the "How High Can You Get" monkey.

Now, after I had been working on this modern version for a while, Del told me to do a retro version instead and demonstrated with a big sprite he had created in a retro style. That and some proofs of concept done by mr3urious, I decided to give it a shot. Here's some previews of what I have:



The one on the left is the original sprite by Del. The rest are my sprites for walk.



This was one of mr3urious's concepts. Originally, his colors didn't match up, so I recolored it to what you see now.



The ears and tail here are from Classic Mario's raccoon form.



I created this one, though mr3urious fixed the coloring on the hat.



The top sprites are the modern items and the bottom are their retro counterparts. The mushrooms are from the Game Boy Donkey Kong game, with the Super Mushroom colored blue. The oil drums should be obvious.

And now... the moment you've been waiting for... an update!!

You see, when I started on Big Jumpman, I decided to differentiate him by using certain poses for actions from the Game Boy Donkey Kong. One of these was the stun sprite. I found one of the best looking ones from the game and tried to replicate it in Big Jumpman form. What follows is a comparison screen with Mario from the GB Donkey Kong and Big Jumpman. Let me know what you think.



That's it for now. I'll continue to work on getting Big Jumpman done. Please feel free to give comments, suggestions, whatever.

Actually... one more thing...over time, I've made different avatars using these sprites.

(click to show/hide)

This was the first. After I made the stun sprite for small Jumpman, I created another avatar, the first in the Jumpman vs. Gutswario series.



Then, this next one came during the Bidoof invasion.



Then when we got to Zetaboards, I created the second part of the series, with Jumpman getting revenge.



And now... with Fusion Fangaming comes part three... where a new challenger appears!

Speaking of, my other two projects will be in a later post.

[TheomanZero]

I think the "retro" Jumpman sprites are a better fit than the SMAS-edit ones.  They make a pretty good skin, which I'd like to see continue.  (Incidentally, if you do continue working on the SMAS-based ones, the outline colors are inconsistent, so be sure to fix that.)

[Vic]

Oh my god the Parrot Jumpman looks so horrible it's creepy