Topic: November 2014 Castlevania Dungeon Sprite Contest

[uzo]

We've got a lot of talented pixel artists around. Don't just call something on the first entry you see.

[Dracula9]

butit'sthesecondentryuzo

But yeah. Fantastic work aside, we've still got a good two weeks left. Plenty can happen in that timeframe, especially when you've got such skilled folks as Donoffrio (and VDK, but I dunno if he's on here or just CVBla) hanging around.

[VladCT]

Vedora's here too, but lately he seems rather busy.
In any case, if anyone's gonna top that they'd need those two weeks.

[Lelygax]

OK, this is my entry:

Surely if I was a judge, you would receive my vote. Man I can totally see your inspiration coming from Chaos statues from AoS and Dracula pain, also this eye in his brain seems to me like as if his mind have some kind of parasite, while Dracula itself is suffering, magnificent indeed.

I've already thought about using that "mental dimension" in a project, but you top it and even improves in many ways the idea, Im really touched by it. Maybe it will even be my new wallpaper for some time.

Also you at the same time did a new enemy (Bloodman? Like a Mudman of blood?) a new Julius design and a new boss, wow.
I really want to see what more will come from these contests.

[Las]

well i'm not on here much..but it's defintly going to be hard to top that amalogamation of drac form plottiwst. Very nice and yet interesting work on his final form. That's about as creepy as any sotn boss. Just Wow!

[theANdROId]

No offense to plot, but there are two weeks left, and I think someone with a good imagination and/or a decent knowledge of CV (and some spriting ability too!) could come up with something awesome!  I'm eager to see what else is submitted!

[theplottwist]

No offense to plot, but there are two weeks left, and I think someone with a good imagination and/or a decent knowledge of CV (and some spriting ability too!) could come up with something awesome!  I'm eager to see what else is submitted!

I'm actually eager to see this happen!

[darkmanx_429]

OK, this is my entry:





This is Dracula final form in the 1999 battle, if the game were made by me: Dracula's Spirit. The TRUE boss here, though, is the Crimson Stone. The sprite is cut like that because this form is an entire level. But I kept the main sprite itself separate.

Read the whole concept (along with something else I did) here, at your own risk:

(click to show/hide)

Using a combination of the power of the Hakuba ritual inbued in the Vampire Killer itself, and Charlotte Aulin's knowledge of the "multilayer quantum-space barrier", Julius is able to use it to enter Dracula's mind, so he can find and destroy his connection with the Castle, in a reverse twist of Brauner's paintings in Portrait of Ruin.

The battle happens inside Dracula's psyche, a vast sea made of the blood of countless impaled humans with the castle looming over them. All this blood represents the souls of these humans. The scenario is the "will of the artist", but in this case the canvas is Dracula's mind, and the artist is Dracula himself.

In this dimension, Dracula's distorted spirit can be found, and is composed of a wolf, a bat and a demon, and in his hands, he holds the Crimson Stone, which he uses to draw his power from the Castle, and also is his weak spot. He's buried in heaps of the human souls he absorbed and enslaved along the centuries. These human souls, in turn, are submerged in the sea of blood.

It's all very symbolic, considering this happens inside Dracula's own personal dimension. The concept comes from "Whip's Memory" which has its own dimension inside its supposed psyche, with a full fledged Richter Belmont inside, and again, from Brauner's paintings and how Charlotte and Jonathan could enter it to destroy their core source of power.

The goal is to destroy the stone between his hands, which connects Dracula's soul to the Castle. The Castle in the background represents the connection Dracula has with it inside his spirit/mind.

When Julius approaches, he's able to climb the small hill of souls and hit the stone. After hitting enough times, Dracula reacts.

Dracula has some attacks: The wolf head is able to vomit spheres made of blood to hit Julius when he's near, the bat is able to flap the wings very fast so he can send Julius flying far from the Stone, and the demon head's forehead eye can shoot spheres of energy towards Julius' position that explode when making contact. The Stone itself can shoot red lighting bolts towards Julius, and can create waves of bats made of energy that hit multiple times (Akin to Dracula's "Bat Moon" attack on Order of Ecclesia). The Stone can also heal itself by absorbing Red Zombies (Which are human souls summoned to attack Julius).

Everytime Julius attacks the Stone, the Castle in the background can be seen "phazing" in and out of reality.

Near its destruction, the Stone summons a doppelganger of Walter Bernhard made of human souls, and shields itself, so only after destroying "Walter" it can be attacked again.

When the Stone is destroyed, the Castle in the background suddenly disappears, symbolizing the broken connection between Dracula's Spirit and the Castle, and Julius is kicked back to reality.

Also, this is why Julius loses his memory: This is the price to pay for entering Dracula's own psyche to fight him, to lose a little from his own mind.

I even imagine his musical theme to be "Arch Enemy" from Harmony of Dissonance, remixed to use a lot of Kingdom Hearts' style violins.

And yeah, I made a mockup representation of it:



That's it dudes! I REALLY loved this challenge, as I always wanted to create a Castlevania final boss! Making everything took me a whooping 10-days time.

Whoa?! Since you are done a bit early you really should do some animation to this sprite, I can totally see this monster moving in my mind!

[Dracula9]

Hopefully I can finish this monstrosity in time (the body's roughly 750 pixels wide all together). If I can't...I'll find a way to enter something decently composed. But entering the head just to sort of put myself in the running.





C'MON D9 YOU CAN DO THIS

[darkmanx_429]

Holy Crazy Scale!

Hopefully I can finish this monstrosity in time (the body's roughly 750 pixels wide all together). If I can't...I'll find a way to enter something decently composed. But entering the head just to sort of put myself in the running.





C'MON D9 YOU CAN DO THIS

[theplottwist]

Hopefully I can finish this monstrosity in time (the body's roughly 750 pixels wide all together). If I can't...I'll find a way to enter something decently composed. But entering the head just to sort of put myself in the running.





C'MON D9 YOU CAN DO THIS

Sweet baby Jesus, you have to finish this now. I also though about Dracula being a dragon, but I couldn't execute it inside the concept I had in mind.

But this is simply spectacular!

[Dracula9]

I still think you've got me beat. I just went with the easy Dracul=Dragon route, whereas you've created a masterpiece worthy of the series canon.

I'll try to finish this nightmare. My work schedule's pretty lax the next week, so if I don't get called in on an offday and nothing life-changing comes up I should be fine.


...man, it's still hard to believe only a few years ago I was churning out shitty Simon edits, and now I've got this magnificent t-rex dragon bastard.

[BLOOD MONKEY]

Dracul=Dragon

Damnit! Now everybody's gonna think I ripped off of you.

[Dracula9]

Unlikely, given that Vlad II coined the name, and his son took it, six hundred years before I made this image.

Also, getting there.

[uzo]

Holy shit, you guys are going all out.

Keep at it D9. I want to see this.