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Sonic 3 & Knuckles: Project Chaos - History

k u n g f u c h i c k e n

By k u n g f u c h i c k e n,
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Spire Newbie

Spire

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Well I'm very glad to see that you guys like my ideas. While I would of course prefer to keep it exclusive to my design, you may absolutly use the blue/red sphere idea on the official CD labels, thats ok with me.

I've followed some of the suggesting and removed the directional blur effect from the background, as well as the shadows behind the titles. I seem to be hearing conflicting opinions on that Andes font though - I did initially choose it because it was used in the game itself, but I think it also just seems to fit in well with the rest of the design. I'll consider looking into alternative fonts, but most likely I think I'm just going to stick with it.

Front Back

Also, I apologize for the mistakes on the track list.. I guess I made a copy+paste mistake on track 21. But hey, I spelled Hadyn's name correctly the first time so that has to count for something right? :wink:

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random person Newbie

random person

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About the Andes font: I think it's OK for a secondary title, but for the main title of the project it seems to lack some importance. Just as in the game this font is used for the zone title screen but not for the main title or the cover itself.

I was just thinking, it would be cool to have 'Project Chaos' in some other font, but have somewhere written 'A Sonic the Hedgehog 3 and Knuckles Arrangement Album' or something like this using the Andes font but smaller in size. Well, I'm lazy so you'll have to figure what I'm trying to say or just ignore my comments :P

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Hadyn Newbie

Hadyn

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I spelled Hadyn's name correctly the first time so that has to count for something right? :wink:

Yes.

Yes it does. I actually noticed that yesterday, forgot to comment then, but seriously, nice work :P

I'm still not sure I like the drop shadows/inner shadows/glows on the main logo though. I just think it needs to be flat colors - maybe with a slight gradient over the whole thing, but the shadows sort of collide too much with the colors as is. Especially on the knuckles emblem - the red doesn't mix with the greys very well at all.

On the other hand, I could just do all this in my own version of the cover, which I'll do... soon... maybe.

But yeah, you're free to do it how you like, really. Ignore me if you disagree with anything :)

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Spire Newbie

Spire

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Also, I apologize for the mistakes on the track list.. I guess I made a copy+paste mistake on track 21. But hey, I spelled Hadyn's name correctly the first time so that has to count for something right? :wink:

Oh sure, but you totally misspelled "housethegrate". :P

:banghead:

I've been playing around with the S&K emblem quite a bit actually. I think I'd be reasonably happy with the way it already looks but I'm still looking for something else that might look better, and while BLueBeRRy's did an excellent job with his logo, I think it would really clash with the colorful background that I already have on my cover. I might post some of my variations later and see which ones people like the best.

Also, I'll be sure to try that font, thanks!

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Spire Newbie

Spire

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Another update:

Front|Back

But this time I've made a lot of changes. Either I've improved it substantially, or completely butchered it ..although if no one likes it I can always go back to the way it was before.

The new rounded-rectangle style I put over the title/track list is based on the blue-sphere counter from the special stages. The font I used isn't quite accurate to the game but seems to similar enough:

spherecounterzk6.jpg

Oh yeah, and I realize that on track 18 I couldn't quite fit in "BrainCells+SnappleMan", I'll be able to fix that later, it's just going to be a bit of a pain the way I have things set up right now.

BTW: Thanks a lot for all the feedback thus far. I really appriciate it! I wasn't even sure if I wanted to finish this at all before, and hadn't even touched it for months, but now it's turned into quite a project.

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q-pa Newbie

q-pa

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Another update:

Front|Back

But this time I've made a lot of changes. Either I've improved it substantially, or completely butchered it ..although if no one likes it I can always go back to the way it was before.

I like it! :)

Random thought from looking at your screenshot above: Maybe it would be a cool idea to make a 3rd disc design for the website bonus tracks, using the white star sphere. 8)

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GaMeBoX Newbie

GaMeBoX

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Hey spire, i think that new version was way cooler than the old one, you went for cleaner look. I think you should remove that lensflare effect on the back though, because its a pretty cheap effect, and i dont think it fits in behind the tracklisting. But other than that, a huge improvement from the last version.. :)

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Dark Phazon Newbie

Dark Phazon

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Officially, Rexy's track is called "Shumacher's Bar". The first post is just a little misspelled with that. Otherwise, I'm quite impressed! Much improved over the old version.
As long as everyone's critiquing spellings and such, I believe it's supposed to be "Schumacher's Bar", spelled like the F1 drivers, Michael and Ralf Schumacher's last name. :wink:

And BTW, that is a great reference for that song's title, Rexy. [/F1_fan]

As for the cover-art, I really like the back-side's design. But for the front side, it just looks like it has no depth to it, like it's flat. I don't really know, but I think the main thing that gets to me is how the background is just solely the checkerboard pattern, for the front cover.

On the back, the checkerboard pattern works well, because there's that "outer-space" style blue on the one edge, helping create the image of the sphere. On the front, there isn't anything to reference to, so it just doesn't come across as a sphere the way the back does. But overall (even though it sounds like I don't), I really like those covers, Spire!

I wish I had time myself to attempt my own take on covers for this project, but that's unlikely to happen.

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JackR Newbie

JackR

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I know my opinion on the covers isn't that important, since I wasn't involved in the project, but I do have to say...

I'm loving the back cover. Absolutely loving it. The only thing that I don't like is the Chaos Emerald; there's something about those uneven edges (bottom left, especially) that my eye doesn't agree with. Aside from that, I've just noticed the gray line (which I go into detail on below) on the Disk 2 track box; left and bottom sides. I love all the little details though, especially the side tabs with one being red and the other blue. Brilliant.

The front I'm not quite as impressed with. Sonic looks good, but Knuckles just seems off to me. You've got that gray shadow all around him; pick one light source and go with it. On Sonic, you've got the shadow just underneath, the light obviously coming from the top left. I think it would vastly improve Knuckles to do the same. Right now, he looks like a sort of raised, rounded bevel of some type; one that magically casts a shadow on all sides.

Next is the color transition. First, the blue to black; it's really good until you get to the bottom, near Knuckles. It goes from a seamless trasition between the colors to blue, gray line, black. I know you're trying to go with a 3D effect, but this was not a 3D game; I think it would look better if it was all like the top half of Sonic; blue to black, straight transition. The slight darkening of the blue works nicely to still provide the 3D effect anyway. Sadly, this shadow on the top left is in direct contrast to the work on Sonic that I liked, with the LIGHT in the top left.

I think that's the biggest change that needs to be made; pick one light source and go with it. Right now, Sonic is getting light from the top left, Knuckles casts a shadow all around, the whole logo gets light from the bottom right, and the sphere gets light from the bottom left. If all these light sources (or at the very least, the ones on the logo; it might look cool to leave the sphere's where it is and light the logo separate) were unified, I think it would improve a lot. Personally, I suggest lighting from the top left, because you've already done so with Sonic, and I think it turned out very well.

The last few things I wanted to point out were that the whole logo is a victim of that gray line outline again, except for on the bottom right (where the light's coming from). I think if you just go pure black it would look cleaner. And finally, some of the shapes on Knuckles; the tip of the right dread has a vertical line, compared to a more natural point like the other two, and the top of his head forms a rather odd angle; perhaps round that off?

I know, I'm being rather overcritical, especially for someone who didn't work on the project, but I'm just throwing my ideas/suggestions out there.

Despite all my nitpicking, I really like the covers; a great idea, and something I could never hope to do myself.

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jontilton Newbie

jontilton

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same here, i don't know if my opinion matters since i have no part of the project.... but i'd like to offer my 2 cents

front - i'm not quite sure why, but the newly added boxes around the lettering is bothering me... it just seems to distract too much and draw attention away from the logo, if we could see a version without the boxes, or perhaps with lighter boxes, i think it may look better

back - again the boxes

don't get me wrong, i LOVE what you did with the album art, but you did ask for opinions, so i'm just letting you know what i thought. keep up the good work!

<EDIT> also, the blood on the asphalt project could use some album art love from you highly talented artists.......

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Nineko Newbie

Nineko

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I agree. I don't like the box on the front. I like, instead, the box for "Disk 1" and "Disk 2" on the back. Those are good and should stay, imo. Maybe you can do one with the blue sphere and one with the ring? Still, I'm liking them.

Also, I don't like the gray background in the tracklisting. I liked it more when the text was directly on the orange thing.

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Spire Newbie

Spire

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Actually, the copy+paste error I was referring to earlier was caused by me copying the same textbox over and over - the font was leaving too much space between lines so I had to put them each in seperate boxes. I still typed out everything, which is why there were so many spelling mistakes :? .

JackR: Have you seen the new version of the front cover? I believe I've already addressed the "grey lighting" issues with the logo, but maybe I'm just misunderstanding you.

Jontilton: I couldn't use the "&" on that cover because of font size issues, it just won't fit in there. But don't worry - I'm going to be re-arraging the text boxes later, though, and hopefully I should be able to solve that problem in the process.

q-pa: I like your idea! how's this?

projectchaosbonustrackcdtc2.th.jpg

Nineko: Aesthetically, I agree with you on removing the desaturation box on the track list; however, having the text directly on the background makes it a bit too illegible I think. The contrasting colors just seemed to confuse it a bit too much. Maybe I'm wrong though? Here is what it looks like without the grey boxes. I'm just not sure about that bottom-right corner :/

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Nineko Newbie

Nineko

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Nineko: Aesthetically, I agree with you on removing the desaturation box on the track list; however, having the text directly on the background makes it a bit too illegible I think. The contrasting colors just seemed to confuse it a bit too much. Maybe I'm wrong though? Here is what it looks like without the grey boxes. I'm just not sure about that bottom-right corner :/
mmmmh, you're right.

but you know, the text can fade to brighter colors...:wink:

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Spire Newbie

Spire

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Well, I've tried that before, but unfortunatly the bright orange tiles confilct just as badly with the brighter text as the darker tiles conflict with the darker text. I could make it fade into a bright white, that would probably do the trick, but then it doesn't really fit in anymore.

However, I think I found a solution anyway. If I just put a very thin, 0.25pt outline along with the gradient it appears to be much more read-able. Still not as legible as I'd like but it seems to be working, what do you think?

Back

Edit: And while I'm at it, heres some changes I made to the front that will hopefully help make the rounded-rectangles fit in better around the title.

Front

I think it also helps it match the back better as well.

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