Using Brawl Stage contest art for a SSF4AE mod - asking permission

doshu

edit : the mod is finaly done, go see this post for screenshots and download links !

Hello everyone,

I'm currently working on a "Ultra Light Stage Alternative mod" for Super Street Fighter 4 Arcade Edition on PC. Allow me to paste my post from the shoryuken forums :

"The aim of this mod is to allow very low end PC that can't even run dhoushi's simplified stages'mod to run SSF4AE with "High" graphic background stages while keeping 60+FPS. It will be a collection of modified training stages replacing all the standard stages of the game, while trying to stay as close as possible to their original theme/atmosphere (as possible though, it won't be for several stages).
I also plan to release the modified training stages alone, so they can be easily used as Training stage only "

and a picture of some WIP :



As you can see, those 4 stage backgrounds are all from the Brawl Stage Contest, and I must apologize for using them without proper permission. But better late than never, or so I thought, so here I am to ask the permission to use the art from the contest for my mod.

The mod won't be only made up from Brawl Contest's material, but I would like to use lots of it, since they're so good lookin and high definition. I have some SFIII stage rips, but they're definitely too low definition to give good results.

Of course, the mod will contain all the appropriate credits for every piece of art inside it, my credit being residing only in the encoding of the art into the stage files. Giving full credit to the real artists was my intention from the start, and the post on the shoryuken is only the result of my sheer enthousiasm concerning the mod. I hope I haven't offended anyone by doing this.

As for actually getting the needed permissions, I doubt that every single person who participated in the contest will read this post and answer me. So I'm asking you, forum regular's, about the best course of action. Should I ask all of them by private message (I guess I should, but still asking, since it's my first mod ever) ?

Finally, I have to say that although I made an announcement about the mod going to be released by the end of the week, I haven't released anything yet, and still can stop the whole thing from going public. Should it be the case, I will only keep the mod for myself, and only release the training stage not using Brawl Contest's art.

Thanks for your advice(s) .

edit : finally, I'll just PM every member of the contest, it will be easier and faster that way. Still, I wouldn't mind hearing your opinon about all this .

edit 2 : of course, the mod will be 100% free, it will never be sold in any fashion.

Xoliul

Hey Dude,
this is going to be like, just 2D backgrounds ? I don't mind that at all, sure Andre won't either.

doshu

Yes, it's just 2D backgrounds. As you maybe know, the Training stage is basically just a big cube, so my mod just uses some art to fill the wall with pretty textures, making it look like a "real" stage.

However, one of the drawbacks regarding the original art is that the texture quality is less than the original, because of the allowed resolution (1280*800), as you can see from the sample above. Nevertheless, it still represents a huge leap in visual quality from the vanilla Training Stage, and even more from the "low" quality stage mode (being all black with wireframe).

d1ver

Hey, man
I don't mind at all. Make it pwetty:)

Mark Dygert

Thanks for the PM and the heads up, I'm glad you're asking people.

I don't mind if you use my stage at all, a little shocked actually ha! My stage wasn't exactly all that hot and I kept working on it after the contest ended so there are some improvements you might want, if you're actually interested.

doshu

Mark Dygert wrote: »

Thanks for the PM and the heads up, I'm glad you're asking people.

I don't mind if you use my stage at all, a little shocked actually ha! My stage wasn't exactly all that hot and I kept working on it after the contest ended so there are some improvements you might want, if you're actually interested.

Well, I won't say no if I can put my hands on even better material to work from. But I'm already pretty satisfied with what's available on the contest topic .

If some of you are interested in seing the project grow (a big word for a small project compared to your stages...), and/or in giving my a (small) hand to make things look even better, I could briefly explain how the Training Stage editing works, and what kind of jpg gives the best results .
I'll try to do that tomorrow.

doshu

Ok, so here's a bit of explanation on how it works. As you'll see, it really needs only basic picture editing skil, and by no way a "real" artist's skill like yours^^.

Before starting, I must warn you that the below explanitions might seem very n00bish... because I'm a n00b^^. I have almost 0 experience in modding or in picture editing. All I did is "reverse engineer" hunterk Classic Ryu Stage files (see below) with some tools provided from the shoryuken community, to be able to make my own stages.

First, let's look at the "cube" limitations : the edges (this stage was done by hunterk of the SSF4AE wiki mod - he worked from a mod from Recycler, who worked from SSF2 HD Remix material ; the result is great, I wish I had all HD Remix stage art to work from^^)



As you can see, all the vertical sides of the cube are filled with the same part of the texture, making it "loop" when it reaches the end. The same with the floor/ceiling. In practice, it doesn't show that much, except when performing some Ultra's like Ryu's Metsu Shoryuken.
But what is important here, is that because of that loop, the more the left and right sides of the texture looks alike, the less it will be apparent in the stage. In this case, it's almost "invisible".

Secondly, here's the kind of file the stage's texture is made of :



Basicaly, the "floor" part is upside, then comes a thin black line, and the the main background. What is important here for "good" results, is that the floor looks as much as possible like one, as it does from all the above exemples (and in the WIP preview screenshot). If the original jpg image's "floor" isn't "straight", or is filled with different objets and such, the result might be awkward (or not, it depends).

For exemple, let's first show the results from the 2 pictures above :



All in all, except the crappy resolution problem (Street Fighter Alpha stages, no way around it I think... too bad, since I really love the China wall theme), those stages look "good" : the floor is floory, and the edges of the texture look alike, so it should be pretty "invisible" while playing.

Let's then move to a "difficult" file to work from (at least for my skills ; I'm sorry to bring up your art rambooze, but it really does a great job of illustrating my point here, as I said in one of my messages)



That's it for the explanations. I think that they give a good idea on what kind of file is best suited for my mod. So far, I've done 36 stages, about half of them are quite good, the other is still in need of work (I haven't released anything yet ; repeating myself here, but better safe than sorry^^).

If you have any questions, please ask

doshu

Here's the last news from the shoryuken forum's. I hope that the result so far looks good to you .



I think this will defenitily do it . The pictures editing is quick and easy (3 of them, small-medium-big), but the text editing is more tedious and time consuming. As for the name of the stages, and their choice in regard of the vanilla ones, I'm trying to stay as close as possible to the stage music.... the thing being, I totally "SSF2 HD Remixed" my stages' music . Some choices were obvious, some not really. For exemple, "Secret Base" music is Vega's music, so I thought that the futuristic looking stage (from GGXX) would be just fine. Russia was obviously Zangief's music, so it became the famous Steelworks from SF2. As for the Volcanic Rim becoming a cemetary, as strange as it may seem, it's pretty logical for me. Some weeks ago, I chose Akuma's music for the stage, and, for me, the Atmosphere from this cemetery suits Akuma/Oni/Evil Ryu well. As for the location names, I'm probably going to change every one of them. Oceania becoming Japan bugs me because of the world map showing Oceania (and of the annoying announcer), but I guess perfection won't be possible here .

Last but not least, here's a preview at Guile's Stage !





And some previous WIP that I didn't post here yet (the stage name isn't haloed in red yet in this one) :







More should be coming soon...

doshu

I just released the mod. As I said in my private messages, I didn't use all the material I got the authorization for in this mod, mostly because of stage location problems. But rest assured, you didn't gave me your authorization for nothing, as I will release all the stages I made as single Training Stages .
Again, I thank you all for your support .

Here's a copy of the post at shoryuken with plenty of screenshots :

"The time to release the Ultra Light Stage Mod has come (see end of post for the 2 download links) !


While the file is being uploaded, here's a complete overview of the mod (I'll repost some stuff already posted before so that this post is "complete") :

• 21 brand new stages, with new selection screen pictures and text
• All the stages are based on the original stages'locations
• Music that fits each stage's atmosphere
• Mutes the announcer before the fight, so that he doesn't say the name of the original stage
• Comes in two versions : one for ENG characters'names (Bison=Dictator), one for JPN characters'names (Bison=Boxer)

An overview of the Stage Select screen for each stage :







An overview of the ingame render of all 21 stages :







A list of the 21 stages and their associated BGM :
STG_AFR -- DJIBOUTI -- USAF Airfield (Guile)
STG_BRA -- BRAZIL -- Tropical Jungle (Blanka)
STG_BRX -- PERU -- Mountain Cliff (T-Hawk)
STG_CHN -- CHINA -- Village Street (Chun-Li)
STG_CNX -- CHINA -- Courtyard by the Sea (Feil Long)
STG_EUR -- SPAIN -- Dead or Live TV Show (Claw)
STG_JPN -- JAPAN -- Snowy Night (Ryu slow)
STG_JPX -- JAPAN -- Sakura’s Home (Sakura)
STG_LAB -- UNKNOWN -- End of the World (Dictator)
STG_RUS -- USSR -- Steelworks (Zangief)
STG_RVR -- JAPAN -- Zen Garden (Rush of the Wind)
STG_SCO -- SCOTLAND -- Continental Forest (Cammy)
STG_USA -- USA -- Back Alley (Ken)
STG_VCN -- LOST ISLAND -- Pirate Cove (DJ)
STG_VIE -- THAILAND -- Ancient Ruins (Adon)
STG_VNX -- THAILAND -- Ancient Fighting Arena (Sagat)
STG_BLD -- USA -- Suburban Street (Viper)
STG_IND -- INDIA -- Desert Ruins (Dalhsim)
STG_KOR -- KOREA -- Old Cemetery (Gouki)
STG_AFX -- EGYPT -- Lost Tomb (Hakan)
STG_LBX -- UNKNOWN -- Secret Laboratory (Seth)


Here are the credits for the mod:
a.Most of the stages of this mod were created using art from:
- Xoliul and Wahlgren -- Street Fighter 2 Guile's stage remake (USAF Airfield)
- Bbox85 -- Samurai Shodown TamTam's stage remake (Tropical Jungle)
- d1ver -- Soul Calibur 3's "Water Mill Valley" remake (Village Street ; Ancient Fighting Arena)
- itsmadman (http://www.rashadmadison.com/) -- X-Men vs Street Fighter "Dead Or Live "The Show"" remake (Dead or Live TV Show)
- seforin -- Mortal Kombat 3 Cyrax/Jades'Desert stage remake (End of the World)
- lonelysquare -- Street Fighter 2 Zangief's stage remake (Steelworks)
- r4ptur3 -- Street Fighter 3rd Strike Makoto's stage remake (Zen Garden)
- Mark Dygert -- The Last Blade Zantetsu's stage remake (Pirate Cove)
- Tobeeffle and Mr_mout -- Street Fighter 3 Alex's stage remake (Suburban Street)
- Gannon -- Mortal Kombat's "Bell Tower" remake (Desert Ruins)
- EzMeow -- The Last Blade Kaede's stage remake (Old Cemetery)
- Faf -- Soul Calibur II's "Egyptian Temple" remake (Lost Tomb)
- ParoXum -- "Devoter Spaceship" based on Guilty Gear XX's FRASCO (Secret Laboratory)


b.The other stages are based on original material coming from:
- Marvel vs Capcom Stage 9 (Mountain Cliff)
- The Last Blade Kaede's stage (Courtyard by the Sea)
- Street Fighter Zero 2 Ryu's stage (Snowy Night)
- Street Fighter Zero 2 Sakura's stage(Sakura’s Home)
- Street Fighter vs Capcom (Continental Forest)
- Street Fighter 3 Alex stage (Back Alley)
- Street Fighter Zero 3 Adon stage (Ancient Ruins)


The usage rights:
You are not allowed to use any of the textures credited in the (a) section of the credits without asking the authorization to their author first, would it be for a free amateur mod or anything else.
You are free to use the textures credited in the (b) section of the credits section in non-commercial mods. You are not allowed to sell them or claim them as your own work.


And the thanks:
I would like to thank every single person that helped me out building this mod, and especially the people credited above for allowing me to use their work. The result doesn't do their art justice, just go see for yourself how good it really looks


All the stages, plus around 10 others, will be available as single Training Stages mods later on (individually or in pack(s), haven't decided yet).


The mod is packed to install in the "patch1a" folder, thus not overwriting any original files. See readme for full details.


The mod comes in two .7z archives:
- ULSM_1.0_p1-doshu.7z for everything except the BGMs (51.4 Mo)
- ULSM_1.0_p2_BGM-doshu.7z for the BGMs (167.6 Mo)"

lonelysquare

Real cool work, Doshu.