Riot City Remake Beta v3.0

Hello everyone! I've been lurking on both this forum and the old one back on bombergames.net for several years now, learning how to use SORMaker and playing the unique mods made for SoRR. And so, I thought it was finally time I join the community. Anyways, this is a mod I've been working on for a few months now (ripping the sprites, making the levels, procrastination, etc.):



Comparison screenshots:







(Not much, I know haha)



Some footage:



It's short though, only 2 stages long. It was gonna be 3 but I didn't want to delay the release any longer. But, I feel that there's just enough for another play or two.


Has around '4.1' 5 stages, so it's kinda pretty lengthy. It's very hard, much like the original game, so you shouldn't be too careless playing through this.

Also, I'm planning on adding elements from the Turbografx-16 port, Riot Zone, into the mod later on.

There are a few issues here and there, but they'll be ironed out (if I have time).

Here is the link for download:

Code:

http://www.mediafire.com/file/8p9vvxgfn6k3tqv/VG%2796_-%3D-_Riot_City_Remake_Public_Beta_v3.0_-%3D-_VG%2796.zip

Enjoy!

Glad someone did this one, Ironically Riot City is another sega brawler celebrating it's 25th. Although nowhere near as good heh heh, downloading!

Thanks Din, and I've never even noticed that it's been 25 years! So I guess this will be the game's 'present', haha.

Just played through this little gem last night I have to say an impressive amount of effort is being put into this so far. I take it that the two different routes represent Riot City and Riot Zone/Crest of Wolf respectively. The intro scene is well made (and translated?!) This how Riot City should've played LOL.

Thanks, it's fun making a SoR mod. And yes, you're right! I got the enemy names from Crest of Wolf, so all that's left is the enemy palettes and placement from that game for the next release.

And thanks, that intro scene was a pain, hahaha. It's still unfinished though, since you can still see the Japanese characters lingering underneath. Also, I just realized that I forgot to give credit to Eien Ni Hen for translating the intro (1983parrothead posted the translation on the Riot City longplay video on YouTube, in the comments section).

And yes, if WestOne wanted to give Final Fight a run for it's money, they should've put much more effort into it. Like, no weapons to pick up? Even in Crest of Wolf? Come on now, haha.

Edit: Updated it to v1.1, fixed up the credits a little.

So, gave a test to this mod. A video will speak more than words, but still have some points I'd like to suggest.


First of all, fantastic work! I'm so glad you're aiming for a full mod (with fonts, custom items, sounds, etc.) with this one, and I feel honored you used Rushing Beat Remake as your template for it.

It's funny, just the day before yesterday I was watching a run of Riot Zone and then Riot City on YT and was thinking the game itself (the original from SEGA) wasn't half bad technically. Didn't really like the usage of the colors of the stages, but I love the seedy inner city vibe the game has (I have most of their resources, but not all of them).

Technically, your mod is looking great so far. The mod didn't include custom colors/names yet, but I'm pretty sure you'll add them (the video has the Battle for Rio 2 since was the last game I played).

Let's go into specifics.

• Most of the stages in the original games have rats running. You might like to have those (especially in the ones without maps). How to add the rats animation? make a layer of your rat with the length of your scene (or longer) with the frames in each of it, place the rat sprite either 320 pixels ahead (with the animated sprite exactly in the same location). set the layer in auto-left scroll at the speed you want your rat to be running and the speed of the running animation according to the speed of your scroll. I suggest you to put the scroll in infinite so a "new" rat pops ups running later. You can add other rat running either at a faster or slower speed so looks like another animal passing by.
  
• The rain in some scenes I think it would look better with a transparency of 50% rather than the lighting effect. With lighting effect it looks too bright and yellow and looks like a golden shower than anything else (yes, I know that acid rain would justify it, but in lighting looks way too intrusive), with 50% looks like rain more without being intrusive on the sight.
  
• Mind the reflection effect in the rooftops, I'm personally not fond in using reflection effect in areas where pits should be unless a foreground could be placed over the areas where reflection looks out of place.
  
• Scene 1-8... I liked how you changed the boss positioning and added an extra biker route. Now by this extra area, in the background there's a huge gap where there's no buildings at all (I saw the layer, the buildings are way too low over the horizon of the scroller, I suggest you put those buildings a bit higher so they can be visible in that place. I'd recommend you placing those buildings at the same height of the buildings at the boss fight area.
  
• Scene 1-9 was an incredibly creative way to simulate a drop down from a higher place. Unfortunately, the drop cannot be done at a higher speed, but it was VERY creative alright! Loved it!
  
• For the rooftop areas, what I highly recommend you to add depth in the scrolling, separate the background buildings with the bigger ones so it looks with a better roll as you walk. Also, separating the bigger buildings will make you solve the problem I just mentioned in stage 1-8.
  
• Check the game breaker issue I found in the video... I couldn't continue from there anymore. Check your start point.
  
• Add the icons of the original characters in the dialogues from the cutscenes instead.
  

Overall, it's the beginning of a great mod. Keep up the good job.

Don Vecta wrote:So, gave a test to this mod. A video will speak more than words, but still have some points I'd like to suggest.


First of all, fantastic work! I'm so glad you're aiming for a full mod (with fonts, custom items, sounds, etc.) with this one, and I feel honored you used Rushing Beat Remake as your template for it.

It's funny, just the day before yesterday I was watching a run of Riot Zone and then Riot City on YT and was thinking the game itself (the original from SEGA) wasn't half bad technically. Didn't really like the usage of the colors of the stages, but I love the seedy inner city vibe the game has (I have most of their resources, but not all of them).

Technically, your mod is looking great so far. The mod didn't include custom colors/names yet, but I'm pretty sure you'll add them (the video has the Battle for Rio 2 since was the last game I played).

Let's go into specifics.

• Most of the stages in the original games have rats running. You might like to have those (especially in the ones without maps). How to add the rats animation? make a layer of your rat with the length of your scene (or longer) with the frames in each of it, place the rat sprite either 320 pixels ahead (with the animated sprite exactly in the same location). set the layer in auto-left scroll at the speed you want your rat to be running and the speed of the running animation according to the speed of your scroll. I suggest you to put the scroll in infinite so a "new" rat pops ups running later. You can add other rat running either at a faster or slower speed so looks like another animal passing by.
  
• The rain in some scenes I think it would look better with a transparency of 50% rather than the lighting effect. With lighting effect it looks too bright and yellow and looks like a golden shower than anything else (yes, I know that acid rain would justify it, but in lighting looks way too intrusive), with 50% looks like rain more without being intrusive on the sight.
  
• Mind the reflection effect in the rooftops, I'm personally not fond in using reflection effect in areas where pits should be unless a foreground could be placed over the areas where reflection looks out of place.
  
• Scene 1-8... I liked how you changed the boss positioning and added an extra biker route. Now by this extra area, in the background there's a huge gap where there's no buildings at all (I saw the layer, the buildings are way too low over the horizon of the scroller, I suggest you put those buildings a bit higher so they can be visible in that place. I'd recommend you placing those buildings at the same height of the buildings at the boss fight area.
  
• Scene 1-9 was an incredibly creative way to simulate a drop down from a higher place. Unfortunately, the drop cannot be done at a higher speed, but it was VERY creative alright! Loved it!
  
• For the rooftop areas, what I highly recommend you to add depth in the scrolling, separate the background buildings with the bigger ones so it looks with a better roll as you walk. Also, separating the bigger buildings will make you solve the problem I just mentioned in stage 1-8.
  
• Check the game breaker issue I found in the video... I couldn't continue from there anymore. Check your start point.
  
• Add the icons of the original characters in the dialogues from the cutscenes instead.
  

Overall, it's the beginning of a great mod. Keep up the good job.

Thanks Don for the constructive criticism! And no problem, your mods helped me learn to be creative with SoRMaker.

And oh shoot, I actually do have custom palettes (some of them aren't complete) and names, I just forgot to put them in the RAR folder. Whoops.

Fun Fact: I had a butt-load of screen shots which I was going to use to rip the items (already used them for stages), but I must've removed them somehow, so now I'm ripping them again. Glad that my stage rips weren't deleted!

As for the specifics:

[*]Yes, I noticed the mice running throughout the stages in the original game, and I'm planning to include them for the next release. And thank you very much for the advise, saves me the trouble of finding what type of scroll to use, haha.
[*]Golden shower, that made me laugh! I thought of using the transparency of 50%, so I'll use that instead.
[*]As for scene 1-8, I just saw what you mean when I went into SoRMaker, I'll shift them up.
[*]Scene 1-9? Oh shoot, I forgot to remove that, haha! That was supposed to be for only for stage 2, on scene 2-5. That way, the player will experience two cool moments, where the rain/rooftop route in stage 1 will have them deal with the bikers, while stage 2 will have them see that little cinematic sequence. And as for that 'cutscene,' thanks, I wished I could speed up the scrolling, too. I always wanted to include that from the original game in some form or fashion.
[*]I knew it had to be that part! I'll see what I can do. I think it kinda worked okay for 2-player mode, at least. Oh, and for the hidden route (scene 2-10), that part's unfinished. There's hidden 1-ups there (you can see them in SoRMaker), but I was kinda unsure where to put them. I'll try to fix that for the next release.
[*]Yes, the icons will definitely be replaced for version 2.0. I was speculating on including them for the first release, but I wanted to get at least one demo released before I go back to college.

Cool. Glad you're liking my ideas.

Forgot something important.

Any scene that uses ground reflection should be able to pass through gaps found in the floor (Noticed one of the rooftops have this effect on), this looks really bad when you're passing through a narrow bridge or plank and the character's reflection can be still seen though the hole's walls and the void created under the bridge. The only way this effect could work is to put an anti-reflect layer over the areas you need to hide (these at -10), but with the void area is impossible to cover so... I highly suggest you to remove the ground reflection effect in that area.

Did you notice the game breaker at the end of my video?

Yeah, I decide to remove the reflection on the rooftop scene. Before I released v1.0, I did notice that the reflections went over the bottomless pits, but I was unsure on taking the effect off at the time.

And yes, I commented on your game breaker in my last post. I'll try to solve the tricky position issue.

Any update on this amazing mod? I can say I'm really pumped up by it.

Hi Don, yeah it's been a while, haha. Unfortunately, I can't release really anything as of yet, but I will tell you that the "bare-bones" layouts of stage 3 to 5 are finished (well, were finished a long time ago), it's just that I have to iron out the kinks and such. I do also have some little twists and turns planned for it...

Edit: Version 2.0 uploaded!

I have finished Riot City and now started playing Riot Zone recently. If there is a mod created using these sprites it would be awesome. There are also some spirtes on sprite-resource for Riot Zone. Keep up the good work, SoRR is the best. I hope you make many more mods for this game

Change the enemy sprites? this is exciting news...

zakforradio wrote:I have finished Riot City and now started playing Riot Zone recently. If there is a mod created using these sprites it would be awesome. There are also some spirtes on sprite-resource for Riot Zone. Keep up the good work, SoRR is the best. I hope you make many more mods for this game

Thanks, I have a few ideas in store for the next release of Riot City Remake, just taking a break for now. There will probably be a 2.1 revision of the game later on. And yes, I think Mr. Din's making a mod that's replacing the enemy sprites. There might be a tutorial on that one day, hopefully! And if I have time, I'll make more mods, as I do have several ideas, some that will be easier to do than others, haha.

This beta version is more complete than many so-called-finished mods!
This mod is brilliant! I am not found of homage mods, but the customizing here is so strong we feel like playing something really different, well done!

vince wrote:This beta version is more complete than many so-called-finished mods!
This mod is brilliant! I am not found of homage mods, but the customizing here is so strong we feel like playing something really different, well done!

Thanks! I've only played one SoRMod demo before, but that was when V5 first got released. But yeah, once this barrage of college labor is over I'll get back to working this mod.

Please do, this has a ton of promise. Best of luck with your studies.

WillyTheSquid wrote:Please do, this has a ton of promise. Best of luck with your studies.

Thank you!

EDIT AS OF 12/29/2016 : Added revision 3.0!

vince wrote:This beta version is more complete than many so-called-finished mods!
This mod is brilliant! I am not found of homage mods, but the customizing here is so strong we feel like playing something really different, well done!

Hello, its good idea?

Whoa, looks nice! You got Hawk from Riot Zone in there! Version 4 of my mod would've been released already had I understood how to properly modify the character sprites in the fpgs.

Is this mod still on the go? I'm really looking forward to the final version...

Here's a run for the first version of the public beta. I fixed the gamebreaker that kept me stuck the last time I played, so at least I was able to finish it. And I didn't know there was a more advanced version so I'm downloading and might do a run of it later.

So, played the updated demo and so far looks like an almost complete mod (basically it has everything, in my opinion just needs better tweaking regarding item drops and scaling for both 2p and bosses). But the whole mod looks really awesome. Playing path 1, Enjoy!



And here part 2, that ending, lol