RPG Maker Map Using DAZ3D Props (Example Included)

LevoMalvo

I recently saw an image online of a game that appears to be using DAZ 3D props and characters to create the maps. I've figured out how to create the character sprites but I'm having a hard time figuring out how that created the maps. I'm really curious about how they were able to create the grass and concrete.

This is the image I'm referring to: 

The Blurst of Times

RPGMaker uses a grid system for the maps, as you're probably aware.
The ground is made up of tiles, and likely they just made some kind of seamless tile/texture for the map painting aspect. It doesn't have to be a render at all, and it most likely wasn't 100% done via Daz.

HTStudios

What is the game? I like how it looks, reminds me of those 90s games where they would use real people as sprites. I think you could accomplish this by setting up your environment, adding a camera, set it up looking straight on and down 30-45 degrees. Then in the camera parameters turn off perspective. Render out and bring into Photoshop for resizing so that scale makes sense for 48x48 tile sets. In Photoshop make it look how you want and once in rpgmaker user the whole graphic as your map.

Ascania

Lust Epidemic on Steam. Not gonna link it here. It violates the DAZ3D TOS and you have to be logged into Steam to see it.

Edit: Also on Itch.

Drip

The Blurst of Times said:

RPGMaker uses a grid system for the maps, as you're probably aware.
The ground is made up of tiles, and likely they just made some kind of seamless tile/texture for the map painting aspect. It doesn't have to be a render at all, and it most likely wasn't 100% done via Daz.

Correct. Though I think the grass is a standard RPG Maker tile, the car was a custom tileset, probably using a render of the car on a transparent background, cut up in 8 seperate tiles (might be 10 tiles, as I'm not sure about the side mirrors). Within RPG Maker, you can then use the tiles on your map (like, for example, tree tiles), on top of the normal background, and set them as un-passable. You can even make your own trees and buildings etc. this way, but it may take some effort to bring them into the right color range and pixel size, and still have them look good.

LevoMalvo

@TheBlurstofTimes and @Drip - Thanks for the replies. I had a feeling that may be the case and I would need to find tiles for the ground that would match the renders of buildings, characters, and objects. I tried rendering my own grounds within DAZ myself but had mild success but notice I could only make the scene so big. I really appreciate the answers.

@Drip - I don't actually know the name of the title, I found the image on Google after searching for RPG Maker Game DAZ3D. The image points to want appears to be an 18+ video game website with the OP asking a similar question. I'm going to try your suggestion to see if I could get a better result, thanks.

 

Uthgard

As far as I know, there are three ways to do this (that can obviously be combined for greater effect):

- Parallax mapping: this is a term that has a very specific meaning among the RPG Maker community, in which it is used to refer to the use of a single image as a map (usually divided in layers so characters can walk behind or below some features of the terrain, such as trees). You will need to render the whole map, in as many passes for layers as you think necessary, use specific plugins, and then use the editor to assign the corresponding events and tile passability, while essentially working on a blank map. It sounds a bit daunting, but it is the method that can give the most spectacular results (any RPG Maker with maps that look like paintings... well, they are paintings, and the game is using this technique).

- Make your own tilesets: render whatever it is you need, either terrain or items, and divide it in a grid to structure it as a tileset. This is a lot of work, but it gives you the advantage of being able to work with your graphic assets in the map editor much in the same way as any commercially available tileset, though with the same drawback of your map feeling unnatural as it necessarily fits in a grid. In fact, PVGames has many tilesets done in this style.

- Yanfly's doodads plugin: this won't allow you to make a whole map, what it will allow you to do is move and place whole images in your map without the need to split them previously and fitting them in the grid, so that flowers, for instance, can be placed in an organic manner. I haven't used it, so I am not familiar with the procedure, and it needs you to be in test mode rather than in the editor to place the doodads. It looks like an interesting workaround to some of the drawbacks inherent to the map editor.

Of course, all of this is useless without the knowledge about how to render things so that they work in the top-down perspective usually used for the engine. I haven't actually tried it yet (it's far easier to linger on the planning stage without actually working) but this thread discusses it and shows promising results.

 

Edit: All the Yanfly plugins I linked used to be free, but I just realized that is no longer the case. I am sure there are free alternatives to most, if not all of them. Good luck!

HTStudios

Great writeup @Uthgard! I just wanted to add that though Yanflys Plugins cost money now, you can get the entire collection for $5 on their Patreon.  That money is being used to pay Archeia's company "Visustella" to update them for RMMZ.

Uthgard

Thanks for pointing that out, I just saw their pricing on itch.io and had a sudden urge to get off my ass and learn Unity. And Visustella's price tag for the ports isn't giving me much incentive to get MZ...

akmerlow

Are people deformed? I still look if RPG Maker can allow use non-chibi characters, and without big constraints on pixel resolution.

Uthgard

That... depends. If you are making your own sprites, they can obviously look however you like and have the resolution you deem best, but the base game works in a 48*48 pixels tiled grid, so you would need a plugin to adapt things if you started using sizes that differed too much. Another thing to take into account is that using rendered sprites with painted tiles does clash a lot, so you would have to work quite a bit to get a consistent style (such as using the previously mentioned methods). In fact, part of my excuse for not having finished my own projects it's that I am not quite satisfied with my current capabilities regarding said topic.

akmerlow

Hm. Btw, i have VX Ace, how outdated is it?

Uthgard

Either not at all or quite a bit, depending on what you want to do with it. VX Ace is two versions behind the latest release, MZ, and one version behind the one which most people are still using, MV. If you want to upgrade, keep an eye on the Humble Bundle Store or Steam, as MV is guaranteed to be on a deep sale quite often (it has been in the past), and has a lot of support that solves many of the engine's native issues. Ace, on the other hand, is much more limited. I am not aware of any solutions to change the tile size, and even changing the screen resolution or getting a mouse to work was a bit of a chore (to use terms that won't get me banned in this forum). As to MZ, I have heard nice things, but not enough to justify buying a brand new engine, least of all when a lot of the usability of the RPG Maker line depends on user support, and that just hasn't had time to catch up to the latest version.

akmerlow

Yeah i think i got vx when on sale.

Thanks for sharing thoughts.

Uthgard

No problem, I fear I have an overabundance of thoughts to share.

HTStudios

akmerlow said:

Hm. Btw, i have VX Ace, how outdated is it?

Many RPGMaker users swear by VX Ace and prefer it to MV and MZ.  All RPGmaker engines make retro-style games best, so it really isn't outdated per se. The biggest difference is the tile size is 32x32 vs 48x48 for the newer editions. Which, if you wanted to use Daz assets, would be an advantage for the newer versions.

Uthgard said:

Thanks for pointing that out, I just saw their pricing on itch.io and had a sudden urge to get off my ass and learn Unity. And Visustella's price tag for the ports isn't giving me much incentive to get MZ...

I think I'm gonna wait quite a long time for MZ... maybe the Visustella plugins will go on sale by then. MV suits me fine and I while MZ has a few QOL advantages, it seems you could make identical games in both engines if you're making your own assets anyways.

LevoMalvo

Uthgard said:

As far as I know, there are three ways to do this (that can obviously be combined for greater effect):

- Parallax mapping: this is a term that has a very specific meaning among the RPG Maker community, in which it is used to refer to the use of a single image as a map (usually divided in layers so characters can walk behind or below some features of the terrain, such as trees). You will need to render the whole map, in as many passes for layers as you think necessary, use specific plugins, and then use the editor to assign the corresponding events and tile passability, while essentially working on a blank map. It sounds a bit daunting, but it is the method that can give the most spectacular results (any RPG Maker with maps that look like paintings... well, they are paintings, and the game is using this technique).

- Make your own tilesets: render whatever it is you need, either terrain or items, and divide it in a grid to structure it as a tileset. This is a lot of work, but it gives you the advantage of being able to work with your graphic assets in the map editor much in the same way as any commercially available tileset, though with the same drawback of your map feeling unnatural as it necessarily fits in a grid. In fact, PVGames has many tilesets done in this style.

- Yanfly's doodads plugin: this won't allow you to make a whole map, what it will allow you to do is move and place whole images in your map without the need to split them previously and fitting them in the grid, so that flowers, for instance, can be placed in an organic manner. I haven't used it, so I am not familiar with the procedure, and it needs you to be in test mode rather than in the editor to place the doodads. It looks like an interesting workaround to some of the drawbacks inherent to the map editor.

Of course, all of this is useless without the knowledge about how to render things so that they work in the top-down perspective usually used for the engine. I haven't actually tried it yet (it's far easier to linger on the planning stage without actually working) but this thread discusses it and shows promising results.

 

Edit: All the Yanfly plugins I linked used to be free, but I just realized that is no longer the case. I am sure there are free alternatives to most, if not all of them. Good luck!

Thanks, Uthgard for the tips. I believe I have the Yanfly Doodad from before it went behind the paywall. I would need to look and see what's the term of use for the plugins if they were downloaded while still free. I had a lot of success making character sprites, buildings, and objects but it's really the terrain that has me stumped me. Would you have any suggestions on have I could render grass or a street tile for the ground layer?

I tried rendering a 48 x 48 square similar to the tiles in RPG Maker MV, but the render just loses all detail and looks horrible. I was thinking I might have to render one large plane and then place it as the ground instead.

Uthgard

Rendering the ground as a single image and setting the rest of the map on top of it is quite likely to give you the best and most straightforward results for what I think you want to achieve (it basically amounts to a partial parallax map, and you could always render different kinds of grass and soil and layer them in photoshop for a more unique and tailor-made map) but if you want to render your own tiles and set them at a higher resolution than the default you can do that by using this method. Also, regarding Yanfly's plugins, he has stated that anything you have you are free to use on your project, even if it is a commercial one. The paywall is not retroactive.

Sorry I can't help more, but it is a topic I haven't been able to solve to my own satisfaction, and I would welcome more discussion on it. For instance, any ideas on what the best camera parameters may be to make a tileset or a map? I am quite useless beyond making semi-pretty pictures, and that's more intuition than technical knowledge.

brownedave2

I've made a number of videos about more advanced applications of art assets with RPG maker.  While I used oil paintings and vector cartoon graphics, the techniques are appliccable to any kind of art.  Daz renders of backgrounds or character animations would certainly work very well.  RPG maker is highly adaptable with many different plugins.  That said, having used it, I would actually recommend not using RPG maker at all.  Rather, an engine like GameMaker would be a better choice which is more versitile while being equally easy to learn, that or unity or unreal which are more difficcult to learn, but obviously more versitile as well.  

If you do still want to give it a try, here are some links. At the very least they might provide some ideas of what is possible in this engine (or any engine really).

https://www.youtube.com/user/Shineyoctopus/videos

 

 

 

LevoMalvo

Uthgard said:

 

 

brownedave2 said:

I've made a number of videos about more advanced applications of art assets with RPG maker.  While I used oil paintings and vector cartoon graphics, the techniques are appliccable to any kind of art.  Daz renders of backgrounds or character animations would certainly work very well.  RPG maker is highly adaptable with many different plugins.  That said, having used it, I would actually recommend not using RPG maker at all.  Rather, an engine like GameMaker would be a better choice which is more versitile while being equally easy to learn, that or unity or unreal which are more difficcult to learn, but obviously more versitile as well.  

If you do still want to give it a try, here are some links. At the very least they might provide some ideas of what is possible in this engine (or any engine really).

https://www.youtube.com/user/Shineyoctopus/videos

 

 

 

Thanks, Dave; I came across your channel about three years ago and remembered the excellent Animated Lighting tutorial you uploaded. I've thought about using GameMaker but was too scared to jump in and learn all over again. However, it's been crossing my mind to do so again because RPG Maker is limited in many ways. I might have to suck it up and find some tutorials on GamerMaker to get started.

Uthgard

brownedave2 said:

I've made a number of videos about more advanced applications of art assets with RPG maker.  While I used oil paintings and vector cartoon graphics, the techniques are appliccable to any kind of art.  Daz renders of backgrounds or character animations would certainly work very well.  RPG maker is highly adaptable with many different plugins.  That said, having used it, I would actually recommend not using RPG maker at all.  Rather, an engine like GameMaker would be a better choice which is more versitile while being equally easy to learn, that or unity or unreal which are more difficcult to learn, but obviously more versitile as well.  

If you do still want to give it a try, here are some links. At the very least they might provide some ideas of what is possible in this engine (or any engine really).

https://www.youtube.com/user/Shineyoctopus/videos

 

 

 

Talk about a blast from the past! I remember your tutorials fondly, they were very useful and showed how much the engine could be pushed beyond the default RTP, though I am coming to the uncomfortable realization that, when trying to do anything beyond using DLCs to make pretty FF clones, I am just trying to fit square pegs in round holes. Heck, not even graphic adventures work seamlessly. So, I think I agree about finally taking the dive with another engine.

BradCarsten

It looks like it's probably hand-drawn textures rather than rendered.

start with a 180x180 image

choose two greens

add cloud filter

add noise

blur noise

resize to 45x45 and tile. You can always darken it a little if the tiles are too noticeable. Edit* looking at the original, there is probably a slight blur added afterwards as well, which I haven't done. 

It looks like the concrete textures have a bit of grass on them as well, with a slight shadow to get them to look like they are spilling slightly onto the path. 

BradCarsten

 

So concrete is the same. Create cloud, add noise, blur noise, then add a bevel. For tiles next to grass, you add a small strip of grass to the end or bottom (I see they curve their ends so that the corner tiles are more natural. I didn't do that, but I'm sure you get the idea)

LevoMalvo

BradCarsten said:

 

So concrete is the same. Create cloud, add noise, blur noise, then add a bevel. For tiles next to grass, you add a small strip of grass to the end or bottom (I see they curve their ends so that the corner tiles are more natural. I didn't do that, but I'm sure you get the idea)

Thanks, BC, I tried this and was able to get some pretty good results, although I will need to ticker with it a bit more to get the rounded corners. Really appreciate the example and details. 

BradCarsten

LevoMalvo said:

BradCarsten said:

 

So concrete is the same. Create cloud, add noise, blur noise, then add a bevel. For tiles next to grass, you add a small strip of grass to the end or bottom (I see they curve their ends so that the corner tiles are more natural. I didn't do that, but I'm sure you get the idea)

Thanks, BC, I tried this and was able to get some pretty good results, although I will need to ticker with it a bit more to get the rounded corners. Really appreciate the example and details. 

Best of luck. Keep us updated, it sounds like an interesting project. 

terminatoray

Ascania said:

Lust Epidemic on Steam. Not gonna link it here. It violates the DAZ3D TOS and you have to be logged into Steam to see it.

Edit: Also on Itch.

 

I'm sorry but it's not that game it's My Summer with Mom & Sis