VGponies

Changes

2012-02-24T10:18:00.001-08:00

Yes, we have changed, we are no longer brawl is magic.. we are now VGponies. Why you ask? because we want to ponify ALL the games! Games like...

Mario Kart
Animal Crossing
Skyrim

Team Fortress 2

Minecraft
and of course.. Brawl!

So stay tuned for future updates!

New Animator and Small Update

2012-02-18T20:28:00.000-08:00

Hi! I'm smellyfeetyouhave and I'm the new animator for the project I used to do pony and TF2 animations in Source Filmmaker before Valve broke the plugins, and I'm happy to be helping out.

My YouTube channel is http://youtube.com/user/smellyfeetyouhave
You can see some of my animations on there, but I never uploaded many of the things I made.

This video below is what got me asked to help.

Read more about it after the break.

I know there's been a lack of info lately, but we're working on it.
Before any animation could be done, eXiggah had to finish fixing up, rigging, and making the model look good. The Rainbow Dash model, which is what I am making the base animations off of, is almost done. eXiggah just got it working properly in the game.

I have started a few animations and they are progressing nicely. Hopefully since now that I'm on the team, and the first model is practically done, things will progress much faster.

We hope to get some more info to you guys soon.

Feedback and Q & A

2012-02-13T15:14:00.000-08:00

Recently i released a small beta for a Tuscon, AZ brony meetup.
They gave me some questions and feedback!

Read about it all after the break.

Jeffry J. writes,
Do the characters have the same abilities as the underlying character? Reason I ask is that the characters chosen seemed to be unpopular with the regular players (I haven't really played the game much since I don't own it, so I have no idea why that would be). They said things like "I can't play Pit", and then would proceed to choose other chars like Mario, Samus, Kirby, Link, etc. If the old character doesn't matter, my suggestion would be to replace their name completely so that players don't have a preconceived notion of how the character plays..
Currently the custom characters have the same abilities because we do not have any custom animations on them. However we do plan on changing this.

Can the character thumbnails on the selection screen graphic be replaced? That way even if the name stayed the same, it would be easy to pick an MLP character.
Yes, but because we only had 2 custom characters we haven't created any new Thumbnails

The first map, Battlefield, crashes the Wii.
Well, that's an improvement from what it used to do! :D

It was hard for me to tell what Rainbow Dash was doing. When I pushed 1 (plain Wii controller, no nunchuk) I was assuming that was a range attack, but she would go up into her posture and I wasn't sure if it was actually working to attack people. I hardly know the game tho, so maybe that's what Pit's attack looked like, and I just suck? Your readme mentioned combos, but I don't think I was doing those. Flying was cool though! Someone showed me how to do that (up twice). I had a blast playing RD, thanks!!!
The reason for this was because she had no custom animations

I never got to try this, but if more than one Spike or RD is chosen, does their color change?
Not yet but we are working on it.

Compared to the in-game characters, RD seemed too big and Spike too small.
This wont be a problem later on when have all the characters replaced. but for now i can see how it is an issue.
(However spike about is the same size as olmar so i don't really see any problems.)

I'd say your biggest impact would be to create MLP-location versions of all the levels.Those seemed to be appreciated more than the characters themselves (yes, weird, I know.. maybe they liked being able to play "their" character, but have it be in the MLP universe?).
Once again, its coming soon.

Livestream

2012-02-10T12:50:00.000-08:00

Stream Disabled

~~Ignoring that "now" part,~~ we're ~~going to be~~ livestreaming ~~as we work, because we're so far behind and all we can show is our fruitless work. We don't have any times set for~~ now, ~~but for now tune in around 7:00 Pacific to see how we've been wasting our time!~~
-Edited like a pro, B1NARY

http://www.livestream.com/xigger

New team member + Equestria Daily

2012-01-28T11:45:00.000-08:00

Hey there, TommoPuppy here! I'm the guy who made the Spike model. Go to my DeviantART or Tumblr pages to see more of my work and more pictures of Spike too.

But that's not what I'm here to talk about, for you see, not long after the previous blog post, we were featured on Equestria Daily! And I'm really super stoked to see something I contributed to being reported on there. So to those who came from Equestria Daily, greetings, and to Seth, thanks for writing about us!

But unfortunately they weren't entirely clear on what we were doing, so most people just thought that we were making model replacements and that's it. Not true! The content in the video is only the tip of the iceberg. In fact, we plan to replace almost everything, or as much as can be edited, and make all 6 ponies as unique characters. Right now we're working on getting Rainbow Dash into the game complete with her own moves, animations and voices, so stay tuned, and feel free to offer suggestions in the comments section too.

-Tommo

Oh look, A video!

2012-01-25T19:03:00.001-08:00

Spike made it in first!

2012-01-21T12:50:00.000-08:00

[download source]

Here's something I whipped up yesterday: This is an early version of a new Spike model made by TommoPuppy, and we managed to get it in Brawl yesterday replacing Olimar's first costume. For those of you who aren't familiar with Brawl mods, or video game mods in general, these mods are just fun little things. This specific Spike mod was more of a request and won't be a part of this giant mod, but you'll probably enjoy this nonetheless.

By the way, the reason you see Spike easily replacing a character and not any ponies is because the animations work best with two-legged characters. Spike uses Olimar's animations well, while ponies using any character's animations turns out a little weird.

Tell us what you think below, and remember to give the modeler some love too!

3D Model in a 2D Fashion

2012-01-15T11:47:00.000-08:00

I had previously discussed the importance of 3D ponies being able to move exactly as they do on the show. Those who are experienced with modeling know that this isn't an easy task, but it is indeed possible: The important key is that the model needs to be separated into multiple parts, just like how they are drawn.

The picture above is an example of this, with the arm being separated from the body. Cartoony characters such as Kirby share this trait, but it's terribly noticeable, isn't it? Worry not, for the models in-game appear as one model, rather than a body and arms. This is only a preview rendered in a low-graphics hacking tool.

And since we're on the subject of the model's appearance, we've decided that the ponies should remain bright, cell-shaded, and with an outline in Brawl, no different from Friendship is Magic. Changing the design to a darker, detailed look is closer to fan-art than what an actual My Little Pony game should be. Our goal is to provide 3D My Little Pony as professionally and as close to the original animation as possible.

Let me know what you think in the comments below!

Bronycon/Flash Game/Actually Brawl Related

2012-01-07T12:50:00.000-08:00

Today is a good day to be a brony: we have bronycon AND a new episode all on the same day! I'm watching the live stream of the event, as many of you may be doing, but in the meantime I've managed to multitask and achieve other things too.

For example, this flash game I made a while ago and never uploaded finally got around to being uploaded. Collect the cupcakes, jump over the haystacks, it's pretty simple.

Now speaking of Brawl, the reason you guys came here, I can only bear news as of now: I've finished all of the program-related aspects, so animation is the last frontier... Before a preview video, anyways. You guys should pressure me into releasing a video sooner.

Derp/Involving the Community

2012-01-01T23:07:00.000-08:00

Apparently, the holiday season is spent with family and friends more than by yourself working on pet projects; funny how these things slip my mind. So not only did I fail to meet my goal of posting each day until Christmas, but I slipped and didn't get to post much at all.

Moving on, here's my topic for today: A video of a short Brawl mod featured on Equestria Daily's Nightly Roundup yesterday, here's a link for those of you who didn't see it. They're only texture hacks over Captain Falcon and Ike, not necessarily jaw-dropping, but what got me most is that this hack (along with several other pony-related Brawl hacks) go largely unnoticed. Shouldn't the Brony-Brawl-Hackers gather together, like many other game modding communities? All I can suggest is the Brawl Vault that I go to and chat with a few bronies, and even get a helping hand every now and then. If you have any suggestions, add a comment below!

EDIT: Broken link fixed!

Progress

2011-12-28T21:51:00.000-08:00

Sup eveypony!

Hope you all had (and still are having) a good holiday break. We've been working though to bring you ponies!

So for, the only thing holding us back is animation. But thanks to eXiggah were running full steam ahead. Onward to 300+ Character animations for each character.

Also, Expect an official roster list soon. As in, Valve time soon.

Mare-y Xmas to everypony across Equestria!

2011-12-24T15:36:00.000-08:00

Play on your Wii, modded or unmodded, or PC!

2011-12-24T14:57:00.000-08:00

It's Christmas time, so I'll be brief: This Brawl mod can be played on modded Nintendo Wiis, softmodded and hardmodded, to some extent unmodded Wiis, and on the PC. I'll go into detail another time, but for now be comfortable knowing that you can use your Wii remotes on your pc!

3DS Max Animation

2011-12-22T17:15:00.000-08:00

Animation is one of the more important factors that determines the quality of this mod, so we've taken the liberty to ensure that animation from a 3DS Max rig (or any 3D modeling program for that matter) will be useable in Brawl. This is a Maxscript animation exporter I programmed for such the occasion: The animation is exported into a simple text file, and translated into Brawl's animation format. The alternative to this exporter is animating one limb at a time, like Garry's Mod: but our favorite ponies deserve the best, right?

Sorry for the late post. And for the no-pony post.

Community Brawl Hacks

2011-12-21T15:10:00.000-08:00

I won't pretend to be the first person to hack Brawl with ponies, or even the first to hack in pony models. The Brawl hacking community is easily the largest hacking community for a console game, and of course there will be plenty of hacks done outside of this team's work. But I'll try my best to advertise the work of others as well as our own: the more the merrier!

Above you see a few samples: a Cloudsdale stage, actually made by B1nary, a Yoshi textured after Vinyl Scratch, and Pikachu in a Wonderbolts costume, all linked to their respective owners. So, expect to see lots of cool Brawl mods on this blog, even if they weren't made by us!

Model Changes

2011-12-20T15:21:00.000-08:00

KPShadowSquirrel's models are good, but they weren't made to animate; actually, these models were made in Zbrush, and without a skeleton to be animated with. So we're changing the model to be more "animation friendly" if not more "show accurate" in terms of how many crazy poses this model can pull off. (And a few extra details here and there wouldn't hurt either)

As for the lighting, we're not sure if we want to go with a brawl-ified, deep-shading look or to keep a cartoony, short of a cell-shaded look. Everyone has different tastes in 3D ponies, so our goal is to strike a delicate balance with the lighting: worry not, for this picture above is much brighter than the final product you'll see in Brawl... most likely. Maybe I'll get to show a well-shaded Brawl model this week!

The gift that keeps on giving!

2011-12-19T14:59:00.000-08:00

I don't remember exactly what I promised last blog post, (and I'm not going to look back and cheat) so the most practical solution is to announce the best solution possible: This blog will have a new update every day until Christmas! It's only half of the 12 days of Christmas, but Daily updates makes it feel like our favorite Equestrian blog! Onwards to the important stuff!

I would like to announce that we have a new member on our team, Tetrapony, helping primarily with 3d modeling and animation. He was previously mentioned on this blog for his face rigs, which you may hopefully see more of in the future. However, we are still looking to expand our team, and you just might see another comrade join our ranks soon.

Come back tomorrow around 3pm Pacific time for another blog update!

Demand for 3D models/Animation Research

2011-12-12T12:28:00.000-08:00

That's a lot of trophies!
I don't know how obvious this is, but just to clear things up: We're going to mod as much of this game as possible. While a small team of 2 isn't big enough to promise a lot, our team will expand as soon as our showcase does. Fortunately the biggest hurdle for this mod, graphics, is within reach: I can make 2D images (B1nary is better) and 3D models (I think I'm better) very well! Yet these satisfactions have an unfortunate truth looming over my head, the fact that there aren't many preexisting 3D models. That leaves me with a lot of 3D modeling to do, and that in itself is a lot of work for Bronydom in itself. While I won't promise good textures, I can promise good models by my next update.

And after extended periods of research into how these ponies limbs properly work, I have come to the unfortunate conclusion that they have no limits. Since pony legs seem to bend and stretch on an as-needed basis, animating these 3d ponies will have to be (almost) completely pose-oriented, based on the show's common movements, rather than creating new stances.

Summary: Ponify ALL the game, I am 3D modeling, and animating... forever animating...

Title/Main Menu Theme Song

2011-12-05T16:07:00.000-08:00

Hello everypony!
Just a preview of the new songs that will be included in the mod.

Quick 2D to 3D Comparison

2011-12-02T00:24:00.000-08:00

Neck animations with the crazy stretch animation? Madness!
It's been too long! The wait between updates has been growing, confound these ponies. The reason for this crime? None other than... 3D transition. While these ponies have found their way into the third dimension in Garry's Mod, MikuMikuDance, and other various game mods, none of them really capture the essence of the Friendship is Magic animation. Super Smash Bros., a game dedicated to representing mixed genres, should settle for nothing less than the genuine show animation!

But that's easier said than done: Above is a basic comparison, in which you can see problems with the transition to 3d. The show animation is drawn differently from every angle, while 3d models remain the same no matter what angle you look at them. Applejack's hat is always behind her ears on the side view, behind the ears from the front, back, and top view. The hair flowing down each ponies neck is usually towards the camera. (Despite that picture of Applejack)

Problems asides from the transition aren't as bad: Every time you cringe when you see one of these 3D ponies bend a limb the wrong way, (I really need to work on that by the way) or notice that Applejack's hair doesn't have those orange streaks, or even the small details like how far each part of the body should or shouldn't move. These problems are addressed much easier.

But this blog post has gotten long enough; Long story short, I've bitten off more than I can swallow. But I'm going to SWALLOW it any way I can, for the Brony community!
Seriously, I really need to get myself to stop bending pony legs backwards.

"Mane 6" Work In Progress

2011-11-22T13:56:00.000-08:00

Click for Full photo!

Here's a Work In Progress picture of our favorite mane characters. There's lots of room for improvement, especially as the Brawl hacks allow for more customization. It's such an early work in progress that I probably shouldn't even be showing these so early... But some of you wanted to see more than just Rainbow Dash, right?

You might be thinking "What about Fluttershy?" I assure you that she's in-game with the rest of the 'mane 6', but her work in progress isn't quite ready to be shown yet, and for that I apologize.

What I learned about friendship is...

2011-11-17T21:58:00.001-08:00

Total productivity levels of our team:

Exiggah:

B1NARY:

As you can guess Exiggah is more productive than i am.

Package for Animators, Message for everypony else

2011-11-17T11:40:00.000-08:00

Here, I have two download links of Rainbow Dash: The first is the Brawl file, which also requires this lightweight program to be opened and animated. The other is an Object file for normal 3d modeling programs.

Since these are for animation purposes only, these models only contains what is necessary, namely the body, open wings, and a few animations I've already created (Only in the first download, sorry!) It's basically a pose-able mannequin for anypony wanting to animate!

Now for the general message: Not everyone wants to wait for Rainbow Dash to wait for their favorite characters. Others want Pinkie Pie, Trixie, Twilight, and every other pony/zebra/griffin/dragon/draconequus! Could you expect another besides Rainbow? Possibly. But what you should be expecting first are facial expressions. Anyone who regularly checks the DeviantArt page for the pony models should be familiar with this.

Capture Card Acquired!

2011-11-16T15:50:00.001-08:00

The above is a Raw non-edited video of the mod. This is mostly a test to see how well my new capture card works. Be sure to leave your comments below!

Equestria Daily and Brawl Animation

2011-11-16T12:03:00.000-08:00

First of all, I want to thank Equestria Daily for being featured in their Nightly Roundup, and everyone who shows support in the comments! I was so excited to see my half-finished work on the blog, that I stayed up all night and learned to animate! And seeing as how I've advertised my looking for animators, I might as well explain how animation in Brawl works:

The picture above shows the BrawlBox program, which is the swiss army knife that makes Brawl hacks possible. The animation system uses only transformation, rotation, and scale to create animations, so keyframes from any modeling program can be used in Brawl. But the downside is that we cannot import the animations; they must either be animated in BrawlBox, or the keyframes from another program have to be copied into Brawlbox by hoof.

I'd also like to talk about the style of the Brawl animations: While the picture above moves slowly, (at least on my computer) Brawl runs at 60 frames per second, so this animation will play two times a second, with 10 frames left over. This animation was made to match the style of the other characters in Brawl, but I can't really explain that; Anyone interested would have to study Brawl's characters to compare.

Lastly, I'd like to tell mention (especially for those unfamiliar with Brawl modding) that there's no need to worry about glitches or game-crashes when animating. Anything that causes bugs is more involved with more program-oriented modding.

This seems good enough for now. For anyone who wants to learn more, I suggest you visit the Brawl Hacking Hub, the Brawl Vault, or email B1nary or myself. And of course, I'll be listening to you, the community, for what you want us to mod into Brawl!

Welcome!

2011-11-16T09:33:00.000-08:00

Hello everypony, i just wanted to let you know we now have a Google Plus Page!
Be sure to share with everypony you know!

First Post

2011-11-13T16:28:00.000-08:00

I know that literally no one is following this blog, but here's a post anyways! Rainbow Dash is looking prett-y good... now begins the animation process. And we welcome everyone who wants to contribute! Since B1nary posted his email link, I'll have to post mine as well. Apply here too!

20% Cooler

2011-10-27T15:00:00.000-07:00

yes....

Also we are need animators to join the team!

Click here to apply

New Website!

2011-10-27T14:56:00.001-07:00

Hello there! Welcome to the home page of the "Super Smash Brothers: Brony Edition" mod! Here we will be update everyone on the progress of the mod!