dylestorm

I Love The Hori Split Pad Pro

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I personally never had any issues playing the Nintendo Switch for long periods of time (thanks to my relatively small hands). However I do have issues with the analog drift on my Joycons. My launch day Switch was relatively problem free until Super Smash Bros Ultimate came out. Not long after playing the game, my left Joycon started to drift. Thankfully I was able to fix the issue cheaply by ordering some replacement parts on AliExpress.

Considering that I mostly play my Switch in handheld mode, having to replace the analog sticks every so often isn’t a long term solution. I went online to search for a suitable replacement and came across the Hori Split Pad Pro.

When it comes to build quality, I personally feel that Hori products are fantastic and the Split Pad Pro is no exception. The full sized analog sticks are solid and feels great, had no issues pulling off special moves in Street Fighter with the d-pad and the buttons are responsive. The overall design of the product makes it really comfortable to hold, further reducing hand strain when gaming for long hours. You can also assign turbo / auto fire to buttons and there are also 2 extra mappable trigger buttons at the back.

The Hori Split Pad Pro is not without its caveats however. They lack wireless capability (meaning they have to be attached to the Switch in order to work), no gyro sensors and also no rumble. The Split Pad Pro adds a bit of extra weight and the larger size also makes the Switch less portable, in the sense that it will not fit into most ‘made-for-Switch’ pouches.

To sum things up

Pros

  • Good build quality
  • Great analog sticks, dpad and buttons
  • Comfortable to hold
  • Able to assign turbo  / auto-fire to buttons. Additional 2 mappable trigger buttons
  • Able to fit into the Switch dock without having to remove them.

Cons

  • Lack wireless capability
  • No gyro sensors
  • No Rumble
  • Add a bit of extra weight
  • Larger body means less portability.

Overall, I love the Hori Split Pad Pro and it has been my daily driver ever since I got it. If you are interested in getting your own Hori Split Pad Pro, Play-Asia has quite a number of selections, including the really awesome Pikachu Cool edition. (Affiliate links)

Pixel Art Asset Updates

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Recently, two of my pixel art packs have gotten significant updates. Starting off with Pixel Sidescroller Spaceships, I’ve added 7 brand new ships designs with up and down animations, along with a few new projectile designs. Making the up / down animations was harder than I expected as I had to redraw the ships in different perspectives but the process itself was fun and I learned a lot. Will most likely tweak them a bit more in the near future.

The next is the Simple Pixel Food Icons pack. Originally the pack contains only has 100 (16 * 16 pixels) food designs. I’ve added another 100 similar designs but this time in 32 * 32 pixels, redrawn from the ground up.

 

Pixel Art – Girl Listening To Music in Night City

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It took me about 3 days to complete this artwork. I present to you a portrait of a girl listening to music with the night city in the background. I originally wanted to design the city with a more futuristic, steam punk like style but decided to go with simple buildings with neon light banners.

While I have been doing Pixel Art for about 2 years, most of my designs are relatively simple ones such as space ships or food icons. I decided it was about time I tried doing something larger than 48 by 48 pixel and this was the end result.

This design has also been uploaded to my Redbubble shop if you are interested in grabbing a t-shirt, mug or sticker.

Tutorial Part 1 : Making A Simple Pixel Art Ship

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Greetings and welcome to my very first tutorial – Making A Simple Pixel Art Ship. Hope this tutorial will help kickstart your very first pixel art sprite. I do plan to expand these tutorials in the near future so do check back often. You can also check out my sprite packs over at Itch.io or GameDevMarket.

Additional Info

1. Project files for this tutorial are available on my Itch.io page.

2. The software I use in this tutorial is called Aseprite (not sponsored). It’s been my go to software to make pixel arts for almost 3 years. It’s available on Windows, Mac and Linux. If you are on iOS, I recommend using Pixaki. (not sponsored). I used Pixaki a lot before moving to Aseprite after I bought a drawing tablet for my PC.

3. The canvas size is 32 by 32 pixels.

4. You can easily select the lighter or darker version of your base color by clicking either the foreground or background, selecting HSV (2nd tab) and drag the V slider (3rd one). Please refer to the two pictures below.