Hey guys, it’s time for a second Epic Battle Fantasy 5 foe competition!

As you all should know by now, the game released on Steam a couple of months ago, but I’m still working on additional dungeons and secret areas. The first foe competition had artists submitting designs for enemies, and then I would animate them and put them into the game. The Voodoo Dolls, Haunted Mirrors, Fallen, and Bomber Cats were all created this way.

This foe competition is similar, but a little different. This time I’m looking strictly for old-school pixel-art. The final foe animations will look different from the usual EBF style, and because of this, I won’t need to redraw the art you submit, like I did in earlier competitions. Here’s an example of what your submission should look like:
And here’s an example of how I will animate it:
Flash Version / YouTube Version

Requirements

• Art must be submitted in .PNG format, and must include a normal-sized and zoomed-in version, as shown above.

• Art must be your own work, and original. No recolored Sonics!

• Art must include several sprites (animation frames), usually including:
◦ 2 alternating “idle” sprites, that will make the foe look like it’s walking or dancing on the spot.
◦ 1 “hit” sprite, for when the foe takes damage or dies.
◦ 1 or more “attack” poses, used during attack animations.
◦ “Skull” and “bone” particles, for the death animation.
◦ Any projectiles or accessories that may be needed.

• I can add any sprites that are missing, and may edit any that don’t work well. You can write a description of how you think your foe should be animated, if you wish. Animations don’t have to be like the ones shown in my example – I can animate completely different death and attack animations for new foes. So the sprites listed above are flexible guidelines.

• Sprites should be small. Mine are roughly 16×16 pixels, and I recommend staying under 50×50.

• You don’t need outlines for your foes, they will always appear on a black background.

• Your image background should be transparent.

• You don’t need to arrange your sprites in any particular way. It’s nice if you keep things compact, but I’ll be cutting the sprites out anyway. Canvas size doesn’t matter.

• I prefer creatures, not humans. But I won’t rule out humans completely if they’re creative.

• Winners will be chosen for style, creativity and uniqueness! I’ll be aiming to animate a huge diversity  of foes.

Ideas

The goal of this competition is to make retro-themed enemies that will remind players of earlier times. This is not essential, but I encourage you to base your art on that of early games consoles, like the NES, Atari, or SNES, taking into account their color and resolution limitations. You can cheat a little if you wish, or just make up your own pixel art style.

My designs are based on Zelda 1 monster sprites, with the battle background being in the style of Final Fantasy 3. You too should refer to old games that you like.

You should also consider what elements or status effects that your foes might use or be weak against, so that they fit nicely into the EBF battle mechanics. Try to design monster types that have not appeared in the game yet.

You can discuss this competition in the Foe-Competition channel on the EBF Discord.
I encourage people to share work-in-progress and pixel-art advice there.

Submission

Please post your finished art on either:
• Your DeviantArt (I’ll add it to my collections)
• The Newgrounds Art Portal (use the “ebf” tag)
• The Foe-Competition channel on Discord (type “finalArt” in your post so I can search for it)

Make sure it’s public and please send me a link to it. If you post it anywhere else there’s a risk it will get lost. If you can’t do that, you can email your art to me at kupo707 at hotmail.com.

You can submit as many designs as you want.

Prizes

You’ll get to see your art come to life in a popular game series!
You’ll have your name in the credits.
You’ll get 2 free copies of EBF5. (or my other games)

Legal Stuff

By submitting your art you agree that I can use it in Epic Battle Fantasy 5 and in any possible future games, on all platforms, forever (if you win the competition). I will not own your art and you can still use it in whatever way you like. You will not own any part of the EBF games and will not receive any compensation except for the prizes listed above.

Deadline

The Pixel Art Foe Competition will run for a few months. I’m not sure exactly how long, but I’ll end it when it looks like I’ve got enough designs to work with. Winners will be announced on my blogs as I animate each foe.

Good luck and let me know if you have any questions!