2 Body Blows questions: Body Blows: mirror effect, BBG: misplaced row.

[lilalurl]

Not really a problem but I thought this forum was the most suitable for the questions. Perhaps coders heaven would have been a better choice...


As most of you probably know, 2D fighting games use the 'mirror effect'.

For those who would not know it's based on creating the graphics for a character as seen from on side and then applying an effect, such as a mirror would, reproducing the graphics but from the other side. Thus, coders could save half the memory that would be needed if characters were drawn for both sides. However the result can be disturbing when a character is not symmetric. The most famous example of this being Sagat's valid eye and eye patch jumping from right to left when Sagat changes side.

But Body Blows is not like this (that’s what we love with Amiga games, don't we?) and as you can see on the screenshots (watch and sword strap circled in yellow) characters with distinctive left and right sides are drawn so that the items for each side are 'realistically' displayed.

Besides, I know that most arcade system do not use complete sprites. To make myself clear, character sprites are in fact a collection of numerous sprites animated together.


I'd like to know if somebody has more information about that. Did Team 17 really code both sides of each character? Was it done only for asymmetric characters? Were some body parts 'mirrored' while the distinctive left/right parts were drawn for each side?


I have the feeling this system was rejected in Body Blows Galactic. Indeed, Dino, the only character I thought would have distinct sides, apparently doesn't. The green rider always falls behind the dino when they are knocked down, not matter the side.

I haven't checked Body Blows AGA, nor Ultimate Body Blows therefore I don't know if the original characters such as Mike or Ninja were 'mirrored' or not. If somebody was kind enough to check .


Another point of interest is Body Blows Galactic Danny's jacket flag insignia. As you can see on the screenshot the left row of the flag is not lined up with the right row. It seems like its coordinates have been inadvertently incremented by 1. The result is that the red top line is out of the flag. If you check the other flag the second strip from the bottom seems to be made of two joint red strips, which comforts me in the idea of a mistake for the row of the other flag. I know it's not an emulation problem since I clearly remember I had noticed this when I had an A1200.

Anyone got a theory on this? Genuine mistake, not spotted by the Wolves (Team 17 playtesting team)? Processor/language error (something like coordinates (flag) within coordinates (position of the flag on the jacket) within coordinates (Danny's sprite position) resulting in a unexpected increment)? State of the art jacket design? Where in Body Blows Galactic is Carmen Sandiego (I'm sure she is the red top strip) crossover?

Any suggestion welcome.