Thumbnails Repository Facelift

Xunkar · 26 May 2022 13:51

(GameBoy)

EDIT: Removed images in favor of links.

Xunkar · 26 May 2022 13:52

(GameBoy)

Double Dragon 3: The Arcade Game (USA, Europe)

Today I’m add adding two games that were simply missing from the repository, Japanese exclusives. Working with Japanese boxart is made even more difficult by the lack of sources available online, but the results are decent. Getting rid of stickers is a chore…

Dragon Ball Z: Gokuu Hishouden (Japan) || ドラゴンボールZ・悟空飛翔伝

Dragon Ball Z: Gokuu Gekitouden (Japan) || ドラゴンボールZ・悟空激闘伝

EDIT: Removed images in favor of links.

Xunkar · 26 May 2022 13:55

(GameBoy)

DuckTales (USA, Europe)

This one actually used the Australian box art which has quite a different color scheme and had a larger sticker on top. This is more faithful to the original US & European release.

DuckTales 2 (USA)

Beside the desaturated colors this one was already in decent quality, so not much work involved. It should be possible to use the European artwork to get a higher quality result but there’s a lot of redrawing involved due to the different logos, maybe at a later time.

DuckTales 2 (Europe)

Surprisingly the European release has a slightly different art. Specifically the title is placed higher due to the lack of the red Capcom sticker and the artwork shows a bit more to the left. It’s in a higher resolution so it looks sharper but the colors are a little crushed, I tried to fix it but in the end some of this information can’t be recovered.

Final Fantasy Adventure (USA)

A plain background is always easier to deal with. But the one in the repo had the color completely wrong, bright neon green. It was also in a smaller resolution (most of the covers I work with are 256x256 to begin with so the result is pretty much always twice the resolution). Also the cover was actually the boxart of the re-release of the game by Sunsoft. I restored it to the original Square release.

The Final Fantasy Legend (USA)

Restored the original release. I was also able to use a promotional poster to redraw the centerpiece in a higher resolution, I’m quite happy with the result.

Final Fantasy Legend II (USA)

Not a mistake, no idea why they went back to the FFA cover style for this one but anyway. Once again, restored the original background color and the Square release.

Final Fantasy Legend III (USA)

Same thing expect that by then Square had become Squaresoft.

EDIT: Removed images in favor of links.

Xunkar · 3 May 2022 11:18

Seems I can’t edit my posts yet. I wanted to make it clear in the OP what the goal of the thread was and quickly explain my idea of restoration, but I guess that’ll have to wait. To sum it up, if anyone wonders: Yes, most of those covers could be made to look even better by recreating many things through vectors. I have no experience in vector art so I won’t try, but even if I could I probably wouldn’t. You see, I try to steer clear from the “computer generated” look.

I also make sure that every detail is actually faithful to the original. You might see a sticker off-center or some other odd thing that could be fixed. I spend a lot of time on restoration so don’t think I failed to notice, everything is intentional and backed by pictures of the original boxes.

Ganbare Goemon: Sarawareta Ebisumaru (Japan) || がんばれゴエモン・さらわれたエビス丸

Gargoyle’s Quest (USA, Europe)

Gauntlet II (USA, Europe)

Gradius: The Interstellar Assault (USA)

Gremlins 2: The New Batch (World)

Harvest Moon GB (USA)

hunterk · 3 May 2022 13:24

The board is weird about editing. Regular users lose the ability to edit older posts pretty quickly, so you might have fallen into a doughnut hole in the permissions.

If you want to PM your text, I’ll add it to the OP.

Xunkar · 10 May 2022 16:48

Heracles no Eikou: Ugokidashita Kamigami (Japan) || ヘラクレスの栄光・動き出した神々

James Bond 007 (USA, Europe)

Kid Dracula (USA, Europe)

Kid Icarus: Of Myths and Monsters (USA, Europe)

Killer Instinct (USA, Europe)

Old-Hutter · 10 May 2022 17:03

Sorry for my bad English.

1 - Your initiative is commendable, congratulations. Please don’t stop. 2 - I imagine that posting all images will make the topic giant and difficult to handle. Could I suggest that all images are placed in a single file, and that it was updating them as it allows you?

Thank you very much.

Xunkar · 10 May 2022 17:30

Thank you. I had my doubts about the format too at first, but this seems alright with board’s admins. I imagine all those pictures are not a massive load for clients because only the last couple of posts are loaded when someone visits the topic, and everything in between is fetched on demand.

However I suppose I can post the link instead of the picture to reduce the bloating. Shouldn’t be a big problem.

Xunkar · 15 May 2022 11:00

New batch of 6

Kirby’s Block Ball (USA, Europe)

Kirby’s Dream Land (USA, Europe)

Kirby’s Dream Land 2 (USA, Europe)

Kirby’s Pinball Land (USA, Europe)

Kirby’s Star Stacker (USA, Europe)

Krusty’s Fun House (USA, Europe)

Xunkar · 23 May 2022 21:47

And 6 new Game Boy games

The Legend of Zelda: Link’s Awakening (USA, Europe)

Makaimura Gaiden: The Demon Darkness (Japan) || 魔界村外伝・THE DEMON DARKNESS

Mario’s Picross (USA, Europe)

Mega Man: Dr. Wily’s Revenge (USA)

Mega Man II (USA)

Mega Man III (USA)

Xunkar · 27 May 2022 12:10

(GameBoy)

Mega Man IV (USA)

Mega Man V (USA, Europe)

Megami Tensei Gaiden: Last Bible (Japan) || 女神転生外伝・ラストバイブル

Megami Tensei Gaiden: Last Bible II (Japan) || 女神転生外伝・ラストバイブル II

Metroid II: Return of Samus (World)

The previous art for Metroid might’ve looked OK, but besides the heavily saturated colors a few details were different. I suppose it’s the European cover but I couldn’t find any evidence that this exact cover was ever used, so I based my work off of the US release.

Mystical Ninja Starring Goemon (USA)

Xunkar · 28 May 2022 18:32

Today I come seeking your input. I wanted to work on the cover for the GameBoy game “Mickey Mouse: Magic Wands” but I’m faced with a little conundrum. This game has the same ROM for the US and European versions, but it was released under a different name in both regions: in Europe it is called “Mickey Mouse V: Magic Wands.”

Until now when a game had a different box art per region but the ROM was multi-regional, I simply decided to use the cleanest art. Not in terms of scan quality but rather how much of the art is actually showing. For example, European release usually have less stickers than US ones due to the lack of ESRB rating. So when both arts are the same I favor the European one.

However in this case, the game has a different title, which is not a minor detail, and I don’t know which one should be used. The other problem is that the game was apparently only ever released in the US as part of the Player’s Choice program, featuring a unique bronze border and a large sticker… All in all a less appealing edition in my opinion. I believe the best solution to this would be to “de-specialize” the US version. In other words to use the European box art, but minus the mention of the “V” in the title.

Nothing impossible here, but it’s a matter of conventions and expectations. It’s important to note that, unless new evidence comes to light, such a cover would be a pure invention: it never existed in the form described above. In that particular case, could it be interesting to actually have a (USA) and a (Europe) box art for the game? Naturally the game would still be recognized by RA as (USA, Europe) when scanned, but the end-user could rename the game to pick the version of the thumbnail they want. It would mean either having a box art for (USA, Europe) too, defaulting to… whatever, US release I guess; or getting rid of it to force users to rename their library entery to select the correct edition.

What do you guys of this?

hunterk · 29 May 2022 00:26

hmm, that’s a tough call. I think you can’t really go wrong with the objective, purist approach, so I would probably make that the default, but having an idealized one is cool, IMO.

Xunkar · 29 May 2022 10:30

But even doing things exactly by the book, I end up having to decide between US and Europe art for the game. A different art can be OK I think, but the name of the game isn’t going to be correct no matter what choice is made and that’s a whole different story. And unfortunately RetroArch does not handle such a case.

Perhaps a great solution would be to implement a region preference setting in RA. Something like… “Use thumbnails matching this region first in case of ambiguity.” Then we could have both a (USA) and a (Europe) box art. In case of a match failure, RA would need to try to select the art according to the setting. So, first try to download the art for “Mickey Mouse (USA, Europe)” and seeing that no thumbnail exists for it, try “Mickey Mouse (‘Preferred Region Setting’)” if you see what I mean. This could solve all issues regarding editions and user expectations.

hunterk · 29 May 2022 12:04

Yeah, no perfect solution. I think in these purely judgment-call cases, just go with whatever looks the best. If the USA release is covered in junk and the EU release is the same game, it’s reasonable to go with the EU cover.

Xunkar · 2 June 2022 13:38

(GameBoy)

Mickey Mouse: Magic Wands! (USA, Europe)

Like discussed earlier, I went with a mix of european and american box art to completely recreate a de-specialized, more neutral art for the game. It’s not a perfect solution, but a perfect solution is currently impossible considering how RetroArch works. However I’m quite happy with the result.

Picross 2 (Japan) || ピクロス２

Pocket Monsters Midori (Japan) || ポケットモンスター・緑

Pokémon: Blue Version (USA, Europe)

Pokémon: Version Bleue (France)

Pokémon: Red Version (USA, Europe)

Pokémon: Version Rouge (France)

Not super happy with this one. Considering the popularity of the game I’m surprised by the absolute lack of good scans. Might be able to revisit this in the future, but this is the best I can do right now with what’s available.