Frame break
Modder Ryn (or “WistfulHopes” on Xitter) has beenposting her work so farand a few fans of the genre have been getting excited. You can see a good side-by-side comparison of the game with and without the shader inthis tweet from “MarrowOchi”.
The shader is looking swish, with lots of pop art dithering and deep, thick outlines. “Here there’s contrasting highlights on the brighter tones compared to the shadow tones,” says Ryn, explaining the header image above. You can also see it in action inthis short video of Ryu knocking seven shades of sense out of Spiderman. This art style is popular in the much-respected 2D fighting games by Arc System Works, so it’s no surprise the fighting game community would want to see similar visuals applied to a broadly Marvel-themed fighter.
Case in point: fighting game streamer Maximilian Dood has also pledged support to the mod, saying he hascommissioned the modderto continue work on the project. “We’re in the early stages, with only a couple days of tinkering, but already the results are absolutely incredible,” he said recently.
The same code-wrangler working on this alsoput Sonic into Guilty Gear: Strive, andCloud Strife in Multiversus. Excellent. I don’t know if those previous efforts are publicly available to download or simply fun antics the modder enjoys posting online. Either way, I appreciate it.
Back when cel-shading was first being used in games likeJet Set Radio, the art style was not so universally appreciated. I vaguely remember complaints about The Legend of Zelda: Windwaker as looking childish. It’s nice that we can now enjoy the possibilities afforded by all types of art styles. Maybe someday the plastic look of MvC: Infinite will be fashionable. Thanks to IGN forfirst noticing the mod.
