What is a good tile size?

[Fanifacation]

So for my game ive kinda been stuck on a good size for my tiles. Mosy of my character sprites are 20 by 50. (I know it's large but that's what i'm working with)

Basing off this i thought of maybe going with 20×20 tiles but im still not sure. Any advice helps.

Thanks in advance.

 

[K3fka]

Really hard to give a specific answer here. Traditionally, powers of 2 are used: 8x8, 16x16, 32x32, but those arose from technical limitations and have kind of stuck. There's nothing stopping you from using whatever arbitrary sizes you like because modern hardware can handle a lot more tiles than older stuff.

It really comes down to what you think looks best. Also depends on the resolution(s) you want you game to run at. Don't make things too small and difficult to see, but also don't make things so zoomed in you can't see much of the game world around the character. Using small sizes that get scaled up is also going to give your game a more pixelated look, so if you're going for a retro style, keep that in mind.

 

[SnoutUp]

20x50 is large? Oh, sweet child of summer! Go for 64x64 with your character (leave yourself some wiggle room) and 32x32 might be a good tile size to go with that, but it depends on the game, platform, resolution, will you be upscaling much, how would you like for your game to look fulscreened in extreme resolutions and etc.

For example, my current game has 64x64 ground tiles, with 256x256 backgrounds and 128x128 character sprites.

 

[Fanifacation]

@SnoutUp
Well the 50 by 20 is more or less just the hight and width of that one specific sprite. I also have sprites that are quite taller and a bit thicker while others are smaller yet wider. However the area where the feet are is usually just 8×14.

I definately have varrieying sizes of sprites but of all of them the most average one is 50×20.

 

[Yal]

Power-of-two graphics have some perks since computers still operate better with powers of two, so even if you don't need to use power-of-two sprites and tiles, you can make things like texture page construction more efficient if you stick to them. A lot of people that make stock resources (me included) stick to 16x16 or 32x32, so if you want to be compatible with those in case you find an amazing tileset made by someone else you should also stick to a standard size.

 

[aamatniekss]

If you're doing pixelart and are a beginner, then dont go over 16x16 tile size, as 32x32px is already large, and it will just look worse than smaller tiles and will take much longer to make, if you dont know what youre doing.

 

[Yal]

If you're doing pixelart and are a beginner, then dont go over 16x16 tile size, as 32x32px is already large, and it will just look worse than smaller tiles and will take much longer to make, if you dont know what youre doing.

Good point. With smaller sizes, you work faster AND can leave more details up to the player's imagination instead of having to drawing/animate them yourself. 16x16 graphics require 75% less work than 32x32 because of the size difference alone, and then the "leave it up to imagination" aspects shave off a bit more on top of that.

 

[Fanifacation]

A 16×16 tile would be ideal but would i just scale the size of the tile up if my sprites to big for them?

 

[aamatniekss]

No do-not mix pixel sizes. I doubt your sprite is too big though. Usually a normal size for a 16x16 tileset sprite is 2-3x tile height, so up to 48 px. Maybe you can show us some of your sprites, and we can suggest the best choice for you specifically.

 

[Fanifacation]

This is the most average npc sprite i have. He is 49x19. the reason for that is so when the player walks on an even number tile like 16x16, they don't feel like they are just on a graph as much since they don't line up. i know that a good artist can get around that with normal tiles but I figured i'd help. The reason I said 50x20 before was so you'd be more likely to recommend me a good even number tile size, sorry for lying about that.

 

[aamatniekss]

That is a top-down sprite right? Then I think it doesnt matter that much what tile size you use imo. Can you maybe show a scene of your game?

 

[Fanifacation]

@aamatniekss Um not really. Just kinda started on it actually. Just picture an earthbound like game in terms of perspective but with bigger, more detailed sprites like this.

 

[aamatniekss]

Well, idk, I dont see a reason why you couldn't use smaller tiles, as long as you build your levels keeping in mind how big the char is. You could try like 24x24px tiles as a middlepoint between 16x16 and 32x32px tiles.

 

[Carnivius]

Small tiles are tedious as all heck to create levels with though especially if you got a lot of interconnecting pieces and you're manually placing them down. Even more especially with GM's room editor which won't let you move groups or copy/paste.

 

[Fanifacation]

I dont have a problem with using small tiles like 24x24 or 16x16. Ive used 16×16 before and liked the results so i think i'll give 24×24 a try for now.

If it doesnt work out i'll post again here.

 

[Carnivius]

I dont have a problem with using small tiles like 24x24 or 16x16. Ive used 16×16 before and liked the results so i think i'll give 24×24 a try for now.

If it doesnt work out i'll post again here.

Most of my retro projects use 8x16 (for wide-pixel) and one of them uses 4x8. And it can be VERY fiddly and time consuming but it's required for these particular projects.

Even with larger tiles like 16x16 a room editor with copy/paste groups and such will speed you up considerably. for example in GM's room editor if you made a house out of a bunch of tiles, you have to manually place those tiles again and again and again everytime you want a house and it can take ages. In a good room editor you can just copy and paste the first house (or even be able to turn the house into a 'brush' to draw with) and be done in seconds. GMare (Game Maker Alternative Room Editor) lets you do this and if it wasn't for that program I would likely have given up on GM a long time ago.

 

[daizeemi]

mine i use 64x64 its and when i start the game all tiles becomes blurry why tho?

 

[aamatniekss]

mine i use 64x64 its and when i start the game all tiles becomes blurry why tho?

go into Global Game Settings > Windows > Graphics and uncheck Interpolate colours between pixels

 

[gamedev4life]

depends on what look your going for. 8x8 is more of an 8 bit NES look, 16x16 is more 16 bit SNES like, while 32x32 is more of a PS1 look, and higher than that is imo beyond the realm of pixel art, which of course there is nothing wrong w that

 

[Yal]

8x8 is more of an 8 bit NES look

I beg to differ... that's more of a Gameboy look, the NES could natively display 16x16 sprites. The big difference is that the NES could only have 3 colors (+1 transparency) per sprite, while the SNES essentially could have any number of colors. If you try to just use 3 colors per sprite, they look "8-bit", no matter their size. (Plus some other caveats like building all big shapes from tiles in a grid... the trees in Shovel Knight's village is a good example of this)


So the TLDR is "eschew rounded shapes and only use 3 colors at a time", I suppose