After Burner II - aburner2-rondar(20101028)

[rondar]

I found this flyer while I was looking for some After Burner cabinet artwork, and I thought it would make a cool theme.

http://img401.imageshack.us/img401/7933/comingsoonflyersm.png (http://img401.imageshack.us/i/comingsoonflyersm.png/)

So here it is. I still have some cleanup and animation to do, but I wanted to get some feedback before I put any more time into it.

http://img638.imageshack.us/img638/6774/aburner2.jpg (http://img638.imageshack.us/i/aburner2.jpg/)


Why "aburner2" you ask?

First off, it confused the hell out of me that aburner2 was the parent rom for the After Burner games (see Official MAME xml excerpts below).

"<game name="aburner" index="" image="">
<description>After Burner (Japan)</description>
<cloneof>aburner2</cloneof>...
...</game>

<game name="aburner2" index="" image="">
<description>After Burner II</description>
<cloneof></cloneof>...
...</game>"

So after some quick Google-ing, I figured out that After Burner II is the game that most of the world played in the arcades. It was never labeled with the "II" because there wasn't a previous version for us. "Our" game had more stages and a throttle control/afterburner (how ironic that the other version of After Burner didn't have an afterburner). Feel free to Google more about it.

Bottom line - want the game pictured below for your MAME setup? Get aburner2!

http://www.arcade-museum.com/images/118/1181241628106.jpg http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_OCvCBicw6jY/Sr2Oxs1gUxI/AAAAAAAAAEE/3LGf9TglMag/s400/After+Burner.JPG

P.S. If anyone has high-res photos or scans of the cab artwork above, I'd love to use them to make a killer theme.

[Babymaggie]

Way to go rondar!

That's all very confusing lol!

What a lush cleanup on that artwork esp. fixing that plane, nice and vibrant colours and an awesome video border.

[mattedsmith]

Absolutely genius use of the goggles!

Bigger plane (unless you're making it enlarge/zooooom forwards - or fly from beneath the logo some how....)

[rondar]

Absolutely genius use of the goggles!

Bigger plane (unless you're making it enlarge/zooooom forwards - or fly from beneath the logo some how....)

Snagged the goggle idea from one of THK's themes - I think he used a racing helmet. I'll look at the jet's size once I start animating - don't want to cover too much of the title, though.

[mean6]

Dude, that looks sick. Looks like I will be adding that game back to the database!!!

[IrishKrush]

Very nice!

[Shanenashley]

Me wante!

[THK]

Nice theme.

I very much like the way you implemented the vid.

Some minor things though:
-Could you maybe merge the current jet aircraft artwork with the original from the poster. It does feel far too cleaned & lightened/white. It doesn't have the same feel as the original to me, especially in contrast to the pilot artwork, which seems far less retouched.
-Did you use an outer glow or motion blur on the airplane? It looks like its washing out the title logo some. It just bothers me a little bit. If it has a resting animation it would be good as you see that effect moving/changing in respect to the logo, so it is clear that it isn't a wonky logo.
-The drop shadow on the plane seems off with the rest of the theme. Even though the title logo has one as well.

k, way to much typing going on, drop the beer, time for bed....

[Secret80'sMan]

So the original Afterburner had no throttle control or Afterburner button? If so that would explain why my brother was over and he kept asking where that button was and we couldn't figure it out in the limited time we had that day. Nice theme Rondar, thanks for the history lesson too, love it when there is a story to a theme. I wish more of them had this kind of info in the text file with each theme.

[rondar]

Nice theme.

I very much like the way you implemented the vid.

Some minor things though:
-Could you maybe merge the current jet aircraft artwork with the original from the poster. It does feel far too cleaned & lightened/white. It doesn't have the same feel as the original to me, especially in contrast to the pilot artwork, which seems far less retouched.
-Did you use an outer glow or motion blur on the airplane? It looks like its washing out the title logo some. It just bothers me a little bit. If it has a resting animation it would be good as you see that effect moving/changing in respect to the logo, so it is clear that it isn't a wonky logo.
-The drop shadow on the plane seems off with the rest of the theme. Even though the title logo has one as well.

k, way to much typing going on, drop the beer, time for bed....

Yeah, the plane is definitely the area that I want to work on the most (and a cleaner bg). The plane actually came from a different flyer - because the one pictured is missing half of the wing, tail, and part of the nose. I'll see about merging it, though. The plane will move, so the logo won't look blurry in the end product.

Any tips for the motion trail? Judging from your past themes, you seem to have a pretty good handle on those.

[rondar]

Almost done with this one. I scrapped the old plane and started from scratch using the same art source as the helmet. It's a million times better. I also made it a little larger than before. And then I added a blue sky bg with a cloud shelf.

I decided against the motion trail because I thought it might be too messy in front of the title (especially since the plane is larger). I do plan on adding some flames from the thrusters, though.

http://img607.imageshack.us/img607/8131/mythemesnapshot.jpg (http://img607.imageshack.us/i/mythemesnapshot.jpg/)


The animation is coming along nicely. Two jets enter from left and exit at the top, and then the "main" jet swoops in from behind the helmet. The title and video appear as the jet passes the side of the helmet.

(It's running a little slow in HS, so I'll speed it up.)
daV796ca5QI

[manipars]

Excellent work as usual, Beautiful theme, I'm impressed.

Unfortunately when it comes to flash heavy themes, they'll never run at the intended speed when HS is upscaled higher than 1024x768 and will force your CPU down to its knees. Resolutions like >1920x1080 (or higher)will literally run most flash heavy themes in slow-mo even on top-of-the-line systems when compared to the default HS resolution.

I guess it's time for me to invest on a good ol' arcade monitor, even a old quality CRT 4:3 TV would do (If I can find some these days) =)

[EvilDindon]

Top notch.

[Babymaggie]

Wowzers rondar what's going on? The theme quality lately is going through the roof!

I was looking forward to this one and I'm not disappointed!

Fabulous!

[mattedsmith]

Totally in awe....:adore:

[mattedsmith]

......but if you were a proper theme maker you'd make the clouds do a complete 360 around the screen, just like the game :cool:

[rondar]

......but if you were a proper theme maker you'd make the clouds do a complete 360 around the screen, just like the game :cool:

Believe it or not, I actually tried that, but the theme was already chugging along - that and the sky/cloud image would have to be huge to rotate that way. Hey, even F-14's have a ceiling. ;)

Below is a final look (video shows Flash version first, and then an alternate non-Flash version). To make the Flash work more smoothly, I spaced out the small planes in the beginning a bit more. I also started the animation with the helmet sliding in from the right. And, of course, now there's FIRE! :evil:

NOTE: I used the standard quality aburner2 video from emumovies for this theme. It lets the flash work better, and because of the video size and "tinted glass" over it, I didn't notice too much of a difference in quality.

FDA36AfK5fE

I'm off to upload (before anyone else can make any more smart-ass comments) ;)

[rondar]

This theme is available to download.

The existing wheel looks great, but here's a couple of alternate wheels to match the theme:

http://img834.imageshack.us/img834/4655/aburner2wheelalt.png (http://img834.imageshack.us/i/aburner2wheelalt.png/)

[/URL]
[URL=http://img17.imageshack.us/i/aburner2wheel.png/]http://img17.imageshack.us/img17/5586/aburner2wheel.png (http://img301.imageshack.us/i/aburner2wheel.png/)

[donnei1979]

This is FFing sweet!!! thanks dude great work dont foget to add the mp3 i made to this theme :D

[Secret80'sMan]

Crazee!!!!!! Looks amazing Rondar!

[soulspawn]

This theme is... awesomenesss!!!

[rondar]

This is FFing sweet!!! thanks dude great work dont foget to add the mp3 i made to this theme :D

I've got your mp3 on aburner, but after seeing a vid of Secret80'sMan's setup, I had to add "Danger Zone" (from the Top Gun movie) to my theme.

[RetroBorg]

Friggin' awesome!