This week's challenge is brought to us by weekly challenge winner kakikukeko. Mockup a character selection menu of a game of your own. It can be any kind of game, puzzle game, beat them all, platform or whatever..

Rules:

• You have to show (at least) one character and its name.
• The character select must be a living character -- not a ship or other type of vehicle.
• Size MUST BE 240x160 (can't be vertical) .. you can work half rez if you want (or mix some full rez/ half rez element), but your final picture must be 240*160.
• Up to 64 colors
  

Here are a few examples, from the  simplistic look of sonic or metal slug (sorry gba version ^^) to the hardcore SFA3 ....  don't stick to those, there are so many other kind of menus...  good luck!

The challenge thread will have all the challenge updates. The thread is also a great place to post your WIPs.

It's time to head on over to the forum and vote for the latest pixel art challenge: Earthday Tribute.

VOTE NOW!

The CMYNRGB Challenge pixel art challenge is complete and we have three new champions. This week's challenge awards go to the following pieces:



Thanks so much to all who took the time to vote and participate in the challenge! Check out the CMYNRGB Challenge forum thread for more information.

Korean police officials are investigating a reported theft of video game code taken from Korean-headquartered MMO publisher NCsoft, one of the region's top computer game publishers.

 Following details of Nintendo’s record breaking full year financial results yesterday, company president Satoru Iwata has labeled worldwide shortages of the Wii console as “abnormal” and promised to increase deliveries by May next month.

According to Space.com, we've got a big brother lurking in our horizon (well outside our solar system's horizon anyways).

There might be some downtime for PJ over the next few days here and there, but it shouldn't be anything drastic.  We are in the middle of switching servers right now.

Edit:  OK, server should be all set now... please let me know if you guys run into any further bugs.

Simple rules this week brought to you by weekly challenge winner Lawrence.

• Must be a forest scene, with trees/plants etc. (can be a forest clearing, within the forest itself, above it, etc)
• Only 16 colours allowed

The challenge thread will have all the challenge updates. The thread is also a great place to post your WIPs.

It's time to head on over to the forum and vote for the latest pixel art challenge: CMYNRGB Challenge.

VOTE NOW!

The Game Mockup Tiles pixel art challenge is complete and we have three new champions. This week's challenge awards go to the following pieces:



Thanks so much to all who took the time to vote and participate in the challenge! Check out the Game Mockup Tiles forum thread for more information.

Sega To Bring Chameleon, Streets of Rage To Wii VC

Sega of America has announced the next four games to hit the Nintendo Wii's Virtual Console over the coming weeks, bringing back classics like Shining in the Darkness and cult platformer Kid Chameleon.

Square Enix Confirms PSP Final Fantasy Remakes

Square Enix has officially announced the latest Final Fantasy remake for handheld game consoles, with remastered versions of both the original Final Fantasy and Final Fantasy II scheduled to ship exclusively for the PSP in North America this summer.

Ever work with a really bad palette?  Here is your chance to push your skills to the limit.

Rules:

• Pixel anything you want...  An animal, monster, your mom, a car...
• Animations allowed, but not required.
• Colors: 8 colors, NO transparency is allowed, and you MUST use ALL the colors
  
• Size: EXACTLY 128 by 128

The challenge thread will have all the challenge updates. The thread is also a great place to post your WIPs.

It's time to head on over to the forum and vote for the latest pixel art challenge: Game Mockup Tiles.

VOTE NOW!

The Billie Jean Illumination pixel art challenge is complete and we have three new champions. This week's challenge awards go to the following pieces:



Thanks so much to all who took the time to vote and participate in the challenge! Check out the Billie Jean Illumination forum thread for more information.

Ever wanted to create that one game you've always dreamed about, but are a really bad coder and/or don't want to learn? Then you need Stencyl, the easiest 2D tile-based game creater ever (plus it's free!). It uses point click programming with easy to set up triggers. I like it because now I don't need to keep posting on the GMC for help on my games made with Game Maker. The best part about it (mainly because we are all artists) is that the only part that really requires any skill is your graphics. So far, Stencyl has "kits" for you to make platformers, action, action rpg's, strategy and shooter. More kits will arrive.

home page: http://www.stencyl.com/about/

The following pixel artists produced Pixel Joint's top rated pixel art for March 2007. Many thanks go out to this month's top pixel artists and all the members who took time to rate.

Pixilang is a simple programming language for small graphics/sound applications. Created by Alex Zolotov (NightRadio) and Mik Razuvaev (Goglus) for non-programmers, demosceners and designers. Any pixilang programs keeps in a TXT-files, so you can edit it in your lovely text-editor. Pixilang interpreter works on different operation systems (Windows, Linux, PalmOS) and distributed under GNU GPL license. 

Official website of the project

You can watch some examples here

Gamasutra presents part three in contributor Matt Barton's extensive look at the history of computer role-playing games, this time exploring the years from 1994 to 2004. Part one, covering 1980-1983, and part two, covering 1985-1993, are also available. Link to the article

Make a game mockup of an underground city or place using only 2D tiles. Only background and characters.

• No tile size restriction
• Animation is optional
• No isometric tiles
• No life counters, status bar or other UI elements
• No limit on unique tiles

The challenge thread will have all the challenge updates. The thread is also a great place to post your WIPs.

It's time to head on over to the forum and vote for the latest pixel art challenge: Billie Jean Illumination.

VOTE NOW!

The April Fools Gallery Study pixel art challenge is complete and we have three new champions. This week's challenge awards go to the following pieces:



Thanks so much to all who took the time to vote and participate in the challenge! Check out the April Fools Gallery Study forum thread for more information.

Since joining Pixeljoint on March 26, 2006 Buloght (Ghengis Pixel) has provided us with some of the best eye candy and technically exceptional pixels. A very private and shy person Buloght recently answered some questions about his pixelart, thoughts and even some personal stuff.

This week's challenge is brought to you by tomic. Create a piece featuring character(s) illuminated from below by a light source (as in Michael Jackson's Billie Jean video - pic1 pic2).

Rules:

• Character(s) must be lit from below
• Canvas max size: 320x240
• 32 colors max
  

The challenge thread will have all the challenge updates. The thread is also a great place to post your WIPs.

The Close Encounters pixel art challenge is complete and we have three new champions. This week's challenge awards go to the following pieces:



Thanks so much to all who took the time to vote and participate in the challenge! Check out the Close Encounters forum thread for more information.

It's time to head on over to the forum and vote for the latest pixel art challenge: April Fools Gallery Study.

VOTE NOW!

This week, each of you has a homework assignment.  You're going to go out and start a fight with a total stranger... You're going to start a fight... and you're going to lose.

Rules:

• Pick a fight with a total stranger
• Lose