PIXELS project.

Pencil to Pixel: Storm

Storm's appearance in the Capcom's X-Men: Children of the Atom is based on Jim Lee's iconic design from the all-time best-selling comic, X-Men #1 (volume 2). In fact, Capcom actually repurposed some of Jim Lee's art for the game's intro, and character select screen.

Released midway through it's third season, Capcom's arcade adaption also takes strong inspiration from X-Men: The Animated Series, employing the same voice cast.

Capcom recently released Marvel vs. Capcom Fighting Collection: Arcade Classics, featuring Children of the Atom. Of the many reason this collection is notable are the various design documents included within the game's museum mode.

This gallery is an enthusiast's dream come true, giving us a peak at Capcom's creative process and showcasing some scrapped concepts.

Interestingly, some of these sprite sketches feature Storm with a ponytail. While it's not as iconic as her 90's blowout, Storm could be seen wearing her hair tied back in the comic and it's animated adaption.

Marvel vs. Capcom 2 New Age of Heroes: Recolored Rogue

In their video game adaptations, Capcom's developers based the X-Men's appearance on the then-contemporary designs of the 90's. As such, Rogue looked like this when she first appeared in a Capcom produced fighting game, X-Men vs. Street Fighter.

But for one reason or another, Rogue's sprites from X-Men vs. Street Fighter were recolored for her appearance in Marvel vs. Capcom 2. (Interestingly, it appears that they never originally intended to change her design for MvC2.)

To my knowledge, no one at Capcom has ever stated why this change was made, but I have one theory. When Rogue first joined the X-Men, she wore a costume where the primary colors were green and white/silver. It's also worth noting that all of Rogue's MvC2 sprites and palettes use a smaller amount colors, since her jacket is no longer colored differently from the rest of her attire.

Pencil to Pixel: Elec Man

This concept art for the very first Mega Man game was on display at the Rockman Unite 30th anniversary exhibition in Japan.

These Keiji Inafune sketches on the left were the basis for Elec Man's in-game animations. The picture on the right features unused pixel art sketches for Elec Man's standing sprite.

All of Rugal’s Stages/Black Noah’s appearences in KOF.

From top to bottom:

Electronic Gaming Monthly #33 & #93

Issue #33 (April 1992) of Electronic Gaming Monthly featured the infamous Sheng Long April Fool's Day prank. Sheng Long either uses Ryu or Ken's sprites as a base.

As you can see, Sheng Long's Shoryuken is engulfed in a transparent flame. A similar effect was later used by Capcom for Ken's fierce Shoryuken in Super Street Fighter II∶ The New Challengers. This has become a staple of Ken's in-game persona ever since.

With the release of Street Fighter III∶ New Generation, EGM would bring back the Sheng Long for their 1997's April Fool's Day issue.

Like the SF II prank, this version of Sheng Long uses Ryu or Ken's sprites as a base. The faux Street Fighter's characters sprites and the artwork used for his versus screen bust were crafted by EGM editor Mike Vallas.

Super Donkey was a platformer that was in development for the SNES from 1991 to 1992, parts of which would be used as the basis for Yoshi’s Island. The game was never publicly revealed by Nintendo; its very existence is only known due to internal development data surfacing in 2020.

The main character in Super Donkey’s playable builds, found in Nintendo’s internal archives, is a pilot character who resembles either the main character from the 1981 Sky Skipper arcade, or Stanley the Bugman from the 1983 Donkey Kong 3 arcade, drawn in a Rayman-like “floating limbs” style. Most available material for Super Donkey features variations on this character. However, the development files also include graphics for the main character being Mario himself, suggesting the developers have considered (however briefly) to turn the game into a Mario game.

This compilation shows all available versions of the main character's graphics. Note that these run the gamut from the original pilot, to the pilot with Mario's mustache, to Mario with the pilot's clothes, to just Mario. Note also the unique armor worn by the character in the bottom left.

Comparison of Bowser's sprite as seen in Super Mario Bros. (bottom left) with an early sprite recreated from design documents (bottom right).

Top: a piece of Super Mario Bros. concept art features a variety of early and unused sprites for Mario, alongside a different palette.

Bottom: it is assumed that the bottom two sprites are part of the same animation due to their similarity, though it is unknown what that animation would have been used for. Possibilities include being an early death animation or trying to get the player's attention. This is a mock-up whereby the sprites were recreated from the concept art by finishing the uncolored portions.