How to make 3D Title Lettering? | Pixel Art Workflow

In this video, I’m searching for a relatively easy way to construct retro-style blocky pixel art lettering, and I cover my workflow for designing the title of a notorious and polarizing classic from the 16-bit era!

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0:00 Intro & Title Perspective
0:58 Canvas Size & First Attempt
1:44 Text Tool
2:19 Changing the Perspective
3:12 Customizing the Letters
4:02 Making it 3D
4:55 Colour
7:04 Finishing Touches
8:25 FINAL ARTWORK
9:09 CRT Time
9:32 VID OVER

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Check out my art here:

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Software used: Adobe Photoshop 2022
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Title sequence theme music by Failpositive:

Background music courtesy of YouTube Audio Library.

[Po-sdjd]

Honestly Metal Abyss was my favourite in the series, like yeah the difficulty was maybe too unforgiving (especially with all those glitches) but man, the atmosphere in that game is just unparalleled

[DEADMALLANGEL]

Metal Abyss might have been a glitchy mess, but that makes it a perfect speedrun game. Hopefully GDQ can showcase it this year!

[Christian-vebs]

Cyber Craze Metal Abyss was a childhood favorite of mine. Thanks for making this. Really brings back memories. They really should make a new game to introduce it to newer generations.

[RainMakeR_Workshop]

Metal Abyss has by FAR the best soundtrack of the series. Every track is a sick. And the final boss track is EPIC.

[ulrickai]

Like I said with my review on Cyber Craze Metal Abyss in gamefaqs years back, the game brought some new mechanics that is quite revolutionary. You actually see many games now use similar mechanics but sadly since it was a pioneer to those mechanics, it has a prototyping feel to it. The story is what brings it down for me personally but since we know the original scenario writer left during this period, it makes sense that the story didn't feel quite the same. The bugs also hurt it but with mods that fix those and clean up some of the janky enemy AI in the 5th stage, going back to it now, I think gameplay wise it holds up decently well. Of course since the game had to be modded, the harsh reviews from all the way back made sense. It's a shame that they didn't learn from what worked in the series and tried but failed to capture what we liked from the previous titles instead of improving upon the groundwork of Metal Abyss. I do think it's worth revisiting now though, in both it's original form to see the interesting mechanics and when it feels to much, go play the modded version that really shows off what the game could have been.


On a different note, great video as always. Making these more elaborate titles have always been difficult for me and mine always ends up looking a little flat but some new ideas are coming up now to improve my previous works. Though do you have a recommendation for getting a similar effect in Aseprite? As much as I could start in Photoshop and just continue to workflow into Aseprite, it be nice to know if I can do the entire process just within Aseprite.

[rmycelot]

It's interesting how much people wanted to make 2d pixel art 3d instead of trying to embrace the medium they had. Pixel artists like Brandon shape the medium and embrace its quirks, while people of the past strived for more and more. It shows that there are two avenues of skill: learning a skill to its fullest and exploration into new mediums.

[seanss]

Cyber Craze Metal Abyss was actually the first "craze" type game so I'm glad its finally getting some love

[JayFolipurba]

I like the whole story that emerges while you're working on it. And I agree, it really needed a subtitle.
It's interesting because I definitely like the aesthetic, wouldn't be subscribed if I didn't, but my workflow would have been completely different.. I would have made the typography in 3D, imported the image in PS as a template to pixel over and indexed the color for an automatic dithering gradient.

[thego-dev]

tbh i'd say Metal Abyss is my personal favourite.
the mechanics are actually really good, and the game's a lot fairer if you _actually_ understand them
the problem's that _the game doesn't know how to teach you_

like, the hook n' slash: _you're supposed to attack _*_while_*_ you're still hooking an enemy, not _*_after_*
'cause then the slow lead-in is basically negated, and you can reliably use the stun the attack gives and not just get punished by even slightly faster enemies

but it just teaches you can hook people in, use the axe to attack, and then tells you to "hook and _then_ slash" or whatever
it never specifies _how damn early you gotta do it_
(ever wonder why mostly speedrunners liked this one? _'cause they figured these things out_ )

i promise, if you don't like Metal Abyss, just search the old forums, you'll find quite a few tips and "cheats" that'll make the game 10x more enjoyable
(man i wish they added this in the remake n' change a lot of the phrasing in tutorials.
i think i even remember the design lead admitting that they weren't that happy with how they explained stuff, but were a bit cut for time and screen space. anyone know where to find those old interviews?)

[Timpers]

love how the crt screen made the dithering blend more! turned out so good :)

[spinnysalmon]

Tbh I Metal abyss was always too difficult for me, but I think it make a lot of great changes to the series (the grappling hook being my favorite). Where the series REALLY started to go down was Cyborg Rampage.

[jembawls]

As others of have said, actually Metal Abyss was my fav too. It had it's issues, but I think that had a lot of charm and helped cement some really precious memories I have of my brother and I playing co-op together. Part of me wants to pick it up again, but idk, I get the feeling that those memories are best left and cherished as they are 😅

[IrisLuminMiel]

Oh man, I remembered my bro played Metal Abyss on SNES version. Heard that the Genesis was quite different in terms of difficulty but the soundtrack was so much better!

Amazing work on the video btw. I always get inspired by your videos even been trying to do pixel art even tho I am morr comfortable with regular digital art

[AB-Prince]

I use piskell, and one of the things I do for gradiant lettering is have a layer with transparent letters on a black background, then draw the gradient separately. and I've always loved using lemon yellow fading to pink, with a sharp jump to blue fading to purple.

[IvanTheTerrible]

you're my hero, and by far my main inspiration for improving my pixel art

[theepurpletoaster]

My friend has played Metal Abyss before, and we talked about it a couple of times. They told me the game was lucky even to come out, going under intense crunch for the summer holiday release. And I think that glitches of your character disappearing or losing all of your missiles randomly just adds to the atmosphere of being a rogue cyborg hunting down other rogue cyborgs. Who's to say (besides most of the reviewers) that your character's implants aren't faulty and thus causing all the glitches?

Great video, I love it when people can talk and make up lore together. Based on what was said about the game, I think it would be a mixture of Blade Runner and Cyberpunk 2077.

[tjzomboy]

I love how Metal Abyss gave us a well needed backstory for the original antagonist! Very much underrated!

[masonprice]

This is a super cool video topic, thanks brandon!

[VC-cxgf]

Metal Abyss had some really good ideas that I think would've freshened up the series if it wasn't for the extreme difficulty and all the bugs that made it almost impossible to finish, but I think if they were to revamp it like they did with the Cyber Craze Classic Collection, fix all the bugs and give it a new coat of paint, it would get the appreciation it deserves. Maybe even bundle it with the final game for the "sequel duology collection" or something. The 5th game actually sucks but I'm sure people would want to play it.

[paranoidpumpkin]

Cyber Craze, truly a game of all times