nintendoprecure

[nintendoprecure]

Happy Birthday to Masako Gushiken!

“Don’t bother, I already know. Today is my birthday. That won’t stop me from my studies and training, so I kindly ask of you to leave me be and we can both go our separate ways. … why are you still here? Ugh, my birthday wish? Do you think I’m a child? … … … you aren’t going to leave until I say? … You are annoying. My wish is to surpass my own self. If I don’t, I am nothi— Now leave, I got to get back to stretching.”

[nintendoprecure]

Happy Birthday to Sonar Sokudo!

“Here to wish me a happy birthday? You didn’t have to! I already have SO many adoring fans all saying the same thing to me, it’s SO hard to be the popular kid, heh… but seriously, thanks. I’m going to have a huge party later, you can pop over if you want! All my friends are gonna be there and yes they’ll be food— Oh? My birthday wish? Doesn’t that defeat the whole purpose if I tell YOU it??… … …you aren’t going to leave until I spill, huh? Fine, fine. I’ll tell you. But if you tell this to anybody I WILL make sure you regret it!… I wish I can continue to be with my friends forever. Okay that’s it, I refuse to get all sappy. Go scram now, I’ll see you at the party!”

[nintendoprecure]

Happy Birthday to Hotaru Yume!

“Today is my birthday. I’m very happy, maybe this year I’ll grow a bit taller… yes, I *am* happy, even if I don’t look like it. Emotions… I can feel them, I can empathize with others, but I cannot show them. My face remains unchanged and my voice remains flat. I wish I could smile… would it be cute? Would it make others smile along? Would it aspire laughter?… I may think about it a bit too often. Perhaps that is my wish then. I wish to smile with everyone else.”

[Hotaru’s birthday was on 4/27. Due to Peach returning from hiatus, it is being posted today]

[nintendoprecure]

Happy Birthday to Emiko Sestuko!

“My birthday is today. Have you come to send your regards to me?… Thank you, I appreciate it a lot. Being away from home, especially today, has me a bit saddened. I do miss my parents and my brother, we’d usually… uh… eh… how do you say that word in English again?… My apologies! I’m still learning the language as I go in school… ah, right- it’s celebrate! We’d usually celebrate together as a family. You want my birthday wish?… well, I guess I’d like to see my family again, maybe they can come over for a vacation here! There’s plenty of places that Sayaka, Larissa and Natalie have shown me and I’d love to share it all with them. Perhaps that is a bit selfless as a wish due to feeling a bit homesick, but I have plenty more birthdays in the future to look forward to.”

[nintendoprecure]

Behind the Scenes of Project: SFA - Magical Girl

Hello everyone!! Welcome to the behind the scenes post for the latest Project: SFA batch, “Magical Girl”. I wanted to go back and show some concepts, pages cut from the final version, inspirations and my thoughts on trying to adapt characters from my other project into Project: SFA!

Larissa & Maria- Adapting characters from a written format into comic format

To start this off, I feel I must start with this topic, since everything is built around adapting Larissa to this format.

Nintendo Precure! (will be shorted to NP), the main project Larissa comes from, is written in an episodic format with occasional art going along with the text. For the most part, both Larissa and Maria are only shown in well… words. For a comic where there’s no descriptions but rather the artwork you see on the pages, I had to think about how to SHOW their dynamic.

In NP, Maria for the majority of the time is simply just a voice in Larissa’s head that only she can hear. After transformation is only when she’s physically interacting with everyone else. For a comic, having just a voice speaking to Larissa wouldn’t really work in a compelling way. Sure, it could work, but would it be engaging?? So with that in mind, I made Maria appear as a ghostly spirit that looms behind Larissa as she goes about her time in the Mushroom Kingdom. Overall, I think this is a great way to show more of Maria to the audience and ties very well in with NP’s overall involvement with one’s spirits (which is inspired off of Smash Ultimate’s spirit system. I won’t be getting into that here since it isn’t important for SFA.)

Another thing important was Larissa’s expressions. I tried to make her as emotive as possible, but in the end I guess it just ended up looking like she was about to explode from anxiety for most of the time ahahaha (she’s has so many shocked/scared faces😭). For the most part, it’s really nice to actually get to draw out her faces instead of just describing them in written form.

Concepts- warmup sketches, ditched ideas

Before starting on drawing the comic, I would often do warmup sketches to get myself into the grove. Usually it would just be the characters, but sometimes I’d use this time to explore ideas I had for how I could take the comic’s story before drawing the actual comic pages.

Simple sketch warmup on Larissa and Maria, exploring their dynamic of the girl who had made a deal to take upon a responsibility that is much bigger than herself. The caged motif with Larissa is very important to her relationship with Maria. For the comic, I decided to use the paneling to reflect the cage instead, seeing it as a good opportunity to play around with paneling.

These were sketches for a ditched transformation route— where as both Larissa and Maria danced, Larissa’s form would slowly turn into her form’s version of Cure Jump. This sequence was inspired off of Infinity Nikki’s opening, where Nikki dances with one of the miracle outfits. As that happens, her form slowly changes into said outfit as the scene plays out.

In the end, I decided to not go with these sequence of events for two reasons.

1) You NEVER see Larissa transform into Cure Jump herself.

This is something that is a rule to me. NP’s whole story revolves around the fact that well… Larissa isn’t supposed to be in these events. As stated in the comic, Larissa was never meant to be Cure Jump, and she isn’t. She’s just a vessel for the fragmented piece of Maria who is now stuck inside of her. So having Larissa transform wouldn’t be accurate when she physically can’t. Only Maria can, hence why you always see her take over Larissa’s body before transformation. (Blue eyes JUMPSCARE)

2) This would have taken up A LOT of pages!!!

Essentially, if I did this whole sequence in actual comic format after the warm up sketches… it would have taken up a lot of pages. And frankly, I was afraid of this ruining the pacing of the scene if I had this drag out for too long. Also my iPad. My poor iPad. She hates me already. (If you guys didn’t know, my iPad… I really shouldn’t be using it for anything right now.) So in the end, I decided to cut this idea from the final product. The idea was fun to play around with, but in the end I think what I ended up with was much better in terms of pacing and showing off Larissa and Maria’s dynamic. (The cage strikes again!… it’ll be showing up quite a bit in Larissa’s story…)

This batch introduces Merlon, a wizard that many are familiar with from Paper Mario, though SFA’s Merlon is… a bit different. Their intro is already up on my account, but here’s the concept sketch page for them.

Ditched Pages- The Real World

Like any comic draft, there are pages that didn’t make it to the final draft, being cut completely. These pages I cut were actually set where Larissa is from, the real world. One of them featured Larissa on the bus heading home from school, and another one of her returning home to be greeted with Pixelena, her team’s crazy mascot.

I had these pages drafted because I was honestly struggling on how to start this batch. During this stage, I wanted to emulate how the artwork is done for NP’s story. There’s no creative comic paneling to emulate NP’s “anime screenshots”, including dialogue being at the bottom, just like subtitles (font and everything). Below are some of the artwork from NP to try to show what I mean by this.

I did this to differentiate the two settings, if that makes sense. With the format like this, readers would be able to see how we’re currently not in the Mario universe and elsewhere due to these format changes. I do the same as well when I want to flashback to scenes in SPM, using the same speech bubbles and font as the game!

Eventually I came to the conclusion that I didn’t want to show the real world and cut these pages from the final product. Shockingly (well, to me anyways) I’ve had people ask me about wanting to see more into Larissa’s life, which is something that I will confess I wasn’t planning on showing much of in SFA. I love Larissa, she’s my baby, but SFA is well… NOT her story. She’s in it, yes, and there are going to be moments that are important to her character (same with Maria as well) but this is not her time to be miss main character. That’s what NP is for. I do appreciate how lots of you seem to care about her and want to learn more about her, it does makes me very happy,,, I will continue to try my best to find a balance that works well to share more tidbits about Larissa & Maria for SFA only readers to enjoy without having to dive into NP to learn everything about them.

Though just because I cut the real world from this batch, it doesn’t mean in the future I won’t include scenes from the real world. It honestly just depends on when it’ll fit without throwing off the flow, if that makes sense.

Inspirations- The essence of a magical girl

Since Cure Jump is still at her core, a magical girl that so happens to be Mario themed, I turned to the Kamikita Twins’ work on the Precure mangas to channel that same type of energy into her when she appeared transformed especially for the transformation page.

I heavily took inspiration from specially the Fresh Precure manga adaptation (to the shock of absolutely nobody that knows me, Fresh is my favorite Precure season and forever will be) for the formatting on Jump’s transformation page. I didn’t want to drag out the transformation, mainly because the joy of magical girl transformations are seeing it in action but well— I can’t really animate!… so we go with the next best thing. Of course, this isn’t a manga, so I adjusted the formatting to fit a comic better, along with color. I’m honestly really happy with the final result, it makes me so happy seeing the page come together so beautifully…

The cover image is also a reference to another piece of precure artwork from the Kamikita Twins of Cure Lovely and Cure Unlovely. I’ve always wanted to draw Larissa and Maria in these poses, and I figured that the cover image for this batch would be a perfect time to do so!

I’ve realized that when I use references, the proportions end up looking almost exactly like the reference and I need to get better at flat out not replicating the whole thing… you can always tell when I draw something with vs without a reference💀 There’s always room for improvement…

Ending thoughts

For what it’s worth, this comic batch I started to work on October 21st and finished on December 16th… a total of 57 days… and even then afterwards, I was making quick edits because I realized I had mistakes (thank you to everyone that pointed them out to me😭). I don’t know when the next batch will be out, because once again, my iPad is acting up on me and won’t charge. I really do want to continue making digital art, but I have to remember to be cautious with what I have before I ruin it beyond repair and can’t do ANYTHING at all. I would actually cry.

As both NP and SFA has been around with me for a long time, seeing the two together after so long makes me pretty emotional. I think younger me would be so happy to see that one day I did actually finally put the two together like she’d hoped. Not in the format she originally thought, but alas still together. SFA I feel does give off the vibes of a project that perhaps someone younger would have wanted, and I take no offense to that now. It’s honestly what I’m going for, to capture that feeling is genuinely a compliment to me.

Next comic batch, I really want to focus on either Flame or Aqua, since both are main characters which I haven’t really explored much. This is due to the fact that I will have to put a lot of effort into their kingdoms’ world building instead of using an already existing one that everyone is familiar with for Sweetheart. I love them too and they deserve love as well!!

Thank you for reading until the end!! Until next time, stay peachie!

[nintendoprecure]

Character introduction: Maria/Cure Jump

~Basic info~

Name: Maria

Alter Ego: Cure Jump

Age: ?

Birthday: ?

Hair color: Brown w/ red ombré

Eye color: Blue

Maria is the fragmented part of Maria Oscuro’s spirit and is the true identity behind Cure Jump. She is a side character in Project: SFA.

Maria is strong willed, brave, leader-like and an ‘overall joy to be around.’ As Cure Jump, she fights with the power of fire, along with a few other new tricks up her sleeve that she learns from Mario as they protect the kingdom at times. Though… there seems to be something behind those blue eyes of hers.

When separated from her team and from her leader role, she appears to be more impulsive than usual. In terms of empathy, she seems to be lacking a bit when it isn’t towards anyone that isn’t on her side. She also seems to always resort to physical attacks, a force to be reckoned with. Her powerful fists with crimson flames burn bright, ever growing… ever spreading… Being fragmented from her true self has left the key components that make her ‘whole’ missing.

For more information on Cure Jump, such as voice claims, please visit @nintendoprecure

~Outfits/Appearances~

Jump has two main looks that she uses. Her first appearance, the one Larissa sees in her mind is actually a reflection of what Jump is supposed to look like. Her hair is swept to the opposite side of Larissa’s, her ponytail following the same direction. She sports Mario’s signature cap, gloves and overalls but with tall brown boots and a loose belt around her waist. Her striking yellow cape ties the iconic look together that reminds Larissa of Super Mario World. Though, even though she is supposed to look exactly like Maria Oscuro, the girl who was supposed to become Cure Jump, for some reason… she’s missing her freckles, giving an uncanny, too perfect look to her face.

Her other look, the one that everyone knows is influenced by Larissa’s body. Features are changed to be more cutesy, her hair being more wavy, swept to Larissa’s direction. The iconic Mario cap is replaced with a mushroom clip, and her sideburns are longer and more flowy. Her overalls are more of a layered overall dress, her sleeves long and drooping with the gloves and cape lost. Pink gets added as another accent color to solidify Larissa’s influence.

Jump’s outfit colors change depending on if she has a power up or not, just like Mario.

~Power and abilities~

Cure Jump is a balanced physical fighter, packing good punches and kicks when in battle. She also wields the ability to summon fire for her special attack, “Jumping Fire.” Her jump is also significantly higher than her fellow teammates (which for SFA, aren’t important). At this point in time, she has started to gain upgraded attack power-ups by using “amiibos”. By scanning one, she can summon a copy of a fellow companion to preform their final smash. If they’re around, the power will simply be transferred to them to preform the final smash instead.

In the Mario universe, Jump can also use the various power-ups just like Mario. The only downside is that they only work for a short amount of time for Jump. (Like how the fire and ice flower power-ups work in Mario Galaxy).

~Relationships~

Larissa: “As my vessel, Larissa is… not ideal. She is a coward, fragile like a flower… but she has potential if she puts in the effort. I’ll make it work, that’s why I’m here. As a Precure, it’s my duty to complete my mission, and I will do anything to see it through… no matter what blocks my way, I will rise to the top…”

Mario: “As my teacher, Mario is exactly what you expect. I don’t have much to add, I do what he says, even if I don’t agree at first. Our upbringings are different, so of course at first we’d not agree immediately to certain solutions. Luckily, I’m flexible… not as much as I should be, but I am flexible. He’s a good man, just wants the best for his family and friends, and I can respect that.”

Peach: “The Princess has been awfully busy lately, preparing for her coronation and all. From when I do speak with her, she is very kind and caring, exactly what this kingdom needs. Larissa is more crazy about her than me, so I apologize for the lack of words.”

Sweetheart: “The young Princess… she is very innocent for her age. She seems to have this… unwavering adoration towards anyone. It’s cute… but I fear it may bring her trouble if the wrong person comes along.”

Luigi: “… Luigi reminds me of Larissa.”

Flame: “Flame… for being a fellow fire user like me… he couldn’t be so behind. That scepter of his honestly limits his ability to do more, along with how he constantly panics over everything. Urg, just like Larissa… it’s okay, it’s honestly entertaining to see him arguing with Aqua.”

Aqua: “Aqua is just as good as they say, especially for being around Larissa’s age. His grasp on his aquatic powers are truly impressive for how young he is, and I can only see him getting better as time passes. I can admire his power, but he is a bit stuck up, which… can be worked on. I can’t help but feel he’s trying to compensate for something with that ego of his.”

Merlon: “Merlon is the anchor of this world to my own. They help with summoning me here and returning me back. When in private, we’re able to discuss… topics that we wouldn’t dare to speak of to anyone else. After all… this world is just a video game. But alas, I don’t think I’m even able to tell YOU everything about Merlon. That’s only up to them.”

̸͎͈͙͓̻̻̪͉̭̞͇̰͒ィ̴̨̰̘̥̻̻͊̇͐メ̸͈̠̩̪͔̼̙̒̇̆̓̿́͊̌͊̈́̕ー̴̡̯͙͈̲̤̻͈̤̹͖̌̑͛̒̇̎͐͂̅͐͠ͅン̸̧̪͉̫̺̠̩̟̀̎͛̋͐́̽͑̔͒͌̌̚: “When I—█████████ he’ll—█████████ make sure—██████████████ aha—█████████!!!!—█████████ secret—████████████████ never—█████████delusional…”

~Maria? Or is it Larissa?~

Struggling to tell if it’s Maria or Larissa? Check her eyes!! They say that eyes are the one gateway to someone’s soul, after all~

Larissa will most of the time always have her glasses on, and her eyes will be warm brown. Maria will always take off Larissa’s glasses, and her eyes will be blue.

Maria’s dialogue will also always be italicized in the comic as well.

That’s it for this intro, thank you for reading!

[nintendoprecure]

Happy Birthday to Sayaka Kamiyama!

“It’s been getting quite cold lately- have you been bundling up? All nice and cozy?— no? That certainly won’t do! Come over here, I’ll get you a coat— no, no I insist! Even a scarf at least… and your lips, they’re chapped… here, I have some extra lip balm you can use!— oh… you’re wishing me a happy birthday?… oh, pardon me! I just worry so much about others that sometimes, I forget about myself… but thank you for the warm words. I just wish that everyone I love stays safe, healthy and happy… it’s what every mother would want, right?”

[nintendoprecure]

Important announcement from the manager of this blog.

[Project: SFA]

Magical Girl (Part 2 of 2)

Click here to go to part 1!

Thank you for reading until the end!! This took so long to draw😭

Maria/Cure Jump and Merlon will be getting specific intros posted at a later date. Please look forward to them!

Anyways stream Maria!!!! Saying I’m obsessed with this song is an understatement, it’s a lifestyle.

[nintendoprecure]

. . .

Jump’s… Jump’s reputation…

[Project: SFA]

Magical Girl (Part 1 of 2)

Previous comic batches:

One Last Birthday Surprise (Part 1) (Part 2)

Good Morning! (Part 1) (Part 2)

After “The End” (Part 1) (Part 2)

Part 2 will be posted tomorrow! (Will update this post with the link)

This batch features Larissa from @nintendoprecure, another project of mine! I hope her inclusion isn’t confusing, ahaha😭

[nintendoprecure]

Happy Birthday to Natalie Goldstone!

“Yo!! Nat’s here!! Today is the day for the one and only me, my birthday!! I plan to have the coolest, most epic birthday celebration I can achieve!! My little sis is gonna be there, and ALL my friends too!! You should totally come visit and check out all the free food!! I wish that I can continue to shine and be the brightest, coolest person I can possibly ever be!! That way…. I’m never going anywhere!! I’ll always be searching for the next coolest thing, and you BET I’ll be all over it!”

[nintendoprecure]

Happy “Birthday” to Shizue Suzuki

“Kukukuku!… ‘Birthday’, huh?… well, yes that’s my totally real birthday date, but it doesn’t really matter to me— What’s that? You get presents on your birthday?… Kukuku… you know what, maybe I WILL celebrate this ‘birthday’ tradition… As the ‘Birthday Girl’ of today, I should get EVERYTHING I WANT!!!… NOW WHERE’S MY PRESENT???? GIMME IT!!!”

[nintendoprecure]

Happy Birthday to Micheal “Taylor” Prescott!

“According to the date, today is my birthday. I wasn’t going to make a big deal out of it, but Sonar insisted on having a little party with our friends since my parents aren’t going to be home… oh, don’t worry about it! I’m quite used to it at this point— you want my birthday wish?… uh, by all means, wishing isn’t really something I believe in. I’m a person of science and discovery! My hard work and dedication will allow me to reach new heights, no need to waste my time on wishing on a star. Sonar and his buddies believe in me, and that’s all I need!”

[nintendoprecure]

Happy Birthday to Annie Rosella!

“Ah, it’s my birthday today! And guess what? Sonar remembered this year! He NEVER remembers, what a pain in the rear he is! But this rose he gave… I’m really touched by the gesture, it’s so unlike him!… Oh, you want my birthday wish? Of course! I don’t mind telling you! Call me lovestruck, but I hope this year Sonar has the guts to ask me out! I’ve seen the way he sometimes looks at me! But I’m not making the first move, not at all! If he truly wants me, he has to start running! Maybe this rose is the first step…”

[nintendoprecure]

Happy Birthday to Larissa Frausto!

“… h-hi— um… y-you’re wishing me a happy birthday?… m-me?… a-are you sure you aren’t thinking of my twin instead?… oh— well, um… t-thank you… h-huh?… my birthday wish?… well… I… didn’t really think of one, but… m-maybe meeting someone who’ll help me grow?… or maybe just… surviving school without my sister to hide behind… uh… and the new Style Savvy game… I-I want that… maybe I can find some old Mario games I wanna play too… there was one from my childhood that I always wanted to try out…”

[nintendoprecure]

Happy Birthday to Maria Oscuro!

“Today is my birthday! I’m going to spend it to the fullest!!… My family is still back home in Italy, but I know that they’re celebrating with me in spirit. Besides, I have plenty of new friends I made here in school!… my birthday wish?— Hmm… I guess that would be something along the lines of finding a piece of myself that I feel is missing… well, I’m sure that a piece of me isn’t ACTUALLY missing, but metaphorically! There’s always ways to find yourself, no matter how old you are! That’s just what I gotta do!”

[nintendoprecure]

Happy birthday to the athlete of the team, Masako Gushiken!

… she’s a bit moody, I apologize

[nintendoprecure]

Happy birthday to our speedster Sonar Sokudo!

… what? He shares a birthday with someone? That’s a common occurrence, but the more the merrier!

Here’s some old art of him from 2021 as well