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[jamesprimate]

I was a little scared to read after all of those uhhh... suggestive... kraken comments earlier in the thread, but that was a fun read 

[akryl9296]

I've been away for a day and this is what I come back to...

I notice that the right proboscis/genital/digestive fluid sac/crop/ink bladder is retracted in the first gif, but distended in the second. Please tell me that even if they are totally passive gameplay wise, they will have some disgusting autonomous behaviours like extending/contracting/secreting/spasming.

Because nature is gross.

I second that. Those violet things should change colour and enlarge when slugcat is detected
Speaking of which, maybe there should be some eating animation when it catches the slugcat? It could try to suck slugcat in through the hanging tubes or something. Maybe even live slugcat x)

[theEasternDragon]

Dear god ye'all. Shut up! You are ruining my rain world experience! Seriously, acting like a bunch of immature gamers of something. *wink wink*.

[tortoiseandcrow]

Now I remember what it reminds me of:



I actually find this to be utterly beautiful.

[Christian]

Knowing the pace that Joar works at, I bet the next update will have a fully-designed kraken, head and everything

I was wondering, will krakens and lizards interact? Or does the kraken only reside in the upper regions where lizards can't reach? Pretty interested to see how it interacts with other species

[jamesprimate]

^ oh man we have some cool plans for that. i wont spoil it though

[JLJac]

Update 387

Wow, that was a lot of work! But also probably the most fun I've ever had. Since last time, the beast has gotten a head, feather like appendages on its arms, smoke coming out of the thrusters and some kind of shell on its back.

Many things still need work, such as the head and neck being too lose and floppy when it's flying, and the smoke in general. I would like to have the smoke look cooler, but I settled for this as good enough for now. My main concern was that I really wanted the smoke to be affected by the wing flaps, and I got that in even though it doesn't perhaps look all that natural. Maybe down the line I'll do a 2D grid based fluid simulation o_0

Here's the head in its classical frame animation sequence. I'm getting rusty at old school animation haha! But with some help from the computer (rotating the sprites, mostly) it still looks smooth enough.



And on the creature!



The tusks or mandibles or whatever are probably going to have some stuff going on, I imagine that they'll hang like this, but when the creature gets into Hunt Mode they retract towards the neck, and sit there in a "charged" position. From there they can move forward quickly in a bite, and if that gets you you're stuck. If it doesn't, however, the creature needs to retract them again before biting the next time, giving you half a second of breathing space. I think that might be necessesary in order to give you the feeling that you have some sort of chance - this way you can actually save yourself from a close encounter with a bit of skill and luck. If you're caught automatically when touching the head, the creature can just kind of cheaply sweep around and get you pretty much whatever you do.

Here's the creature taking off:



And an remake of the eagle landing one, now with head and all that stuff (this one took a thousand takes, because it just refused to land on the little platform... Everywhere else was preferable, apparently -_-)



And last, some climbing gameplay where I manage to make the beast lose track of me. It's usually not that easy, but I was lucky this time and the tracker sent a ghost off to the right instead of up the pole. Remember that it doesn't have any AI yet, only the tracker. The AI is literally two lines that say "go through the known creatures in the tracker. If they are a slugcat, tell the pathfinder to set the movement destination to where that critter is believed to be. Break the loop." Behaviour will probably look cooler once that's actually sorted out.



Oh and also, maybe we need a new name for this beast? Sky kraken was fun as a WIP name, but seriously, the finished product is looking distinctly not like an octopus to me. "Skull Bird"? "Jet Beast"? Suggestions?

[surt]

Looking pretty freaking awesome.

[rjcade]

It just keeps looking better and better.  Inspirational.

[jamesprimate]

seriously this is jaw-droppingly impressive, and i dont care if im biased saying that. dat death from above eagle drop is just straight up amazing. the head movements are so smooth! RW gets a lot of talk about the life-like animation, but this bumps it up A FEW notches imho.

Oh and also, maybe we need a new name for this beast? Sky kraken was fun as a WIP name, but seriously, the finished product is looking distinctly not like an octopus to me.

SKULL VULTURE

KABUKI BUZZARD

DEATH'S HEAD CONDOR

definitely some sort of vulture thing though

reminds me a little of Wan Shi Tong from avatar, totally my favorite spirit:

[quan]

wow this is looking really gooddddd

[Vadinci]

Looking awesome I really love the smoke as well!

Oh and also, maybe we need a new name for this beast? Sky kraken was fun as a WIP name, but seriously, the finished product is looking distinctly not like an octopus to me.

SKULL VULTURE

KABUKI BUZZARD

DEATH'S HEAD CONDOR

definitely some sort of vulture thing though

I second this, it reminded me of a vulture immediately!

[Christian]

Damn Joar, you always raise the bar with every new GIF. Easily the most impressive creature so far IMO, it's so insanely smooth and freaky

And I'd have to second the name "Vulture". That's the vibe I'm getting from the look and movement

[JLJac]

Thanks 

Also James persuaded me into implementing this one thing we've been talking about, having the shadow of the creature as a warning of its approach :



I'm really happy with the result! Subtle enough, but still totally possible to notice if you're alert.

In physical reality, how things would work is that the creature would have to be like, in front of the level, behind the camera, to block the light like this. A while I was thinking about having the shadow casting creature be in another room or something, to get that. But we are awkwardly trying to make 2D and 3D work together here anyways, and sometimes the best solution is the simplest one. It struck me that what probably makes most sense from a utility perspective is that if creatures above the screen cast shadows on the level. So, maybe we'll let realism go out the window this time - just because it's such a charming detail to the actual game experience to be able to see shadows of critters above like this. And who knows, maybe when they're up there they move a bit in the z dimension to get in front of the sun, haha! Anyways, now we have this weird situation where if the creature is moving downwards, you first get the shadow, and then one screen later you get the shadow + creature. Not realistic, but it works

Technically what's going on, is that if the creature is above the screen, all of its sprites are moved down one screen height, making it reappear in the screen rect, and colored in the "shadow only" color. Simple as that! So a cool thing is that every sort of animation and behavior the creature can do, the shadow can do as well.

[Christian]

That's just so visually awesome

Although the thing goes from terrifiying to clumsy in that GIF when it slams its head full-force into the platform upon swooping in :p

Good thing it has a shock-resistant protective bone casing around its head

[Janeator]

It looks amazing!
About the name, I'd name it Skull Vulture or simply Vulture.

Also, I'd add a few more feathers so the wings look like they can really make him fly, but that's just a small detail.

[JLJac]

That's just so visually awesome

Although the thing goes from terrifiying to clumsy in that GIF when it slams its head full-force into the platform upon swooping in :p

Good thing it has a shock-resistant protective bone casing around its head

Hahahaha dude, this is procedural animation, every creature is always clumsy as hell! I've kind of tried to make a world and creature designs that can roll with it though - like if things are a bit weird and uncanny it feels sort of correct, mood wise, that the creatures are clumsy and jerky and all that.

It looks amazing!
About the name, I'd name it Skull Vulture or simply Vulture.

Also, I'd add a few more feathers so the wings look like they can really make him fly, but that's just a small detail.

Yup, James and I discussed it, and we've decided to just call it "the vulture". The other creatures follow the same pattern of being named after whatever real life creature they resemble - snail, bat, leech, lizard. So it just makes sense for it to join them! Also vulture sounds kind of ominous without necessarily putting in a whole bunch of darkgrim words like Skull etc, haha. Also I think it has a kind of creepy quality when something has the name of something you know what it is, but is clearly something else 

On the number of feathers, I can tease you by telling that it's literally a variable I can set, but I deliberately set it to 16-22, I think it was ~ it'll remain a mystery how it can actually fly, I guess! 

[Rebusmind]

The alarming shadow is really nice and shows how beautifully they are rendered, but then I would take out his 'second' shadow that is right behind the creature.

[sergiocornaga]

Hahahaha dude, this is procedural animation, every creature is always clumsy as hell!

The actual motion looks totally believable to me, I think it's more of an AI thing? Like, you'd expect the vulture to give obstacles a wider berth rather than crashing directly into them.

The alarming shadow is really nice and shows how beautifully they are rendered, but then I would take out his 'second' shadow that is right behind the creature.

Hmm... that's a good point. Maybe the warning shadow could be going bottom to top, like it's flying overhead in pseudo-3D? Or would that destroy the effect?

[marcgfx]

the vulture is really cool, the clumsiness even adds to the realism. if he was not so terrifying, he might even be loveable. if hitting his head that hard has no effect, I doubt a rock will do much either. how do you defeat a monster like this ?
the smoke could probably do with a bit of alpha? the much diskussed appendages could probably work quite well as feet... I'm currently not sure what to think of them. I'm also wondering why one is bigger than the other, but asymmetry is not something that unusual in nature.