next »

[Cakeprediction]

That thing is truly beautiful and horrifying, Can't wait for the actual skin on the beast D:

Why haven't I preordered this game yet O.o

[dancing_dead]

Joar, that last pic firmly qualifies you for a ph.d in magic! ...congratulations on your wizardhood.

[oahda]

 

[ProgramGamer]

Welp, I didn't want you to create a leviathan, but you've done it anyways now so we can't go back.

Seriously though, give this thing a lobster mouth with feelers and it should achieve its purpose.

[Teod]

(not that it can even grab you at all, but just from testing whether it's able to move up to me and boop me with its head)

This sentence got me thinking: This thing doesn't encounter slugcats all that often. Shouldn't it act towards the player with confusion and curiosity rather than aggression? With a creature this size that would still be pretty dangerous, but will give it a bit of a unique flavor.

[Woodledude]

(not that it can even grab you at all, but just from testing whether it's able to move up to me and boop me with its head)

This sentence got me thinking: This thing doesn't encounter slugcats all that often. Shouldn't it act towards the player with confusion and curiosity rather than aggression? With a creature this size that would still be pretty dangerous, but will give it a bit of a unique flavor.

It's not aggression. It's hunger. The hunger of a giant beast that needs to eat its weight in food every day to stay healthy, immersed in the putrid leakage from the garbage wastes in its desperation for a meal. I don't see how it would be able to resist even a small morsel like Slugcat.

[marcgfx]

looks awesome, the flow looks very realistic. I can imagine it being really scary, just seeing parts of the beast and not really knowing what it is up to. great job!

[Christian]

(not that it can even grab you at all, but just from testing whether it's able to move up to me and boop me with its head)

This sentence got me thinking: This thing doesn't encounter slugcats all that often. Shouldn't it act towards the player with confusion and curiosity rather than aggression? With a creature this size that would still be pretty dangerous, but will give it a bit of a unique flavor.

It's not aggression. It's hunger. The hunger of a giant beast that needs to eat its weight in food every day to stay healthy, immersed in the putrid leakage from the garbage wastes in its desperation for a meal. I don't see how it would be able to resist even a small morsel like Slugcat.

I imagine something that big, basically an aquatic apex predator, has little distinctions about what it eats. Frogs, slugcats, lizards that unfortunately fall in, vultures that get to close to the water...it's all meat.

And a beast that size...there has to be some other species between it and the frogs, that it eats, right? How else would it sustain itself? The frogs seems too small to keep it fed

[Woodledude]

...about what it eats. Frogs, slugcats, lizards that unfortunately fall in...

Frogs? Is that what we're calling the excretory fish Joar was working on a couple pages back? 

Definitely a better name for them, if so. Also, possibly the salamanders will help, but it would be interesting to see some other, perhaps more docile sea creatures. Feeder dolphins, that eat little swarms of krill, perhaps?

[Christian]

...about what it eats. Frogs, slugcats, lizards that unfortunately fall in...

Frogs? Is that what we're calling the excretory fish Joar was working on a couple pages back?  

Definitely a better name for them, if so. Also, possibly the salamanders will help, but it would be interesting to see some other, perhaps more docile sea creatures. Feeder dolphins, that eat little swarms of krill, perhaps?

I think Joar called them "jet fish", but I saw someone call them frogs on Twitter and I guess it kind of stuck in my mind.

Oh, right forgot about the salamanders. Do they hunt fish/frogs too or just slugcat? Fish/frogs > salamanders > leviathan/sea monster would be a nice aquatic food chain

Actually do lizards eat lantern mice (and cicadas)? I mean, they probably should, right? Besides that fact that lizard and snakes here eat mice and insects, would make sense that they'd settle for other species if slugcats aren't around

[chriswearly]

...about what it eats. Frogs, slugcats, lizards that unfortunately fall in...

Frogs? Is that what we're calling the excretory fish Joar was working on a couple pages back? 

Definitely a better name for them, if so. Also, possibly the salamanders will help, but it would be interesting to see some other, perhaps more docile sea creatures. Feeder dolphins, that eat little swarms of krill, perhaps?

To tangent off your last sentence, it looks like that's another way the Leviathan (looks like a microscopic parasite from biology class, just super ginormous btw) could eat, I think. It would find nests/swarms of the Leeches, and 'vacuums' them into its mouth. I don't think it's picky. Like what's been said, it's huge, and so it should eat anything and everything without judgment.

A (rhetorical) question I have is, though, is what hurts it? I would guess that unless there's something bigger than it (oh dear god) then the only "predators" it has are somewhat smaller critters that are fast and pick it off slowly. Like swordfish-type creatures.

The Salamanders, though half-aquatic, seem about the right size, and their ability to escape to out-of-water might be the perfect advantage.

Perhaps the leeches munch/suck off the Leviathan for nutrients, at least especially if/when it dies and falls to the bottom of the water floor.

[ProgramGamer]

Maybe they suck the blood directly off of its tendrils?

[jctwood]

Is there a post where you have explained the systems behind making such wonderfully smooth soft bodies?

[Christian]

Is there a post where you have explained the systems behind making such wonderfully smooth soft bodies?

There was a Kickstarter post last year that talked about the animations
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/rain-world/project-rain-world/posts/720818

And I recall other more detailed posts here, but those are hard to find

[Wlad]

Is there a post where you have explained the systems behind making such wonderfully smooth soft bodies?

Maybe in this old post about prototype you find something: http://forums.tigsource.com/index.php?topic=22849.0

[JLJac]

The big fish is gonna eat everything, is the idea. Like, why wouldn't it? It will have trouble catching up with the jet fish though!

Is there a post where you have explained the systems behind making such wonderfully smooth soft bodies?

Here's technical guide in case you want to do it yourself:
http://forums.tigsource.com/index.php?topic=25183.msg1133480#msg1133480
The basic principle is that the creatures are composed of several 2D points with velocity vectors, that are locked at certain distances.

[ProgramGamer]

Vectorial creature programming FTW!

[JLJac]

Oh yes!

Update 451

Progress coming along nicely! First a moody one with the water, showing what this beast will mostly look like in the actual game. Swim slugcat swim!



This next one represents about the maximum amount of the creature you'll see in the actual game - the water is my friend here, because it's super hard to do the psuedo-3D stuff I usually implement on this scale, so everything being obscured by the water is a godsend. The idea is that never quite seeing the creature in its entirety will both make it feel ominous and also allow me to cut some much needed corners in the animation.



Here's a slow motion gif of what I've got for the mouth parts so far:



I think it's an interesting visual contrast that the entire thing is some sort of soft mushy kelp-grub, but the mouth parts are straight up heavy duty industrial machinery. It also serves a gameplay purpose - in the monochrome underwater environment the dangerous mouth parts need to be somehow distinct from the rest of the creature. If everything was just billowing tentacles you'd not be able to understand what part it was eating you with, it'd just feel like sometimes touching it randomly kills you.  Hopefully this will provide a visual contrast that works even in monochrome; squishy parts - not so dangerous, square parts - very dangerous.

Currently my plan is that the mouth will extend to the position where both jaws are parallel but slightly apart. There it will pause for a little while, before very forcefully with an almost instant movement smash together, and then pull into the head again. Anything that had the bad luck of being in the square-ish area between the jaws at that particular frame gets pulled in with it. Once retracted, the jaws will glide outward towards the resting position again.

[Schrompf]

This one is sooo amazing. Especially in the water context - it certainly loses fascination in the last image.

[Zorg]

Stunning, and terrifying! 
I'm really jealous of your programming magic.

If everything was just billowing tentacles you'd not be able to understand what part it was eating you with, it'd just feel like sometimes touching it randomly kills you.  Hopefully this will provide a visual contrast that works even in monochrome; squishy parts - not so dangerous, square parts - very dangerous.

In my eyes it would be totally okay if THAT creature killed you instantly on touch. I'm not sure about the machine parts. I imagined rainworld as a planet where civilisation has gone long ago. Where did that creature get his teeth? Maybe it's very old, too, but somehow it feels out of place anyway. No other creature features artificial parts, right (or do lantern mice need batteries)?