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[jamesprimate]

back from PAX!!

lets get this devblog some content

here is a WIP "battle loop":
http://soundcloud.com/james_primate/danger-in-gnomeland

[peous]

here is a WIP "battle loop": http://soundcloud.com/james_primate/danger-in-gnomeland

Nice melody, but maybe too much stereo effects, a bit disturbing when listening with headphones.

[tsameti]

Huh. 70% done and no screenies? Not even UI? I'm... confused. And it's voxel based? I'd really like to see something in action.

[RoboB0b]

Huh. 70% done and no screenies? Not even UI? I'm... confused. And it's voxel based? I'd really like to see something in action.

I was really tempted to post a screenshot at first but decided to hold off.  Rho just recently started working on art and I decided to wait for a screenshot instead of posting one with placeholder art and then having it change right away.

It has almost come down to adding in audio and art assets and the game is finished.  The original artist was doing it in his spare time and it was later than I would have liked when we realized he didn't have enough spare time to get it done.  So right now art is well behind the rest of the game 

I should be able to post a screenshot of some terrain very soon.

[jamesprimate]

here is a WIP "battle loop": http://soundcloud.com/james_primate/danger-in-gnomeland

Nice melody, but maybe too much stereo effects, a bit disturbing when listening with headphones.

good feedback! in chiptune scene stuff, tracker panning is a "cool skill" (channel economy and all that), but if it seems a bit extreme in VGM I'll definitely consider toning it down. Anybody else have an opinion on that?

[RoboB0b]

Update time!  I've been a bit focused recently and haven't thought to update in a while.  I had another funny situation happen today that I wanted to share.

In the spirit of the game, combat is mostly simulated.  You don't have control like an RTS or a tactical RPG.  There are a lot of factors working "behind the scenes" with some options for the player.  Once the actual fighting starts it mostly plays out on its own.

One thing that happens is characters will drop whatever they are holding if they get hit hard enough in the arm or hand.  Yesterday, I added in the ability to pick up objects during combat.  This is to recover from a dropped sword or whatever but also for the worker gnomes to try to defend themselves somewhat if they are attacked when unarmed.

I was balancing some combat values today and so was doing a lot of testing fights.  A goblin and gnome were fighting and the goblin ended up dropping both his shield and his sword.  He managed to punch the gnome in the throat, killing the gnome. Then before attacking the next gnome he picked up his shield and the gnome's corpse.  He then went on to beat the other gnome with the gnome corpse. 

I think maybe one-handing a corpse might be too much but I don't see why you can't wield an arm or a leg.

[RoboB0b]

Since I still haven't posted screenshots, I feel like I should clarify a bit on my comment about comparing it to a voxel world.

The game is definitely rendered in 2D with isometric tiles.  There aren't any meshes or anything.  Although, the game simulation is 3D tile/grid based.  It is a discrete world, meaning game objects have a cell position and don't "live" in between cells.

In general the game simulation can be independent from the visualization.  It's pretty common now to see fighters or platformers with 2D gameplay but 3D visuals.  The Civilization series switched over to 3D rendering I think with Civ 4, but you wouldn't lose a whole lot if someone wrote a 2D renderer for Civ 5.  In a similar way there is Mode 7 for SNES which allows you to render perspective, giving a 3D look.  Games that use that could be on a 2D plane or in 3D, but my point is that simulation and visualization don't always have a hard link.

As a counter example, I worked on Toy Soldiers with 2 other programmers and the game would have to probably be rewritten from scratch to be rendered in 2D.  I mostly say that because gameplay is entirely animation driven.  It's to the point where there are "0 physics" in the game.  If you watch this trailer I don't think anyone could guess there isn't a physics simulation.

Anyways! I hope to post some screenshots soon and I think it'll be less confusing at that point.  Some things are better understood in motion though, so I'll probably follow up with a video later.

[RoboB0b]

I updated the main post with screenshots!  The art is still a work in progress.  It's just some empty terrain to get an idea.  The HUD is also hidden.  It looks like there was some compression in the uploaded images but I think it should give a good idea still.

[jamesprimate]

looks niiiiiiiice! I haven't seen the zoomed out version before.

[RoboB0b]

Ctrl + Scroll Wheel.  It's in the controls menu

[Rusk]

It looks great. Can't wait to see some buildings in there. With a view like that, I suppose most of the village will be above ground?

(Although those sections where X and Y slopes meet could look more natural.)

[RoboB0b]

It looks great. Can't wait to see some buildings in there. With a view like that, I suppose most of the village will be above ground?

Thanks!  It depends.  I tend to play mostly underground, but there is nothing stopping you from playing mostly above ground.  You'll need to go to the surface for your farms and trees but you'll find better ore the deeper you go.

For rendering, there is no distinction between above/below ground.  So you can dig a big pit and see it from the surface or carve out large multistory underground rooms.

[jamesprimate]

any pics of underground??

[RoboB0b]

Here are a couple big caverns for you james:

[tsameti]

Oh hey! That's fun. It's got kind of a lego feel to it. I do like the geometry of your terrains though, this could double as a slip-n-slide game, haha.