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[Ardbob]

The Brain of Sammy Schizo

Throughout the game, you will be thrown into random battles, but some tiles you step on may increase or decrease your chance of going into battle! Getting thrown into battle when you're not ready certainly wouldn't be pleasant, so I'd like you to be prepared. Sammy Schizo was a very paranoid zombie. So paranoid, in fact, that even after he died in a tragic lawn mowing accident his brain continued its paranoia! You carry his brain with you now, so that when danger is near, it can warn you.

The brain is an icon on the top-right corner of the screen that glows various colors to convey your chance of a random battle occurring on the next step.

[Ardbob]

Bad News: My CPU fan's clips broke. It still works somewhat, but if I play any game (including testing Zombie Quest), the temperature shoots up to dangerous levels. I'll still be working on the game as much as I can, even if it means only writing, but I might not have much to show you guys until I get a new fan.

[Ardbob]

Since I couldn't work on the coding or design of the game, I turned to working on a little art, so it turns out I do have an update for you guys! It's just not very deserving of its own devlog. So here you go, the brain of sammy schizo changing its glow to warn you of danger.



Those are seperate stages of danger. So on the first (no glow) there is no danger of battle. Whereas the last (dark red with greenish spots) you are almost sure to go into battle in the next few steps.

[Ardbob]

Working on the interface for the battle system and menu system. The windows skins were finished a long time ago, but I'm moving parts around and making it as easy to use and aesthetically pleasing as possible. I'll show a screenshot when I'm confident it looks good.

[Trystin]

Sounding cool, are we going to maybe get some screenies soon? 

[Ardbob]

Sounding cool, are we going to maybe get some screenies soon? 

Thanks! I hope to release a couple screenshots definitely soon. Unfortunately they won't be of beautiful areas or actual gameplay. I have no dedicated artist at the moment, and the only thing I'm capable of drawing are icons and the window borders. So, as soon as I finish arranging the menu and battle interface, I'll be able to show screenshots of that! :D Screenshots of gameplay and areas will have to wait a while though.

[Ardbob]

Devlog #007 - Tuesday, December 25th, 2012

• Altered a lot of scripts to allow for multiple window styles.
• Completely rearranged the Battle Interface so that the Status window is on top.
• Scripted the character positions for battle.
• Implemented ultimate skills, used when the Hunger Gauge is full. As of now, you learn the first one at level 5 and a new one every ten levels after that.

Merry Christmas, everyone!

[Ardbob]

Devlog #008 - Saturday, December 29th, 2012

• Worked with illustrator to create the main character's portrait. I think you guys will love it.
• Made changes to window borders and backgrounds for message and menu windows. It looks a lot cleaner now.
• Did the art for 3 icons: Health, Stamina and Hunger. They're essential to the battle status window, so I worked on them first.
• Finished the battle status window! Screenshot below.

This is the battle status window displaying character information pertinent to the battle. The character's name is on the left, followed by their Health, Stamina and Hunger. Their status effects (debuffs) are on the right-most. The status effect icons are generic icons, however. I have yet to create my own. This window will be displayed on the top of the screen during battle.

The other window for battle are either finished or half-finished, so hopefully soon I'll have a lot more screenshots! Keep in mind though, the battle background art, enemy sprites and player sprites are all stand-ins. Once I have a pixel artist and environment artist (tileset artist) on my team, those will be changed. If you are an artist and interested in the project, send me a PM!

[Ardbob]

I should note that the background of the battle status window is partially transparent black. The trees and grass you're seeing are just my placeholder battle background.

[Ardbob]

Devlog #009 - Wednesday, January 2nd, 2013

• Implemented a day/night system. Time in-game is four times faster than real time. Day time will have more effect on the game's features than just tinting the screen different colors. For instance, many non-player characters will be in different places at different times of day. Another example: Some skills will do more/less damage during certain periods of the day.
• Added in the choice system for the game. Nearly every conversation will feature at least one choice. This feature is the first to be completely implemented. Its unlikely I'll need to make any changes to it unless testers give me negative feedback concerning it.
• Changed the window design for non-battle situations. Simpler and more modern now.
• Worked on the sandbox room in which alpha testers can test out features and give me their feedback.

[Ardbob]

My illustrator finished the main character Wilfred's character portrait! So, I decided to show it to you guys. As you've probably noticed, the character sprites are sorta cartoonish and goofy looking. Well, I wanted the character portraits to be the polar opposite. Let me know what you guys think! Here's the character portrait side-by-side with the sprite:

[jO]

I really prefer to low-fi pixelversion of your original sprite. But then again, that is my personal taste, since I love pixelart.
Are you planning to use this clash of resolutions in more areas than just the character portraits? If not I would fear that the portraits are just gonna stick out as something alien.

So IMHO i'd go with a low-fi pixelart look also for the portraits. It would result in a more homogenic look and also be a little easier on the amount of work you need to do when generating all those portraits.
In addition, I really like the goofy look of your original sprite, which is completely lost in the new portrait. It looks way too serious for a comedic game imho.

[Ardbob]

Thanks for the feedback!

Have you ever played an RPG that was pixelart, but the character portraits were anime-style? There's a lot of those. To clarify, they are only still images and will only be used in the main menu and in messages. I don't feel like the portraits will clash with the pixel style art. Tilesets, character sprites, objects and such I definitely agree need to stay the same resolution, but the portraits are really supposed to be a little separated in that sense.

Here was my thought process:
I need a way to identify which character is talking, and I need something for the menus. For those I could have: 1. Just names. 2. A little animated character sprite. 3. An illustration of the character. I figured an illustration would look the best, but I could be entirely wrong.

Looking back on it, an animated sprite may be a better option. I could have icons/bubbles pop above their heads showing emotion on different messages or animated them differently. Or should I have just names above the message and no picture, then just show emotions/reactions on the sprites themselves?

[Moczan]

I would still try to aim for same resolution, you can have non-pixelart portraits, but display them on x2 or x3 (whaterever you use for your sprites). Most games that mix those two try to at least stay at same resolution.

[Ardbob]

Oh, I see what you guys mean. I'm experimenting with different types of portrait styles at the moment. I'll keep that in mind.