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Ragtag Studio
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Ray's the Dead


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« on: May 04, 2013, 10:11:32 AM »

Hello there friends!  My name is Matt Carter and I'm one third of Ragtag Studio and art director on our new game, Ray's the Dead.  We've been banging away on the game for about 8 months and I wanted to finally get on here and make this thing official.  Ever since we started development on Ray's the Dead I have been dying to share the project with the community here at TIGSource.  Now that we've officially announced the game and things are little less secretive (there is so much cool stuff that we have in store!) I can finally start sharing with you the labor of love that we have been working so hard at.  So, with no further ado, here's Ray's the Dead!


Please consider backing us so that we can make this project a reality.

Description
Ray’s the Dead is a game where YOU are the leader of the zombie army. It’s story driven gameplay will challenge you with a satisfying blend of action, tactics, puzzle, stealth, and adventure, all rolled into one fresh gaming experience. Sneak, smash, laugh, and moan your way through the last hurrah of the 1980’s as you take on the role of Ray, the newly risen zombie who has the unique ability to resurrect the dead and bring them under his control. Along the way you’ll discover who Ray really is, how he ended up dead, and most curiously, what is this giant lightbulb contraption sticking out of his head! You’ll make fantastic new friends as you build a diverse zombie army to crush your human opponents. Ray’s the dead will take you on an adventure unlike any you’ve seen before as you experience his fun and exciting tale! This a zombie game with real brraaains and heart.

Status
We've been banging away at Ray's the Dead for over 8 months now and things are moving along pretty well. Last fall we showed a proof of concept to a few people at Indiecade. After the positive feedback we received there we felt confident to set our next goal to have a playable demo ready for PAXEast in Boston. It was a lot of work (a ton!) but we reached that goal and had an amazing showing of the game at PAX. Over the last month we have been preparing our Kickstarter, which will go live this Tuesday.  From here we have a year of development ahead of us where we take the mechanics that we have, polish them, and make content.


About a month ago we launched our Steam Greenlight Campaign.  Things are going pretty well so far but of course we are always looking for more yes votes! Smiley Hopefully as we post more about the game on this devblog you will find it worth your time to lend us your help in getting on Steam!


Trailers



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« Last Edit: March 07, 2015, 10:27:51 AM by Ragtag Studio » Logged

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Panurge
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« Reply #1 on: May 04, 2013, 11:40:12 AM »

Oh man, that pun is so terrible that it comes out the other side and is strangely charming!

I've long been of the opinion that the zombie genre needs laying to rest for good but this Overlord style approach is a really nice twist. It all looks very tight indeed, in fact - good luck with it.
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Ragtag Studio
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« Reply #2 on: May 04, 2013, 12:08:00 PM »

Oh yes!  That, that, NAME! See you noticed. Smiley Thanks for the comments.  You bring up a number of points that we've had to deal with as a team and I am going to be addressing them in future posts.  As a matter of fact the next post I am working on is in regards to the game's title! Cheers.
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happymonster
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« Reply #3 on: May 04, 2013, 01:30:10 PM »

Yeah I agree with Panurge - nice twist on the genre.
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Udderdude
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« Reply #4 on: May 04, 2013, 01:35:13 PM »

Fairly sure the concept was already done with games like Stubbs the Zombie. 

It looks cool and I like the art style.

I watched the trailer and there's one scene where you and a bunch of zombies walk right up to a bunch of cops and cruisers and they don't even react, you almost walk right by them.  I hope you realize that's not exactly compelling footage .. lol
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Ragtag Studio
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« Reply #5 on: May 06, 2013, 09:06:38 AM »

Udderdude

Very perceptive about the Stubbs the Zombie connection!  Another member of Ragtag Studio, Chris Cobb actually worked on Stubbs the Zombie when he was at Wideload Games. I worked at that studio as well and that is why we have a special place in our hearts for Stubbs.  While you are correct in pointing out that Stubb's was one of the first games that let you play as a zombie it was missing the key element that we are bringing to the table, the ability to directly control your zombie army! 

As for the trailer footage... hmmm, that makes me laugh.  I'm not sure we ever looked at it from that angle.  You see, in that part of the game its Halloween and everyone thinks you are dressed as zombies and so you have to sneak around and not be detected as zombies.  Being so close to the game I think we may have not realized how that bit of footage might come across.  Of course the other thing you have to realize here is this is completely teaser footage.  We are a long way from done on this puppy! Smiley  Thanks again for your interest.
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Ragtag Studio
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« Reply #6 on: May 06, 2013, 11:56:54 AM »

Right now I am making an animation of Ray crawling out of the ground for our Kickstarter page.  Not sure exactly how this is going to work out but I have some ideas.
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Ragtag Studio
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« Reply #7 on: May 08, 2013, 07:24:04 AM »

Had a very busy day yesterday.  First big news is that we launched our Kickstarter campaign!  Ho yeah.  Okay, the nerves will be working overtime for the next month. I also got to do some fun art for the Kickstarter.

I also worked on a couple of particle effects for Ray's zombie mind control light beam.  Over the last few weeks I've learned more and more about the ins and outs of Unitys particles.  I've got a long way to go (never have gotten to do much in the way of effects) but I'm feeling more comfortable with it. 
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Ragtag Studio
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« Reply #8 on: May 09, 2013, 12:56:15 PM »

Yesterday was mostly about stressing about Kickstarter. What a strange thing it is!

I made another animation to show progress.


It's gonna be a long month.  I think tomorrow I am going to get back to doing some level design.
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ericmbernier
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« Reply #9 on: May 10, 2013, 11:56:49 AM »

I heard your interview on Big Sushi. The art looks amazing so far. Good luck with everything, I'm looking forward to following its progress. Beer!
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Ragtag Studio
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« Reply #10 on: May 13, 2013, 11:02:53 AM »

Thanks man, that really means a lot!  You can meet us live tomorrow at 2 on twitch.tv if you are interested.
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Ragtag Studio
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« Reply #11 on: June 20, 2013, 01:50:38 PM »



Last week we had the great fortune of being part of Sony's amazing E3 Playstation press conference.  If you missed it, Sony invited 8 indie developers to be on stage and show off the games that they will be releasing on Playstation 4.  I had the honor of being on stage representing Ragtag Studio. 
http://youtu.be/5Fy3oapyqng?t=2m2s

The conference was just so amazing!  The shear size of the stage and video screens was intimidating and being on stage with the likes of Klei, Super Giant, and Oddworld was even more so.  We had three practices, two in the morning after which we were shuffled out quickly so as not to witness any secrets beforehand, and the third that was right before the event we cordoned off in a "greenroom" in which they kept us for similar reasons.  After that was the E3 show floor where we showed Ray's the Dead in an indie section of the Sony booth.  The whole week was a whirlwind of new faces, press interviews and parties.  I was more than a little overwhelmed.   Of course we still have to finish Ray's the Dead so I am happy to be back to work jamming away.  I have a bunch of art stuff that I made over the last month that I want to share with you soon.  Laterz.
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poe
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« Reply #12 on: June 20, 2013, 01:57:04 PM »

Hey I saw you guys at E3! Congrats on such great publicity, this game is one of the ones that made me want a PS4. ( Amongst a lot of other indies )
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Ragtag Studio
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« Reply #13 on: June 20, 2013, 02:01:06 PM »

Hurray!  Did you come by the booth and say hi?  We're struggling to figure out exactly how many people actually know and care about Ray's the Dead so it's good to hear from you. Smiley
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poe
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« Reply #14 on: June 20, 2013, 02:01:34 PM »

Hurray!  Did you come by the booth and say hi?  We're struggling to figure out exactly how many people actually know and care about Ray's the Dead so it's good to hear from you. Smiley

No I saw you guys on the PS4 stream Smiley
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Ragtag Studio
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« Reply #15 on: June 20, 2013, 02:05:12 PM »

Very cool.  It was a pretty good event overall I was particularly impressed with the PS3 stuff.  I'm not sure if that's good or not. Smiley The indie segment was a big deal for the industry as a whole I'd say.
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Ragtag Studio
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« Reply #16 on: June 24, 2013, 07:56:57 AM »



I wanted to share this promotional image I came up with a few weeks ago.  As you can tell this a sort of fan art homage to Invader Zim.  Invader Zim was one of the inspirations for the characters in Ray's the Dead.  I really love the over the top zaniness of Zim's facial features and expressions.  I also really liked the dark and cynical nature of the world Zim inhabits. I've made the image available here in various sizes for use as a desktop wallpaper.

Download various sizes at the links below.


1280 x 720
1280 x 800
1440 x 800   
1680 x 1050
1920 x 1080
1920 x 1200 
Zip of all sizes
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Ragtag Studio
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« Reply #17 on: July 02, 2013, 03:51:00 PM »

I was watching Chuck Norris's Invasion USA and had the urge to scribble this.  Probably not going to be in the game but hey.

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Ragtag Studio
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« Reply #18 on: March 07, 2015, 10:09:05 AM »

Haven't posted here in long time but if you have been following us on Twitter (@ragtagmatt, @ragtagchris, @raysthedead) you will know that production is still under full steam.

Wanted to post here about a little project I have for today. Going to create a helper script in Blender to position "sprites" that I have imported. The script will position the sprites relative to the Gimp file they are exported from and set their origins based on points that I am also exporting from Gimp.
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Ragtag Studio
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« Reply #19 on: March 07, 2015, 10:27:13 AM »

Here's an image of a character ready that I am testing export out of the gimp. The green targets are where the sprite joints are. I wrote a script to export the offsets of each layer as well as the joints. I'm having some problems getting some of the batching to work in Gimp but I am going to put that off for now. Next comes the script for Blender.
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