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[Matthew Rayfield]

Earth Avoid
( an RPG about leaving the planet to visit your mom and big hands )

Click Here For Latest Update
( 2018 / 6 / 27 )

First Post:

( gif from 2018/2/14 )


about

Earth Avoid is an RPG heavy on adventure, with a light combat system. In fact, I'm probably not even going to call it combat. More on that to come...

Story line (so far) is you get a message from your mom telling you that you need to leave the planet because something bad is going to happen to visit her. Then the rest of the game is your journey to leave.

The graphical look may change a bit, but I want to keep things stylized like this. I will probably experiment more with the color changing (seen in gif above) and the border.

technical info

Currently this is a web-based game. And it's an engine that I'm creating from scratch in Javascript. With the exception that I'm using Three.JS to handle the WebGL usage.

I'm a web developer by trade, so this was the most comfortable way for me to go. And I'm a believer in the web. However, if I run into performance issues that I cannot fix, there is a chance I would move to another platform/engine.

Even though it is web-based, upon release I will most likely bundle it up into an app so that it can be release through Steam and the like.

Because it's cross-platform by nature of it being web-based, I am toying with the idea of making this both a PC & mobile game.

progress log

• basic world / movement
• color changing
• tile texturing system
• level editor
• dialogue system
• first area
• "combat" system

Thanks for looking ! And please let me know what you think or if you have any questions :]

[SolS]

I like what you have so far for the art style

[Matthew Rayfield]

I like what you have so far for the art style

Thank you !

April 10th 2018 Updates

I've been working quite a bit on the game engine itself. But I've gotten that to the point now where I can get going hard on the story & graphics. So hopefully will be able to put out some updates soon that show more what the game world will look like.

( your house, first map )

This is most likely the first scene in the game. It's your house. Pretty happy with it but will probably add some more stuff to it in the futurrrre...

( you find a big hand )

I'm shifting the story line a bit. Instead of your mom warning about an impending disaster you find a big hand on your way to visit her. This is the big hand. One of many ?

( level editor )

And finally here is a weird little look at the level editor I have. It's in-game. This I thought would be easier than switching back and forth between two interfaces. I can zoom out on any map and place tiles, edit tiles, etc. Still the event scripting is easier to do through a text editor. The level editor just makes it easy to visually place tiles. Before I was coding them, which gets tedious on big maps.

That's all for now ! Thanks for checking it out :]

[Tusky]

Looks fun. The monsters look neat 

Releasing on PC i assume?

[Matthew Rayfield]

Looks fun. The monsters look neat 

Releasing on PC i assume?

Thanks !

Yes PC / Mac for sure.

But I've tested it a bit on iPhone, and if I can get the controls to work well I'd love to release it there too

[slimehunter]

I'm loving the hand-drawn art style.

[samljones]

Hello Matthew, I really like your project.

It reminds me of those indie legends like 'On/Off' - I believe that's the name.

A very heartwarming and unique style that makes me want to know more and try it out.

Do you have any vision for the scope of the game? ie. how long it will be, how 'deep' it is? It looks very story-based.

[Matthew Rayfield]

I'm loving the hand-drawn art style.

Thank you !

Hello Matthew, I really like your project.

It reminds me of those indie legends like 'On/Off' - I believe that's the name.

A very heartwarming and unique style that makes me want to know more and try it out.

Do you have any vision for the scope of the game? ie. how long it will be, how 'deep' it is? It looks very story-based.

Glad you like it !

I have played only a tiny bit of OFF but it seems like a really cool world, so I appreciate the comparison.

Not sure how long this game will be yet. But I want there to be a few hours worth of content. I have the main story line vaguely outlined in my mind, but certainly things to figure out as I go along.

I also want to put in side quests and fun little things to do in the world throughout. Because when I play games I always end up liking the little extras the most.

[Matthew Rayfield]

May 17th 2018 Updates

I've been working on the battle system. At first I made something that involved bouncing balls around the map and trying to hit your enemy. But I didn't really like it.

I want the battle system to have a different feel than the rest of the game.

So here's what I have so far... It's the transition from map to the battle screen:

( entering battle mode )

Next up is to have the actual battle gameplay. I'm not exactly sure how it will work, but broadly I want to have it based on throwing items at your enemy.

Each item will have a different weight and attributes which will alter how it's thrown and how much damage it does.

I've done a few other things in the game engine, but nothing very exciting to show now. Just stuff that will help with building the game world.

My near term goal is to create a demo of the game with just the first town. Even though I'm still quite early in development, I want to be able to release a little something for people to play with.

Okay, that's all for now ! Please let me know if you have any feedback on the battle system transition. I want it to be cool !

Thanks for checking out my progress !

[Matthew Rayfield]

June 27th 2018 Updates

Hey there ! So this update is a little bit overdue, but I still wanted to post it.

I've been working on the battle system more and I thought it would be cool to show the iterations I went through for the throwing mechanic.

The aiming aspect of the throwing is super straight forward. Aim more to the left, aim more to the right. Easy. But once you've picked an angle, you have to select how much power you'll throw with, a la Worms or Gunbound. This control for me was more of a challenge..

#1

My first attempt. I liked how this looked, but it didn't play well. With only 4 levels of power it was very difficult to shoot precisely. You might overshoot, step one power level down the next shot, and undershoot. I tried a few things to remedy this, adding more dots (was ugly), allowing for greater angle precision (was confusing), etc. But I had to face facts that I needed a MUCH MORE precise power control...

#2

So I tried something like this. Much greater precision. Instead of 4 levels of power this has a range of something like 0-50. And I even liked how this looked ! However, I knew that without any visual markings to indicate how much power you were using (other than the length of the arrow) it was going to be frustrating to adjust your power on the next turn. Even when I tried to put a little tick mark showing how much power you used previously, the relatively small size of the arrow still meant a lack of precision...

#3

So I added some measurement markings ! This worked a littttttle bit better. But, I didn't like how it looked. And it was also hard to be precise, because again, not a lot of space for the visual indication of power.

#4

This was just a quirky idea. Kind of thinking of the gauge more like a spring. I like how it made the ball seem to launch like a pinball. But it still had the same problems as the previous control. It was also kind of confusing..

#5

Decided to bite the bullet and make a radial power gauge. And it instantly felt better ! A much wider range of power possibilities now that the gauge takes more area. And the tick marks instantly give you something to base your power on. Plus the "last shot tick" lets you make adjustments relative the last shot. It's nothing ground breaking UI wise, but it feels good and I'm almost happy. I just have to...

#6

Remove that arrow ! And now I am happy with the look and the feel of this UI : ]

These little GIFs focus on the look of the UI, but I was equally concerned with feel. For each iteration I was testing the UI in a mockup battle scene. A test bed where I had to be precise with my shots. If the UI wasn't capable of that task, it was on to the next one.


I have a good deal more of the battle system done. But I'll leave that for another update. Here's a taste:

Also working on the environment for an "early look" demo:

More info on that demo to come... : ]


Let me know what you think !

Thanks for checking out my progress !

[GaryTheWizard]

Ah that entering battle animation looks great! Fan of the style too, I always like wriggling/line boil on animations

[Matthew Rayfield]

Ah that entering battle animation looks great! Fan of the style too, I always like wriggling/line boil on animations

Thank you !

I'll post the end-of-battle animation soon.