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[cubit]

No harm no foul I know that this project could seem to have been dwindling along but I promise I'm working as hard as I can to get it in good shape. I'm also talking to some folks about teaming up with other devs to speed things up considerably. You will have those visible POD legs!

[io3 creations]

Hey cubit

Thank you for your detailed reply.

But, I often consider my life to be a rather unfortunate series of mistakes. I can just add another to that countless list

I know a few things about things not exactly working out as I planned them.    Some "mistakes" may turn out to be valuable life lessons later on.

Both videos are running in engine, not concepts - I moved over to UE4 a good while ago. Primarily because I had been using it day to day for my employment and had gotten very comfortable with it.

Yeah, the "physics" word in the title was a good indication that isn't just animation.    Plus, I had a suspicion that the graphics look more "Unreal-y" than made with Unity.  However, your Unity videos do look good and that's why I was wondering.

Clearly I have erred in this thread and I have obviously misconstrued what devlog means on Tigsource.

While I've visited a few times over the years, I've become a "regular" fairly recently so my opinion may not exactly reflect what devlog means on TIGsource.  Personally, I like your notes and description of your thought and work processes.  I could agree, that labeling work is a good idea to avoid confusion or misunderstanding.

There are many things to consider when posting work early on.  As you mentioned, it can be used to whet appetite but there is danger of someone "borrowing" and people associating it to that work if that other game comes out earlier.  I've read about a few games like that over the years.  Perhaps one lesson is that if you expect development to be "slow", then it might be better to wait until you have something more substantial to show.


Hmm, Codemasters ... I remember that game from my Commodore 64 era

That original leaked video has been lost due to the youtube account deletion, but here it is:

I would've had my suspicions that the video is more  "fake 3d" than actual 3d.  But then again, I'm a visual person and have been doing similar and 3d animations so I'm more perceptive in that regard.

I even posted in the comments that I had made the video, it was not meant to be publicly released and was only concept animations but my comment just got downthumbed! :D

It's not easy to convince people who really want to *believe* something to be true.


Looking at the previous pages, as I had similar thoughts about my spider game.  Though, with only one swinging "line" and rigid legs, some aspects are a bit different and need different considerations.  I haven't even considered grass or leaves type "bending" objects that could add quite a bit of challenge when designing game.  e.g. enemy AI considerations.

Hopefully, you'll find the resources *soon* that you need to make your game real. 

[SpacePotato]

Whoa what this? Cubic I can't believe you let some random dude single handedly change your state of mind like that.

I come to this forum (almost) everyday just to see if this devlog (and a few orthers) got any updates and now look what have you done mister Rojom. What came through your mind when you wrote an absolute negative comment like that mister Rojom? "Oh boy he promised us a painting now he's making a statue, boo...".

Look the game is not even changed that must right? From the start its 2.5D not 2D spider limbo. The art style still the same, procedural  leggings still there. From 2.5D to 3D it just like zoomed in, more immersive, more possibilities. I can't think of anything negative about this change accept it gonna take more time to finish this game cause obviously 3D space is more complicate right?

By the way I have an idea for justified 3rd person camera. 360-degree camera, yay! Or fruit fly drone.

[cubit]

Io3, didn't mean to imply you in that stuff about other projects nabbing inspiration It's just an word of warning to others to be careful what you put out there too early  

Hey SpacePotato

It's not so much an entire change of state of mind - I just thought it might be best to hold off on updates until things are more presentable. If the next updates are more developed then there less chance for misinterpretation. I just want to work on the game and I only have so much energy to divert to forums. I don't want to have to deal with forum tussles small or large because they play on my mind and then effect my ability to focus on work.

Truth is I'm not really very comfortable posting my work out into the world, I'm never fully satisfied with anything I create and then putting it out there still feels like sending my child out into the dark woods

But I do it because I think its the main way to build interest up for an indie title over time (as opposed to having a marketing campaign with a budget like "proper" game companies do). I think I perhaps just started too soon in retrospect.

[Jad]

Please post anything you like anytime you like and I've got your back for any person who feels entitled.

To me, this can become a game (which would fulfill your dream and as such satisfy me from an empathetic standpoint) but if it just stays as a document of ideas about rendering, wonderful lovely concepts I am equally happy. I expect nothing, but this devlog is one of the most beaufiful works of Forum Posting Art I've seen in a long time and I think it's just lovely.

Come any twists and turns in your vision, please feel free to post things here. I promise I will hold no expectations.

I'm already happy!

[SpacePotato]

Well friend I'm no master of marketing but if you want to build interest for your game then Devlogs forum is not very effective.

What you need is a twitter account. Seriously just post a picture every few days (maybe link to the devlog too) and the whole indie industry will follow you. Journalists, game developers, youtubers plus random people who interested in your game. You gonna get thousands of followers in no time. And when your game are done, make a kickass trailer, sent out emails and free keys to these journalists youtubers and boom that it, the rest is up to the game itself. Honestly I can't think of a better marketing strategy for an indie game other than posting pictures everywhere and a good trailer(+ real time gameplay).

Anyway, about devlogs, update your devlog frequently are very good thing to do. People can learn from you, encourage you, give you ideas, etc... Just take all those comments very lightly. If you read something that kind of upset you, just shrug and move on. Don't distance yourself or you may lose your working spirit.

It took me exactly 1 hour to write just this many words. Life is hard when you are stupid.

[io3 creations]

Io3, didn't mean to imply you in that stuff about other projects nabbing inspiration It's just an word of warning to others to be careful what you put out there too early  

I didn't think so either.   I was just replying with my thought process.  One thing I forgot to include was exactly about that.  I have a few ideas that I considered starting a devlog for. Mainly to get feedback with certain aspects and see if the concept can be actually made into a full and fun game.  But since I wouldn't be able to work on it for some time and as you mentioned, somebody might be able to "borrow" the idea and finish the game earlier.   For that reason, I'll only start the devlog once I have a good "headstart" so the concerns mentioned won't be issues.

Since you switched to Unreal, have you considered the Unreal Developer Grant?  The amount may vary but could still be beneficial and at least it doesn't seem to be as restrictive as publishers.   One issue might be is the amount of gameplay or other work that already needs to be shown with the Unreal engine rather than just concept drawings or animations.  If interested, it could be worth it to give it a try.

[io3 creations]

Well friend I'm no master of marketing but if you want to build interest for your game then Devlogs forum is not very effective.

What you need is a twitter account. Seriously just post a picture every few days (maybe link to the devlog too) and the whole indie industry will follow you. Journalists, game developers, youtubers plus random people who interested in your game. You gonna get thousands of followers in no time. And when your game are done, make a kickass trailer, sent out emails and free keys to these journalists youtubers and boom that it, the rest is up to the game itself. Honestly I can't think of a better marketing strategy for an indie game other than posting pictures everywhere and a good trailer(+ real time gameplay).

Anyway, about devlogs, update your devlog frequently are very good thing to do. People can learn from you, encourage you, give you ideas, etc... Just take all those comments very lightly. If you read something that kind of upset you, just shrug and move on. Don't distance yourself or you may lose your working spirit.

It took me exactly 1 hour to write just this many words. Life is hard when you are stupid.

I agree that posting updates on multiple social media channels can be beneficial. Especially, since certain people have their own preferences and may have accounts on some media.  You can build up a nice following but I wonder about YouTubers or journalists following you.  I'm just saying that because I don't have much experience in that regard but heard more about developers contacting said YouTubers or journalists before the game is released or the at the start funding campaign. 

Overall though, I do agree that much like Steam and other platforms can provide a way to bypass publishers   if you have a "good" game and it's fairly easy and cheap to also market it one way or another.  That's the best part for "indie" developers.

[cubit]

Thanks for the kind word Jad I'll continue to post bits up on here from time to time.

Spacepotato, that sounds like good advice, I do have a twitter account and I have started posting recently, so we'll see how it goes - even though I am totally not one for social media (i'm not "social" at the best of times! Too much work to do haha).

Io3, Yep - plenty of indies get massive exposure so it's definitely doable! I suppose it's just getting that initial first 'buzz' about your project to trigger general sharing amongst gamers.

In the spirit of posting more, here's last nights effort: Have you ever wondered what it would look like to a small bug looking up through the tiny branches of a garden moss? Here's an ingame shot. Next step are the sporophytes!

[cubit]

And todays further development of the moss scene with added spore pods (in game shot):

[io3 creations]

Very nice!     And the minimum system requirements are going to be ... ? 

Interestingly,  if you are near to the ground, the thicker the vegetation, the shorter the viewing distance so in theory you can have more details.  Though, that's just one aspect and with sparser vegetation or open areas things will obviously change. Also, it may not be that easy to simplify the physics part where static path and dynamic object considerations are important.

When it comes to "social" media, as a developer working on a game, you can think of it as a devlog.  As mentioned before, you post your progress (images, videos) and if people ask questions, answer them.  Interestingly, there has been a similar question on this topic in another thread: https://forums.tigsource.com/index.php?topic=54019.msg1228103#msg1228103
@UnfoldedGames mentioned how the Greenlight campaign brought a lot of followers.

[cubit]

Probably nothing too out of the ordinary, I have a decent midrange graphics card and I'm getting 35 fps at full graphics settings and I haven't created any LOD's yet, so the performance should improve dramatically because there are a lot of wasted verts The further away leaves can become billboards very quickly.


Thanks for the link, I've also heard that greenlight gets a lot of traffic to devs - definitely a good option there.

[io3 creations]

Though that might change a bit once you start adding environmental/vegetation destruction ~ as in Crysis.   My rig at that time could barely reach the medium settings and it was very apparent that some of the destroyed tree branches and tree trunks didn't move very realistically.  But, in a way, it was still fun though.   Not sure if you had ideas for that but based on your grass deformation tests, I'd imagine explosive shockwaves would have some affect on nearby vegetation movement.

[cubit]

ahh yes, the veg destruction is something I'd like very much but I'll have to consider that after the POD's in good shape and see how far I can take it. I'd say it's doable but how far reaching it can be will depend. It's part of a wider challenge of the vegetation physics. Even for normally simple things like wind, Although I can use vertex offsets in the shaders for subtle motion, I cannot really use it to the degree it's often found in games for wind FX etc (the Witcher 3, did it well recently). But, fancy physics enabled vegetation will likely be an option if activated/deactivated in a smart way. I hope

[io3 creations]

Haven't played the game but found a few wind effect related videos and agree that the trees move quite well ... but one of my pet peeves is when even in a windy place the characters' hair moves as if there was no wind - e.g. being covered by some kind of "force-field".  Kinda immersion breaking. 

[cubit]

Agreed! Witcher 3 also had hair and clothing being affected, so the illusion was pretty complete.

[io3 creations]

I went over the pages and have to say again that I really like the attention given to the design details.  My "notes" are about 2/3rd the way there.  The content is there just not as polished.  But it's only for me so that's ok.   It's been useful when I had to refer to it during other projects months or years later.  Especially, commenting my code has been useful.


Based on some of the documents, it seems as if the game was developed for consoles (or at least for controllers).  Do you also plan to develop it for computers with keyboard/mouse only?

As you know, usually it's recommended to do a prototype to see if the concept even works as a game.  Have you done any playable prototypes (2d or 3d) for the pod movement? I'm thinking mainly about moving up on walls or plants.  Or will that come after the environmental physics has been established?

[cubit]

So it was originally gamepad focused when it was a sidescroller and at one time I had pitched the game as a console title. Now I'm focusing on mouse/keyboard controls for PC but a gamepad will work just fine. As indies the PC is just a lower barrier to entry (No devkits, certification etc), plus I'm a PC gamer so the last console I have actually owned was a SNES!

The prototype is in the works but it's more to do with technical problem solving and bringing all the different aspects into one working base. Gameplay wise I'm very clear on how it'll handle and play - so have a strong vision of those areas. That's not to say it won't require plenty of tuning along the road of course.

[SpacePotato]

Everybody has a strong vision of how their game will play, until they try the prototype, heh heh.

[cubit]

That certainly can be true, we will find out soon enough in this case too