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[SolarLune]

Game's looking outstanding. Love the simple graphics. Keep up the good work. P.S. Adding an inventory is a lot of work, but I like the feeling of filling it up with items. Although, you can usually gauge how far through the game you are by how many essential slots you've filled. Kind of a downer when you know you're near the end. Anyway, carry on! 

[Painting]

If I had my midi controller/synth with me I'd ask if you needed music or sound fx or somethin.

I have my midi controller/synth with me.  If you're wondering.

I'll probably put up a public demo once my composer finishes some songs for the game!

[Hempuli‽]

Unfortunately, there wont be much of an 'inventory' per se, but you can certainly see your collected items in the HUD. The 'pause menu' will look something like this:

As you see, the map eats a lot of space although technically I could go the Super Metroid way and include subpages. Don't know if that's really necessary, though.

If I had my midi controller/synth with me I'd ask if you needed music or sound fx or somethin.

I have my midi controller/synth with me.  If you're wondering.

I'll probably put up a public demo once my composer finishes some songs for the game!

Yeah, I've already got a composer. Thanks all the same.

[mokesmoe]

You could also add scrolling, but that size looks fine.

I like how we got a nice metriodvania discussion out of this. Lots of fun.

[Hempuli‽]

You could also add scrolling, but that size looks fine.

Yeah, scrolling could be a possibility, but personally I'm not a huge fan of it. I like a more compact design.

To continue the metroidvania talk, what kind of puzzles have you enjoyed in metroidvanias? The game currently consists mostly either of just plain fighting or jumping 'puzzles', but I can't think of any interesting actual puzzles that could go well with the design. Pushing blocks is a safe bet but that's kinda old and boring. Any ideas?

[DangerMomentum]

I've always enjoyed figuring out how to use the abilities I have to get to my objective. Fusion was really good about this- you would often times find speed boost blocks in a place where speed boosting seemed impossible, and it would take some clever navigation to make it through the blocks with your boost intact.

[Painting]

This is only tenuously related to puzzles, but I've always loved abilities having a couple of really obscure uses that most players may never see. After years of playing the game, I seriously just found out today that the Wheel ability in Kirby and the Amazing Mirror can travel on hills situated on the ceiling; a bit of level design that barely ever shows up in the game at all, and is never necessary. You could have the grappling hook interact in particular ways with certain enemies, for instance.

It's a pretty cliche thing to say, but it's totally true - even if most players won't ever see it at all, it can really add to the experience.

[mokesmoe]

Remember, stick with what works. Don't say "Block puzzles are old, so I will use something else." Say "Block puzzles are old, so how can I make them more interesting?" You could add moving platforms to your block puzzles. Make your grappling hook interact with the blocks in some way.

Also, the things many people don't see are great. Like in Kirby 64, you can hold stuff above your head in order to throw it. Some enemies will do useful stuff on your head though, like most projectiles trowing enemies will keep shooting stuff that can kill other enemies.

[BlueSweatshirt]

You should try making an enemy you could use the grapple hook on

[Painting]

Something like that ground-worm spazzing out and dragging you around with it would be baller.

[Lizardheim]

Sooo... Any ETA on demo?

[Hempuli‽]

Unfortunately no; the code is quite much ready for that but my composer is in a great hurry so estimates on when he finishes the needed tracks are a bit unclear.

[Lizardheim]

But you're just waiting for the soundtrack, right?

[Hempuli‽]

But you're just waiting for the soundtrack, right?

Yeah, the areas I intend to include in the demo are finished.

[Lizardheim]

Hey did I ever told you the story of how I became deaf?

Oh well I tried atleast...

[BadgerManufactureInc]

Hello.

I'm really looking forward to this. 

Ever since Officer Alfred I've been following your work, and this is shaping up to be my most favourite of all your games so far.

[andy wolff]

This looks quite lovely and I want to play it. I had seen the gifs around, but I'm not sure how I missed this devlog

[Hempuli‽]

I've been stuck with the underwater area - player's slow movement and awkward controlling makes designing interesting rooms quite difficult. It's not helped by the fact that I'm slightly out of ideas as to what kind of puzzles/challenges the area should have.

Here's a super-cool visualization:


The red blob represents areas that are quite much done, and the blue blob represents this underwater sector which is causing problems. Good thing it's small!

[JMickle]

Make it take place in/around tubes? Water areas need tubes, and you can make them any size you dang want!

[SolarLune]

Do like Cave Story and add currents to toss you about. Exploiting them would mean faster movement and access to hidden areas.

You could also add some sort of extremely powerful enemy - being chased while running slowly through an underwater maze would be pretty crazy.