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[MaloEspada]

all those filters applied to the pixel art look amazing

[superflat]

Thanks man - I think it's more exciting in motion because you get all the dither patterns overlapping with different colours, the moving fog and the noise and so on.

The way it's done is quite convoluted - it's probably a 8 pass process or something...  

- First comes the fog.  It's a simple Pixel Bender shader (so it runs on its own thread) which scrolls three copies of the same semi-transparent texture at different speeds  It always goes R-L, but nobody's noticed that so I'm fine with it!

- First lighting process is to prepare the virtual lights (the Pixel Bender shader I wrote supports three, one of which is used for the flashlight.)  The scene supports infinite virtual lights, but it wall only render the three nearest the camera, so this bit of code just assigns the properties of the two nearest virtual lights to their two spare shader brethren. This means setting up their colours and attenuation as well as the bitmap mask that's used to draw them, and nice things like glows, flickers and fades.  

- The light shader does its thing and is applied to the main buffer.

- Next is the warp shader, which is in use in the top screen, but probably not doing that much.  It's used to convey general fucked-up-ness.  This has four main parameters - the scratch texture in use (and its position) for old-movie type effects, a desaturation parameter, a blur parameter and TV+magnet-like sin-wave displacement thing.  A lot of the work is done code-side to get an interesting spread of parameters, and not have everything fuck up at once.

- That's then applied on top of the fog/light pass.

- In hi-fi mode (there's two modes, these shots are hi-fi,) two grain textures are applied, but updated at a slower framerate than the game (around 24fps which gives a nice filmy feel without sacrificing the smoothness of the game which is meant to go at 60fps.)  One grain texture runs at the same resolution as the background image, one runs in native resolution.  In this way you get both the individual 4x pixels flickering, as well as the more realistic per-pixel film grain.

- The very last process is to apply the vignette / special texture.  This texture took about two days to get right!  It has a very subtle set of four overlays which are more pronounced towards the edge...  First is a simulation of an RGB CRT, so each 4x pixel is split into a reg, green, blue and 'gap' pixel.  Then there's the scanlines, which are very subtle indeed in this one (don't want to hammer them in every game I make.)  The next step is a vignette, just a general darkening towards the edges, and finally my favourite, which is the weird 'outlined pixel' thing, which you can spot towards the edge- the pixels become more like individual spot of light, like a faulty CRT or something.  Didn't want it all over the image, as it's too strong and distracts from flat areas of colour such as the player's shirt, but I ike the way it breaks up towards the edge.

[superflat]

Just a quick progress update here:

- Got inventory tallies appearing.
- Got the downward (leg) shot working, it makes the enemies retreat a bit, but doesn't do much damage.  Very useful when in packs.
- Made the headshot easier.
- Got gun reloading, automatically and via the menu.  The menu's realtime ala Demon's Souls in this game, so you can't reload while paused as in most RE / SH games.
- Added the ability to turn on and off the flashlight via the inventory menu.
- Added three or four new rooms.
- Completely redid the 'Thin Man' sound set, about 16 zombie noises and footsteps in all.
- Reduced enemy damage, increased the player's recoil time.
- Begun the introduction of the new enemy!

Have already gone past the deadline for Indiecade, there's another one in about 12 days, so I may well enter it... It feels like it's coming together well.

Next up is:

- Flashlight batteries / fading, dot a few around the world.
- Map?
- Finish the apartments 1F and the next section (probably best not to say what that is yet.)

[superflat]

Progress update...

Here's my screenshot saturday:



Things progressing very fast, I'm on the final section of the Apartment building which makes up about 1/3 of the game.

- The flashlight and battery system is in and really helps the feeling of tension.
- I've reduced lighting across the board.  I think it helps!
- Done some new music for the nightmarish sections.
- There's a bunch more food items (and soda!)  Each has differing effects on your immediate health and the health you regain by sleeping.  Short and long-term energy I guess.  I'm not revealing any stats to the player (apart from flashlight battery and ammo counts.)
- I've done about ten new rooms, a couple of new cutscenes and puzzles.  There's now 45 locations, which are between 1 and 10 screens wide.
- Improved the heartbeat / visual pain indicators.
- The big finale is in the works.  Can't reveal too much about it though!  I hope to get it done in a week or so, then focus on bug-fixes and polish for the last couple of days.

[TheLastBanana]

This looks great. Looking forward to trying it out!

[superflat]

Thanks man, appreciate the response as was starting to wonder whether I was just talking to myself in this devlog hehe. 

[Inanimate]

Yeah, the problem with devlogs is that sometimes I feel a bit funny responding... but rest assured, usually people are interested in your game.  I, for one, really love the aesthetics of this; it always lights me up whenever I see it.

[Hima]

Horror is one of my favourite genres ever so I really can't wait to try this.

[Cosr]

I just have to say that the palpable sense of atmosphere from just these still shots is delicious.

With the promise of hallucinations, I'm hoping for some good exploration of the protagonists damaged psyche, but I'm looking forward to this game in any event.

[MaloEspada]

Thanks man, appreciate the response as was starting to wonder whether I was just talking to myself in this devlog hehe. 

worry not; we are all here waiting to put our hands in this baby

[Sakar]

Surprised I haven't commented yet. This is looking wonderful, really looking forward to trying this game out

[superflat]

Thanks everybody, I guess I shouldn't be worrying about it too much then...

I'm still feeling great about the project, it's just that having worked on it so long, it's hard to see if it's still something that others might be interested in.  I'm sorta putting all my indie eggs in this basket!

I'm dying to show and share with you guys, but realistically it's months away still, and I've already put about a year in.  There will be a video at some point, and I'll keep posting screens and things here.  It's getting harder to do without showing the many things I want to keep secret.  So much of this game depends on having no spoilers, y'know?

It's going to be a commercial game, but not over-priced.  About 1/2 the size of a PS2-style survival horror.  There will be a large free online demo, perhaps 1/3 of the game (but with greatly reduced sound as the game already has about 30mb of music in the first level at the heaviest .mp3 compression I'm happy with.)

[cynicalsandel]

I'm looking forward to this game. It's one of the few devlogs I view consistently. However, I never have anything worthwhile to say.

[deadeye]

I too have been following this!  I just don't have much to say aside from what everyone else is saying... which can pretty much be summed up as "looks awesome, can't wait to play it"

[Paul Jeffries]

Looks awesome, love the graphical style.

[RichVreeland]

the game already has about 30mb of music in the first level at the heaviest .mp3 compression I'm happy with.)

win! was already looking forward to this but now even more!

[ShogunDusk]

あなたは私の好きなタイプ。

[gimymblert]

あなたは私の好きなタイプ。

As for you the type which I like.

[superflat]

@ShogunDusk ... ははは！どういう意味ですか？

Everyone else, thanks so much for the encouragement!  It really helps motivation on a long project like this.  I've just shared the latest build with a few friends, and the reaction's been surprisingly good.  I wish I could somehow clone myself and get all the art and level design done quicker, but it's gonna take months either way.

I remember Infinite Ammo's Alec saying something to the effect of how frustrating it is to do a story-based project which means you can't give away almost anything if you want to keep its impact.  I totally agree there!

What I can say about the story is I'm trying to take the path of Silent Hill 2, spinning a yarn which is about the character.  Psychological rather than body horror.  I'm writing elaborate back stories for all the characters and locations, even if they're never revealed, and making sure every interactive object in the world helps to reinforce this aspect.  I'm trying to tell a story with a lot left open for interpretation, and to have aspects which should read differently depending on how the player approaches things (your actions are all invisibly psychoanalysed.)

Although I have an intended meaning in my head, I don't want most people to discover it, or rather don't want to prescribe it, I'd rather let players get a sense of it, but also have their own interpretation.

Anyway, I'm rambling quite badly now, but I just wanted to try and get across the difficulty of getting a story like this right - making Soundless Mountain II I had my script laid out for me, here I must try and make something which elevates this game from being simple survival horror fanservice.  I hope not to let you all down!

[ShogunDusk]

@ スーパー  フラット

これは素晴らしく見えます