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[JLJac]

Haha yep, garbage worms are going to get the bezier curves in their polish pass!

Update 529

Working some on alternate food sources. First up, pop corn!



These "seed cobs" require a spear to open. Once you've opened one, you can eat your fill from it - it allows you to max out your food meter. However, once opened it will go stale (like the other two in the gif) for many cycles, I have the default set to 7-10, but it's tweakable on James' end.

The idea is that these are sort of a limited resource where you have to make some interesting decisions - you can get free food, and all you need, now - but then you won't have it for later. So coming across one of these you'll have to ask yourself if you REALLY need it right now.

The ideal tactic I imagine is to be using them mainly when moving between regions. It has previously been sort of a problem that you manage to collect enough "karma" to pass into a neighboring region, but once through the gate you starve because you don't know where the food is in the uncharted territory. The alternative is to get some food in your starting region and then move out - but then the time pressure can be really rough. So with these, you'll be able to scope one out but save it until you're doing your rush for another region - then you can fill up before moving out, giving you a bit of a softer start in the next region.

[Christian]

A very nice 15min in-depth sneak peek with Gamespot from PAX East :

Looks fantastic but...

The game still has those insta-death off-screen falls? Any plans to add some effect so we know which drops are deadly and which drop you into a lower room?

[Saijin_Naib]

Any chance for the map revealing itself quicker or slower based upon heatmapping to emulate the Slugcat's ability to recall the rooms from memory? I'm really thinking that idea would make the map fit the idea of being based upon memory much more strongly and would communicate that to the players intuitively without feeling gamey.

Further detail below:

Would heatmapping be something you could apply to the map to further make the map feel more organic and like recalling a memory?

Currently, it sounds like you have a simple binary mask (revealed/hidden), but I'm wondering if you couldn't also make a heatmap using some color depth (4-bit? 8-bit?) that would represent the number of times SlugCat was in a given room. The more times in a given room, the higher the value of the heatmap for that location. The heatmap would be how "fresh" that room is in SlugCat's memory. You could also normalize the frequency of visits with the time since visit, thus allowing for "rot" of memory of that location.

By combining the binary mask and the heatmap, you'd have a recall system that instead of spreading outwards in a linear fashion would reveal the most "fresh" or remembered regions by the SlugCag first, and then, after struggling, SlugCat would then slowly recall other locations that perhaps it visited infrequently or a very long while ago.

[tortoiseandcrow]

It's really wonderful to see some extended gameplay. It looks and sounds amazing.

Also: eeeee! Popcorn!

[Crispy75]

Looks fantastic

I'm still a little worried about the clarity of foreground vs. background. When James was looking for a vulture, I had a hard time knowing which poles could be climbed and which were in the background...

[Saijin_Naib]

I'm still a little worried about the clarity of foreground vs. background. When James was looking for a vulture, I had a hard time knowing which poles could be climbed and which were in the background...

Yeah, that environment seemed to be pretty tough that way. I'm wondering if it is just a video colorspace/compression issue and it is clearer in-game.

If not, perhaps some more fog or another cloud/vapor layer, or maybe just some more background obscuring between the two would help differentiate them somehow?

[battlerager]

I'm still a little worried about the clarity of foreground vs. background. When James was looking for a vulture, I had a hard time knowing which poles could be climbed and which were in the background...

Yeah, that environment seemed to be pretty tough that way. I'm wondering if it is just a video colorspace/compression issue and it is clearer in-game.

I had 0 problems with that, my only "readability" problem was that I thought all the spiky things (plants?) everywhere were deadly spikes.s 

Game looks fantastic in motion, can't wait.

[JLJac]

Update 530

Food sources pt. 2, Water Nuts. These guys are originally hard little seeds, that can in fact be used as rocks for throwing at enemies, and are completely inedible. If you dip them in water though, they become a delicious frog egg kind of watery blob.



How much of a pain getting them to water will be, is completely up to James over in level design department. Sometimes they might grow very close to water, making it easy to just plop them in and enjoy. Other times, it might be a long haul where you have to ask yourself whether it's worth it to bring them with you, as they do occupy your paws that could otherwise be used for carrying spears or catching bats.

[theEasternDragon]

I can see the news headlines now: "Brilliance achieved, gamers everywhere rejoice", "The gaming industry has taste again, Ubisoft to go broke".

A few months... soon my precious... soon.

[presidenthobbes]

Update 530

Food sources pt. 2, Water Nuts. These guys are originally hard little seeds, that can in fact be used as rocks for throwing at enemies, and are completely inedible. If you dip them in water though, they become a delicious frog egg kind of watery blob.

How much of a pain getting them to water will be, is completely up to James over in level design department. Sometimes they might grow very close to water, making it easy to just plop them in and enjoy. Other times, it might be a long haul where you have to ask yourself whether it's worth it to bring them with you, as they do occupy your paws that could otherwise be used for carrying spears or catching bats.

If you wanted to be risky, could you wait for the rains to start, and open them using the water from the opening downpour (that doesn't kill you)? I really think that some high risk food that encourages you to cut it real close with the rains would be amazing, and these water nuts could very well fit that niche in the drier areas.

[jamesprimate]

^^ gooooood point, im def going to use that :O

[Christian]

I got to ask, how much tutoralizaling/hints will there be to help players? Because a lot of those seem like things you'd discover by pure luck. For example, that a spear would open up a corn shell but not a rock, or that you'd need to carry a nut to water. Or that those things are even edible. Will there be environmental storytelling or maybe scripted events that occur to hint at those things?

[jamesprimate]

none! or at least very little. its a sandbox, with multiple ways through every path, so we really want people to experiment and discover things for themselves. in fact often when showing the game we see players finding solutions that we didnt even anticipate, which is amazing! handholding would spoil that i think.

that said, im working on the tutorial right now, which is few rooms of environmental puzzles forcing the player to learn basics of control and game mechanics, perhaps with a little glowing holographic helping hand 

[JobLeonard]

^^ gooooood point, im def going to use that :O

If nothing else, it makes the "physics" of the world feel more consistent; which is what separates the Spelunkies from the average platformer.

[Lucs]

that said, im working on the tutorial right now, which is few rooms of environmental puzzles forcing the player to learn basics of control and game mechanics, perhaps with a little glowing holographic helping hand 

Overseers confirmed in the tutorial ! 

[typhvs]

A very nice 15min in-depth sneak peek with Gamespot from PAX East :

Looks fantastic but...

The game still has those insta-death off-screen falls? Any plans to add some effect so we know which drops are deadly and which drop you into a lower room?

Just so great guys...   

[JLJac]

Update 531

Food pt. 3, jellyfish!



The jellyfish float on the surface in shoreline region, behaving perhaps a bit more like a portuguese man-o-war than an actual jellyfish.  They are a pretty straight cut food source - you just collect them and munch them down in 3 bites like most other edibles. I did want to add something to make them a little bit more exciting though, so they do have sticky tentacles. The tentacles don't stick on every collision, but swimming through them there's a small chance to get tangled. If that happens, the jellyfish acts as a buoy making it harder to dive down, which might be a slight annoyance. After being stuck for a little while the jellyfish will stun you momentarily and then let you go. It's easy to get away though - just get out of the water, or even just do a swim-jump up above the surface. Or better yet, grab the thing and gobble it down!

[Christian]

Man, the sheer number of different species in this game is insane. You're putting stuff like Far Cry and its "ecosystem" to shame.

[cloudgods]

Whoa this is looking so good! The interactions between the different NPC species is really impressive and finding ways of using them against each other is so interesting as a mechanic. I'm so excited for this game!

[Magurp244]

I'm curious, how do the additional food sources (jellyfish/popcorn plants/water nuts) fit into the ecosystem vis a vis other species? Do the jellyfish entrap and consume other fish type species? Do the scavengers harvest and store water nuts for later consumption? Etc.