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[tchassin]

Update 62
Hey there!

Since there are no big features left to code, I spent the week making small improvements and fixing some low priority bugs. Enemies are no longer deleted when you run away from a fight, they are simply deactivated for a few seconds instead. I also added some visual feedback to the field section: healing at a fox statue or cutting down bushes will now play an animation.

Most importantly, I think the battles feel a lot better now that I added SCREEN SHAKE to the game (it can be turned off in the options). See for yourselves:

As you can see on the gif above, I started working on better visual effects. Soon the game will be rid of placeholders! The new battle sprites are also in progress, but I think it is still a bit early to show them.

See you next week!

Cheers!  

EDIT: I am taking a little break away from the computer, updates will resume on August 13. See you then!

[tchassin]

Update 63
Hey there, long time no see!

The new battle sprites are coming along pretty nicely! They still need some polish, but I think some frames look good enough for a sneak peek:

               

As you can see, the new sprites are larger and more detailed, which is why we had to cut down the number of frames per animation.

In the mean time, Pierre and I are also working on the UI and new gameplay mechanics. Once again, we are considering delaying the next demo a bit in order to add a couple more features and create a better experience. I will keep you informed!

See you next week (for real this time)!

Cheers! 

[Ashedragon]

Those look absolutely lovely!

[tchassin]

Those look absolutely lovely!

Thank you! I'm glad you like them!

Update 64
Hey there! I got a bit behind schedule this week but we're back on track!

Pierre and I decided to discard the previous enhancement system. It didn't bring much to the game and required the player to go through an extra menu for any action in battle, which was a bit of a drag on the long term. Additionally, it caused a few bugs and was quite hard to maintain.

As of today, enhancements have been replaced by Sigils, a simpler yet better feature. Sigils are items that can be used by any character in your party to use special skills in combat. They can be equipped using SP (Sigil points), stronger sigils requiring more SP. Once a sigil is used, it cannot be used again until the player reaches a healing statue or win a number of fights based on its SP cost. They can be dropped by bosses or found in special treasure chests throughout the game.

I'm still working on the sprites and should be done with them (except the boss) at some point this week.

See you on Sunday!

Cheers!

[alaNintendo]

Reminds me a bit of Breath Of Fire for some reason, Love it!

edit:

But man did that box art mislead kids in the 90's

[tchassin]

Reminds me a bit of Breath Of Fire for some reason, Love it!

Thanks, the sprites are mostly inspired by those from Breath of Fire IV!

Update 65
Hey there!

I don't have a lot to say this week because I mostly fixed bugs and did some polishing. Since the game is in a playable state, I also had some friends test it. Of course, they found more bugs and things to improve, so I guess I know what I will be working on this week.

On the graphics side, I finished the sprites (except the boss), but since Pierre was not available this week so I am still waiting for feedback for the finishing touches.

See you next week!

Cheers! 

[tchassin]

Update 66
Hey there! Sorry for not updating the devlog yesterday!

This week, I finished implementing the background music and the navigation sounds. It completely changed the game atmosphere. It is a lot better now! I also corrected a good number of bugs and should be done with the most annoying. Finally, the battle result screen received a complete overhaul. The previous design was simple but had several pages and it was becoming annoying to click through them all.

I came up with a more efficient design that fit on a single page while displaying information more clearly:

I think it is a lot better this way!

Pierre is back and gave me feedback on the character sprites, so I am making small improvement to the sprites. For example, you can see on the screeshots that I added a shadow since the last time.
Pierre is also making slow but steady progress on the new UI skin and I cannot wait to share it with you. It is looking really good!

See you on Sunday!

Cheers! 

[tchassin]

Update 67
Hey there!

Since the code for Blade of Victory v0.5 is mostly done and the game is in a playable step, I started working on a demo build and had some friends give it a go. They found a couple bugs and gave me some useful feedback for the next public build. I am currently working on a better sword attack since it is the least reliable feature at the moment.

I also spent some time improving the battle sprites. Pierre is super busy again so the UI is progressing slowly and I won't be able to show you anything today. Sorry

I won't have much time to work on the game in the next days, so see you in two weeks!

Cheers! 

[tchassin]

Update 68
Hey there!

Since last time, lots of things happened.

First, an important announcement: we finally found a new title! The game is now called Blade of Verdance. We chose this name for several reasons. Verdance is the name of the kingdom where the game takes place and we though using an in-game element in the title would make it less generic, thus reducing the chances of someone else releasing a game with the same title before us again. We also wanted the keep the BoV acronym (after all, the project is still called "BoV Prototype" on my disk) because we grew used to it.

Victoire's sword attack was completely reworked (code and animation): it can now hit several targets in an arc, which feels much more satisfying and makes hitting enemies a lot easier. I also added a character/weapon compatibility system and different weapon types. Victoire now wields swords, Latharn staves and Erik bows.

On the visual side, Pierre and I are currently iterating over the existing battle sprites. Pierre finalized the boss design and his idle pose so I can start animating it.

But the biggest news of the week is that the new UI is done! All navigations bugs are fixed (for now) and the placeholders have finally been replaced.

It's not final and still needs some polish, but doesn't it already look a lot better? Pierre really did a good job on this one!

On a side note, I've been thinking about writing more technical posts, maybe once a month, focusing on how the game is made and the reasons behind the design choices. I've got several topics on mind: the reasons that lead me to switch to Unity, our solution for pixel-perfect scaling, how we handle data, etc. How does that sound?

See you next week!

Cheers! 

[Ashedragon]

The UI is very nice. o:
Not too cluttered or too simple.

[RujiK]

That pixel art is really good. Especially the 8 directional girl and the portraits. Nice stuff!

[tchassin]

The UI is very nice. o:
Not too cluttered or too simple.

Thanks! Pierre spent a lot of time on it.

That pixel art is really good. Especially the 8 directional girl and the portraits. Nice stuff!

Thanks! The new portraits will be in the next demo build, as well as an updated field sprite.

[tchassin]

Update 69
Hey there!

This week, Pierre and I finalized the sigil list for the demo. Some required to implement additional features to existing systems so it took longer than expected. I also improved the AI, fixing some rare bugs occurring during the boss fight in the process.

On the graphics side, I polished the field attack animation and it looks a lot better. I reduced the anticipation to make the attack feel more responsive. I also reduced the number of frames to mirror the style of the battle sprites.

I also made a draft of each of the boss' animations and I am waiting for Pierre's feedback. Finally, I changed the main menu screen to reflect the title change.

Pierre is polishing the portraits and should start working on the new battle background in the next few days.

Once we are done with the graphics, we should be able to release a new demo, so stay tuned!

See you on Sunday!

Cheers! 

[tchassin]

Update 70
Hey there!

The new demo is almost complete !

Pierre is working on a new battle background and I am currently polishing the boss sprite. We'll publish the new build as soon as were are done, which should happen this week.

See you soon!

Cheers! 

[tchassin]

Update 71
Hey there!

It is done! The new demo is out! Tell your friends!

You can play in your browser of choice  here (also available for download)

If you do play it, could you please take some time to give us some feedback? Thanks in advance!

See you next Sunday!

Cheers 

[radynaraya]

I got play your Demo. I love classic RPG like Suikoden and BOF and your demo reminds me so much of them. I love your sprite for pixel art. I'll follow your thread! 

[stewiepixels]

just came across your game. Looks lovely !

[tchassin]

I got play your Demo. I love classic RPG like Suikoden and BOF and your demo reminds me so much of them. I love your sprite for pixel art. I'll follow your thread! 

Thanks! I hope you had fun!

just came across your game. Looks lovely !

Thank you! We put a lot of effort into it!

Update 72
Hey there!

It's been almost a week since the second demo came out. We learned from the first one and collected feedback from the players through a Google form this time. It paid off, a lot more people answered and we got more precise feedback.

The feedback was very positive. Players enjoyed the demo and really liked the graphics but were more reserved regarding the battle system and some felt the system was not original enough. Most players said they wanted to learn more about the story and characters in-game.

The demo seems to be a lot more stable than the previous one since we didn't get any crash reports, only minor bugs or glitches were found. We are pretty happy with how it all turned out! 

After releasing the demo, I started implementing new features again. I implemented a new save/load system and started studying the new Unity Tilemap feature in order to edit maps directly in Unity instead of using Tiled. I am also working on small productivity tools.

In the meantime, Pierre and I are designing new features to make the battle system feel more interesting and unique and a character progression system.

See you next week!

Cheers! 

[tchassin]

Update 73
Hey there!

Earlier this week, I wrapped up Blade of Verdance v0.5 after importing some fixes and improvements from the demo build. Our new goal is to build an horizontal slice of the game, a base we will improve over time. I wanted to begin with improving the dialogue system by I noticed something was wrong with NPCs:

Turns out Unity's physics engine, which handle collisions, did not work the way I wanted. After fiddling with the available settings and doing some research, I decided to write my own collision system on top of Unity's. It did not turn out very well at first:

After trying different approaches, I found an acceptable solution. I'll try to improve it at a later date, I need to take a break from physics for now.

I also started working on a simple localization solution. It was originally planned for much later, but it occurred to us that it should be done while there isn't a lot of text in the game. It will support external translation files in the JSON format.

See you next week!

Cheers! 

[tchassin]

Update 74
Hey there!

I spent some more time on the collision system this week and it's working pretty well now, except for that one edge case where you can moonwalk through walls. Since it's  pretty rare, I'll leave it for now.

I also implemented and tested the localization system:

Et voilà! The language can now be changed from the main menu and does not require restarting the game.

Pierre and I also settled on new features for the battle system. I'll tell you more about it when I start implementing them, after the horizontal slice.

See you next week!

Cheers!