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[Quicksand-T]

Finally, I want a vilain with a purpose. Not something lame like destroying/conquering the world. To me, this is a cop out. No. A vilain must be convinced that he's good in his perception, that what he's doing is right, this, to me, is the key to an interesting vilain. The kind of vilain tou can sort of understand and feel sorry for.

The villain's husband/wife died sticking a fork in a jammed toaster. They want mandatory safety features added to appliances that would make the protagonist an obsolete, banned model.

[marcgfx]

not that easy. waffles require a machine, but why would they despise a toast. maybe a toast could not be considered a healthy breakfast, so the antagonist could be a healthy alternative. maybe the cereal killer? not that cereal is healthy per se. an apple a day keeps the doctor away, maybe fruit-salad? fruit-lord. just brainstorming...

[Zizka]

The villain's husband/wife died sticking a fork in a jammed toaster. They want mandatory safety features added to appliances that would make the protagonist an obsolete, banned model.

 :giggle:That would imply that the antagonist is human however...

not that easy. waffles require a machine, but why would they despise a toast. maybe a toast could not be considered a healthy breakfast, so the antagonist could be a healthy alternative. maybe the cereal killer? not that cereal is healthy per se. an apple a day keeps the doctor away, maybe fruit-salad? fruit-lord. just brainstorming...

The play on words "Cereal Killer", is a good play on words. I really want the antagonist to be bread or cereal though, so fruit would be out of the question.

I did think about having all food groups in the game but if you add the robots, it would be too much content for the game, I feel it would become bloated so to speak.

Dieter Doomsdonut  . But I guess the German scientist angle has been done before extensively.

I think I'll need to make concessions about the machine associated with the villain. I've done research and there's really not much besides a toaster that people would recognize  . It'd be so awesome two have the two of them go toe-to-toe in an epic battle. 

So, yeah, definitely not that easy.

[marcgfx]

maybe thinking about the most interesting opponents would be easier, than thinking about the most sensible one? the theme is everything but sensible, so why limit yourself so early on. by adding robots, you basically need to have the antagonist be a robot, or I don't quite understand the importance of them. or are you referring to the toaster itself as the robot, the suit? maybe it's about having a suit, so a bowl of milk (bowl as suit) could be a possible character. or a pencil and a sharpener, a seed and an apple. the flower and the pot... always two components that make up a character. the oven and the cookies. the infernal oven, with lots of nasty cookies !

[GregBTGS]

maybe thinking about the most interesting opponents would be easier, than thinking about the most sensible one? the theme is everything but sensible, so why limit yourself so early on. by adding robots, you basically need to have the antagonist be a robot, or I don't quite understand the importance of them. or are you referring to the toaster itself as the robot, the suit? maybe it's about having a suit, so a bowl of milk (bowl as suit) could be a possible character. or a pencil and a sharpener, a seed and an apple. the flower and the pot... always two components that make up a character. the oven and the cookies. the infernal oven, with lots of nasty cookies !

I like that idea; you could have a level (possibly a bonus/secret/hidden level) where the breads in a bowl of milk and has to slide to the end hitting things (possibly cookies) with the spoon (into the milk), but has to get to the end before going soggy (time limit).

[Zizka]

@marcgfx:

Yeah, maybe you’re right about the villain. Maybe I’m looking too much into this, lol. I just don’t want another doctor Wily I guess  .

About the robots:
I want my game to be nod to Mega Man, so I think robots are appropriate. But that’s not the only reason. Since all of the bosses of the game are some sort of tool or appliance, it made sense to me that enemies would be part of the same category. In a way, it’s limiting for sure. But in another way, foes make a coherent whole. I think it wouldn’t make much sense if I had, say, a piece of cheese shooting laser next to round saw walking about. The enemies need to be part of the same “gang” so to speak, well, to me anyway.

As for the main antagonist, I’ll put it on ice for now until I need to delve deeper into narrative. The thing is, with a game like this one, you can’t get too complex in the narrative but I wouldn’t it to be an afterthought either. The intro for Mega Man is usually a couple of screens long and lasts for less than 20 seconds. This being said, I want the best of Mega Man without the worst.

Narrative wise, I’m wondering about Pan’s origins. I’m wondering if I want him to be human in the first place but transformed in a slice of bread or a slice of bread somehow turned sentient. I was also toying with the idea of Pan being a failed genetic experiment to engineer a more advanced seed to grow cereals in harsher climate. I think that’s a good idea narrative wise but it seems too… deep? In a way, it needs to remain simple enough without having an intro of 30 minutes while being deep enough to be interesting.

Another idea is to have both protagonist and antagonist to crash on Earth following a fight in space in the vicinity. It's inspired by the Transformers. This way, I wouldn't need to explain everything, they both come from a planet where bread are living creatures. I was thinking the antagonist would be an expert in robotics (having even designed Pan's toaster suit) and would quickly turn the appliances in the house they crash in to turn them against Pan. That could be a good backbone for the story.

@GregBTGS:
The milk slide sounds good to me. Designing a secret level would be so awesome. It really all depends how well the KS campaign goes really. 

[marcgfx]

I'm not so sure you should go with alien/mutations, your setup is way too wacky for anything even pseudo-realistic in my opinion.

I wasn't planning on fleshing it out this much, but it was fun:
maybe dough could be seen as the opposite to toast, ... if dough was the antagonist (only dough is pure, hates dark toast), he could use a rolling-pin in the first battle, a mixer in the second. maybe defeating him, would be putting him in the oven -> *ding* when its done -> could result in his next incarnation (big fat loaf), he runs away swearing. he is now even more dangerous (he now hates himself as much as toaster guy and wants revenge). shred him and put him in the oven again -> "ding" -> bread crumbs (mini antagonists, but this might be taking it too far)

flower+water: how it all began, origins, separated at birth
dough: rolling-pin, mixer
big fat loaf: bread-cutter -> cuts himself up to make more antagonists
bread crumbs: ... maybe both toaster guy and antagonist turn into bread-crumbs and fight it out in an epic real time strategy level...

[Zizka]

Thanks for sharing this, marcgfx. 

I'm not so sure you should go with alien/mutations, your setup is way too wacky for anything even pseudo-realistic in my opinion.

Mutations will be necessary to justify the use of BNA for upgrades (this is necessary) though although not necessary in the narrative.

I'm not sure. A lot of great fiction has a basis in mutations such as the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles for example. I find difficult to explain the origin of the character without referring to the alien/mutation trope.

I wasn't planning on fleshing it out this much, but it was fun:
maybe dough could be seen as the opposite to toast, ... if dough was the antagonist (only dough is pure, hates dark toast), he could use a rolling-pin in the first battle, a mixer in the second. maybe defeating him, would be putting him in the oven -> *ding* when its done -> could result in his next incarnation (big fat loaf), he runs away swearing. he is now even more dangerous (he now hates himself as much as toaster guy and wants revenge). shred him and put him in the oven again -> "ding" -> bread crumbs (mini antagonists, but this might be taking it too far)

I don't think the reason to dislike Pan here is viable enough. Unless you meant it in a nazi sort of way (being pure), which could be interesting. A nazi dough as an antagonist. That'd be cool. 

The rolling-pin, I'll most likely keep, it's an ingenious idea for a weapon.

Most importantly, the dough idea is pretty damn cool. I was thinking of dressing the dough with some useless attire like a top hat, a monocle or something like that. The reason I like the dough is because, gameplay wise, there's a lot of potential here. Shapeshifting comes to mind: morphing into a fist to punch, growing in size, etc... Also, maybe I could play around with the idea of joining the whole "the dough", the dough wanting to re reunited with Pan (his missing part) to reach optimal form. There's something to tap here.

As a final boss, it would be easy to give him multiple stages too. First shape, second shape, third shape and so on.

flower+water: how it all began, origins, separated at birth
dough: rolling-pin, mixer
big fat loaf: bread-cutter -> cuts himself up to make more antagonists
bread crumbs: ... maybe both toaster guy and antagonist turn into bread-crumbs and fight it out in an epic real time strategy level...

Seperated at birth, why not. But why would they end up in the very same house though? The whole game is took take place in a single house, there needs to be a reason for the characters to meet and fight in that very house.

The real time strategy... would blow my programming budget through the roof unfortunately. I'd be funny to have many pieces of the dough argue together though (dough), as to the best plan to took out Pan. 

[marcgfx]

I don't know what you mean by BNA, but this is why I dont like the mutations: mutations occur in living things, before a toast can mutate you would have to explain how it came to life. so why not just skip the mutations. I dont think it needs an origin story that makes sense, because no matter what you try to explain, it will still make no sense. but of course thats up to you

I was thinking of an ethnic approach, pure/unpure, so yes it could be attributed to nazi and many other origins of conflict.

the rts idea was a joke I know how much work that would be to pull off... I've tried.

my try at an origin story:
why would they be in the same house: someone made dough (near a nuclear plant of course), made some bread from half of it and then cut the bread into slices of toast. the rest of the dough gets stored for later use in the freezer. the nuclear plant explodes the ingredients/devices come alive. the freezer stops working, the dough gets out of the freezer and is mad to see what has become of the rest of his/its beautiful body.

[oldblood]

For what it's worth-- this is a game about toasters. I would definitely not overthink anything story wise. If it's fun and funny, do it. This is a setting where you have all the freedom and you're not bound by the constraints of reality. Don't take yourself or your story too seriously...

[alvarop]

Do I sound like an asshole if I say that I might very possibly skip the story? I'm mostly interested in the gameplay. If there's stuff, during gameplay that pops-up and helps the game thematically, sure, but if it's cut-scenes or text, let me skip it please.

[Zizka]

@marcgfx:
I explained the necessity for robots/BNA in a PM  .

@oldblood:
Yeah, maybe I’m putting too much thought about it. Maybe people don’t even care about the origin of Pan and just want to play the game. For sure, this isn’t an RPG so the story really is secondary. Shovel Knight had a pretty “bare boned” story after all. I still need to find why they’re fighting however, that much is for sure. The whole nazi thing might be too “narratively intense” to be crammed in the game. Gah!

@alvarop:
Ohhh nooo! Yeah, well, I guess you might not be the only one who doesn’t care about story in a game like this . It interests me because it’s my game but I might probably skip it too if was another person’s game. But yeah, giving the option to skip cutscenes and the like is mandatory . I hate when I’m forced to watch something I have no interest in, so no worries about that. I think it’s pretty much a given function in games nowadays anyway.

[Nev]

Hi !
I'm Nev and i'm working on the SuperToasterGuy's game as LevelDesigner.
With Zizka, we work for done a full level playable in the Ks's demo.
If u have any question for me, i'm here now ! 

[Zizka]

Changed the log again,  . I'm sure by now you're addicted to the everchanging devlog logo! 

Music with Trev

Trev is moving studio at the moment which is why there’s not much happening at the moment. I’m hoping to share more content as soon as possible.

Programming with Sahand :

We’re currently at v.1.07 of the engine prototype. The reason why I’m not showing anything is because it’s not quite what I want it to be just yet (and I’m self-conscious about it!). It keeps improving but it’s not quite there yet. Next time I record a .gif about the engine, you’ll see a clear and cut improvement over the previous version you saw last.

The main issue is the rope jump. It’s too clunky at the moment and I want this to be super fluent and nimble. I want the player to feel like he has excellent control over the swing rope and the moves he can pull with it. I want the physics to be top notch. At the moment, when you release from a swing, the momentum isn’t portrayed accurately enough or not dynamically enough. Your momentum doesn’t carry you very far which makes the whole notion of rope jump not very exciting. I want the player to feel like spiderman swinging in between buildings, that kind of dynamism and speed is what I’m looking for.

A lot of other stuff is being implemented but I won’t be showing anything until the rope jump is the way I want it to be.
I’m trying to tweak the controls to be more responsive. I want Pan to react instantly to commands, I don’t want a single delay because of animation frames getting in the way. I’d rather have animations which are less fluid and accurate control than the other way around.

Another thing which bothers me is the way one of Pan’s foot changes orientation when shooting. It really annoys me (I was trying to reproduce Mega Man’s shooting stance but it just doesn’t work well). I’ll need to fix that.

Level Design with Nav

Nev (who has just introduced himself in the previous message, is currently getting into the details of actual level design.

Another sketch (as you can see, it's getting a lot more detailed):


I also have a much better idea of the enemies we'll be designing. Some of them are pretty cool I think.

Game Design: with me

Another thing I’d like to integrate is the whip. This was mentioned a while ago and I responded that I preferred the main weapon to be a long range weapon. I figured there really was no harm in adding a short-range melee weapon. I’d like the animation to be based of the Castlevania structure: not many frames but plenty of impact. I have a tendency to animate too animate with too many frames. This is a bad habit I’m working on. I feel like few animations give an unpolished look the characters but it’s because I don’t use certain techniques enough (like blurring for one thing).

I'm not happy with the current version, it lacks something. But, just to show that I am working on it:


Hair dryer, still wip:


Some questions I’m asking myself:
a. Should shooting your Voltcannon (long range weapon) use up LB (liquid butter)? This would force the player to rely both on melee and ranged attacks. It would also encourage players to try to grab butter cubes. In Mega Man, you basically never use secondary weapons except when facing a boss (bad design I think). Once emptied, the LB meter recharges up to a certain point, so it wouldn’t be very problematic as a game mechanic. Charged shots would also use more LB than regular shots. It would also make a LB meter upgrade more appealing. Right now, I think I’d like to implement that mechanic. In Earthworm Jim, your ammo is limited. Once you run out, you can still fire but only not as effectively. It also forces the player to be more considerate when using ammunition as opposed to firing constantly all over the place.

b. Should out-of-toaster form allows for other actions than just crawling? If I just let it crawl, just how much can I use this mechanic in-game? It would be limited and repetitive… OOT (out of toaster) should be fun too. I don’t want the player to think that OOT is a pain in the neck he has to go through. In “Ratchet and Clank”, I always thought the segments with Clank were irritating...

[Zizka]

Hello guys!

Another day, another toaster (and another log icon). By the way, do you like the log structure? Do you have any ideas to make those better? Always want to improve!

In the last log, I forgot to talk about the last rewards, so here they are.

@Avlarop:
Reply 70: feedback


@oldblood: Insanely informative and useful PM about Kickstarter.

@marcgfx:
reply #68: feedback


Reply #66: feedback


Reply #63: feedback


Reply #58: feedback


@Quicksand-T:
Reply #60:


@GregBTGS:
Reply #64: feedback


Music with Trev:
While waiting for new songs, I took some time to better evaluate my needs regarding music in order to calculate the amount for the Kickstarter.

Art with me:
Fixed the following:

Whip V.2 (wippit good!):


Hair dryer (can't get rid of the background in GraphicsGale):


MechaCopter (can't get rid of the background for some reason):


Working on the tileset at the moment.

I've approached my favorite pixel artist to do the title screen, fingers crossed!

Also, I've come to the realization that I would need to make my own font. There's just nothing out there for commercial projects.

Programming with Sahand:
So I’m glad to have another build to show you guys. Quite a lot of effort went into coding this, so thanks Sahand! A great many changes. I’ll let you observe them on your own instead of listing everything.
Here it is, enjoy!



Honestly, this has really, really boosted my motivation. Not that I wasn't motivated but when you see everything you've created take form the way you wanted it to be... it's a great feeling.


Narrative Conundrum:
A good deal was written about the narrative this week. It helped me focused and sort of funnel all of my ideas.
I’ve done some thinking and I agree that I have to stick to the bare minimum. I’m thinking two or three splash screens when the game launches to explain the plot.

The next objective will be to determine what to put on those splash screens. It has to look good, immediately immerse the player while not being too long for players like Alvarop (this isn’t a negative criticism, I’m that way too!).

Thanks to marcgfx’s feedback, I’ve creatively steered towards giving up the idea of having the villain riding a machine.
What has been suggested so far is an uniform dough as the main antagonist. I like the idea of the possibility to have the dough take various shapes gameplay wise. My only concern is:

Would a shapeless blog have much of an appeal design-wise? Shredder is an awesome villain, with plenty of punch and character. I’d like my villain to be the same, I don’t want it to be plain. How do you reconcile the versatility of the dough with great character? That’s what I’m pondering.

Kickstarter News:
I’ve recalculated my budget and I think I could lower the amount asked from 10,000 to 7,000$, which is a lot more reasonable. It all depends on those damn taxes really. If the Canadian government taxes 30%, it’s such a huge chunk of revenue which just vanishes!

It’s definitely taxable according to subsection 9 (1) of the Income Tax Act. It’s just a matter of determining just how much I would be taxed for.

Money used for rewards can apparently be tax deductible IF the requirements are met. Which is another way of answering nothing at all.

Anyways, reading stuff about taxes and not something I’d want to bore you with here.
(oldblood: no money for a CA at the moment, gotta do stuff on my own! ).

Stretchmarks:
I couldn’t sleep last night so I got up and brainstormed some ideas for stretch marks. I got nine of them, here they are:

1. Extra prologue stage: find more about the background of the main characters (Pan + dough).
2. New Game +
3. Longer music tracks
4. Dancing mini-game (pressing the beat with the buttons with Pan dancing).
5. Second playable character
6. Secret stage: hard to find but reveals a major plot twist!
7. Collectable concept art (meh).
8. bigger roster of enemies.
9. More special abilities.
 
Aaaaaaannnnd that's it! This is probably one of the most solid logs I've released so far. I hope you enjoyed reading it. If you like what you see, say it!  It's always nice to get a pat on the back and know what you do is appreaciated (be it for the music, prog, or art!).

P.S.: Forgot this too. It shows the key binding system (rough) and the stage select concept (of course the art is placeholder, it's just to give you an idea):

[marcgfx]

great to see pan in action!

about the dough villain: maybe he could be considered as a character similar to the "borg". a collective intelligence. pan is the individual that has been taken from the collective and is both a danger and a missing part.

[Zizka]

Ok but why is Pan a danger?
Why is he attacked by the Collective?
Why are they fighting in a house with hostile appliances?
If the dough is after Pan, why would Pan try to go after the dough? Shouldn't it be the opposite?
Unless...! Pan is prisonner of the house and fighting the machines would allow him to break free from the house?
Pan is captured. Tutorial level is Pan breaking free of his cell. Then he needs to flee the house before he's assimilated by the Collective.

How a out that? It's pretty coherent right?

[marcgfx]

breaking free sounds like a pretty solid basic plot. either he then tries to escape, or he tries to free others. maybe there are more toasts captured in different places?

Indiviuality is always a threat to a collective. think of politics:communism vs democracy, book:1984, film:ants/matrix/Equilibrium, series:startrek(the borg). pan could be fighting to free more from the collective mass of dough.

was just thinking about an alternative movement method for pan OOT. pressing up, makes him stand up sideways. by rocking left and right he can start a rolling motion and then gain speed by rolling a bit like sonic ... just in case you need a way to move faster than the current crawl.

[Zizka]

was just thinking about an alternative movement method for pan OOT. pressing up, makes him stand up sideways. by rocking left and right he can start a rolling motion and then gain speed by rolling a bit like sonic Wink... just in case you need a way to move faster than the current crawl.

Yeah! The breadroll! 

breaking free sounds like a pretty solid basic plot. either he then tries to escape, or he tries to free others. maybe there are more toasts captured in different places?

Indiviuality is always a threat to a collective. think of politics:communism vs democracy, book:1984, film:ants/matrix/Equilibrium, series:startrek(the borg). pan could be fighting to free more from the collective mass of dough.

I wrote a short draft:

Splash screen 1:

In the year 20xx, in a kitchen next door, lived an unexplainably sentient chunk of dough. It had been gifted with both supreme intelligence and a passion for science. Within days it had designed and built a wide array of mechanized minions to do his bidding but it soon came to the conclusion that no articial intelligence could ever match his own...

Splash screen 2:
The only way to ever match the extent of its intellect was to duplicate itself; its own subordinates achieving things out of anyone's grasp but its own. Splitting his very being in two, the first experience was a success: a slice of bread with seemlingly absolute loyalty, living only to do its Master's bidding: Pan."

Why would he want to revolt against his master though (dough)? 

[SpeakUpGames]

super toaster guy gives me hope for a better future in this world