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[Jasmine]

I adore this game

ALLLLL the yes'es.

[Ishi]

Wooah that's fantastic, thank you! I'm working overtime right now and that really made my day

[goob256]

Stalked you on Twitter a bit a while ago then found this devlog... game looked really good. Very Super Mario World in a way (in a good way...) Most of all it looks like a lot of fun!

[FK in the Coffee]

I adore this game

This is incredible and so is this game

You've got game feel down to a science with this one, Ishi.

[KaiTheSpy]

I adore this game

Seeing this is making me even more hyped for this game!

[Ishi]

Hello all

Obstacle Course!

This week I put together an obstacle course level using my test environment graphics. It's a linear course that tests your ability to do various rolls and jumps. I don't think something like this would end up in the final game, but I want to get more people testing the game out (in person for now) and this is something they can have a go at. The collectable shells are a kind of high-score for the level, which is the role the will probably play in normal levels too.



I also added a new feature to my debug view - a Mario Maker-inspired trail! Sometimes it's handy to see the exact path that Leilani moves along, for placing trails of shells or seeing what kinds of jumps are possible.



For next week I'm working on checkpoints and animations / transitions for dying and restarting. Thanks for reading

[Osteel]

I want to get more people testing the game out (in person for now)

I was about to ask. </3

Anyway, I love this project, the controls and gameplay are pretty spot on. I don't know if this has been asked, but will there be controller support?

[battlerager]

The collectable shells are a kind of high-score for the level, which is the role the will probably play in normal levels too.

That and subtly guiding the player to take certain paths / jumps? (COUGH DONKEY KONG COUGH COUGH)


Looks great, as usual! 

[Ishi]

I was about to ask. </3

Sorry  I'm working towards a nice releasable playable demo!

If anyone lives near Cambridge UK, I work on Leilani at the CB2 Indies meetup every Tuesday - feel free to come along

Anyway, I love this project, the controls and gameplay are pretty spot on. I don't know if this has been asked, but will there be controller support?

I have proper Xbox controller support at the moment - with rumble of course

I'm planning on adding generic joypad support too. I already have a controls config screen so it should be pretty flexible.

That and subtly guiding the player to take certain paths / jumps? (COUGH DONKEY KONG COUGH COUGH)

Hehe, well you have to have trails of collectables to jump through! I'll try and limit myself and not do it on *every* jump.

I really like how Kirby Rainbow Paintbrush has a lot of star trails that appear as a reward for exploring, so would like to do that kind of thing too.

[Ishi]

Hello!

I've had a productive week on Leilani!

Checkpoints

The main thing I've worked on is tweaking how checkpoints work. I added them to the game a long time ago so they were a bit outdated.

I'm thinking of using shells as a kind of score for the level, with some sort of reward for getting a certain number. So now Leilani's shell count is now stored when you reach the checkpoint.

When you die and return to the checkpoint you lose a few of them. I think the game needs some sort of penalty like this to make the player care about dying, and I decided a while ago to ditch the concept of lives, so losing shells seems the next logical step. There's a limit on how many shells you can lose at each checkpoint so hard sections shouldn't feel too punishing - you'll never drop all the way to zero shells for instance.

I also polished the transitions for dying and restarting, and the shell count display. I still need to give Leilani some sort of proper death animation but that can wait until another time.



Level Select

I also added a placeholder level select screen. For now this will help me to keep my levels more organised and make the game generally more playtest-friendly. Now you can go in and out of different levels without having to use any debug keys.



Thanks for reading

[Jerom]

It looks rrrreally great (I follow this project on Twitter for months)!!

Do you plan to animate the sky area in the future?
The slowly moving clouds are cool but IMHO the sky still looks a bit plain.
Maybe adding flying tiny (few pixels?) birds, sunbeams, or even more clouds could help to make the sky more "alive".

[and]

Ah this looks really great!

Posting here to follow

[Ishi]

Thanks both!

Do you plan to animate the sky area in the future?
The slowly moving clouds are cool but IMHO the sky still looks a bit plain.
Maybe adding flying tiny (few pixels?) birds, sunbeams, or even more clouds could help to make the sky more "alive".

Yeah I'd like to improve the beach background more - not sure exactly how yet. More parallax clouds would be cool but I do like the feel of a big open blue sky too I'm also not sure if the bushes are fitting for a beach, I like the colours though.

There will be palm trees on the beach levels (didn't put any on this area as it was just to test the checkpoint) so that helps make it look more lively.

[Ishi]

So are you thinking of making these shells currency then? or you have to spend them to unlock boss doors or something?

The shells won't be a direct currency themselves, as I don't want to encourage any kind of grinding (like in Wario Land where to get the best ending you have to keep replaying old levels and playing the bonus games to grind enough coins).

I think there'll be an optional "collect 200 shells" (or whatever) challenge for each level, and maybe completing that for each level will unlock something.

[ghosted]

Love the clean look, love the lead character and it's reminiscent of classic platformers without sacrificing it's own identity. Great stuff.

[Ishi]

Aloha!

Lava level!

This week I've focused on making this level. It's not totally finished, but what's there has been through a number of revisions and is feeling pretty good to play.

(Apologies for the 20fps gif, trying to keep down the file size.)

I'm using my test environment again, so everything looks pretty blocky! It's good to block out levels quickly like this without having to worry about how it looks.

The core part of this level features the classic rising lava challenge. The main reason I chose to make this level is that I've been worried about whether Leilani's 3-tile jump is too restrictive, so I thought a vertical level would be a good way to really stress-test her jumping ability.

I'm not really concerned about the jump height any more - wall jumping and bouncing on enemies offers enough opportunities for gaining extra height. The low jump also emphasizes Leilani's preference for smashing into things.

My original layouts for this level were way too hard (I think that's normal for any level design) so it felt good to go through some revisions and make it a fairer challenge.

When the player is under stress from the rising lava, simple things like choosing whether to do a normal jump or roll jump actually become quite difficult tasks. I tweaked a lot of the platform layouts to make it more obvious which type of jump is best in each situation, which helps the level to flow more smoothly.

Another important tweak was to avoid placing any platforms with a vertical difference of 4 blocks. Since Leilani's jump is 3 blocks high, it can be hard to judge whether a 4-block-high platform can be reached or not (whereas a 5-block difference is clearly not reachable). When the lava is closing in on you it's not fun to be uncertain about your jumps. (Also see this Suzy Cube article about this kind of thing!)

This level is a lot more fast-paced than I imagine the typical Leilani level to be - I think the next level I work on will be slower and centre more around the various enemy interactions.

Mini-break

I'll be taking a week off from Leilani just to relax and prevent myself getting burnt out (I also helped to release Elite: Dangerous on the Xbox One this week!)

I'll hopefully still have something nice to post on the devlog next week! Thanks for reading

[and]

I think the shorter jump and having to use enemies or the wall to get the height you need will only make moving around more interesting. The lava level looks like it'll be really fun to try and climb fast enough.

I definitely want to play this if you ever feel the need for testers...

[Ishi]

Hello

I've stuck with my plan of taking a break this week - it's been good to do some other stuff but I'm itching to get back into working on Leilani! I'm planning to polish up some of Leilani's core movements/animations and then make a start on designing another playable level.

Music

I thought I'd fill in the development gap this week by sharing a second music track from the game. I'm working with Woofle who makes amazing music, and I love what she's made for Leilani so far!

The new track is Cloudy Caverns, which is designed for the steamy underground cave areas. It really shows off the more moody side of the music in Leilani's Island.

Cloudy Caverns on Soundcloud


For those who missed it previously, here is the beach theme Sunshine Sands:

Sunshine Sands on Soundcloud


Hope you like them

[KaiTheSpy]

The music fits so perfectly! I think its pretty great.

[Jasmine]

Can't stress enough (have I, though?), how awesome Leila's work is, and is going to be, for the game. Also, did you help program for Elite? That game looks boss!