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TIGSource ForumsCommunityDevLogsSarani - A Game about Enlightenment
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Ariedhan
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« on: October 17, 2015, 04:09:53 AM »

Hey Folks! I'm Adrian, game designer of Tibi Games a small indie studio from Canary Islands and Im here to show you our first project: Sarani.

Preface

Sarani means Path in Sanskrit. The whole game is the path of the player towards enlightenment. The main character, starts the game in deplorable conditions and its mission is to open all of its chakras first to become balanced again and then towards illumination.

The way to do this is to fight 7 monsters, each and one of the representing an unbalanced Chakra. According to hinduism, taoism, yoga and many other teachings, when our chakras are unbalanced we feel negative effects on both our body and mind. The idea is that these monsters make the player feel as if its chakras are unbalanced. For example an unbalanced first Chakra: The Muladhara will make the person feel anger if its overactive or depression if its underactive, so the monster will show symptoms of this.

Gameplay

Sarani is an action RPG, so expect attacks and dodges everywhere. However the main mechanic of Sarani is the use of Masks. During the game the player will equip different masks that will give different abilities. The player can switch between masks at any moment. In combat the idea is to allow different type of fighting styles and sick combos. We are still playing with it, but probably the player will only equip 3 active masks and maybe some pasive masks. The idea is that masks are time limited, you cannot wear one mask all the time so the player must always be switching between them.

But, where do these masks come from? The masks represent the achievement of a balanced chakra thus the players will obtain them after they defeat a monster, conquering the odds that separates them from elightement. Relating to the previous example, a balanced muladhara means a greater connection to earth and the world around you. The Muladhara masks, then, will allow the player to move and dodge faster.

TThe idea is also that each player chooses where to start first, each player finding its own path. Every player will obtain the first mask in the same way and then they can choose to open any other of the chakras they want, exploring the world of Sarani. We want to give the sensation of the world being open. No missions or arrows, just explore and find you way.

We have set the camera to a 3/4 perspective with (probably) variable zoom, partly because its easier than a 3rd person camera, partly because we can control the experience much better this way. The characters and assets in the game will be modeled in 3D using blender and we want to find the game's own art style.

Latest Screenshots










« Last Edit: November 07, 2015, 01:34:01 PM by Ariedhan » Logged

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« Reply #1 on: October 17, 2015, 04:44:58 AM »

Sad day. The pictures aren't displaying for me.  Sad

So far, the story premise sounds very interesting! The use of different masks makes me think of persona usage in Persona 3.

I have a lot of questions, though I wouldn't dare unpack all of them on you. I'm just curious about the world you are crafting:

Will masks only come from major bosses? If that is the case, will there be ... mini-bosses that allow players to obtain masks and then bosses that help progress the 'story' or chakra? Are there minor enemies, or will the basis of the story revolve around exploring the world and fighting the bigger bosses?

What other factors exist to make the player want to explore Sarani?

I assume the player starts in one area ('slums'), and works their way out, though it could be a metaphorical representation of such a dark situation, rather than literal.

Ah, this can get really deep, really fast.
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« Reply #2 on: October 17, 2015, 05:22:09 AM »

Woops! Sorry about the images. Posted them again Smiley Thanks for your reply.

Our idea, which of course may change during the protoype phase, is to have 7 masks, one per Boss, each mask being unique on its own, the main character will change its appearance and abilities. As you said the main path of the game will be exploring the world and fighting these bosses. The idea is that once the player enters into the boss "area", the boss will start having small confrontations with the player. These confrontations will sometimes be small battles but others may just be small puzzles or labrynths, it will always depend on the chakra the boss is representing as we want the player to feel the effects of the unbalanced chakra.

The question
Quote
What other factors exist to make the player want to explore Sarani?
you posted is very important, we will think about it a lot from now onwards. Thanks!  Beer! We have only thought about these "boss confrotations" I talked above but I dont know if they are enough to fill the gaps between the boss fights. The problem with mini-bosses or other enemies is that the game can turn big really fast which is something that scares me. If the boss confrotations are not enough, we will start brainstorming new ideas to make the player continue to explore Sarani.

The player starts in an area which will lead to the first mask (I like the slums idea!). After that it will arrive to the centre of the map which lead to the rest of the paths. Our idea is to have a central hub which enlightens once you beat a boss.

The world will enlighten and change subtly as the story progresses, coming from brown, dark colours to brighter one. The main character itself will change, his animations will go from afraid, shy to other more secure and balanced. The clothes will become cleaner and brighter.

I hope this answer your questions, at the least it helps us beging to see other points of view of our idea, again thanks!

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« Reply #3 on: October 25, 2015, 02:49:08 AM »

Hello everyone!

I am going to edit the first post everytime there is an update, so it's easier to see the latest screenshot of the game. Basically Im going to copy the Current Status post from last week below. And after that continue with the devlogs in further posts.

Status Week 1:

This week we are working on the combat system (with free assets) in Unity and the concept of the main character.

The main character will always wear a mask and we want to try to achieve a "blank slate" sort of character, i.e. a character anyone can relate to, doesn't matter either your gender or race.


In this first concept, made by one of our illustrators Aythami, the character seemed way to an adventurer for the game we want. At the beginning of the game the main character must show symtpoms of being tired, unbalanced and worn out. We decided it would be better if its clothes were maybe less "adventury".


Here is a newer concept, we still need to work on it but hopefully we will achieve something that fits the game soon.
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« Reply #4 on: October 25, 2015, 03:28:03 AM »

Hello again!

This week, although the main character is not yet final, Aythami has been trying to see what colours would fit our main character the better. Take a look:


Since the fact the main character starts in a very bad state, we think its better if its clothes are worn are dirty. As the game advances it could be a cool idea that the clothes start getting cleaner and brighter, showing again the effect of the enlightement.

Personally, I believe that the markings shown in pictures 6 and 7 are really cool. What do you guys think? We are thinking of creating a simbology for the game, one that reminds of its background and relates to the simbols of each chakra in the case of monsters/masks.

For her part, Elena, has been working on some concept art of the scenary. This one is meant for the Muladhara part of the world . Elena has used the red colour, related to this chakra and some tribals props which show the animal relation of this chakra (I would talk about chakras and our vision of them later).




So...Chakras, what are they?

Chakras is a term used in many asian religions and teachings. Yoga, Hinduism, Taoism... and, in the west, in the new age movement. There is a lot of information about chakras in the net and it changes slightly according to the school. Being a yoga practitioner myself I have also tried to add what i've learned so far. All of this information is really useful for creating the games background as it is a massive source of information.

Basically a Chakra is a node through were your spiritual energy flows. Although it is associated with your spiritual body it has effects on your physical body and on your mind. Although there are many chakras, they are 6 (or 7) main ones or big ones. Think about a big river which represents your spine, these big chakras are nodes in the spine where the river branches off to the rest of the body.

Chakras are often pictured as a loto flower with different amount of petals and colours and they are associated with a mantra silable which is said it helps to open them. As I began to study chakras I though that they could only be closed or open, however they can also be in an excited state, i.e. opened too much, making the energy to overflow and having negative effects in both body and mind. For the chakra to have good effects it must be in balance.

This is all for now. Next week we will show more cool advances in our art and I will start talking about the first chakra: Muladhara and the interpretation of it in the world of Sarani.

Be Happy everyone!
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« Reply #5 on: November 07, 2015, 02:46:45 PM »

Hello everyone!

Adrian here to continue with our devlog on Sarani.

We continued to work on our main character, here is a black and white version:


We are prerry happy so far. We think this character could be anyone, male or female and from any ethnic which was something we wanted for Sarani. After all, the patch of enlightment can be achieved by anyone.

Next we are going to be working on the Base Mask. This is the mask the main character will be wearing when it has no mask equipped. It has to continue with the "blank slate" aspect of the character plus giving it some sort of personality. We hope to show some concepts soon!

Muladhara: Bottom Chakra

The English name for this Charka is Root and its located in the coxis region. Its a chakra deeply associated with our instics, our animal behaviour. It acts as a base and is related, often, with our conection to earth and nature. When in balance, this chakra will give us will, power and strength and a great base to work with other chakras. When in disbalance, however, we feel fear of loosing our material goods and our safety. Basically is the charka that makes us afraid of trying new things. Furthermore if this chakra is too excited we feel too much attachment with our material goods or relations, making us to become greedy and even use money or power to influence others.

Every Chakra has 3 aspects in the game:

1. The Boss you need to defeat. This will show the unbalanced aspects of the chakra
2. The mask you obtained. It will show the balanced aspects of the chakra.
3. The part of the world this boss influences. As the boss, it must give the feeling of the unbalanced chakra.

In our case the Boss has to show fear. He can be afraid of the character and then make the character to feel afraid, both thinks can be achieved by having many interactions with the boss throughout the level. Furthermore, it has to be conected to nature so its probably going to be an animal or beast. The greedyness aspecpt could be shown in the boss lair, were many treasures can be found.

The scenary would be a jungle or a forest, with lots of creepy plants and shadows lurking around, we can play a lot witth this to give unique sensations.

In the case of the mask, the player will have to feel "light on his feet" as it shows the contact and balance of the legs. It is a carefree sort of mask, that is happy with nothing. We are still thinking about the mechanics and the animations but Im thinking something like this.

Next week we will be talking about the second chakra: Svadhishthana.

Happy week you all!
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