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TIGSource ForumsCommunityDevLogs2D Survival/Tower Defense | Devlog 16: Going on ice...
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oldblood
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« on: January 16, 2016, 09:10:48 PM »

THE PREFACE

...It wouldn't be much of an Oldblood devlog if I didn't start it off with some sort of rambling post...

I will try and keep this one a bit short. I just want to talk a bit before I dive in about what my goals and objectives are for this new game. This is the post that we can all come back to down the road to measure how good I am at setting goals and keeping them.

Some high-level goals and objectives this go-around:

     ● More "Commercial": I'm not looking to sell out. Dark, broody, violent, narrative games are a love of mine. But I need to try and do something less "niche" that caters to a potentially larger audience.
     ● Less Narrative: Masochisia was a great exercise in narrative, dialogue and writing but I'd like to spread my wings and work on something I'm not great at: gameplay.
     ● More Help: I will be working with more people. Will introduce the cast of characters as they get started.
     ● Bigger Scope: Generally, this is something a small indie should be avoiding. But after sticking with Masochisia which was pretty small scope wise, I do want to push myself a bit here.
     ● Longer Schedule: Again, this is not typical of indie development. But after burning through Masochisia in 9 months (which was great), I'd like to not swim upstream against brutal self-imposed deadlines. Not saying I want a 2.5-3 year development cycle, but I will need more time with a larger scope.

As you're probably picking up, a lot of the objectives are surrounding pushing my boundaries for something larger and well... more "traditional". I will also need more dev time as I'm also looking at launching a non-profit charity geared towards gamers and game developers, expect me to sprinkle in a few devlogs about that along the way.

A few of the first milestones I will be working towards are:

     1. I will be prototyping the game with a friend for the next month or so- trying to get a feel for the mechanics of at least one of the core game modes.
     2. Getting more familiar with Spine Pro. I purchased this while I was developing Masochisia but didn't want to slow down the development by swapping animation tools (was using Smooth Moves). Time to start learning Spine.
     3. Once we're happy with the prototype, look to start developing out the aesthetic.
     4. Develop out a playable demo/vertical slice that will likely go to the public.

Once that playable demo is live, I will probably need to start looking to figure out funding sources as my small budget will likely be eaten up by time the demo ships.

My next devlog is going to talk a bit more about the game and prototype at a high-level. More details to come...
« Last Edit: August 02, 2016, 05:28:53 AM by oldblood » Logged

oldblood
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« Reply #1 on: January 21, 2016, 06:55:54 AM »

DEVLOG I.

It's definitely a bit intimidating to branch out into uncharted territory and work on mechanics and gameplay that you've never really dealt with before. Working on Masochisia, it was so primarily narrative driven that the simple mechanics and designs all flowed very naturally- I was very comfortable developing it.

But now, I find myself stepping outside of my comfort zone to try and push myself on what can be developed (particularly on a low budget). This may all fail spectacularly, but at least I will have given it a whirl. So, let's talk a little bit about the game concept and what I'm currently doing...

***

THE CONCEPT

The game will be a 2D, side-scrolling hybrid that crosses base building/survival and tower defense mechanics set in a classic high fantasy world. You will be controlling a Troll sorcerer who has been tasked with uniting the hordes of Orcs,Trolls, Goblins and other monsters under a single, mighty banner. Standing between you and your plans are the "good guys". Humans. They will be crusading to cleanse and purge the stain that is your race...

The player will be building up their fortress, exploring, recruiting minions and can actively participate in combat. Combat for the player will be ranged, melee and the player can choose to participate in dark blood magic, but leveraging it's powers does not come without consequence.

The modes of the game are still be designed, but will likely include an endless mode that grows increasingly harder to see how long you can survive, and other objective based modes that can be completed in a single setting. The game idea also seems well suited for co-op so I will be exploring that as well.

CURRENT STATUS

The first milestone will be putting together the prototype for the game. I have a problem with diving into art, aesthetics and design long before the core components are in place so the first priority will be to nail down the prototype. It will be ugly, as it will have no art... but it will serve its purpose.

I will be working with a long-time friend of mine, Michael (goes by "Metagrue" on TIG) who will be taking the lead on the development of the prototype. He and I will be working closely to nail down the prototype before we start diving too far into the weeds. The prototype will be focused around the mechanics of the "endless" mode that I mentioned above.

I will also be looking at learning a new animation tool. Just so you know, I'm NOT an animator. If you followed Masochisia's devlog, you know that my animations are simplistic at best. You may also know that about half-way through development, I acquired Spine Professional. At the time, I was doing the Masochisia animations with a Unity plugin called "Smooth Moves". Which was simplistic but got the job done. Because I didn't want to pause my work in Masochisia to learn a new tool, I set it aside and finished the game using Smooth Moves.

Now, it's time for me to finally open up and start learning Spine...

I have to say, if you're developing for 2D- this really is THE definitive skeletal (or mesh) animation software for 2D games. It's incredibly robust and can allow a non-animator like me to quickly churn out basic animations. An professionally trained or more talented animator could do incredible things with this software.

I'm going to be very transparent and share some of my first quick animation tests that I was able able to put together over a few hours.


Obviously, these are VERY simple animations using even simpler placeholder art. Neither the art or animations are final, they're simply tests. But, I'm already very impressed with the fact that I can put together simple animations in what really amounts to a matter of minutes.

I will end this introduction with a crude little teaser of early testing of the "ranged" combat mechanics... This will also provide a better idea as to how scale will likely be in the game.

#trickshot
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« Reply #2 on: January 21, 2016, 07:07:08 AM »

Oh boy, it begins. That ranging animation alone looks really satisfying, and I love how you're able to hit your own arrow haha. Good luck, looking forward to another dev log.  Grin
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« Reply #3 on: January 21, 2016, 07:58:27 AM »

Nice to see that you're already at it again, will follow from now on.

Since you expressed a certain hesitation towards branching out from narrative-driven games I suggest using the MDA framework. It's pretty standard in the industry so you're probably already aware of it already, but I think it's the best starting point one can have. It creates a good evaluation loop from the get-go: "Does this gameplay fit my aeshetic goal? Y/N".
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oldblood
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« Reply #4 on: February 03, 2016, 06:31:17 AM »

DEVLOG II.

So it’s been a little under two weeks since my last update, I’m obviously operating on a slightly slower schedule than I used with Masochisia. But things continue to plug along at a semi-healthy pace.

Part of the reason I’m a little behind is that I was able to take 3 days off and headed to San Antonio for PAX South 2016. I didn’t go to promote the new game at all, I really just attended to see the event. It was a fun get-away and I enjoyed getting to support some of the local indies and I also got to meet some of the various YouTubers who’ve played Masochisia in the past- which was really cool and will hopefully further cement those relationships.

I also was able to get some work done on my non-profit, which is now a registered not for profit corporation in the state of Texas. I’m currently in the extremely complicated process of documenting a lot of the legal and IRS paperwork (including Form 1023) to apply for a 501(c)(3) non-profit status. Between completing the paperwork and getting it all submitted to the IRS, it will likely be mid to late March before this is all completed.

***

NOTE: I made all my GIF files way too big... so I'm just going to link to GIPHY files so it doesn't slow down the devlog too badly...

Ranged Combat: Michael and I continue to nail down some of the core features in the prototype. Michael did some more enhancements to the ranged combat that now allows the player to have more control over the velocity of their arrows by the amount of time they’re aiming. This creates 3 different velocities: Weak, Medium and Strong with some random elements to each shot (so arrows don't always follow the same pattern even if they're a similar velocity).

http://gfycat.com/PessimisticBlackandwhiteKillerwhale
Ranged Combat: Still need to play with the values on everything...

There are still a few things we can explore here. Eventually things like damage and knock-back will be added based on the type of shot. This could lead to fun scenarios of being able to literally blast an enemy off your walls with a powerful shot etc. We will eventually also add in things like the arrows actually really sticking into things… but it’s coming together and I’m already really enjoying playing with it even at this early stage.

Melee Combat: We’re also adding in melee combat which has been a bit more challenging. Playing with variants of different types of attacks, breakers, combos etc. It’s still a bit "clunky" at this stage, but we’ve got a lot of work to do around getting things in place and this is all still very early into the prototype.

http://gfycat.com/PleasantVigorousAddax
Melee Combat: Rudimentary attacks, a step back dodge and a heavier attack...

Michael and I are actually a bit divided on the usage of melee in the game. There are concerns that perhaps it puts the player “too much” into the combat (when ranged attacks/magic etc would be cleaner to implement) and melee keeps the player too focused on combat instead of the bigger picture of base building/defense.

On the flipside, melee could certainly add an interesting and risky element of fun to the game with the player determining if/when they want to dive into the combat to turn the tide of the game (at the risk of potentially losing the game). And some players certainly like to get their hands dirty…

Really, until we’re playing the prototype and seeing how the game feels against AI, it’s something we can’t make decisions on as it’s just too early to know. But, it’s been a point of discussion thus far, hopefully you all will share any feedback as we progress.

Day/Night Cycles: Michael also implemented a pretty simple but intuitive time of day system which will be a pretty key part of the gameplay. The day & night cycles fully and the game tracks the days, months etc. It’s a simple system, but it allows us to easily modify how quickly time passes and be able to adjust things like when the sun or moon fades into visibility or how it scales (i.e. the moon appearing larger as the night grows) etc.

http://gfycat.com/ColdUnripeJenny
Day Cycle sped up 50x. Values for how long a day lasts we will need to nail down...

We still need to continue to nail down and enhance the melee and ranged combat mechanics but work is also beginning on the ability for the player to be able to build structures. More on that topic in the next devlog…
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« Reply #5 on: February 03, 2016, 06:43:59 AM »

Looks like a promising start! The Masochisia devlog hit 20-something pages in nine-months, so I look forward to page 97! Will be following very closely.
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« Reply #6 on: February 03, 2016, 08:52:27 AM »

Definitely following.
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oldblood
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« Reply #7 on: February 03, 2016, 01:39:17 PM »

Oh boy, it begins. That ranging animation alone looks really satisfying, and I love how you're able to hit your own arrow haha. Good luck, looking forward to another dev log.  Grin

Thanks man. Feels like I just started the last one but in other ways it feels like a long-time ago...

Nice to see that you're already at it again, will follow from now on.

Since you expressed a certain hesitation towards branching out from narrative-driven games I suggest using the MDA framework. It's pretty standard in the industry so you're probably already aware of it already, but I think it's the best starting point one can have. It creates a good evaluation loop from the get-go: "Does this gameplay fit my aeshetic goal? Y/N".

Thanks for the link, I have read this before but its good to go back and refresh on how I'm evaluating things. Thank you sir.

Looks like a promising start! The Masochisia devlog hit 20-something pages in nine-months, so I look forward to page 97! Will be following very closely.

Hahaha, oh my I hope I don't hit that many pages...

Definitely following.

Thanks zorg. You always have awesome feedback so I appreciate that!
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oldblood
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« Reply #8 on: February 12, 2016, 07:12:34 AM »

DEVLOG III.

This is going to be a pretty unexciting devlog update as I really don't have much to show visually so no GIFs today. Sorry! There is a lot of pieces moving at the moment but it's just one of those weeks where the changes are occurring on the back-end so there's very little to show for it...

Here are the things being worked on right now:

     ● Buildings: Some very early groundwork has been laid that allows the player to be able to  place buildings that use X resources. It's pretty simplistic at the moment and buildings just instantly appear, but it's a start.
     ● Physics Move (3D to 2D): Why? Because we want ragdolls. Why ragdolls? Because they're cool. This is a bit more work than initially anticipated but it should be worth it. It could be really fun to see enemies and minions getting thrown around in combat so this really needs to be in. Unfortunately, this does mean re-doing things we'd already done but we're still prototyping so now really is the time.
     ● AI & AI Devices: Getting the ball rolling on this front as well. Still early as well but getting in AI for both enemies and minions. Additionally, setting up things like spawning waves of enemies and sending them at the player.

There are a few other smaller things occurring too (or other sub-tasks related to these above) but those are some of the core items.

I'm still spending time learning Spine for the animation. There are a lot of features and functions that I just simply didn't ever have to use when working on Masochisia (things like setting up skeletons, IK constraints etc) so it's been a learning process over the last few weeks. Setting up dozens and skeletons for practice and spending hours and hours re-animating the same test characters over and over again to try and get the hang of how it all works.

Once I get started on characters and animation, I will do a devlog or two that covers animation in more detail. Maybe even a vlog. We'll see. I've quickly discovered I will never be a great animator, but hopefully by time we get to the point where I need to start animating the characters, to be at least very familiar with the software.

Hopefully more interesting things to talk about in the next devlog update...
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« Reply #9 on: February 12, 2016, 07:33:31 AM »

Nice to see that you're already at it again, will follow from now on.

Since you expressed a certain hesitation towards branching out from narrative-driven games I suggest using the MDA framework. It's pretty standard in the industry so you're probably already aware of it already, but I think it's the best starting point one can have. It creates a good evaluation loop from the get-go: "Does this gameplay fit my aeshetic goal? Y/N".

Thanks for the link, I have read this before but its good to go back and refresh on how I'm evaluating things. Thank you sir.


You're welcome! I can also recommend doing one-page designs, good mockups for devlogs and documentation. For Crest we still make them, they are great to communicate a feature that programmers, designers and artists all can gather round.

Here's a great GDC talk about it:
http://www.gdcvault.com/play/1012356/One-Page


---


Regarding animations, have you thought about procedural animation akin to Data's Cortex Command (and Planetoid Pioneers)? I think they're charming in their own way, and alleviates some of the woes of animation. Might be tricky to code though (I have no idea).
« Last Edit: February 12, 2016, 07:39:08 AM by Greipur » Logged

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« Reply #10 on: February 12, 2016, 10:40:09 AM »

Nice to see you push your self a bit Oldblood! I'll be watching.
If you want some cool information on animation, look for 'Animatiors Survival Kit' - that's the best book you can get imo.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Animator%27s_Survival_Kit

[snip...]
Here's a great GDC talk about it:
http://www.gdcvault.com/play/1012356/One-Page
Nice talk!
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« Reply #11 on: February 15, 2016, 12:55:28 AM »

Just posting to follow, hehe! Don't know how I missed it so far btw... Smiley
And nice choice with Spine, this software is really great! About the gameplay, it makes me think a bit about a Kingdom with the ability to fight for your avatar, am I totally wrong?
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oldblood
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« Reply #12 on: February 15, 2016, 05:57:38 AM »

Regarding animations, have you thought about procedural animation akin to Data's Cortex Command (and Planetoid Pioneers)? I think they're charming in their own way, and alleviates some of the woes of animation. Might be tricky to code though (I have no idea).

Will be honest, hadn't really thought too much about that. That may not be a terrible idea. I probably should research it more, but since I'm already invested in Spine Pro software, I feel a bit obligated to keep at it haha.

Nice to see you push your self a bit Oldblood! I'll be watching.
If you want some cool information on animation, look for 'Animatiors Survival Kit' - that's the best book you can get imo.

Thanks! Yeah when I'm googling references, I see that name come up a lot. It seems to be the Bible of animators so I probably should go ahead and get it...

About the gameplay, it makes me think a bit about a Kingdom with the ability to fight for your avatar, am I totally wrong?

Thanks Fenrir. I actually backed the Kingdom KS so I've had a chance to put a couple hours into it. I'd say that's not totally off-base for a comparison (in that it's a 2D side scroll and there are waves of enemies) but I think Kingdom is built around simplicity and faster-paced gameplay. This will be slower and more involved, in that the player would be a lot more directly involved (melee/ranged/magical combat, deciding where to build your base location etc) and generally the speed will be slowed down. Additionally, I have some plans for other things that would dramatically change the experience like co-op and some other management type features that focus on the challenges of attempting to manage a horde of monsters but... still a bit early to see which features end up making the cut. So while I think they will be very different games, they both do sort of come from that same tower-defense inspired concept.
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« Reply #13 on: February 15, 2016, 06:42:43 AM »

Regarding animations, have you thought about procedural animation akin to Data's Cortex Command (and Planetoid Pioneers)? I think they're charming in their own way, and alleviates some of the woes of animation. Might be tricky to code though (I have no idea).

Will be honest, hadn't really thought too much about that. That may not be a terrible idea. I probably should research it more, but since I'm already invested in Spine Pro software, I feel a bit obligated to keep at it haha.


Might not be impossible to use both, at least in 3d we see the blend of hand-made and procedural animations more and more. Procedural IK (so the feet always falls on the ground whatever steep inclination) and ragdolls are two examples that comes to mind. But then again, the reason for people using it might not be to avoid having to animate by hand. Perhaps there's no way around it to get good. Wink
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« Reply #14 on: February 15, 2016, 07:24:44 AM »

Oh, I missed this.

I'll be dead honest and say that this seems to be neither my game nor my setting (I much prefer original lore to classic Tolkien fantasy creatures), but the subtext of quote-unquote good humans might turn out interesting. I'll keep checking in to see what you'll do with that.

But kudos for stepping out of your comfort zone — excellent way to evolve one's craft!

The charity sounds interesting! People in general seem not to agree with how Indie Fund operates, so if it's that sort of charity, it'll be interesting to see what you'll do with it.
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oldblood
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« Reply #15 on: February 15, 2016, 08:22:21 AM »

I'll be dead honest and say that this seems to be neither my game nor my setting (I much prefer original lore to classic Tolkien fantasy creatures), but the subtext of quote-unquote good humans might turn out interesting. I'll keep checking in to see what you'll do with that.

No, I totally understand. It definitely won't be up everyones alley even though I'm generally attempting to appeal to a broader audience. I appreciate you "dropping by"!

The charity sounds interesting! People in general seem not to agree with how Indie Fund operates, so if it's that sort of charity, it'll be interesting to see what you'll do with it.

Technically Indie Fund isn't a charity, its more of an investment group. Although they do seem to be a nice group of people who have the developers interests in mind, it definitely operates like a business rather than a charitable organization. This will be an actual 501(c)(3) not-for-profit organization that's attempting to leverage game developers and gamers to help aid in humanitarian causes or needs.

It may end up flopping and being a huge waste or time and money, but it's something I'm passionate about so I've just realized I've got to go for it and if it fails, at least I tried...
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« Reply #16 on: February 15, 2016, 08:29:19 AM »

Yeah, I guess you're right about that. I don't know very much about IF myself, so just repeating what I've heard. Your charity idea sounds interesting, anyhow. Best of luck!
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« Reply #17 on: February 15, 2016, 09:34:53 AM »

Great to see you're making another game!!

The charity sounds interesting! People in general seem not to agree with how Indie Fund operates, so if it's that sort of charity, it'll be interesting to see what you'll do with it.

Technically Indie Fund isn't a charity, its more of an investment group. Although they do seem to be a nice group of people who have the developers interests in mind, it definitely operates like a business rather than a charitable organization. This will be an actual 501(c)(3) not-for-profit organization that's attempting to leverage game developers and gamers to help aid in humanitarian causes or needs.

It may end up flopping and being a huge waste or time and money, but it's something I'm passionate about so I've just realized I've got to go for it and if it fails, at least I tried...

(Not to derail the thread, but the concept seems interesting).
 
Would funds primarily go towards game development costs or charitable causes? 
Perhaps funded games cost money on release, but 50% money made goes to charity, 40% back into the fund, and 10% to developers.

If I had money (cough) I would probably donate to something like that.
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oldblood
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« Reply #18 on: February 15, 2016, 11:06:18 AM »

(Not to derail the thread, but the concept seems interesting).
 
Would funds primarily go towards game development costs or charitable causes? 
Perhaps funded games cost money on release, but 50% money made goes to charity, 40% back into the fund, and 10% to developers.

It's not derailing as I've put a few notes about what I was doing in this devlog. The updates feel a little out of place here but since there are so many devs floating around these forums I figured I could get some good feedback from devs as I moved along with it.

The short answer is there are a few ways you could work it (which is some of the work I'm having to figure out).
 
An Example: You could have a promoted sales event with developers contributing X% of sales to the Charity during the course of the event. Of the X% funding raised from the sale, the Charity would contribute between 75-90% of the funds raised to the specific humanitarian cause. Basically, all funding raised short of administrative or hard costs associated with the event would go to the humanitarian cause with a minimum target of 75%.

The benefits to the developer are: 1. Helping a humanitarian cause. 2. Ideally the events will be sponsored and promoted so coverage for your game/studio during event (press coverage, youtubers, social media etc) and 3. As a 501(c)(3), the contribution is tax deductible which is really important come tax time as you will probably owe Uncle Same money if you're selling games online.

The challenges on my end will be lining up the sponsorships and promotions that incentivize devs to contribute. Getting YouTubers, Twitch players etc to donate videos etc and insuring that we're creating awareness both for the developers and the humanitarian efforts. And the events would be focused solely on true humanitarian causes  like clean water, food, medicine & natural disasters etc. Currently, I'm working through incorporation and filing for the 501(c)(3) status with the IRS. It's pretty intense as you might imagine...
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« Reply #19 on: February 15, 2016, 11:28:00 AM »

I like the direction you're moving. Keeping fingers crossed for production and I volunteer for vertical slice feedback Smiley
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