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TIGSource ForumsCommunityDevLogsYear In The Trees
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Luno
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« Reply #100 on: February 26, 2018, 08:35:35 PM »

Beer! following! looks good!

Thanks!
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JoPed
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« Reply #101 on: February 27, 2018, 04:32:30 AM »

Wow, just wow. I read through the devlog just now and this game is truly beautiful and looks really awesome!  Wink

A little late to the party, but that title scene with parallax effect is pretty great Smiley
 
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jg.camarasa
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« Reply #102 on: February 27, 2018, 06:33:00 AM »

I totally thought I was already following this! The art is lovely, love seeing the progress of these kinds of games, please keep it up Smiley
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Luno
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« Reply #103 on: February 27, 2018, 01:27:11 PM »

thanks so much @jg.camarasa and @Nerve Damage Games!

Realized I forgot to post these new critters that I added recently:



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Luno
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« Reply #104 on: March 25, 2018, 02:49:52 PM »

Post-GDC mega update!

I just got home after a week of GDC and Train Jam which was incredibly instructive, fun, and...exhausting. At GDC I managed to do some biz dev, see some talks, partied a bit too hard, and met many cool people. I even had a few nice conversations with some of the indie game heroes that inspire me every day to pursue this project seriously and to try to take my work to the next level.

Most importantly I think, I feel so much closer to the other Chicago indie devs I took the train out with. I thought we did a real good job of making sure no one was out alone if they didn't want to be.

Train Jam was fun too, if a bit intense. The project I worked on is called Junk Jumble, with Austin-by-way-of-Chicago cool dude @chriswade__






I also did music for another team of Chicago-based friends, and their game was Banana Foolishness






If you just wanted to hear the music, the tracks are on my soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/lunomusic/sets/train-jam-2018

All of the music (drums included) was performed on this tiny keyboard. The Junk Jumble performance is entirely live with some looping, while Banana Foolishness was performed live and then quantized quite a bit to get the electronic sound.


My hand is not gigantic, it's just mini-keys




I thought I would get a ton of work done on the game at GDC, but I was so worn out or otherwise distracted that I didn't actually touch it for more than an hour here and there, with the exception of the flight home.

That said, I was able to finish adding the attack for the slimes, refactoring some action/attack code, and adding the ability to interrupt certain actions/attacks during windup. You can see this all in action in this gif:






Finally, I wanted to talk a bit about Swedish games accelerator Stugan. I'm really pumped about their program 'cause of the nature (*rimshot*) of my game and such...soo I applied again this year! I applied with the game last year and was wait-listed. I made the application video public if you're interested:






The 1:30 video and written application will probably only take you a few hours to finish, and who knows! See http://www.stugan.com/apply/ for instructions. Even if you aren't accepted, I think there are benefits to applying to these sorts of programs. For me, creating content for the application videos and trying to crystallize my ideas about the game into a concise pitch has been really instructive.

I'm still showing people the game and they're like, astonished at how many mechanics there are. Everyone has been saying "Oh, when I saw this I thought it was just kind of an ambient art game." I'm still genuinely confused about why these things aren't obvious, which just goes to show you how artful and deliberate you need to be about how you talk about your game. Start working on these things now!
« Last Edit: March 26, 2018, 09:23:04 AM by Luno » Logged

Josh Bossie
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« Reply #105 on: March 25, 2018, 07:55:43 PM »

I've never heard of Stugan before, but that concept is absolutely nuts. Do you know folks who have done it?
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jg.camarasa
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« Reply #106 on: March 26, 2018, 04:52:48 AM »

Good luck with your Stugan application! I sent mine a few weeks back but seems like I won't be able to go because personal reasons, even if they picked me for some weird reason Smiley

I think your game concept is too perfect not to be selected this year! If you get in make sure to update us about how it's like to be there Smiley
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Luno
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« Reply #107 on: March 26, 2018, 09:30:10 AM »

I've never heard of Stugan before, but that concept is absolutely nuts. Do you know folks who have done it?

Not personally, but I met a few at GDC. You can see all the previous teams on their website at least, some cool games have come out of their program and it's only their fourth year I think.

In all honesty, I'm kind of terrified due to cost and stress: I have a million food allergies, asthma, and would have to continue pay rent while I was there...but it's one of those things where if I had the opportunity and didn't take it, I'd probably never forgive myself? heh
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Yong
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« Reply #108 on: March 27, 2018, 08:09:31 PM »

Your game looks great Hand Thumbs Up Left  following. And good luck with the Stugan application.
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Josh Bossie
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« Reply #109 on: March 27, 2018, 09:45:01 PM »

I've never heard of Stugan before, but that concept is absolutely nuts. Do you know folks who have done it?

Not personally, but I met a few at GDC. You can see all the previous teams on their website at least, some cool games have come out of their program and it's only their fourth year I think.

In all honesty, I'm kind of terrified due to cost and stress: I have a million food allergies, asthma, and would have to continue pay rent while I was there...but it's one of those things where if I had the opportunity and didn't take it, I'd probably never forgive myself? heh

Definitely a once in a lifetime kinda thing. Hope you get in!

My dad does some writing and did something very similar in rural Maine where I grew up. He was gone just 1 week and he came back a bit stir crazy, but he really liked the experience
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« Reply #110 on: March 27, 2018, 09:49:25 PM »

Oh man ... your game looks very nice!
I use unity too, good choice!
GL!HF!
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Luno
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« Reply #111 on: March 27, 2018, 10:01:45 PM »

Good luck with your Stugan application! I sent mine a few weeks back but seems like I won't be able to go because personal reasons, even if they picked me for some weird reason Smiley

I think your game concept is too perfect not to be selected this year! If you get in make sure to update us about how it's like to be there Smiley

Thanks for the kind words and follow. It means a lot to me. Bummer about Stugan - who knows though, maybe next year? I'll definitely post some updates if I'm accepted. Also if not Smiley
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Luno
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« Reply #112 on: March 28, 2018, 06:53:55 AM »

Your game looks great Hand Thumbs Up Left  following. And good luck with the Stugan application.

Thanks!  Toast Right
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Luno
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« Reply #113 on: May 14, 2018, 09:55:44 AM »

Shops are in the game! Most of the art for other NPC interactions are finished as well, so I'll be adding the functionality soon.




Here's the original mockup for the NPC window. Once I got it in game I realized I needed to make it shorter


I also refactored tons of inventory and UI code to be way more performant, and redid the implementation for many of the windows to make them more dynamic. This is making it easier to tune the UI as I experiment with what makes the most sense for the gameplay. I've changed the functionality of the quick slot items and have been experimenting with different inventory designs.




The smaller version of the inventory could have a button that opens up the crafting section to the right
« Last Edit: May 14, 2018, 11:32:02 PM by Luno » Logged

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« Reply #114 on: May 14, 2018, 01:29:36 PM »

This is too inspiring not to follow! Looks so great!
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Luno
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« Reply #115 on: May 14, 2018, 11:33:36 PM »

This is too inspiring not to follow! Looks so great!

Thank you!! (there's a mailing list for early access at Hand Point Right https://www.yearinthetrees.com)
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Luno
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« Reply #116 on: May 15, 2018, 08:43:15 AM »

Since I'm in-between features and have been working on UI a lot lately, I've been taking the last few days to improve some things.



I was messing around with some ideas for the smaller inventory and I think it's really turned out well! With the crafting section collapsable like this, you get more real estate on the screen, and with the more compact design it was possible to get the vertical space for the buttons and gold without too much waste.

Right now, the crafting section functions as an extension to your inventory (meaning, you can keep stuff in there), but I'm not sure this behavior makes sense. I may change it so that when you collapse the crafting section, the items there are returned to your inventory (or to the ground if there's no space). Closing your inventory would also collapse the crafting section.
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« Reply #117 on: June 04, 2018, 09:29:09 AM »

The game continues to get better every time I see it.  I can't wait!

In the crafting inventory, I'm in agreement that it would be best to not allow it to be used as storage.  It would be too tempting to use, and I think would be overall more frustrating to users with the potential to hide things in there unintentionally.

As an alternative to consider besides the good option you mentioned (back to inventory or drop it), you could always keep the items in the crafting grid and in the inventory the whole time, and avoid any space issues if they pick things up with the screen open or potentially craft too many items to allow their grid to be reintegrated.  This would make the grid more of a "blueprint" of the item you're building from things in your inventory.

Keep up the great work!
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Luno
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« Reply #118 on: June 04, 2018, 12:06:17 PM »

The game continues to get better every time I see it.  I can't wait!

In the crafting inventory, I'm in agreement that it would be best to not allow it to be used as storage.  It would be too tempting to use, and I think would be overall more frustrating to users with the potential to hide things in there unintentionally.

As an alternative to consider besides the good option you mentioned (back to inventory or drop it), you could always keep the items in the crafting grid and in the inventory the whole time, and avoid any space issues if they pick things up with the screen open or potentially craft too many items to allow their grid to be reintegrated.  This would make the grad more of a "blueprint" of the item you're building from things in your inventory.

Keep up the great work!

Thanks Moch! I'm definitely on the same page as you here. I actually went ahead and built the feature where stuff gets kicked back to your main inventory when the crafting section is closed (although it's not turned on at the moment).

I've thought about solutions like the one you suggested, but for now I'm trying to avoid anything that diminishes the physicality of the items. For example, one of the subtle changes to the inventory from Diablo 2 to Diablo 3 is that in Diablo 3 you never actually pick an item up on your cursor! When you click an item, you get a "ghost" on your cursor and the actual item stays in your inventory until your next click.

I believe this was a quality of life thing so that you can "back out" of moving an item after your first click (by right clicking), and the item is still where it was before. In the old system if you pick up an item and start moving it, but decide you actually want to just put it back (which doesn't happen very often), you have to then actually click a second time and put it back in the same grid slot...like you would with a real object.

So instead of your cursor acting like your physical hand where you grab items, it acts more like...your intention? it's a very subtle difference, but the items in D3 never felt as good as the ones in D2 and my thinking is that the diminished physicality of the items is a big reason why. Check out this screenshot:



There's a bunch of barely noticeable stuff they changed like this for convenience, that make the items feel worse and "less real" IMO. Items on the grid can only be 1x1 or 1x2 (e.g. a 2H sword is as tall as a pair of boots), the items on the paper doll are different sizes from the items on the grid, etc.

Now, obviously in a game, you can needlessly sacrifice a lot of fun on the altar of "but that's not how it works in real life!". You have to strike a balance though, having things mirror real life behavior when there's no cost to fun is helpful because it makes them more intuitive.

This could be total BS, but I believe that the physicality of these items on the grid is a big part of what makes them feel real and valuable to players. In a game about collecting items, that seems really important to me. I think doing things like having a "blueprint" (at least, if it looks the same as the item grid and is not abstracted in some way) can kind of work against that? But, truly, if that's the best way to make the gameplay feel right, I will do it. Just looking for ways to avoid it first Smiley

Probably gonna try to get more feedback about that before locking in the behavior, but you're right you do kinda forget about items in there. Curious to hear your thoughts on the "physicality" thing, if that's really as important as I think it is, etc.
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« Reply #119 on: June 04, 2018, 12:54:14 PM »

I think you're making a pretty strong point on the physicality.  I'm completely in agreement re D3 that is you're going to force people to play inventory jenga, you need to commit to it.  Simply reducing things to more standardized sizes to make it less annoying it is not the right way.  I have a recollection that the ghosting of the item may have helped prevent item loss when connections died, as when it is in your hand, it is hard to make a good choice as to what to do with it.  What if the inventory is full but there is no longer a "ground" to drop it on?  That leads one down the path of hidden extra inventory space for overflow, and that way lies madness.

For your implementation, I think throwing it back in the inventory is fine, and the ground as a fallback is logical.  However, I could see it as slightly annoying if someone were intending to craft an item, realized they needed to access a separate inventory (a chest, perhaps?), and unexpectedly had their grid reset.  That might be frustrating.

I think, so long as your gameplay was aware of the potential extra inventory and it was not unbalancing (assuming inventory could be at all in your gameplay), allowing it to stay there in the grid would be reasonable.  The only real downside I could see would be forgetting things were there.  Perhaps that could be handled with a subtle UI animation?  Maybe a slight rattle/popout, etc of the crafting grid drawer when it was closed but had items in it?
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