April Goals & Progress Thread

[Kes]

@imascribble

I've never got round to building a website, I just use other people's (lazy or what?), so I'm always interested in seeing what other people have done.  Your signature doesn't yet have a link for it.  Will be be going live soon, or is there still more work to be done?

@Dream3r

I'm not sure I've quite understood what you mean with your 2 screens.  It almost sounds like the player has to go through 2 screens each time they open the game, as there is no option there on the first screen to choose between new game and continuing with a save file.  Will it be 2 screens?  I'm not sure that that would be a popular choice, as after the first time, most players hit 'enter' in order to avoid sitting through splash screens and so on.  They just want to get on with the game.

@niokasgami

Well, at least you recognise that it's procrastination, and don't try and kid yourself that it's something else.  An essential first step to dealing with it.

@Denna

I know that there are car tiles out there.  Have you looked on Granny's list of modern and futuristic resources?  Here is the link to the vehicles section.

@Marquise*

Relax, enjoy!

@CrazyCrab

Good to see you back.  

@EliteZeon

Those forest areas are looking much better now, and so the whole map looks better balanced than on the original.  Did you come to any decision about tinting?

My update

Thanks to some help from bgillisp, I got my Save screen looking the way I want it to.  Hmm, maybe I should post a screenshot.

EDIT and here it is.

My problem was that Yanfly's script allows you to have up to 6 variables giving information on this screen, therefore the space available is in 2 columns.  As you can see I am only using 3 variables, and because it was in 2 columns, there wasn't enough space for the word 'Found' to appear.  I have now (under bgillisp's tutelage), got rid of the second column, and then adjusted the width so that the info wasn't too far from the text.  The other 2 changes I've made is the 3rd variable showing the difficulty mode the player has chosen.  As you know, variables normally only store numbers, not text, so that took a bit of juggling.  And finally, I've got the date and time of each save file so that you can more easily identify the one you want.  I've never been able to work out why that isn't native to the engine. My next task is to see if it's possible to have a different opacity for different windows, as once the proper title screen is in place there could be a problem.  It's an animated screen, and I don't think it will look good to have it showing through on to the save screen the way the place holder one does.  I've got a sneaking feeling, though, that it's got to be the same opacity for everything.

Did a bit more polishing on the maps, then worked on the enemies for this location.  Done most of their basic stats and skills, which will all need tweaking following play testing.  A lot of my skill animations are custom and I'm getting fairly adept at them, but I spent quite a bit of time fretting over the sound effects.  I have some custom ones, and a number of non default ones, but trying to find something that fits both the type of skill and duration is (for me anyway) time consuming.  It is, however, nothing compared to the time I spent trying to find a suitable battle theme for this area.  I spend hours and hours and hours on music selection.  Anyway, I think I've come up with something that goes well with the dungeon theme I've got.

Game making productivity may be hit over the next couple of weeks.  The World Snooker Championships have started and, well, you know how it is...  

 

[imascribble]

@ksjp17: Ya, I've just been too lazy to link it into my sig. It's in there temporarily for now, if you want to check it it. It's still pretty basic, though  :/

 

[bgillisp]

@ksjp17: Glad my advice helped. How did you get the date and time listed in the save file? I might be interested in adding that to my game.

 

[Kes]

@bgillisp

I'll pm you

 

[Dream3r]

@ksjp17  Good point, I'm just kind of experimenting with ideas at the moment.  Might leave out the first screen then.  Currently the game doesn't have a menu at all, just autoloads your save or starts a new game if you haven't played before.

 

[Kes]

@Dream3r

Does that mean that there is only one save slot?  What do I do if I want to reload from an earlier point?  Or if there are 2 of us playing and we're using different save slots for our own game?  If it autoloads, that prevents either of those things happening, and yet they are both quite common.

 

[EliteZeon]

@Ksjp17

Thanks!

Nah I am still trying to figure out the tint more or less. Doesn't help that I keep going through a minute of cinematic text before reaching the village... I should really add a savepoint somewhere and add events that will mess with the tint for me. Then decide from there.

Still need to figure out the music for this place as well. I was going to use Pastorial Prairie by Joel Steudler (I believe), but now I am not sure and currently flipping through songs I have access to. Idk, maybe I'll stick to my first choice.

Edit:

-Oh yea, I got around to making a new game over screen finally, and pretty much here is how I am messing with my tints now:

Spoiler

I might stick with this tint... gives a bit of a misty feeling. Hrm... then again I want it to feel sunny... GAH! Back to testing!

 

[Dream3r]

@KSJP17, Oh that is definitely just a temporary feature so I can bug test the game faster.  Their will be multiple saves.  For example in that screen I showed as the "second screen" instead of play is might just show a few save slots.

But for now it's just made to test out and fix bugs.

 

[Marquise*]

@EliteZeon

THAT WAS YOU!!!  On Steam, the trouble with the windmill sail!  Now do they turn right?

@Dreamer

I know it is more of a hurricane or the eye of a tornado, but I was thinking more to play with the Storm and using the O like the center of the storm and having some wavering Of The slipping into the O of the storm while the Out was still out but felt like the next thing to being torn apart.

Sorry the 2D part of me take over... Yet I am a TERRIBLE typograph!

And Dream3r? You do a survival game.  Save and quit only.  Lose the game erase the save and start all over right?

@Ksjp17

Woah you have a big hard job!  But I like the chocolate tint ^^

Also I thought the second screen of Dreamer to be a transitional fade in and out.  Usually folks feels the transition without realizing what is going on.

pfft.  For the first time in month I am up more than 24 hours and the time seems to had slowed down on me.  (I might get my thyroid checked again.  That or I am a wee bit regenerated.  I kinda fixed a bunch of things today in the house.)

 

[nio kasgami]

for show I work to xD 

Spoiler

that's my manga cover still in work and thanks for makio-kuta for point me out all the point I have to correct xD

that's like you can see a pretty mature story so I can't show it on the forum board this make me sad because I love the concept of my story and this not just a slaughter of murdering (okai if some people just look some pages this seem to be a big pool of bloods without sens) 

but the concept hit a pretty sensible subject who are "the persecution" and how a character can fall down in some dark manner...

in simple I "can" showed this kind of concept the problem is how I work with it..who will not be appropriate...not that's full of sexuality and vulgarity this just....Super gore (example just in the prologue I draw all the details of how the main character "murder" the guy so...hum)

and I admit how I show the portrait of the story and how I treat the character the story is simply not for people who are sensible 

I actually can post the manga ...but only if I censor the gore moment who will reduce a lots of the panels size but I think this will remove the main message I wanted to show (and not this not "kill everyone" uu"....that's a deep  concept I developed with makio-kuta )

but this manga is somewhat something I like to draw ...not that I am super sadistic or such...I can't just explain this feeling

 

[EliteZeon]

@Marquise

100% Honest, I haven't really contacted anyone on Steam about my projects yet. You must have me mistaken...

But wait, I can make this thing turn?

 

[VideoWizard]

Sat 4.18.15- Wow, this is the most cliffy map I've done yet! Lakeland Highlands- Southeast sure has a lot of high land, including the path to the Sky Tower. I wanted to make it look like it's way above the land below, and the Sky Tower portion floating above, so that area doesn't just have about 50 cliff tiles leading down to the ground below.

And with that, we've gone full circle! There's still more I have to do with the map (mainly placing objects such as trees and bushes and such), but yeah, now the fun really begins! Monsters are getting more and more powerful, up to level six during the nighttime hours! Wow. Before long, they (and hopefully the party) will be level ten, then twenty, then... I've also learned a few things about mapping in these topics, and glad I tried it with Celianna's tiles before going too crazy with parallax mapping and such.

 

[Denna]

@Denna

I know that there are car tiles out there.  Have you looked on Granny's list of modern and futuristic resources?  Here is the link to the vehicles section.

I know that, too. The biggest problem is that I'm searching for XP-Tiles, not VX or VX ACE. Google only shows me VX Ace stuff. -.- But one link on that list seems to work for XP and our other cars. We'll see. So thank you never the less.

 

[Marquise*]

@Marquise


100% Honest, I haven't really contacted anyone on Steam about my projects yet. You must have me mistaken...


But wait, I can make this thing turn?

Someone tried.  Had a fancy idea to do like I do when I have a problem with a tile, an animation or a sprite and just got some time with the mill, his idea and Photoshop and BOOM!
Except we kinda all discovered about culling all in the same time, if it is too close to the edge and a character walk nearby and then goes away from the place or vice-versa, you have a popping of the windmill's sails. :S So I thought it was you solving the problem by NOT putting the windmill INTO the village but on edge! So no one walks by the sea or sky to see the pop! ^^


I would had personally probably NOT abandoned it.

 

[Kes]

@Denna

Supercow has some modern tiles which are for XP and which has cars.  

EDIT

Here is the link 

@EliteZeon,

If that is PandaMaru's windmill, yes you can.

Goes looking to see how I did it in Tale of a Common Man.

EDIT

Yup, all I did was place the sales as an event (one big event) and then stepping animation.  When PandaMaru released that windmill she had the sails on a separate sheet so that you could import it as a character sheet and do what I did.

 

[Denna]

@ksjp17: Thank you for the link.

I've changed the windowskin now and I think that it's more readable as before. Hope it's for everyone better now. ^^"

Also the minigame is nearly complete. We just miss some music and 1 icon for the menu (I'm working on it). But everything else works.

I tried to remake the titelscreen, but I don't think that it's better than the other...

 

[CrazyCrab]

Had a pretty productive day so I'm quite happy.

Added 12 enemies with a bunch of skills and personalities - nobody in my game has the ''attack'' command, so everyone is different

No MP either, all attacks are done via TP which is generated slightly differently and works a bit like MP, but not really. It's weird, but I find it fun.

Madroot does it's best to mess up your party with constant confuse and poison skills, Boltbeetle keeps overcharging and then releases thunderbolts, etc. They're also all ''lv 1-2'' and neutral for extra variety. That said max level will be 10 and there will be a pile of factions on top of that, so I have a lot of monsters to make.

Took me a while, but eh, I learned a lot about animations, skills and enemies. I have a feeling the next ones won't take as long

A bit stuck right now as one of my past topics is completely gone and I'm not sure what to do now... I don't want to post the same question again.

 

[Kes]

@CrazyCrab

I have a couple of characters with non default attack, and it makes life much more interesting.  How many actors do you have?  I was just wondering about the player keeping track of so many variables right from the beginning.  Constant confuse and poison skills at level 1?  Together with thunder bolts?  Hmm.  I can only assume that your party starts off pretty tough, with loads of healing items.  I'd be slightly concerned about that, unless your intention is to make a brutal game.  If not, there seems ample opportunity for game overs, and at level one, I personally think that it should be hard to get game over unless I, the player, do something incredibly stupid.

My update

Finished off the battleback for this dungeon, sorted skills and stats, and went for an initial playthrough.  Music and screen tints work really well, and the battle theme works excellently with the dungeon theme, and gives a nice edgy feel to things.  But oops!  These troops are almost unbeatable, and that's at normal mode.  I have to take into account hard and legendary modes as well, so I've probably made this unplayable.  Back to the drawing board.  Yep, probably not a good idea to give all enemies in this dungeon really potent all-party skills.  Inevitably, no matter how I've juggled things with ratings and turns, (and I thought I'd done really quite well with those) there will often come a moment when every enemy in the troop uses its all-party skill on the same turn, and then ...

Back in for a second attempt.  Not bad, but perhaps it still needs just a bit more tweaking.  The engine's AI is not helpful.

 

[Dream3r]

Adjusting some old assets to work with the new game.  New goal for the next day or two is to make this cabin look good.

Here's a sneak peek at some minor adjustments to pretty up the place.

Spoiler

Original Bed Asset

Hue/Saturation Adjustments

 

[bgillisp]

@Dream3r: Definitely an improvement. The first one looked like a bed of ice.

@ksjp17: Glad I'm not the only one who has done that. I had to change most of my enemies so that only one or two in a stack would cast attack all skills, and even then oftentimes I had to lower the frequency of it via some playing around. Hope the rest of the balacing goes well!

@crazycrab: I'm guessing you are intending to make a low level game? Those can be fun. I haven't played a good low level game since abut the Pool of Radiance days (and I mean the 1988 version, not the remake), especially as most games (and players) are obsessed now with "give me more and bigger numbers quickly now!". Seems like its been forever since I've played a game where getting to just level 6 actually meant something, so good luck with that!

Weekend update: I spent this weekend (when I wasn't working on my presentation) on playing chapters 1 and 2 of my game from start to finish, and noting all the errors as I find them or little things that are missing. Did catch a couple of those "Why would this player know this now" and a couple of "Why wouldn't this player already know about this?" Thankfully, it all occurred with 4 cutscenes, so once this presentation is over I'm going to go back and re-write them to make sure the proper people know what they should know, and say the right things. Otherwise, it was just squashing the bugs (switch not on at the right time, the bookcase you can search over and over because I forgot to ever turn on the self switch. You know, the little things).