March Goals & Progress Thread

[Another Ned]

Can't really focus right now so I can't find enough concentration to comment on everyone's progress. So a general: "Yay for progress! And lots of motivation!" for everyone.

@slimmmeiske2: I can't even remember what I was trying to say. If you didn't see it, maybe it only happened on my end. x_x
And thanks for the suggestion, I'll look into it.
___
14th:

• worked more on characters, who refuse to take on a life of their own. They still are but a bunch of descriptive adjectives and not people. Which is frustrating. Characters usually are what come to me the fastest/easiest
• went through more stuff to cut, took notes in regards to changes and functionality
• made a list of locations so I know what I need visually

15th:

• worked on some kind of overview for plot and locations

Then, I gave in and looked into the old (more or less old) abandoned project again. I can't really remember what "coming home" feels like, but it definitely came close, I think. Spent some time going through my old ideas, reacquainted myself with the characters (which were understandably pissed for having been abandoned for so long) and looked at a few of the old maps and even re-worked a few small things (I became a lot more switches/variables-efficient in contrast to last year). I accidentally also did a bit of mapping. And tileset edits. But those were minor, really. Before I knew it it was already 21:00 (9 pm) and the day was over.

 

[Candacis]

Okay, I wanted to share my march goals:

I'm currently working on tiles from scratch, so I want to finish a lot of the autotiles. Mainly the house walls and roofs as well as most of the floors. Theme is hard to describe, it is a vague timeperiod between western and modern time, I think. It concentrates on factories, workplaces and just general city stuff. There will be radios and telephones, but the early versions. All of the tiles will not be too modern, but also not fantasy related. Little to no nature tiles at the moment. Imagine more bricks than wood planks. Style is as close to rtp as I can do it. Goal is to have a set of tiles that are very versatile and can be used for a lot of genres and time periods.

At least that is the vision.

I don't know, if I will succeed since it is the first time I'm doing that much tiles from scratch, but at least it is a good practice.

I am currently working on finishing A3, some of A4 and then it is on to A2. All Outside stuff, don't know if there will be an Inside tileset as well or if that even is the smartest way to start. This weekend I created 7 walls and I'm very happy about that since I didn't expect to get that much done. Quality-wise it could still benefit from some polishing, but right now I'm happy with my from-scratch-walls and that they fit, in my opinion, the rtp and are still different from it. If others will see it the same way, I don't know and right now it is too early to show it to others, because it could very well crush my motivation and I don't want to risk it. So, even if it doesn't meet the right quality, I think, right now it is better to continue regardless and practice, practice, practice.

I just hope, I can keep working on it since I know, I have taken breaks from it in the past because other stuff came up or I lost my energy.

 

[Tuxedo Leila]

@Chiara I can't talk more about the nature of Calliope's Maze because it's linked heavily to the story

It's been a while!

(I'm going to go with this type of lighting from now on. The map must be done first, and then I will do the rest in Photoshop. Exterior maps will have three layers controlled by pictures: shadows, lights, and effects. Interior maps will either have two or one.)

 

My story is clearer now. I've been looking at some of the past discussions on character and game design and I must say, it's really helped in strengthening the plot to my game and how I write my characters. 

 

As for my tiles, I looked at them critically and realized two things: 1) they lack texture and 2) they tend to have this very mechanical look to them. I've also had trouble with creating different atmospheres with my tiles. You see, Runeville (the only explorable city in the modern world) is separated into pretty much four parts: the lower towns (more rugged, lively, diverse), Downtown (tall buildings, some tech stuff), suburbs (posh, organized), and the outskirts. I've only focused on the suburbs until now.

 

So I've brainstormed some of the things I should keep in mind when creating tiles of different areas:

 

RUNEVILLE

Downtown

-Tall buildings, intimidating atmosphere, busy, lacks the colour and liveliness that the lower towns and outskirts have.

 

Suburbs

-Very organized, the houses have their own separate yards and are surrounded by large, huggable trees.

 

Outskirts

-The plants and trees become stranger the more you stray from the path. 

 

Lower towns

-Full of life and colour, there is less symmetry than Downtown. Isn't organized and spacious like suburbs.

 

*I'll finish up my thoughts later.

 

[mlogan]

Can't really focus right now so I can't find enough concentration to comment on everyone's progress. So a general: "Yay for progress! And lots of motivation!" for everyone.

Yeah, I so second this. I've been terrible with my goals, one of which is to post here, and so I've gotten a huge backlog of posts and well, what Chiara said.

But seriously, it does make me happy to see everyone getting use out of this thing.

I did pick up my goals today, kinda sorta, which was an hour of work a day. I've just been at this uninspired stand still with Slimer it seems lately. I really need to find a way to push through it. But I installed XP the other day (which I'd only purchased to be able to use the tiles) and I got the itch to play with it today. It's a nothing special map, but I really, really enjoyed the mapping process. It's not a done scene, but it's something.

I also started working on a snowy forest map in XP as well after listening to one of mostly useless's tracks. It's what I imagined, so I thought I would make a little scene to go with the music. Here is the town I worked on though:

Spoiler

 

[slimmmeiske2]

@ksjp: Thanks I guess our mind just sometimes connect certain dots when it's not necessary.

@bgillips: Thanks! (Same here, haha. We'll get to them sometime)

@Chiara: Characters are quite hard. :/ I know the ones I have in my side project are at the same stage at yours. Adjectives, some smallish backgrounds even, but still they feel empty to me

You gave in! (Yay :3) I'm glad you had a nice time playing around. I often either feel embarrased or happy going through old projects.

@Candacis: Awesome goals! Good luck with the tiles. I'm sure you'll be able to complete them. :3

@Leila: I like your lightning, it's point on. Well, your tiles do have a more "build blocks" feeling to it, but I feel they're very charming :3

@mlogan: Nice map! (And yay for trying out XP ) 

Not a lot of progress today, as my mind was occupied with something else, but don't ask me what, as I can't even remember ^^;

I've slightly edited one of Avery's tileset (the inside tree one) as the bark's colour didn't match with my tree. Then I mapped -everyone's in a mapping phase it seems- a small map with that tree tileset. It's nothing fancy, as the map is only a gateway to another part of the "world". Last thing I did was to set up the passability for this tileset and the one I use for my animal village.

 

[Kes]

@Chiara

Although you say that you can't focus right now, you did manage to do something to move things on a bit.  Sometimes I think that's all one can hope for.  None of us is a sausage factory which can just churn the stuff out mechanically.

@Candacis

I'm looking forward to seeing what you produce.  A tile set like that would be so incredibly useful to a lot of people, so kudos for getting started on it.

@Tuxedo Leila

I like the way you've done the lighting on that map.  I do have a problem with perspective, though, when it comes to the red whatevers above the lower windows.  I can't work out exactly what's meant to be happening, because the window is flush with the wall (they don't protrude from the wall at the base), but the red slope looks like it wants to come away from the wall as if the windows were further forward by at least one tile.  My brain hurts.

@mlogan

I do agree with you, the XP resources are great, and I would love to find the time to do something more than just mess around with it.  Everyone says the mapping is so much better.  My problem is that I'm in love with Ace's data base and damage formulas, so I'm torn.

@slimmeiske

yes, you're right.  I think I must have a very unsubtle sub-conscious to come up with a Joseph Stalin lookalike.  I too like that tile set of Avery's.  She produces a lot of excellent stuff.

My day was messy.  I've done some more mapping, but only after having to do a whole batch of tile editing that I wasn't anticipating.  I'm switching between eventing the previous map and doing the next one, which is the market area, plus some houses.  I found that the stalls etc that I'd set up on my tile sheet were just far too big - almost as big as some of the houses, so I've had to do all new stalls, including resizing all the stuff that is on the various counters so that it fits.  Talking of stuff, I've put in my medieval "Store Your Stuff" enterprise.  Very simple, but it adds a little something extra to the market area beyond the usual.  I think I'm starting to regret deciding not to use Celianna's presets.  This is all taking a lot longer to do, even if it does mean that my city won't look like everyone else's - though having said that, there are lots of similarities, just because I'm using the same tiles.  Still, it's a lot quicker doing it in the editor than it would be if I were trying to parallax it.

 

[hiddenone]

Yay for everyone mapping!  I'm a little sad that the maps for my game are done, cause now I can't fall back on that when I don't feel like eventing. 

I didn't make too much progress over the past few days.  A new idea had popped into my head, so it took a lot of shoving to get it to go back into its little box so that I could focus on this game.  I started to add the luna engine to the game, but realized that 1) I don't have a clear idea of what I want the menus to look like and 2) it adds nothing to the game besides the ability to say "oooh, pretty menus".  So I did the most logical thing and disabled it for now.  Once I've finished more of the game I can decide if I want to go back and use it or not.

After fumbling around with that, I did start working on cutscenes and the behavior sprites that I want for those scenes.  Here's an early look at how the player is introduced to Eve (just imagine the 'thud' as she hits the floor  ).

 

[Tuxedo Leila]

@ksjp17 It's supposed to be one those top thingies that protects the window (I don't know what it's called orz). I think adding a shadow to the side of the window would make it less confusing.

 

[bgillisp]

@Tuxedo Lelia: My suggestion is start somewhere. My first few maps had no plan to them, they were just shell maps for the towns until I was ready to map them. In fact I'm thinking I'm going to have to do this approach to two chapter 5 towns as they are looking like they are going to be difficult to map!

@mlogan: Ice Underfoot by chance?

@ksjp17: We talking like a storage merchant? That would be interesting to see.

@hiddenone: From what I've seen of Luna, its either best set up before you begin, or not at all. I've decided myself to hold off on Luna until my 2nd or 3rd project (probably 3rd, as I have a start on a 2nd project I dabble in when I want to make something, but am at a standstill for ideas on the main game).

3.16 Update: Patched the few bugs/typos reported since the demo was released. Finished off the stadium map except for one room, and did a paper sketch of what Riverdale should look like now...only to realize it is very similar to the current map. Not sure if I'll redo it just to add the two edits I want to add, or if I'll try to shoehorn them in (though my track record indicates that shoehorning into a map never works well for me).

Also redid the MC's skill set. I had wanted to do that for a while, but ideas were lacking. not too many major changes on skills in the demo (the biggest is one skill has been replaced with another), but it will mean more in Chapters 2 onward.

 

[mlogan]

@slim - Thanks! And playing Big Bad Wolf is what made me curious to try. It reminded me of how much I love XP tiles! (Which, I need to finish that up, I think I'm near the end.)

@kjsp - Yeah, I do love the tiles, but the mapping is nice. With the layers not only is it easy to make a less rigid scene, it's easier to fix and adjust things because of the different layers.

Also, what market stalls are you using?

@hiddenone - OH MY GOSH!!! That is the best behavior sprite EVER!!!

@leila - Awnings is the word you're looking for. And I think they look fine - I could tell that's what their supposed to be.

@bgsillisp - Surprisingly no, though I did hear that one later. The one that inspired me for the snow scene is Patterns.




Very tranquil, which made me think of the quiet of the snow.

 

[Another Ned]

@Candacis: Sounds a little industrial, which I'd love. *tries not to fangirl about how pretty industrial buildings from around 1900 are in Berlin*
I wish you lots of extra motivation and energy to complete this. : )

@Tuxedo Leila: Gnaargh, but the curiosity! I have read your post before heading to bed and now I dreamt of the term and want to know what it is and since you won't tell I have to wait and *remembers to breathe* I'm a very patient person. x")
Lighting is pretty. <3
And I do like your tiles, yet understand the need for critically examining one's own work. I just hope you don't get entangled in the vicious circle of "doing stuff. Improving. Noticing that old stuff isn't up to par with current skill. Redoing stuff. Improving", because *selfish person* then I have to wait even longer to find out what Calliope's Maze is.

@mlogan: XP is so wonderful to map with, isn't it? I want someone to perform a dark ritual of Code magic and make it so that one can map in XP and have the maps be available for eventing and everything else in Ace.

@slimmmeiske2: I wonder why some characters become people and others stay in such a state. ):
Well, it's only a year old and from before my total burnout, so it wasn't too embarassing. Except for the placeholder dialogues. And the eventing.
And yay for mapping!

@ksjp17: Thanks for the kind words. : )
And not using the presets also means that you're a lot more flexible (in theory). : )
(and I think my favourite word in the English language is "stuff". So versatile!)

@hiddenone: Just so you know it, while reading it, I saw a cartoon in my mind's eye of Eve stuffing the idea back into a box. Wait a moment while I finish chuckling and giggling – and start anew thanks to the 'thud'. (my mom's comment upon seeing it – we currently stay in the same room – "survival training"? – I think she refers to the sneaky movement before the 'thud')

@bgillisp: Sounds like you did a lot. Wait, you only had to patch a few bugs? Nice. : )
___
I kept playing around with my older project yesterday. The day before, I had already migrated what I needed into a clean new project (the old file was a mess), transferred the scripts I'm using for the project without name (well, those I needed for this particular project) and, as I mentioned, reworked some events. So yesterday, I mapped a bit more, added events, and "life", and side-quests happened (well, more time to familiarize myself with modern algebra's quest journal script), and NPCs appeared and I had a fun time.
Screenshots!

Spoiler

Map, sprite edits and face graphic are at least one year old; the dialogue is new. Also shows the "figure out windowskins" windowskin. (note: There's a pause before the "Queen" when text is depicted)



Map from the day before yesterday. Shows heavy RTP wall edits from a year ago, still WIP (really need to finish them sometime). Some tiles are placeholders.

It's a mix of Mack and RTP, with edits by Liberty and Indrah strewn into the mix (for everything else I'd have to dig up the tileset psds; I name my layers after the content creators). Well, and my own edits here and there. And I need to find out where I got that pretty tree tile from *slaps past self's bad organization skills*

I think I will continue tinkering on my "old" project for a while or switch between both. My old one I always named after the first character, Yarad, so I'll refer to it by that name. The new and current one... Erm. Island Crawler. There, working title appeared.

 

[CrazyCrab]

Hmm, I've completely forgotten about posting here ^^'.

Anyway, finished my combat system on paper and implemented a hefty chunk, made icons, damage formulas, etc  - no 'attack' command, every move counts. With permadeath, it counts even more, with weapons just giving a pile of ''weaponry skills'' that replace the attack command. Aim at the hands to reduce attack, the armor to crush it, or go all in and try to decapitate someone. The skills depend on the type of the weapons (clumsy weapons ht harder but give fewer skills, making them a better choice for mages who will use their energy on magic anyway) and the type of damage - crushing, slashing, piercing. Yep, it all matters as well, good luck piercing a skeleton.

I've also got permadeath and hiring new guys working, but I've still got to polish it a bit. Same goes for class changing.

Overall quite a bit done and I'm more motivated to work than ever. Expect more updates!

 

[VideoWizard]

Mon 3.16.15- A little more progress... the area around the broken bridge has been made! Only took about an hour, too. Now, today is St. Patrick's Day, so wear your green, unless you wish to be pinched by William. (You wouldn't live to tell about it) No, but really, have a great St. Patrick's Day (or night, or belated, depending where you live)!

 

[Kes]

@Hiddenone

That behaviour sprite is among the best I've ever seen.  I love it.

@Tuxedo Leila

Yeah, awning.  Now that the shadow is in, it makes a lot more sense.

@bgillisp

To have only a few things to fix shows how much work went in before the demo was released, so well done on that.  My experience on shoehorning is like yours; it never really works and I end up going back and redoing it anyway, with a lot of wasted time to show for it.

@chiara

I like modern algebra's quest journal script.  I find it very logical to use, and it doesn't require more competence than I've got, so I don't feel intimidated by it.  Seems like you're still moving things on, which can't be bad.

@CrazyCrab

That's a lot to have organised.  As you know from another thread, I'm not a fan of permadeath, but I can appreciate the amount of work and detail that you've put in, so congrats on that.

@VideoWizard

I'm not Irish, but that doesn't mean I don't know how to party with those who are.

@mlogan

You wanted to see what stalls I was using, so here is one.  I've got them with either green or blue canopies, I think 2 colours is enough.  This is the general household stall.  I've stuffed plates, saucepans, cooking implements etc. in there.  (Edit - nothing like posting for spotting mistakes.  I've just seen that my lamp post knocked a bit of the shadow off the stall,  Another thing to correct.)

I've also got a fruit and veg stall, a presents/knick-kancks stall, bales of cloth and reels of cotton stall (everyone makes their own clothes) and a fish stall.  Separately I've got a stall which is just a large u-shaped table selling plants and flowers.  

For shops I've got a blacksmith (complete with furnace and anvil) selling metal weapons and armour, a bow maker and a third shop selling magic staffs and other magic gear.  As a blacksmith would not know how to string a bow properly, and wouldn't have the specialist knowledge for magic gear, it makes sense (to me) to have them as separate shops.  So I've mapped them, a house which is the house selling plants, and the pub.

I think this map is going to be a bit smaller than I had feared, because I only need to put in the cheaper Inn and a few houses and it's done.  All public buildings e.g. Town Hall, Palace, are going to be on a map to the left.

Also did some work eventing on the previous section of the town.  I'm trying to find clock innards, as I have someone who is on the verge of inventing this world's first clock.

 

[mlogan]

Ahhh I haven't seen that one. I was curious because I've put together a variety of stalls for some other things and thought they might be of use.

 

[bgillisp]

@ksjp17: Thanks, the official report was 15 bugs and 25 typos by the first person to play it to end, and a high percentage of those bugs were of the "Why did anyone even try this?" type (aka things I never thought of doing ever, for any reason). About to post an updated demo with the fixes, one fix took me a while to figure out how to prevent it from happening though. As for shoehorning, remember my Elmwood map in the version you played? That was the result of me shoehorning the bank into the map, and it just went all over the place.

@slimmesike2: Well, I downloaded the game, does that count? Too bad I only have a couple short breaks at work today, no time to play more than a few minutes here and there.

3.17 Update: Finally figured out a way to fix one of the reported bugs from happening, in theory. Unfortunately I don't have a save anywhere close to the location of it, and not enough time today to test it. Will have to give it an attempt tomorrow. Also started redrawing Riverdale, this town is going to be more of a fishing village (since it is where two really big rivers meet after all), complete with houses and slums on the west side. The party only has to go to the east side, but they do need to go to the west side at some point. I only got the NW side done today, where the boats and houses are, and am moving my way across to the actual town entrance and shops. Right now you can't even really walk through the map except in test mode (as I still need to connect everything), but it's a start, right?

I don't have my 15 hour day tomorrow due to spring break at the school I teach the night class at, so hoping tomorrow to test the bug and/or do more mapping of Riverdale.

 

[Kes]

Ahhh I haven't seen that one. I was curious because I've put together a variety of stalls for some other things and thought they might be of use.

I've more or less constructed it myself by frankenspriting from elsewhere, with a couple of small touches myself..  Obviously the contents I've taken from all over the place, I haven't made the items from scratch.  But thank you for thinking of how to help.  That is most kind of you.

@bgillisp

Yes, anticipating what strange and wonderful approaches the player will take is one of the more challenging aspects.  Actually, I think I've become much better at anticipating that sort of thing and accounting for it either by conditionals, or by blocking some possibilities which would be too, too complicated to cope with.  Having said that, I've got one side quest with a ridiculous number of switches because of the different order that they might do things in and because they could, if they so wished, give up on it part way through, in which case, an NPC dies.  So I've got branches going off in all directions.  One of the things I've been doing in the feedback on early demos is connected with this.  I can usually tell what order the developer expects me to do something in, and so I go and do it in a different order if I can, to see if e.g. the dialogue needs adjusting with a conditional.  it usually does.

 

[Candacis]

@ksjp: that is just the cutest stall ever ^_^  Combining different resources to one cohesive look is not that easy, but you seem to have an eye for it. I wouldn't worry about a map being too small as long as it has every function you need for the game.

@hiddenone: that behaviour is awsome!

Little update since I got a lot of done for rpgmaker. Not for my tileset, but for the next ReStaff (wheee ^_^). It is nature themed, which gives me a good opportunity practicing with nature tiles. So in a way it helps me with my tiles from scratch since I'm getting more confident making nature stuff. And it is just a great motivation boost. Can't show anything, you will just have to wait for the ReStaff. I have almost one half of a tileset, don't know yet how or if I could fill the other half. I did all the initial ideas I had, now I'm just waiting for another inspiration.

 

[slimmmeiske2]

Too tired to comment, sorry guys, but I've read your posts ^^ Go you!

RM wise I've only copied some characters over to a new map, made several new maps (as in click new map, select tileset and that's it) and slightly edited one character's conversation.

Not RM wise, but still kinda, I've spent the whole day compiling this. The only thing left to do is check through my tranlasted terms list to see if there's any site with fairy tale themed resources and then I guess it's time to translate the terms of new sites.

 

[JAD94]

Finally got to update the demos on my project thread .

Now gonna work on adding a few more things to the main project.