Category Archives: Development Diary

47th Weekly Update : Assassin !

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The 1st Rogue specialization : the Assassin

The 1st Rogue specialization : the Assassin

Pffff, hard week, hard times… :-?

I still had to do many little things this week, including more bug hunting than expected, so I could finish only the 1st Rogue specialization, the Assassin.

Result is pretty nice, though, with a very special gameplay, that may be a bit hard to apprehend (the Man at Arms is much easier to handle), but the Rogue ought to be a bit more technical than the warrior, no ? :)

I just started the next specialization, a tank one, so I hope this incoming week I’ll be able to finish the Rogue, if nothing unexpected comes through.

I set the release date on Steam on November 6th, which should give me the time to get the game proofread and do the French translation.

But I’m getting super tired, especially as I’ve got an army of birds waking me up almost every day around 6:00am (but I swear I’m not a egg snatcher pig :mrgreen: ).

I’m almost there, so hopefully, I’ll hold !

Cya next week to check how it’s going… :)

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46th Weekly Update : Steam & Mac OSX

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Ice Dragon

Ice Dragon

Another good week of work !

The game is now available to play on Steam, with Steam Achievements, for anyone who already bought the game from here . And the Steam Store page is visible here : http://store.steampowered.com/app/409450 . The game should be available to buy on Steam within a couple of weeks.

I also built & packaged the Mac OSX version for ManaGames.com (but still not for Steam), and it seems to be working nicely… :)

Things have been less crazy so I even have been able to rest a bit..! :P

So now, we’re just left with the Rogue class (and maybe the Scavenger Hunt, if I get the mood & energy) and the Steamwork shop integration and it’ll be all done.

Goal for next week is to do almost 2 Rogue specializations ; I’m not sure it’s possible or not, but we’ll know that soon enough ! ;)

45th Weekly Update : 1.0 Baby !

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It's Christmas before Christmas ! :-p

It’s Christmas before Christmas ! :-p

Wohoho !

I did it, the game is finally in a state where it can be seen as complete ! :mrgreen:

Last week hasn’t been exactly easy with Greenlight and everything (see the previous posts in the blog), but I managed to do a little bunch of things in addition of the Arcanist specialization for the Mage. Mostly I added a few abilities for the Mobs so they have more varied sounds & visual FX and the result is impressive ! I hope it’s not too much..! :-P

The Arcanist is a new beast to tame so it seems it’s different enough. I didn’t give him any AoE spells, but instead he got the best solo Crowd Control spell of the game.

I polished & fixed a few bad bugs reported by the first customers, and now the game should be in a solid state and left with a minimal list of bugs (I guess there are still a few ones hidden here and there but I’ll squeeze them soon enough!).

Anyway, I’m nearly dead, really need to catch some sleep.

Hopefully, rhythm is going to calm down now.

This week, the main goal is to get the game on the Steam platform, so I’ll be able to give Beta Steam Keys to possible reviewers : it seems more convenient than using my own system, as reviewers are short on time and are more used to Steam, they might be more willing to give it a try if they receive a Steam Key.

I’m thinking about releasing the game on Steam around end of next week, so after that I might be working on the Steam Achievements. In that case, the Rogue class would come as a bonus update a few weeks later.

Cya soon for more news ! :)

44th Weekly Update : Intense Week !

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Yeah, I already posted a screenshot of that dude, but now it's the final version ! ;-)

Yeah, I already posted a screenshot of that dude, but now it’s the final version ! ;-)

Pfffffffff ! That was an intense week !

So in the order, that gives :

  • worked my ass off to provide good game footage to the Motion Designer so he could create a good trailer, which included the addition of a smooth mouse mode and then an advanced smooth flyby mode with waypoints in the game
  • designed & refined the trailer’s storyboard
  • screenshots & gameplay video for the Greenlight page
  • Key system & buy system for the game
  • Race bonuses : it was even faster than what I planned ; instead of using the Talent System, I used the Class system which was very straightforward to apply the race bonuses (eg: +1 Strength, and stuff like that) ; and it contains the root for the Talents, so I could extend it if some Modders ask me about it :)
  • some serious debugging & cleaning in the game
  • pre-releasing the game for sale here => http://www.managames.com/DungeonGuardians/buy-the-game/
  • writing & sending French Press Release
  • posting in Forums over the Internet
  • writing the English Press Release, feeling “meh” when reading it, and thus ending hiring services of a professional marketing agency in emergency !
  • feverishly looking the Greenlight “Yes votes” counter  raises, minute by minute, till breaking the Top 100 in 60 hours, and being #36 at time of this writing ! Hopefully, it means the game will get greenlit this week, but it still needs a bunch of votes to reach the Top 10, where it’ll be almost sure to get Steam’s eyes on it

So this new week will be hopefully a bit more quiet, with “only” :

  • English PR handling
  • finally designing & integrating the 3rd mage’s specialization
  • adding a few different attack visual FX for the mobs, to bring a bit more variation to the game
  • releasing the final 1.0 version (the Rogue class will come with v1.0a at end of the month)
  • try to get some reviews on popular sites
  • resting & sleeping a bit before I die..! :-P

Cya in 1 week if I make it..!

Official Trailer !

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The Official Trailer is done..!

So the gates of Steam Greenlight are finally open ! :mrgreen:

However, I’m going to delay a little bit the publishing on Greenlight, because I want the game to be ready to be purchased once the Greenlight page will have visitors, hopefully starting to make a few sales.

So right now, it just needs :

  • the Race bonuses
  • a bit of testing to be sure there’s no bug
  • a gameplay video with the final version
  • finishing the payment process

All that should keep me busy for a couple of days, so the Greenlight release should be for tomorrow or Saturday.

The game will then only miss :

  • the Rogue class (and its 3 specializations)
  • the last specialization of the Mage class (there are already 2 done)

They’ll be added during October.

Stay tuned ! :)

43rd Weekly Update : Harder than you think !

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Final version of the Character Sheet & Inventory

Final version of the Character Sheet & Inventory

Ouch ouch ! Creating video games is harder than you think. Creating a good video trailer is harder than I think..! :mrgreen:

So this week, I spent most of my time on the video trailer, which made me realize that I’m no Stanley Kubrick.1

At 1st, I thought about doing a trailer listing & demonstrating all the main features of the game. A lot of Indie games do trailers like that. It’s relatively easy to design, it requires almost only normal game footage, and it’s efficient at presenting the game.

But then I thought it wasn’t the right way for Dungeon Guardians. DG is an adventure, an experience, more than a list of features. So I decided I should do a trailer telling a story, to connect more emotionally with the viewer and let him want to know more about the game afterwards. Ok, it sounded like a great idea, but how was I supposed to do that, especially with very limited assets outside of game footage ?! So with more hard thinking, I designed a decent storyboard, starting with the intro sequence from the game and going into some distinguishable elements of the game (exploration, fights, puzzles).

I found a freelance motion designer to edit all that, but unfortunately, it seems he’s no Stanley Kubrick either. He gave me about 0 idea nor feedback for make the storytelling of the trailer compelling, so I had to do all the thinking by myself. :-?

Fortunately, he has a good artistic sense and he’s able to do nice effects & edit, so the final result should be good.

But with the 1st cut, I discovered a huge issue : basic track shots & rotating shots done manually with the mouse look awfully not smooth & unnatural in a trailer ! So I started by adding mouse smoothing. The result was already significantly better, but any movement done with the free camera mode of the map editor was still awkwardly linear & abrupt. I then added a system of recording & replaying waypoints and added a special curved interpolation between them. Tada, finally, professional camera movements ! :mrgreen:

So now, I’m waiting for the final cut from the motion designer and hoping the result will be good. Once done, I’ll be able to publish the game on Steam Greenlight, as I wrote the long & detailed description of the game this week.

Except the trailer, I wasn’t able to work on the Race bonus because my mind was not set to it (it happens!). So instead, I started to implement the payment & delivery process. It’s based on a Key system like for my tennis games, but with a simplified installation process.

Ok, so here’s the plan for this new week : get the game on Greenlight, do some PR to let the world knows about Dungeon Guardians, polish a few things in the game,2 add the Race bonus (this is one has been running away for weeks, now!). If I manage to do all that, then 1 week later, I should be able release the game !3  :-)

Cya next week.

  1. or maybe I’m the Stanley Kubrick of before he learned anything about movie ; who knows, maybe he’s started by doing crappy videos ! :-P  ↩

  2. mostly: give the possibility to write notes on the map ↩

  3. with the Rogue class missing ; it’ll be added a couple of weeks later ↩

42nd Weekly Update : GUI Done !

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1st Final Screenshot !

1st Final Screenshot !

Woh, woh, woh, big week !

It didn’t go as planned at all, but a lot has been done ! 8-)

So the 2D artist delivered all the final stuff to finish the menus & in-game GUI.

The issue is that he’s not much of a global designer nor a game artist technician ; he’s very good for all the middle stuff, though : creating visually appealing assets in Photoshop !

So I had to be a lot more implied in the global design than I thought I would, and I also did most of the grunt work to prepare the assets to be integrated in the game, often tuning them to adapt them to their specific needs. The good point from this is that I feel the result is much more mine than if I had to do nearly nothing.

And then now, all the menus are done, all the in-game GUI is done. This is a great step done toward releasing the game ! Also, I can now produce a video trailer for the game and then set-up the Steam Greenlight page : exciting times are ahead of us ! :-)

But the 2D artist didn’t stop there ; he went on a rampage, and delivered all the portraits I needed. So I also upgraded that part of the game, so the portrait selection works well enough.

This past week , I also created all the creature portraits, which was the final missing stone in the in-game GUI. I compiled all these portraits into one big 1920×1080 screenshot ; it looks awesome, but I can’t publish it, it’d be just too much of a spoiler..! :-P

So now, the game itself misses only the last specialization for the mage, the 3 specializations for the rogue, a few polishing here and there, and it’ll be all done ! I’ll have to set-up the payment process and I’ll be able to put it on sale on managames.com while waiting to get on Steam. So within 3 weeks, you should be able to get your hands on the game !

And this new week, I’m going to get into the video trailer production, but I have 1 big issue with Unity3D (again!) : in the new version of Unity, there’s a big bug that makes a lot of animations completely silly, thus I’ll have to reinstall a previous version, hoping it won’t corrupt my project… :-? (don’t worry, I’ll do a backup 1st ! ;-) )

I’ll try to do as well the Race bonus, and if I have time, I’ll start the Arcanist (or Battle Mage ?) specialization for the Mage.

 

And let’s say goodbye for now while watching  a series of final screenshots showing the 1st fight of the game ! :mrgreen:

41st Weekly Update : Indie Life #2

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New GUI In Construction

New GUI In Construction

Once again, I’ll have to talk about my personal life this week, else I’d have nothing to say..! :-P

So if you follow this blog, you may remember I had to move away from my apartment a few weeks ago. Last week, the management of my building decided to start to repair my old apartment by destroying every inch of it ! As I stay just in the next room, it made working impossible (I need a quiet ambiance to concentrate!) ; so with my wife, we decided to take a few days off to the sea.

Actually, I had planned to work there, and I even spent about 3 hours to prepare my external drive with all my work. But I forgot it on my PC when leaving..! I guess my unconscious really needed a break… :mrgreen:

I was feeling I was needing a break since a while anyway and even planned to go during August but it hadn’t happened.

So there I ate too much, got sick twice & got 2 kg more. But hopefully now I have the reserves to finish the game & handle its long release process. :-)

The goals of this new week are mostly same than last week : do the Arcanist specialization, integrate the new GUI stuff (you can have a glimpse at the incoming improvements in the screenshot above) ; but instead of doing the Race bonus, I’ll likely do the Mob portraits, as it’s needed for the Trailer. Oh, and I’ll start to look for a trailer artist.

Cya in 1 week to see how all this will have turned out ! :-)

40th Weekly Update : Warlock & Dps Counter

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Dps Counter

Dps Counter History Graph

And again, a good week of work !

I didn’t do everything planned though, because I have been taken by the 2D artist’s new assets, so I had to check & integrate his art in the game. You can see the new Main menu in the screenshot at the bottom of this post.

After that, I worked on the Warlock. He turned out pretty well, with a bunch of interdependent abilities that made him significantly different (and harder) to play than the Elementalist Mage.

But to tune him and make him somewhat equal to the Elementalist, I created a dps counter history graph, and it has proven to be very useful ! You can see it in the screenshot above. If you look closely, you’ll see that Iris, the Warlock, got 2 peaks in her 12-second average dps ; these peaks were way too high and made her best dps by far. Knowing that, I was able to lower the effect of her ability that allowed her to do such high dps (it was her Demonic Form ! :twisted: ).

Using the counter, I also re-tuned the Man at Arms, the Priest & the Paladin specializations to produce more balanced damage & healing.

This counter will be available in the final version, both for players enjoying theorycraft wanting to optimize their party capabilities, and for Modders wanting to tune existing classes or to create new ones.

Next week, I’ll be doing the last mage specialization : the Arcanist. This time, I know what I want to do with him : he’ll be a Haste (ie: speed) based mage. I still didn’t design him, but starting on this base should lead to a special gameplay once again (hopefully ! :) ).

If I have time, I’ll also incorporate the race bonus in the game ; it has just hit me a couple of days that I could use the existing talent system to do that, instead of creating a separate mini-system, so it should be easier to integrate and also allow for more creativity.

And I’ll also probably go on improving the GUI, if the 2D artist goes on providing the new assets.

Cya in 1 week to follow all that ! :)

 

New Main Menu

New Main Menu

39th Weekly Update : Healing & Black Magic

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Healer Talent Tree

Healer Talent Tree

1 more good week of work done !

As planned, I finished the Priest specialization. The result is pretty nice, with a noticeable different style from the Druid specialization. It’ll probably make some fights harder and some other fights easier, as their capabilities differ a bit, but that was expectable.

Then, still as planned, I did in full the Necromancer specialization ! This one is a special beast : he actually bases some of his healing on damaging the enemies, so it gives a very different style from the 2 other healers. It can be a bit intimidating to handle him at 1st, but after a while, he can become very efficient. In bonus, every time you’ll get a new ability during the first levels, it’ll change the style of healing, which will give a good variety to the early game despite still having only a few available spells.

And I even had a bit of time to integrate a few missing weapons : maces, warhammer & practice sword. I still have some other swords to put in the game, as well as all the matching icons for the inventory.

So now, there are 2 specializations for the mage left to be done. 1st one will be a warlock, based on DOT. 2nd one will be, hum… I’m still not sure ! :-P   It might be an arcane mage, somewhat similar to the one from WoW, but we’ll see how he comes out. So this new week, I’ll be doing the warlock, hopefully in full, so I could also do a good part of the last mage specialization.

See you in 1 week for the next report ! :)