Category Archives: Weekly Update

Gateway to Hell ?

I did everything planned last week !

Or almost… Ok, I cheated a bit, I finished this morning before to write this post…

So I finished the Level 13 : just by adding a puzzle, the loot and some secrets, its soul came to life ! Now, it feels much more right than last week, and I’m more happy with the result : it’s a classic level, but still a good level. Especially as it features the best puzzle of the game so far ! I’m really happy with this one ; it’s actually not that hard to solve it, but it requires to really observe and not rush things, so it looks very intriguing at 1st, feeling like a timed based puzzle, but actually it’s just an observation one.

After that I created the Level 14 ; it’s a relatively classic one as well, but with a bunch of elements, architectural & gameplay ones, that make it unique. For the puzzle, I recycled the one from the Level 13 but transformed it to be a timed one ; like that, people who would have thought the Level 13’s puzzle was time based and spent a lot of time to try to solve it in that way will be able to use that training to easily solve the puzzle in the level 14.

And finally, I created the Level 15 ; this one feels special enough as well, featuring some lava (as seen on the screenshot above), it makes me feel like a level from Doom¹. It’s also less linear and globally pretty efficient. I also broke a few of my habits so it brings some variety. And its puzzle is good ; it’s dexterity based but nothing too hard.

And on top of that, I managed the release of my tennis game on Steam, which was kinda erratic, so all in all it has been a pretty busy & intense week !

The good news is that now I create levels much faster than before… More exactly, I create them in less cumulated time… I still need a couple of days to create a level, but I don’t have to work as much every day, so it gave me time to take care of Steam & stuff.

So the objective for this incoming week is to create the Level 16 which will be the last level of 4th tier (actually, it’ll belong as much to the 4th as the 5th), and then set up the 4 boss fights of the 4th tier. I’m not sure I’ll be able to do all that, except if I come pretty fast with ideas for the boss fights, or decide to do more simple tank & spank fights, but we’ll see in next weekly update the results, like usually !

1. yes, the FPS from 1993! ↩

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Level 13th Boss Room

Last week has been a bit slow again, but there was not much more to do to finish the integration of the 4th tier mobs, so I also almost finished to create the 13th level : now it just misses 1 puzzle, some loot and a couple of secret rooms and it’ll be done (except for the boss fight, as usually).

I’m not super happy with this 13th Level though. After the 4 previous levels, which were pretty nicely varied with all their own distinct taste, this one is a bit more generic, classic and straightforward. It still has its own character though, but it’s less strongly marked.

Hopefully, having a more simple level will actually feel like a variation and a nice break after a few harder levels.

I have big goal for this week : finish 13th level, and create the 14th & 15th levels ! Let’s see if it can be done for next weekly update !

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Ratkin Gunners Firing at Will !

Last week has been slow & short, so I didn’t do much…

It’s always hard to switch back to a creative project, and this time was no exception so I didn’t have much mood nor energy last week to work on Dungeon Guardians. Anyway, I managed to integrate almost half of the new mobs needed for the 4th tier, including the Ratkin Gunner featured in the screenshot above, but I didn’t begin the level design as hoped.

So the goals for this new week are to finish the integration and create the 13th level !

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Elven Queen Beast Flooding Acid

Another week that went well : I did everything planned !

1st, I created the 12th level : it has been a bit hard, but once again, I’m happy with the result. It feels special & different from the previous levels ; its exploration is a bit challenging but without being too much confusing either. I even got some inspiration back for a pleasant puzzle ; it’s time based, so it requires a bit of dexterity, but actually, like most puzzles I created so far, it requires mostly observation to understand how to solve it.

I also designed the 4 boss fights. It has been a bit tedious, I didn’t have much inspiration at 1st, but after a couple of days thinking, I ended with some pretty decent fights. The last boss of 3rd tier (ie: in level 12) will be particularly challenging !

While I was thinking about the boss design, I integrated the final assets produced by my environment artist (it was mainly statues, keys and a few props), and now it’s (almost) all done.

And that not all for this week : I even updated a couple of ugly visual fx ; the new versions look much better, and it shows I’ll have some work in that field once I’ll be finished with the dungeon creation.

Anyway, now, with 3 tiers more or less finished, the dungeon has about the same size than the one of Dungeon Master or the one of Legend of Grimrock. It looks pretty nice overall, and I begin to feel anxious wondering what the critical reception will be. I doubt the game will get much famous, but at least, I hope it’ll make happy a little bunch of people !

Ok, so now I’m going to take a break from Dungeon Guardians. For a couple of weeks I’ll be working on the Steam release of my tennis game. I’ve got some big stuff to do, but hopefully it’ll go fine. It’ll be a lot less creative than working on Dungeon Guardians, as it’ll be mostly technical stuff (except for the Achievement design), so it should be easier & more straightforward than the work I did in these past weeks.

I’ll still post during that time, and once it’s done, I’ll be right back on Dungeon Guardians, although I’m not sure on what part I’ll be working then. Maybe I should extend the existing talent trees, so I could test the 3rd tier, or maybe I’ll jump directly into the level design of the 4th tier (ie: levels 13-16). I’ve got some nice ideas for it and I’m impatient to see them taking form. Right now I’m still not sure I’ll go to a total of 20 levels : I worry a bit it’d make the game a bit too long. Testing & more testing should answer that question…

Anyway that’s all for now, cya next time !

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Elven Beast Puppy – Yeah, it’s a puppy, the adults are noticeably bigger ! ;-)

Ouch ouch !

Another difficult week, where things didn’t turn as expected.

1st, I couldn’t resist to look into the Steam release process for my tennis game, and I did all the little things required : the store page is ready with all the screenshots, descriptions and whatnot. Now it just misses the big things : adding achievements, handling online account between Steam & ManaGames.com, and packaging the game for Steam.

I also had to handle the new update of my tennis game : update the OSX, linux & Desura versions ; write a newsletter.

But all this took me time that I didn’t spend on Dungeon Guardians !

And on that side, I had to do the integration of the 4 third-tier bosses, and it took me longer than expected, as the assets needed a good bunch of adaptation ; the good news is that I made mob variations using different skins, so I also have got additional mobs to guard the last boss of the zone ! It’s always nice to have variations as it allows to introduce what a mob type can do through a weaker version, so the 1st learning fights won’t be too hard and will get the players ready for the more serious stuff.

Anyway, now I already started to give abilities & spells to these new mobs, but it’s still not finished, especially as I still didn’t design the boss fights. Hopefully, I’ll do all that this week, including creating the 12th level ! I didn’t start but I gathered ideas about it in the last days.

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Gnome Warriors Lurking in the Dark

I finally did it !

Last week, I managed to do everything I had planned to do..!

So the 11th level came in shape pretty nicely. It’s much more compact and straightforward than its 2 predecessors, but still it should make the players feel disoriented pretty often, even if actually they won’t be really lost.

This level has the highest number of secret passages, mostly to allow to easily walk back if required, but also to provide extra gear.

I even got some inspiration back for puzzle, so the one I created for this level is simple and elegant without being too hard : it just requires a bit of observation and timing.

So only 1 new level this past week, but I did the update for my tennis game as planned.

My Steam developer account has just been cleared, so I have a thousand little things (and some not so little) to do to publish it on Steam, but I think I’m going to try to finish the 3rd tier of Dungeon Guardians (ie: create the 12th level and do the 4 boss fights for level 9-12) by beginning of next week.

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Beware the Cave Troll !

Pffff, again, I had trouble to work this week !

Moreover, the Level 10 design turned out harder to handle than what I had expected. So the week ends with only 1 new level, but the result is at least satisfying !

Let me explain in details. It all starts with the initial game design I made when I began to work on Dungeon Guardians. I didn’t want the players to pick up torches to light their environment, unlike many other First Person Dungeon Crawler. The reason is simple : if we spend the whole game holding a torch, the lighting is more or less identical for the whole game. So by not allowing the player to pick up torches nor lanterns, I control better the atmosphere and its variation through the whole dungeon. It also allows to build more beautiful and impressive scenes.

But there’s an advantage to holding torches : it drastically limits the distance we can see (if there’s no other lighting source), and it feels slightly oppressing to know we could run out of light and end up all lost in the dark if we’re not careful. So I decided to make 1 level that would feature these perks. But I still didn’t want to provide torches : it’s not really possible to predict how many the players would need, as each player progresses at their own pace, so I’d have to put a ton of them, and then the fastest players would end with extra torches to use in the following levels. I didn’t want to do that for the last level either, as I wanted to bring variation earlier in the game. So I had the idea to create the light field : when you walk into it, you get a light spell on your party for 8 minutes. Like this, you get all the advantages without the inconveniences.

So I did all that, and boom, I got the confirmation of my initial choice : constant lighting really doesn’t look that great ! So I had to do some more thinking…

Mainly, I managed to get some better shadowing, so the contrast on screen is better, and the dancing shadows bring some life when we move ; the light from spell slowly pulses so the lighting isn’t totally constant ; and I put a bunch of blue crystals in the caverns so it brings contrasts, while still making the light spell needed, as the crystal light is very dim.

Mines – With Light Spell

Otherwise, that Level 10 contains the most challenging labyrinth so far, and I probably won’t make anything harder in the game. Even with the map, it might prove difficult not to get lost, as there are some up/down tunnels. For fierce explorers, it might be a nice challenge, but for more casual players, it might feel a bit too hard, so I have hidden a map at the start of the level. If anyone has trouble exploring it, I’ll give them the location of the map and it’ll get much more bearable…

That’s all for this week ! Next week, the objective is to do only 1 new level, as I’ll have to spend a couple of days on my tennis game to do a small update.

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Crystal Cavern

This week, I finally managed to do some level design !

The 9th level is now almost finished ; it features the new cave & mine environment. I also created a simple but atmospheric underground forest. The result is likely the biggest level so far. I’m still struggling to find the sweet-spot between accessibility and challenging exploration, but hopefully this level will be interesting to discover without completely losing the player.

My inspiration for creating puzzles is getting a bit low, but I managed to do a decent one.

The missing parts are some triggerable props to open a door (I’m waiting them from the environment artist), and the boss fight, which I’ll take care of once the whole zone of 4 levels will be done (it’s easier to proceed by layer like this).

Unfortunately, this week has been also the theater of some terrible events in France, that let me very shocked & sad, so I had great trouble to work for a couple of days, thus I was able to do only 1 level and not 2 like I had hoped.

On a brighter side, my tennis game has just been greenlit by Steam (on the same day than the attacks!), which means that in the incoming weeks I’ll have to take a few days off from Dungeon Guardians to take care of its release on Steam.

Goal for next week is to create 2 new levels ; we’ll see if I can reach it or not !

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Level Design with Stencil & Paper

Ok, so last week I didn’t work on Dungeon Guardians again… I needed holidays !

And also, I had to work on some other stuff ; antispam for the Forum : it gets a ton of spam, it’s a real pain in the *** to stop 100% of them, there’s always a few ones that pass through the different protections. I also did a small update for my tennis game & its tournament system. This is kind of stuff we have to take care of when we’re Indie developer. I’m always switching hat to handle the different aspects of the game development and the business around it.

Anyway now it’s ok, and I’m ready to do some level design today ! Above, you can see what the 1st step looks like : I get a stencil and scribble on paper some lines for the corridors, some circles for most of the rooms, and some more defined shapes for a few important rooms. Once I have that, I switch to the in-game level editor and refine the layout, which means the final result is always a bit different of the initial paper design, sometimes it’s more than a bit.

That’s all for now, and Happy New Year ..!

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Built-in Map Editor

Ok, this week didn’t go exactly like expected.

In the 9th level of the Dungeon,  I want to create an underground forest. To do so, I bought a Tree pack on Unity Asset Store. They look very good, but their texture mapping was really sub-optimal : a lot of space was wasted.

Wasted space = lost VRAM = less total textures = lower visual quality.

So I decided to redo their texture mapping. 3D pipeline is not exactly my speciality, thus I lost the best part of a day to set everything till I reached a satisfying result.

Once that done, it reminded me that I didn’t check since long time how much RAM the game was needing to run. Last time I did that was for Beta 1, in last September, and the game needed about 450MB. That was quite reasonable and in part with my objective for the game to use 2GB at maximum. According to Steam Hardware Survey, there are 2% of players with less than 2GB of RAM, 10% with 2GB, 14% with 3GB, and the rest ( = 74%) with more than 3GB. For me, it’s important that at least people with 3GB be able to play the game, so the game using 2GB should ensure that. If I can manage to stay under 1.6GB, that would be even better, as it might allow player with 2GB of RAM to launch the game ; although people with such low system RAM might not have a good enough GPU to run the game, so it’s not a big concern.

Anyway, I checked Beta 2 RAM usage, and it was at a massive 1.7GB ! As the Beta 2 is bundled with less than half of the game content, that came at quite a big shock !

After some in-depth checking, I found out it was the creature Animations that were taking more than 1GB : it turned out that with the method I was using to assign animations to creatures, Unity was duplicating the animations instead of sharing them across the creatures like expected. Of course, Unity documentation didn’t have a word about that matter. Once again, I had a big issue because of Unity basic shortcomings. Like I said before Unity is globally great, but it’s trapped with plenty of deadly stuff like that.

Fortunately, Unity introduced a new animation system with its 4 version, called Mecanim (also plagued with a bunch of stupid issues, but I had already solved most of them a few months back). This new version didn’t have the duplicated animation issues, but it means I had to upgrade all my creatures to the new system. I had already planned to do so, so the system was already in place & working, but it meant I had to spend a couple of long days on integration, while I already had more than enough of it in this month.

Once I upgraded all creatures (30% were already using Mecanim), the animations RAM usage plummeted to less than 100MB, which lead the game to need only a bit more of 600GB. Things got back on track, and the 2GB objective should be relatively easy to keep in line now !

So after that, I took a break and as today, I didn’t work on the game for more than 3 days in a row, which didn’t happen since long time..!

But it makes me eager to get back to level design, and hopefully, I’ll get the energy & time to create a level in the next few days (I may take again some break for New Year ).

So as a little teaser as much for you than for myself, I put a screenshot of the built-in map editor. If you’re into level design, you’ll likely enjoy it, as it’s really fast & simple to create a level (except for puzzle mechanism which requires to understand a few advanced stuff).

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