| G_yoshi |
02-01-2006 11:39 PM |
Current state of affairs
Unless anyone noticed, the 12 screenshots cover from Dec 26, 2005 till current (a little more than a month). It really had been approxiamtely 1 year since I last touched it and I'm not sure what drew me back in. To be blunt, I've made the change from 3D terrain to flat levels. Why? I have a few dynamic effects that are kind of hurt by terrain (or rather, large gmaps). Most of what you see is being reused from before (don't be hating on my house insides! I worked hard on those).
Concerning levels, I have a new and very different approach. Everything is being built in small pieces with areas being "self-contained". This means that new areas can be added very quickly (I put together a 3x3 gmap and detailed it in only a few short hours). At the moment, I don't have many levels constructed (wasn't completely necessary). I could use a big hand in this area for now and if anyone is interested, feel free to contact me via AIM or pop in #gscript on IRC and talk with me privately.
Concerning NPCs, I've scrapped my original ideas and am starting fresh with simplicity in mind. My overall goal is still to mix part the gameplay style from the Mana series with a little bit of Zelda/Graal. I have been busy over the past week and half converting and creating new scripts using GS2 by way of #gscript (and I'm quite thankful for their proding too). Its pretty obvious the on-screen display is complete. Right now I'm working on the inventory system which is in my latest screenshot (busy making it secure at this point).
Concerning everything else, graphicswise I'm pretty much where I need to be. I'm glad that most people like the bodies and I'm sure its....strange to see a black man with bright yellow hair, but why should that matter anyway? On the topic of character bodies, it shouldn't come as much of a surprise to learn that both the male and female bodies are converted graal body sprite tables. I can't draw and animate a body for crap so this was the next best solution, however they are only complete to the point where I obviously have idle, walking, and sitting. Its not a long process, but it is tedious and often hard to guess where the actual outline is when there's lots of black. If anyone is interested, I could use a few more hair styles for male and female characters. All I need is a sprite table (best table to use is one for the hats) with the up, down, left, and right positions that's just a simple outline that's filled with grey (each should fit in a 48x48 space). I'll take care of the rest of the process by adding the colors and shading detail; this would also apply to bodies for those that are interested (please use a standard graal body table).
I also have something that most other playerworlds neglect: original music. I have done it myself as well as a small dynamic script that changes the music when its dark out and I hope people will download the music pack when I come back online. Its very much integrated into my world and it would be a shame not to mention harmful towards the play experience I want to create if people don't download it.
More will be divulged at a later time.
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