Fifth Milestone (EN)

Second-to-last milestone before summertime, and so many changes to explain!

Just turning the game on, we perceive the first one, videos (cutscenes) at start.

This has been a paint in the ***, and I’m kind of sure we didn’t use the most proficient way, but it works and doesn’t seems to bring problems (unless you use a toaster instead of a PC). We will soon add an opening to the game, but whenever it’s ready it will be immediately inserted. What we have already added is a cutscene to the main menu, making a top-notch opening animation to the long forgotten book and the menu fading in the book pages. It looks prettier than ever!

When selecting “new game” option we will enter the character creation menu that no longer shows dwarf faces everywhere (actually, dwarf faces are almost extinct atm). Instead of those faces, there is a better distribution of the important information split between both pages of the book. It’s important to remark that race selection is now functional, meaning that the choice will affect player’s attributes and the look of player’s avatar.

The obvious improvement this milestone is the addition of a new biome! We have an ice-themed biome that looks more open and less claustrophobic (and to be sincere, less standard than the classic dungeon theme). This biome is more similar to a cave, less orthogonal and a bit more “curvy”, higher ceiling and lighted with a blueish tone. Torches have been replaced by crystals that emit that blue-tone light and doors are made of metal bars that raise and fall. To make the corners look better we use to different types of columns (one for concave corners and the other for convex ones) that also matches ceiling pattern.

We’ve also added a new effect (an onscreen post-effect) that triggers whenever the player is tired. It needs some adjustments, because we think that it can maybe be too drowsy and we haven’t yet come to an agreement whether it should be permanent or punctual.

Another main improvement is the audio feedback we added. There are lots of sounds, for every entity and almost all the actions the player can make. This gives the game a deeper sense of immersion. Each biome has its own sounds for every element that emits them. The architecture of the game has been modified to make this possible and also make it easier to add more sounds in the future. Speaking of the sound part we also added a combat theme and a manager that detects whether the player is in combat or exploration and changes between those themes using a fade-in/fade-out effect.

Regarding the AI we are working in a ranged behavior that is based on keeping distance from the player and attacking from a distance. Unfortunately, it is too unstable at the moment and makes a lot of bugs.

Finally, talking about the interface, we now show windows (floating windows for now…) in which we show what’s going on underneath (lua-role thingy: attributes, equipment, altered states, survival…). Besides that, we also added some quick slots where you can drag&drop items from the inventory to be used quickly (as the name quick slot may suggest).

As you can see, this milestone is bloated with new stuff and next one (last one before summer) will bring much more. Following, milestone 5 video: