Vilya's Work-blog! (aka Pixel Ferrets behind the scenes)

MrChocodemon

MrChocodemon

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MARCH 03, 2015
A Dreadful Toothache and Some New Maps

Still ain't getting much sleep here (thank you annoying "wisdom" tooth)! I've been managing to spend my time slightly better this time, though, by figuring out new spots treasure hunting.

It's basically the most braindead thing to do for the game, but it also doesn't take very long for Teddy to implement things like this so it's better than doing nothing.

Can you figure out where each of these treasures are found?



​
 
MrChocodemon

MrChocodemon

Handsome Moderator
MARCH 04, 2015
Temple of Seasons: Arcade Mode Backgrounds Part 1

Okay, it's time to get back to business. I mentioned in the last weekly recap that I was working on rooms for the Temple of Season-floors for Arcade Mode, and today you can start seeing the results.


To begin with, we settled on three different sizes for the rooms. We selected these sizes based on rooms from the temple in Story Mode but also on Arcade Mode floors we thought were of a good size.​


http://vilyaroo.blogspot.de/2015/03/temple-of-seasons-arcade-mode.html
 
MrChocodemon

MrChocodemon

Handsome Moderator
MARCH 05, 2015
Temple of Seasons: Arcade Mode Backgrounds Part 2

Today I'm continuing to work with rooms for arcade mode! This time I'm gonna translate the autumn room into a winter and summer version. Most of the job has already been done and what remains is mainly color swapping stuff, so this post will be a bit shorter :)



When color swapping the autumn room into winter and summer, I had to adjust a few things (such as the placement of a few floor tiles and some details on one of the vines), so if you paid attention you'll notice they're not 100% the same... :)
​
http://vilyaroo.blogspot.de/2015/03/temple-of-seasons-arcade-mode_5.html
 
MrChocodemon

MrChocodemon

Handsome Moderator
MARCH 06, 2015

We often get the question why we are trying to make Secrets of Grindea with only three people, most likely from people that have become frustrated with how slow our progress is. In this post I'd like to address the reasons for why we haven't tried to expand our team, and why we most likely won't ever do so.

Reason #1: Efficiency
This might sound strange, but in many ways bringing in more people wouldn't necessarily make working on the game faster. The biggest problems would probably be in the programming department, where each piece of code needs to work with everything else, but it'd definitely be an issue for the graphic artists as well.

At the moment we're also pretty much synced (I'm a bit ahead in general, but it takes Teddy less time to implement my backgrounds than it takes me to make them, so that's the way it should be). That means that if we were to add another programmer, he'd quickly run out of work, and if we'd add another artist, there's no way Teddy would work fast enough to implement everything.

So, we would have to add at least 2 people to help with graphics and programming, and then we'd have to spend incredible amounts of time first formalizing every standard we use, then inform the newcomers about them, including everything from the way Teddy codes to the sizes of common sprites.

Reason #2: Group Dynamics
[...]

You want to know more? You can read the full article over at
http://vilyaroo.blogspot.de/2015/03/why-just-three-people.html
 
MrChocodemon

MrChocodemon

Handsome Moderator
MARCH 10, 2015

One of the things we're working on right now is finishing up the skills. We still haven't implemented the final charges, which would be the most epic version of each spell, and the one that deals the most damage.

So, I thought I'd just throw this out here: what would you like to see? What would your idea of an ultimate version of any of the spells be?

[...]

More on how the final step of Skill is planned can be read here:
http://vilyaroo.blogspot.de/2015/03/skills-what-would-you-like-to-see.html

And suggestions can be posted here:
http://secretsofgrindea.com/forum/index.php?threads/final-skills-what-would-you-like-to-see.3345/

Ps: Please read Vilyas article befor you post something, so misunderstandings can be kept to a minimum.
 
MrChocodemon

MrChocodemon

Handsome Moderator
MARCH 11, 2015
Discussing the Next Temple

Last week, Fred got back after spending 2 weeks in Germany. As usual, we celebrated his return by going to our favorite fast-food restaurant, armed with our sketching books and multiple discussion topics!

One of the most important things we discussed was the next temple, because after just one more area has been implemented (Mt: Bloom), it's time to start working on it. I may have mentioned some ideas here before: the theme of the temple will be time travelling, and the setting will be reminiscent of ancient asia.

Today, we finalized some of these things, and here's what we've come up with so far:​


... You should go and read what the Pixel Ferrets came up with. It's very interesting. Go one.

http://vilyaroo.blogspot.de/2015/03/discussing-next-temple.html
 
MrChocodemon

MrChocodemon

Handsome Moderator
MARCH 12, 2015
Time Temple Sketching

So, in order to get things going with the Time-Travel Temple/Village I've spent some time gathering photos to serve as inspiration for the area graphics-wise. For some of you, particularly those who work with game design, this process will probably be well known to you.

Basically, I Google around for images that suit the themes of the area, in this case various things associated with ancient Asia. I then throw them all into a folder where I can browse them easily, or make one or a few "moodboards" to set the tone for the area. Below you can see one of those that I made for this blog post:

​

http://vilyaroo.blogspot.de/2015/03/time-temple-sketching.html
 
MrChocodemon

MrChocodemon

Handsome Moderator
MARCH 13, 2015
Floor Masks, or "Polishing the Temple of Seasons Ice-Effect Issues"!

Before continuing the work on the Time Travel temple, it's time to do some grunt work. There's one issue in the game currently, most obviously in any room of the Temple of Seasons where you battle winter enemies. Take a look:



Their ice attacks keep overlapping things where they shouldn't! In order to fix this, we need to let the game know where these ice effects (as well as shadows and other effects on the ground) are allowed to appear. ​

http://vilyaroo.blogspot.de/2015/03/floor-masks-or-polishing-temple-of.html
 
MrChocodemon

MrChocodemon

Handsome Moderator
MARCH 16, 2015
Village of the Past

Since the last Time Travel Village-post I've been playing around with making a few houses and some decorative props!

We also discussed exactly what we wanted the area to look like, and decided that we wanted it to feel like a mix of the outdoors, while still being inside a cave. So, to mix the two together, we're opening up holes in the cave, where the outside can be seen (much like it works in the Flying Fortress part of the game), and the ground will be covered in grass - at least in the past version. ~Vilya~
​
There's a sketch of the Area over at:
http://vilyaroo.blogspot.de/2015/03/village-of-past.html
 
MrChocodemon

MrChocodemon

Handsome Moderator
MARCH 17, 2015
"Time Travel Town" Zone 01 - Sketching!

So, we've spent dome time coming up with and discussing a variety of hurdles and quests/puzzles for you to solve on your way through this dungeon, most involving time travelling in some ways! Since this dungeon really will be a village of some sort, we decided to divide the area into several zones, rather than rooms as we've done with the previous temples.

The first zone won't be super big, and will serve to introduce you to the time travelling mechanic as a whole. The obstacles here will be pretty straight forward as you get used to the idea and implications of jumping through time!
01%2B-%2BSketch.jpg



http://vilyaroo.blogspot.de/2015/03/time-travel-town-zone-01-sketching.html
​
 
MrChocodemon

MrChocodemon

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MARCH 18, 2015
"Time Travel Town" Zone 01 - Walls & Video Making

..Yes, we really need a better name for this place than "Time Travel Town"... Anyways.

The last few days I've been playing around with various screen capture software, in hopes of being able to make more videos and GIFs for this blog. I am basically the worst at remembering to take screens of my progress, and before I know it I've been at a piece for an hour or two and there's no way to bring back what the early steps looked like. So, I thought this would be better and easier for me to deal with.

This is my first test at this, and features the incredibly mundane task of adding walls to the first zone of the Time Travel Town, sped up like crazy!


I realize the quality isn't amazing, but I guess for such a boring task at this it doesn't really need to be super HD! Hopefully I'll get used to the bazillions of settings and figure something out for the more detailed stuff later on (I used Open Broadcaster Software and *cough* Movie Maker when making this btw).

http://vilyaroo.blogspot.de/2015/03/time-travel-town-zone-01-walls-video.html​
 
MrChocodemon

MrChocodemon

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MARCH 19, 2015
"Time Travel Town" Zone 01 - The Barracks
Time to start working on the first Zone for real! We'll begin by with adding the exterior of the first house you'll see - the barracks. This is a place where soldiers living in the cave live, and will serve a purpose in your questing through this area.

Instead of posting WIP pictures, I thought I'd upload a video of this process as well. I don't know if you prefer videos to the step-by-step images I used to post before, but as I mentioned in yesterday's post it's definitely easier to remember.


Read a little more and see the end result at:
http://vilyaroo.blogspot.de/2015/03/time-travel-town-zone-01-barracks.html​
 
MrChocodemon

MrChocodemon

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MARCH 23, 2015
"Time Travel Town" Zone 01 - East Parts

The work on that "Time Travel Town" continues this week! In this video, I'm working on the east parts of the map, adding another (smaller) house, some training dummies, a stonewall and a whole lot of grass!

When watching these videos, I'm kinda starting to note a pattern in how I work: for some reason, when I zoom in and out, the item I'm focusing on seems to be slipping more and more into the bottom corner, out of sight! Kind of silly, but I guess I don't really notice when I'm focused on work. :)


Above you can see the end result, with everything in place! Now, the next few posts/videos will be dealing with something slightly different, stay tuned... :)
​
http://vilyaroo.blogspot.de/2015/03/time-travel-town-zone-01-east-parts.html
 
MrChocodemon

MrChocodemon

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Because i wasn't home for 2 days, there are now 2 blog entries at once. Both portraits and both related to major plotpoints of story and gameplay.
So, just the usual. Spoilers ahead.

MARCH 24, 2015
Portrait of a Time Travel Man

I mentioned it yesterday, and today it's happening! Some slightly different videos, and a bunch of step-by-step pictures, as well.

As you may or may not have guessed, the new subject is portraits. As this dungeon is really a town in which you travel back and forth in time, there will be a bigger focus on characters and actual questing rather than getting through a temple from point A to point B (though there will be quite a lot of that as well). And as you know, when there's characters, there's portraits!


More pictures of Vilyas work in progress and a video of her workflow can be found over at
http://vilyaroo.blogspot.de/2015/03/portrait-of-time-travel-man.html


MARCH 25, 2015
Portrait of the Mountain Girl, Young(er) Version

I'll keep on making portraits for a little while, so here's another one! Alternating pixel art and painting is a nice way to alternate work and keeps me from getting bored. So I'll probably swap back and forth between these as we keep on working with the Time Travel Town-thingy!

Now, this one is actually a younger version of one of the characters that you already saw, the Mountain Girl from a few weeks back (yes that means you'll visit multiple years when you travel back in time)! Hence why I keep her original portrait to the left as reference when it comes to colors etc :)



More pictures of Vilyas work in progress and a video of her workflow can be found over at
http://vilyaroo.blogspot.de/2015/03/portrait-of-mountain-girl-younger.html​
 
MrChocodemon

MrChocodemon

Handsome Moderator
MARCH 27, 2015
"Time Travel Town" Zone 01 - The Garden

Alright, back to the pixel art and actual creation of the temple/town zones! This time we're working our way upwards from that house I added most recently on the east side of Zone 01.. :)

The next part of this area is a little garden, which won't really be that interesting in the Past, but will serve as a place for enemies to roam in the Present (where most of the garden will be demolished, so don't worry about enemies hiding behind trees, etc).


http://vilyaroo.blogspot.de/2015/03/time-travel-town-zone-01-garden.html​
 
MrChocodemon

MrChocodemon

Handsome Moderator
MARCH 30, 2015
Tiny Tasks

Today has been another of those days where you do plenty of tiny tasks, rather than focus on a single one! Let's take a look:


One of the things that have been requested very frequently is the ability to trade and/or drop items so your friends can pick them up! So far we haven't had that function in SoG, but from soon on, you'll be able to drop items on the ground in Story Mode (not in Arcade, as it'd be a bit OP in multiplayer runs). Therefore, a "Drop Item"-icon had to be made!

Another thing I was playing around with was making an Arcade Mode version of the Hydra Boss battle room, since the layout the room has in Story Mode makes no sense when you're playing Arcade. For one, the corridor leading into the room is quite unnecessary, and the additional doors (and stairs) will lead nowhere, so they really serve no purpose either.

To solve this, I simply remove the corridor, the stairs and the drop down-thingy on the left side, and replace the doors with decorative trees instead. Then repeat the process for each of the seasons:





See more of the changes and read more infos over at:
http://vilyaroo.blogspot.de/2015/03/tiny-tasks.html​
 
MrChocodemon

MrChocodemon

Handsome Moderator
MARCH 31, 2015
Creating Houses & Being Work Efficient

Today I'm gonna show you a shorter video where I make two slightly different houses! As you might have noticed in plenty of my videos, I copy & paste a lot of stuff that I made previously. Sometimes I alter the colors a bit, sometimes the shape, and sometimes I leave things pretty much as they were.

When it comes to houses, in this instance, I move whatever parts I can use around (and sometimes swap colors) and then fill in whatever's missing once I'm done. I could have painted each and every house, but the amount of time saved from reusing walls and rock textures is pretty huge! And most people wouldn't really notice anyway (and if they did, most wouldn't care).

Remember back in the old SNES days? Almost everything was reused more or less directly! It's pretty amazing what you can 'get away with' when it comes to time and resource saving (if you're making a game and don't want it to take 5 bazillion years, you should probably reuse stuff too) :)​

A video about Vilyas work and the rest of this blog entry can be found at:
http://vilyaroo.blogspot.de/2015/03/creating-houses-being-work-efficient.html
 
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