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

Vilya

Vilya

Developer
Staff member
Hey guys! I've started up a BLOG where I'll post stuff I do for Secrets of Grindea. It'll mostly be graphics in all shapes and forms, but I'll probably also talk about how we work and what we're focusing on right now.. all from my own perspective, of course.

I'm doing this for a bunch of reasons: first and foremost, it would be great to have something to look back on in a couple of years where I can (hopefully) see how I've improved, week for week. Writing about what I'm doing also helps me analyze my work more easily, and I can be more in depth and personal in a personal blog than through the official DevBlog.

Lastly, and the reason why I'm making this post, is so that anyone who might be interested can see more of what we're working on and get updates more frequently than through our weekly recaps !

PS. I would love to get feedback on my work, either in the comment fields of the blog or here in this thread :)
 
MrChocodemon

MrChocodemon

Handsome Moderator
Maybe you should make the link stand more out ^-^
Vilya said:
Hey guys! I've started up a blog [...]
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I don't know about others, but on my screen it isn't very noticable the way you present it right now
It would be sad when no one would visit.
(I'll delete this post later, as it would be a crappy first post for this cool thread)
 
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Vilya

Vilya

Developer
Staff member
Haha, you don't have to delete it! That's probably a good idea, actually :)
 
Rokker

Rokker

Halloweed
Looking good Vilya!
I think that this is exactly what the community wanted, more juicy grindea-stuff to look out for :)
 
GarlicJelly

GarlicJelly

Friendly Moderator (Formerly known as GoodStuff)
Wow, I had almost forgotten how the game used to look before you started updating the portraits. XD Glad to see that we're moving forward and I think a round of applause is in place to congratulate your personal progress. Keep up the good work! 5/5!
 
H

Hans Johansson

Green Slime
The new portraits looks much cleaner but thats almost the thing. All portraits are almost to clean. I would really like to see some more gritty characters. Like the baker, he looks like a hero instead of a baker. Clean hair, perfect chin etc.
I would rather see him in the same painting style but with something more of the type "thin hair/unattended hair" thick chin or maby even overweight "dubble chin" and some speccs of facial hair.

But the artistery is great and the only thing that has bothered me overall is that every single portrait I have seen looks to "clean". I dont know if it is something with the shine you give the hair but its something. Like the bearded dude here http://www.secretsofgrindea.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/people.png, he looks really good cept it looks like instead of beeing a hard working woodchopper he looks like he has stayed inside fixing his hair all day :p

But the diffrence in the portraits overall are great! One of the new ones I really liked was the old dude (http://www.secretsofgrindea.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/portraits.png). He looks much better, much more complete charater in him!
 
Vilya

Vilya

Developer
Staff member
Thanks for your feedback Hans :D
I think you're right, it would be nice to have a bit more diversity in how "clean" the characters are, I didn't think about that before! I'll definitely take it into consideration when I get across another portrait of a working dude.

Ironically, I just finished the portrait of the blacksmith before reading this, and while he at least has a more muscular build than most characters, his hair still looks pretty shiny and styled. Perhaps I'll go back and remake some of these 'workers' at a later stage (or simply wait until the inevitable time when I'll update all portraits for the fourth time XD)!

Here's another blog post, with the blacksmith WIP: http://vilyaroo.blogspot.se/2014/08/the-blacksmith.html
 
H

Hans Johansson

Green Slime
He looks alot better then the old portrait but as said. It looks like he is using shampoo and conditioner every day for atleast 2 hours :D
But thats just my impression. I could never ever draw as good as u do, I can only be on the internet and give feedback!
You guys are doing an awesome job! Keep it up!
 
Vilya

Vilya

Developer
Staff member
Yeah, he got some real shiny and smooth curls going on XD I really appreciate the feedback, anything that can help me improve is awesome :)
 
Vilya

Vilya

Developer
Staff member
I'm just gonna go ahead and double post to let everyone know there's another blog post today, this time about how we use Photoshop to align and crop portraits before putting them into the game: http://vilyaroo.blogspot.se/2014/08/the-middle-ground.html

I'm gonna try to update the blog Monday-Friday and let it rest over the weekends. I'll probably bump this thread every once in a while, like whenever I show stuff you haven't seen much of in the game yet (I'll very soon post about our new talent system, which is our version of stats, so stay tuned for that)!
 
Own

Own

Moderator
The blacksmith looks more like a bard or poet and less like a grizzled blacksmith dude, but that's only because I'm comparing the old and the new. Maybe he wasn't supposed to come off as that gruff all along. =P I like the new artstyle for characters in general, in any case.
 
Vilya

Vilya

Developer
Staff member
Today there's a sneak peek of the Talent system: http://vilyaroo.blogspot.se/2014/08/talents.html

This will basically be our take on stats, which lets you build the type of character that you want and allows us to encourage different ways of playing the game. On Monday I'll post what the interface will look like (though it'll probably appear on the official devblog as well)!
 
Rokker

Rokker

Halloweed
So "talents" roughly translates to stats? Kind of like str, int or dex from many other games? If so; Sounds really awesome for multi-player! Creating extra tanky tanks and glass canon spell casters, perfect! :)
 
Vilya

Vilya

Developer
Staff member
Rokker said:
So "talents" roughly translates to stats? Kind of like str, int or dex from many other games? If so; Sounds really awesome for multi-player! Creating extra tanky tanks and glass canon spell casters, perfect! :)
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Yeah, there will be stats you can increase like str, int and a bunch of others, but you'll also be able to level more advanced things that directly affect your playstyle - like having normal attacks do more damage after using a magic spell, and such! So it's like stats and passive boosts in one package, I guess :)
 
Vilya

Vilya

Developer
Staff member
MrChocodemon said:
I love the interface and the talents
are the free ones not yet decided?
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Yeah, we haven't decided on all yet! There will definitely be many more than 10 per category once we're done as well, so in the end you're gonna have to scroll down to see them all :)
 
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