This week we’ll take a closer look at the next boss in the boss rush, the Season Hydra! As you may remember, I made a part of the background for it a while ago, but today it’s time to take a look at what the elevator will look like with each of the different seasons. First though, we decided to add grass to the remaining two platforms as well, so let’s have a peek at that first:

With that in order, let’s continue transforming this background into each of the four seasons! Starting with Summer:

Next, Autumn:

In the cold days of winter:

And finally, pleasant spring:

Of course, the Hydras will need some kind of wall for them to bang their heads into, otherwise how are you gonna be able to best them?! At first, we considered using the spears you’ve seen from across the game:

A basic WIP, of course, but we thought we might come up with something slightly cooler. Enter the force field:

A little bit more hitech perhaps, but also a lot visually cooler. Especially with Fred’s startup animation of it! Let’s have a look:

And before we go, have a GIF of what the spawn sequence looks like right now (without the proper summer background added yet):

With the Hydra fight well under way, this dungeon is coming together more and more :) We hope you’ll enjoy it!

Another week, and this one’s main focus will be all about GUN-D4M, or rather the upgraded more epic version you’ll face in the dungeon! First up, a slight redesign was in order, to properly differentiate him from the previous version! For this, we made a couple sketches to determine which one we liked the best:

We felt like the one with the lights were the cooler version, so we ended up going with that:

Some colour variations to get it all just right:

And after that, time to start animating that badass! Let’s have a look at one of his animations:

His fingers will feature a new weapon as well… Ooof!

And here’s a bunch of videos from our prototyping of this part of the battle, starting with the two Phasemen, going into the GUN-D4M portion of the game, and then finally a bit of how the boss fight itself will play out:

What do you think so far? We’re all very excited for where this is heading anyway, hope you are too :D

Have you all have a nice easter break (for those of you celebrating or taking time off during the holiday)? :) We’ve had a lovely time with family, but now it’s time to get back to work! This week we’ll start off by showing a couple more backgrounds for the boss rush:

This first one is the floor for the Hydra boss, which I believe we’ve mentioned a little bit earlier. It will include a spring Hydra, so all four seasons are involved, hence the four different platform, each representing a season as well :)

Next up we have a truly terror-filled floor featuring the Power Flower AND BEES! Don’t worry, if it turns out in prototyping that this was a terrible idea, we may still cut this part of the boss fight (or will we? mwahaha):

Teddy, meanwhile, has started playing around with transitions between floors, and here’s a little sneak peek of that:

And Fred continues on with the actual boss fight of the dungeon – Zhamla! Here’s another animation from his department:

This week we’ll start off with another Boss Rush floor, this time the GUN-D4M floor, which will pretty much be the Phasemen floor – but destroyed by the sheer force of the GUN-D4M starting the battle! Let’s have a look:

One of the other things we’ve spent a lot of time on lately is what it’s gonna look like actually summoning these bosses! Each boss will be summoned by the Mirror artefact who ‘governs’ the Tower, and so our idea has been that we want some kind of mirror or glass effect as they appear. The videos below will give a pretty good idea of how our iteration process works – starting off with something small and building on it and editing it here along with more details, until we have something we’re happy with.

So, first up, here’s a couple of our very early iterations:

Then, we added a glass/mirror-like colouring for the next couple iterations:

Here we begin to play around with a glass shattering effect, which in these early prototypes is still very crude, as you can see:

Here Fred has gotten his hands on the prototype and started making some graphics! The shattering effect is still pretty basic, though:

With more proper graphics it’s starting to look more and more like something that would actually appear in the game! Here the “summoning-shards” have better graphics, and we’re playing around with various sizes for the mirror shards as they shatter:

We’ve also been working on the elevator itself, adding some darkness to give a better sense of dept to the dungeon:

Pretty cool huh? It’s really exciting to see this all coming together :) Now, next week is easter here, and with the restrictions finally being out of the way for the most part, it’s time to spend some time with family!

Therefore, there won’t be an update next week, but the blog will be back as usual on Monday the 25th! See you then :)

Okay, time to make a bunch of more final dungeon floors!

Let’s start with the Terrorweed floor:

Size wise, it’s pretty similar to the previous floor, so we decided that the transition between these two floors would mainly be the mirror changing the colour of the grass and having new decorations pop up. In other words, the elevator sizes will remain the same for this one:

Now, the next floor, where you’ll face off against two Phasemen, will be a little bigger:

Here, I began by adding two elevator pieces “above” the original elevator, but then I realized a parts of this elevator will be destroyed by Gun-D4M that will appear mid-fight, and I knew we had mentioned keeping the elevator whole for the entire duration so we ended up having a long discussion about whether or not it should break – in some ways, it’d be pretty cool, but in the end we decided on our original idea of keepign the main elevator itself whole while the rest could get destroyed to fit the size change. As such, I had to remake this floor, keeping the elevator at the top to ensure it wouldn’t get destroyed once the floor starts falling apart:

And so, here’s the final version of the Phaseman floor:

In Teddy and Fred’s department, we’re starting work on the mirror summoning bosses for the boss rush! Here’s a little sneak peek of some of Fred’s animations:

More details to come next week :)

This week, aside from still doing a bunch of bug testing, we’ve been focusing on getting the “elevator floors” for where you’ll battle the bosses just right, starting off with the Shadow Slime floor!

Our first test was with an organic floor, resembling whatever area you fought a similar boss, that would appear around the original elevator. Here’s the process for that:

Our second idea was that the floor would remain in the style of the elevator, with more elevator pieces appearing and connecting to the original elevator. These would then, through the magic of the mirror guarding the tower, be “dressed” in the various decorations that would have been where you first battled this type of boss. As such, here’s the second idea:

For now our favourite is this second version, so we’re gonna go ahead and make the rest of the boss floors in this style, which will be my main focus (in the graphics department anyway) the next upcoming weeks.

Speaking of the mirror artifact, Fred’s been working on some animations for him this week, and here’s one of them:

Now, the elevator will of course move upwards in some way, and Teddy has been experimenting with a variety of speeds and effects. Here’s a bunch of the various speeds:

And here we have the quick ones once more but with blur (and more blur):

Of course, the last thing we want is for anyone battling here to get dizzy from the moving background, so it’s quite a fine line here to make sure it looks cool while still being easy to read. Both the blur and the slower speed seems to be more easy on the eyes, but of course, one option is also for the elevator to stop during the fights. What do you guys think? Do you prefer a moving elevator or a static one? How fast is too fast? :)

Getting ever closer to the end! :D

It’s high time we return our attentions to Story Mode, and so let’s have a look at the interior of the tower this week! Here’s where that boss rush will take place, on an elevator taking you to the top. Here’s the process of the basic background:

The various colored squares in the beginning of the GIF above shows you the various sizes of the boss rooms in Story Mode, which will serve as a guide for when I start making the elevators for each boss. Next, it’s time to add some more details:

And finally, a bunch of moss and small rocks to add further detail to this first floor:

Feels great to have finally started working on this, but there’s a lot more to come in terms of elevators and the like, so stay tuned for more :)

Before ending this post though, here’s a look at some stuff Fred’s been working on as well:

Oh yes, he’s back!! Excited for the final battles to take place? We sure are! :)

This week has been all about finishing up that last bit of Arcade Mode stuff, for me (Vilya) anyway!
That means a bunch of new items have been made that will be available as various rewards, some of which you can see here:

These are, in order of appearance:
* A phonograph that let’s you change the music in your house
* A hat in the shape of a cloud
* A trinket thet lets you have a Lood as a pet
* A trinket that lets you levitate
* A trinket that makes you look similar to Grindea
* A cursed figurine that makes things in your house levitate

I’ve also been working on ways of showing how many catalysts were active during any run on the high score list, which for now looks something like this:

Now it’s back to Story Mode stuff for me, while Fred and Teddy will remain doing a few more things to finish up Arcade (and a ton more bug testing)!

This week has been mainly about bug testing and the fixing of found bugs, as is pretty standard after a new frontline patch! But we’ve also been working on one of the remaining additions to Arcade Mode, and this is something that will be available in Story Mode as well – the statue shop!

You’ve already seen a bunch of the statues made for this shop, but now it’s time to add some more:

And here’s all of the currently available ones:

Of course, these statues will need smaller sprites as well, to fit in the menu and shop interface. Let me tell you it’s quite a challenge making smaller versions of these guys, trying to make them as clear as possible without going over the size restrictions!

Finally, the statue shop needs its own shop graphics, so here goes:

Next week I’m gonna finish up the remaining items and sprites needed for Arcade Mode! Stay tuned :)

This week has been patch week, meaning we’ve spent a ton of time doing bug testing/fixing, AND that the Frontline version of the beta finally has an update! This patch adds the final two floors, new event rooms and some adjustments to Arcade Mode. We still got some things to add, such as sound effects and some minor additions (some updates to the high score interface, among other things), but once that’s done it’s finally back to Story Mode and the final updates of that mode.

The Desert and Lost Ship floors are now added, as well as a load of new Event Rooms, revamped challenge-rooms, more perks, and more stuff that can happen during runs! Arcade Mode now also has its very own map, instead of using Story Mode’s, which.. really didn’t do anything.

Finishing a run awards players with Golden Essence which can be used to purchase rewards, both power-ups and cosmetic. After the run has “finished”, the player can also fight a final battle against two different bosses – the one waiting after a finished Three Catalyst run is an entirely new boss that’s unique to the mode.

Full patch notes as follows:

Additions

• The two final floors have been added to Arcade Mode
• Beating all Arcade Mode floors now provides many extra rewards, as well as a final battle for the Catalyst
• A unique final-final Arcade Mode boss can be encountered if beating the mode with three Catalysts activated
• Nine new types of ?-rooms has been added to Arcade Mode
• The Arcade Mode challenge-room pool has been revamped
• Arcade Mode now has its own map
• Experimental change to new network API for Steam

Changes

• The Arcade Mode shop and most event rooms now has unique looks
• Vastly improved load times when travelling between zones, especially ones already visited during session
• In regular challenge rooms, damage taken no longer reduce health or score
• The player can no longer attempt to brute-force themselves into Pine’s office
• Taking a photo in a Arena Boss Rematch now shows a bag tip explaining the failure
• Salmon can now be caught in the Pillar Mountain ponds in Arcade Mode!
• Arcade Mode Shrine Buffs now last the entire floor, and have more powerful effects
• Enemies in the Temple of Season Gauntlets in Arcade Mode no longer counts as true elites, reducing their item drop rates
• The Crabby’s ‘charge up’-sound is now louder

Bug Fixes

• The game no longer crashes when trying to read the dragon puzzle inscription after solving it without the translation tome
• When a client drops an item, that item no longer uses the host as its spawn-position
• A poorly timed skip of the Desert Rose cutscene no longer puts the main character in a locked animation
• The Butterflown quest can now be skipped if the character has completed it in multiplayer
• Fixed a bug where spinning autumn knights would occasionally leave behind hurtboxes after being killed mid-spin
• The Throw-skill’s damage should now be properly modified by Pins
• It should no longer be possible to get two pins of the same type, even on the run pins are unlocked
• Plant Summons now follow their owner in and out of Twilight, attacking ghosts correctly
• In the rare event that two pins are collected simultaneously, they are now equipped separately
• The ‘Blink casts Ice Nova’-pin now works properly on clients
• When entering a cutscene, the Frosty Friend UI will disappear if up
• Clients should now see the game over screen after dying on floor 1 with a timeshift crystal active

This means we’ve also been spending some time working on the proper achievements for reaching the final two floors, meaning some graphics for that and a nice Solem Hat as a reward:

The Trophies that will serve as awards for finishing each challenge in a floor needed their own drop appearances, so that’s something we’ve been working on as well:

And of course, the wings are now available as rewards! Here’s what they look like, including Fred’s neat animations:

So, what are you waiting for – go ahead and try things out, and let us know what you think! As always, we value all of your feedback and would love to hear back from you guys! :)