GAME PROGRESS REPORT - MAY
Hey folks,
Time for a new Game progress report.
Disclaimer: I'm posting these to be transparent on game development and show progress done. However, it goes without saying that some of the stuff you see here may considered to be spoilers. Although I do my best to keep the big narrative points out (and believe me, there is a lot I would like to show, but that I'm leaving out for you to find and experience in game.)
With that said, here is what you need to know.
- MAKING BARB'S INTRO FIGHT (Warrior ash path) -
This month, my focus was on putting together the "intro fight" with Barb as Warrior Ash. If you played the game already, you know that an intro fight is essentially a fight that you will not win no matter what. It's meant to give you a preview of the fight mechanics.
That is to say, it will have the basics. Such as Barb's main attack patterns.
What it will not have is barb's "horny/boredom" bars that will be the real "life/time limit" bars to keep an eye on to actually survive the encounter against her. This however, is not required for this coming patch as all I need are the basics for the "intro fight". Which will included in the first patch as I said.
I've programmed most of it already, but I still need to Iron out a bug.
With that fight though, comes a few new juicy assets that were made to improve the player experience.
- NEW BARB COMBAT POSES -
As I worked on making the first "intro" combat session as warrior Ash, the Barb attack poses add some variations added to flesh things out.
The intent here is to make the combat more visually pleasing but also to help the player better understand what to watch out for with clear visual hints.
In the past, a lot of these were either very subtle or the warning for an important attack to manage were just text with audio effects.
With this, the player will have a clear understand of what's being done, what to watch out for and of course it greatly increases immersion.
In this particular case, Barb mainly uses her whips to fight. Each whip is used in a different way, sometime both are combined.
It is up to the player to figure out how to deal with them.
Barb using her whips for different attacks/grabs:
- NEW GRAB IMAGE SETS -
Now that we have explored things on Barb's side of the fight, let's see what's going on with warrior Ash during combat.
As you might expect, this fight comes with it's own grab sequence. Which of course involves both of Barb's whips.
In the past, I would usually reuse, or copy paste existing poses for these, but with the new dev approach focusing on quality, I'm now making unique poses for ash during these grabs. Making the experience once again much more visually appealing.
Note: This is something I will also apply to Ash on the Splatter remaster which is planned after I'm done with Barb.
In any case, here is an early view at some of them.
Ash being restrained. And the Grab states evolves gradually.
- What's left to do for the next patch -
Aside from the a bug I need to fix, the "Intro fight" is nearly done. And last month I finished to sub ash "Mini game" intro, along with the events to lead to Barbs introduction.
So what's left now are the narrative events that follow both the "intro fight" and the "intro minigame" as both Warrior and Sub Ash respectively.
Which will involve how Ash resets after combat/service session. And will further the lore by introducing key characters and events.
In other words, it's finishing all the narrative beats that lead to basically talk to barb again to challenge her as a Warrior or sub Ash, and win (Which is what will be worked on for the second patch after that first one).
Some extra image/sprite assets have to be done to complete this part, but we're finally getting closer to a first patch release. After this coming month I should be very close to a deliverable product which will be juicy enough for you all to enjoy.
Although please remember, that I will announce a potential release window when I'm confident enough. (And that the first patch will first release in early access to TIER IV subs to iron out bugs first, and released to TIER III not long after.)
But that's about it for this month's report.
We're getting there. I'm really excited to get this into your hands as soon as it is ready.
Take care.
