SAVAGE: The Shard of Gosen News

"... It's better to burn out than to fade away!"



Sorry -- I've been listening to too much (is that even possible?) of the Highlander soundtrack while working. On a completely unrelated note, how about a project update?!

Talk!

I've begun the process of rewriting old bits of dialogue, as well as creating brand new bits of NPC dialogue and story events. I've updated the old dialogue system to better perform under different circumstances, like whether or not the player should 'trigger' a dialogue event to auto start, or whether they should press the 'interact' button when colliding with a dialogue object to start a conversation with an NPC...





In this one below (don't worry -- the ugly green box is just there for debugging purposes), the player waits until colliding with the dialogue object before pushing 'up' on the gamepad or keyboard:



This system was already in place, but not wholly hooked up to NPCs. It was also super clunky and a bit all over the place in terms of multiple different dialogue objects that would handle different scenarios. It's all been condensed and trimmed down to one tidy little dialogue object.

Direction!

In addition to tidying up the dialogue event system, I've added practical events to the game that will give the player hints and objectives, as well as main and sub quests:



Music Break!

There's plenty of audio and music work left to be done, but every once in a while I'll run over to my music creation and editing software and crank something out to help emphasize the mood and tone of the content I'm working on. Here's a little bit of that (rough and work-in-progress):



Audio Clip: http://www.planettobor.com/savage-devlog/2016/9/11/i-have-something-to-say

Feedback

I want to thank everyone who's been playing the alpha demo for all of their feedback and bug reporting across Steam, Kickstarter, Castlevania Dungeon Forums, IndieDB, Gamejolt -- I'm hearing all of it, adding your reports and issues to my todo lists and replying where I can! Thank you so much - it's a huge help!

There isn't an update to the alpha demo this week since there's a bunch of dialogue and quest content yet to be added to make the beginning area stuff make more sense, but expect it soon!

Thanks again! 'Til next update!

-Matt

Happy Sunday!



This week sees quite a few fixes to issues plaguing the alpha demo! Let's talk about a couple of the biggest and most obnoxious ones:

Alt+Tabbing

This... this has been the bane of my existence for quite a while -- BUT, there's finally a fix for it!



Once upon a time, the game, when minimized, or not in focus, still accepted input. Gamepad buttons would still register, as well as keyboard key presses. So if, say, you were alt+tabbed out and Googling something, any keys that performed an action in the game would register.

I tried to fix this by locking out controls when the game registered an "OS pause event". The problem with this, was that locking out controls if you were in a menu screen, title screen, fade in/out -- ANYWHERE but the actual game-y bits, you could not regain control when maximizing your window or trying to get back into the game again.

Now, you can alt+tab like a monkey on too much caffeine and the game (maybe) won't break! YAY!

Display Size

Currently, the game only draws to an aspect ratio of 16:9, and this caused issues when in full screen on some displays.

Now, the game will respect the size of ANY crazy aspect ratio, while still maintaining it's visuals and aspect ratio.



I even got some use out of this older monitor to test display sizes with!



Different aspect ratios will be supported down the road, but at least now you can play the demo without having vital information cropped from the screen (like the player character's life bar).

Anomalies and Weird Stuff

Here are some (hopefully) extreme edge case issues someone reported to me:





My first response to this would have been to take the cartridge out and blow into it.

Super weird (and very unsettling from a technical standpoint)! Though, I did get some silly enjoyment from seeing those screens. I have no idea what's going on here, but hopefully no one else is experiencing this madness. Let me know if you are!

Steam Keys

If you are a Kickstarter backer, you should have your keys and can redeem them -- check your email!

Anyone waiting on Groupees Build A Greenlight Bundle 5 keys will get them very soon!

Latest Build and Fixes

he latest build for the alpha demo, if you don't get it through Steam, is here:

http://gamejolt.com/games/savage-the-shard-of-gosen-alpha/16310

Patch notes for alpha 5.1.2:

Alt tabbing no longer causes certain screens to become unresponsive
When application loses focus (alt+tabbing or clicking outside of game window), added click prompt to unfreeze game
Fixed a bug that caused playtime to reset once you exit a procedural encounter on worldmap
Fixed the game crashing if you navigate to the 'skills' or 'quest' menus
Fixed mining prison elevator wait time
Pickups are now drawn in front of everything to make them more visible
Improved game scaling based on display size
Tidied up a couple door, tile, object and enemy placements in mining prison
Fixed save/load system and ironed out a ton of bugs (more probably remain)
Deleted save files will clear their display data when deleting a save slot from the load game menu
Game would crash when backing out of Sound menu if a "yes/no" prompt was up Smith hammer drops off of a certain boss

It's a somewhat short list, but a big chunk of last week was spent making sure all of the Kickstarter backers Steam keys were sent out. Again - if you DID NOT get your key and you are a Kickstarter backer, make sure to check your email.

Thanks again everyone, and I hope you all had a great weekend!

-Matt ːcartridgeː

Good morning (or whenever)!



Save System

Just jumping right into it -- this update sees the completion of the game's save system! YAAY!

This was one infuriatingly complicated task, I don't mind saying. To give you a rough estimate of the keyboard gymnastics involved, to get it up to this point (fully functional, with save slot support and deleting said slots within the UI) took over 60 hours this week -- but it was worth it.



There were a number of complications I ran into, especially getting those save slots to draw their relevant data correctly. I was originally accessing the appropriate save files (in .ini format for the time being) to draw things like armor, HP, play time... this caused the framerate to plummet like a ton of bricks.

To remedy this, when the game now saves, 'display data' is now saved to a much smaller, seperate file that is only accessed to display the nifty graphics on the load menu. In fact, as I write this, I'm thinking of ways to improve it even further... so everything I just typed will probably change - ha!



Deleting a slot was challenging to engineer as well -- having to set a flag in another settings file to reset the "working save slot", and also tell the newly deleted and recreated save slots that it has "no data" in it, so the game knows that when the empty file is accessed to simply start a new game.

It's all working and fully functional now, though! The game will save your progress every time you transition from screen to screen -- this will NOT, however, function as a checkpoint. For now, checkpoints are invisible, but will eventually look something like the main character taking a swig of some fun juice (as pictured in the first gif of this post).

When you die, you will start back at your last checkpoint visited, but will retain all of your items and story progress.

Another challenge moving forward is remembering to save the player's location and state after a big story event or something, like after you're taken prisoner and complete the initial burning village sequence:



Go here to check out the latest archived livestream I captured while working on the save system: https://www.twitch.tv/toborprime/profile

Sorry it's muted -- I was listening to too much unlicensed rock and or roll. I'll re-upload the stream on the youtube channel with some of my own music over the video later on.

Hammer!

The forge hammer pickup is now active in the game, and you now need it in order to interact with the forge. To convey this I threw together some extra UI animations and elements:



... And then after finding the hammer, you can go ahead and pound away on the anvil:



Big Screen!

I have a live build constantly updating via the Steam pipeline, and it feels pretty awesome to access it via the big screen!



For the past week, I have been doing most of my playtesting this way to get a feel for how everything works the way someone playing the game normally would -- I gotta say, it's pretty exciting to interact with it this way!



Fixed, Completed, and ToDo

Here's a list of fixes and addressed issues:

• Added fully functioning Save, Load, and Delete save system
  
• Added 'Continue' and 'Load Game' options to main menu, as well as some visual clean up
  
• Shield doesn't get created when loading or continuing a game
  
• kell can't attack when colliding with anvil object
  
• Slavers no longer drop gold keys
  
• rewrote gamepad and keyboard input
  
• there was a problem on Windows 10 while using an Xbox 360 gamepad - button mapping was all messed up and most buttons would not register
  
• removed 'global.fortOpen' checks that were crashing the game
  
• fix burning village NPCs not showing up
  
• pickup forge hammer
  
• static values (like what sprite a weapon or armor should draw in the UI) get messed up on loading a game file
  
• rewrite save system to re-initialize static values
  
• create seperate data file to save load screen display data to so that we are not opening 3 massive save files
  
• display forge hammer in UI if found
  
• can only use forge if a forge hammer is owned
  
• Create "up" arrow effect when able to interact with anvil
  
• create 'no hammer' prompt when trying to use the anvil without hammer
  
• going back to burning village after escaping mining prison starts the beginning of the game all over again
  

... And next up:

Hey there!



You'll have to forgive me if this is a somewhat short update - I've been up for about 24 hours at this point, but it's been worth it! The shiny new alpha demo is up and ready for you to break!

New Playable Alpha Demo

You can download it here: http://gamejolt.com/games/savage-the-shard-of-gosen-alpha/16310

Things are still rough, broken, unfinished and unbalanced, but this is FAR more indicative of what the final game will look and feel like.

On offer is the first section of the overworld map. I've artificially constrained the gameplay to that area (boo!) because venturing beyond this zone will quickly cause things to fall apart (yay!) since all of that stuff is lying in pieces in front of me on my monitor.

What Didn't Make it?!

There's also a TON of stuff that I wanted to have ready for this demo that didn't quite make it and would require another week of play testing, chief among them being the save system, unfortunately (or what would eventually turn into the rock solid save system). But that's next on my list.

An early form of persistence is intact, though, and will keep track during a play session of (most) pertinent things, like which doorways have been unlocked, gates opened, etc.

I've also been digging around in Steam's backend (that sounds super wrong... or right, depending) to figure out the Steam key delivery system, and it looks like I'll have that figured out soon, too.

Keys Update

I want to also give early backers (Kickstarter and Groupees) "beta" keys that allow you to circumvent the release status of the game. In other words, I would be giving you access to live development builds as progress is made, and Steam would automatically (I think) update the game for you.

Anyhow, have a gander at the new build and feel free to tell me what you think so far!

Have a great rest of your weekend! 'Til next update!

-Matt ːcartridgeː

Greetings!



Last week I talked about fixing bugs and tidying up issues in preparation for releasing a playable build that includes the first few levels and areas of the game. The battle continues this week -- here's a list of issues and bugs that have been utterly destroyed (fixed)!!

Bugs and Issues Slain

• Fixed shield door bug
  
• Fixed blood on moving stuff bug
  
• Fixed hitting/opening treasure chests
  
• Fixed falling spike hitting shield
  
• Black circles around torches when fading in/out and creating pause screen
  
• Redid Screen Draw post FX pipeline to accomodate for day/night and torchlight
  
• Fixed pause screen shuts off day/night
  
• Fixed pause screen turns off season check
  
• UI elements placement fix
  
• Overworld solid mountains
  
• Other overworld solids
  
• Shield UI
  
• Fixed hide armor duck block sprite (pictured above)
  
• Recolor plain GUI background sprites
  
• Drop armor bug (dropping a set of armor from the inventory screen crashed the game)
  
• ACCOUNT FOR ALL DROPPED ITEMS!! (certain other dropped items from inventory screen crashed the game)
  
• Throwing Weapons XP bug (incorrect display of throwing weapons experience points, level, and damage values in inventory screen)
  
• Fixed enemy hit by thrown object hurt timer
  
• Fixed saber weapon animation (just looked crappy)
  
• Spiked enemies hurt when you jump on them
  
• Redid shadow sizes and distance
  

An issue and criticism that's been repeatedly brought up is the way player character shadows are drawn when a light source is nearby (torch, candle, etc.). I've finally gotten around to addressing this and tidying it up.



While not 100% where I'd like it, it's a lot more appealing to look at and far less dramatic than how it used to be. I can now turn shadows cast by instances of light sources on and off, so if there is a lone torch against a sky only backdrop, for example, there won't be a shadow drawn awkwardly against nothing but sky.



Enemies also cast shadows, again!

And for those tricky cases where there is only a limited amount of space that you'd like a torch to cast a shadow across, I have put "shadow limiters" in certain areas where, if there is a limiter between an entity and a light source, the shadow will not be drawn.





Here's the video of the livestream I captured of trying to sort out this very issue (the video will be available later on Youtube later, as well):

https://www.twitch.tv/toborprime/v/83490580

Speaking of bad guys, I finally switched on spiky bits causing damage if you attempt to jump on their heads. I've gone through every enemy object in the game (so far) and made sure this works where appropriate (enemies that can potentially spawn with a spiked/horned helmet, creatures that can spawn with naturally grown spikes or horns). This definitely makes fights more interesting and challenges your ability to make snappy tactical decisions. I got so used to testing the game without this feature turned on -- it's nice to get my butt kicked in a brand new way, ha!


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y7PLcJCYoJQ

In this livestream here, I also talk about padding out the game with artificial progression. By that I mean I had planned to include certain items in the game (the core UI code is also built around this) that gave you the ability to quick slot off hand weapons and certain consumables.



Those boxes there are (or, were) tied to whether or not you found the "Item Pouch", "Hunter Belt" and "Warrior Belt" respectively. I've scrapped all that and these features are available right from the get-go (your equipped shield now shows up on the hud, too).

Take the Item Pouch, for instance: consumables that are equipped to this slot can be used on the fly with a mapped button press. If you did not have the Item Pouch, you would have to pause the game by going into your inventory screen, accessing the consumables tab, FIND the item you wanted to gulp down, and "use" it. The same result can be achieved by simply having the chosen consumable slotted to the Item Pouch box and hitting your "Use Item" button when you need it.

The only real difference between these two methods is that one simply takes longer and is a hassle. It doesn't make the game more interesting or challenging... So, bye bye equipment-dependent sub item slots!

LOTS of UI Fixes

For a while now, since I changed the way the game was drawn to the screen, the in-game menu has been drawing all sorts of wonky. That's now fixed, as well as properly displaying your shield.



I've also eliminated the "Shield" menu item in the equipment screen, since shields and weapons exist within the same inventory list. The manner in which you equip a shield is the same as how you equip a sword, etc. Having a seperate "Shield" access node on the equipment manager felt needlessly complicated and redundant.

I've also adjusted the brightness of text boxes and general UI windows to make text more readable. I want to give players more options concerning that later, like different style backgrounds for these elements.



The Battle Continues...

Here's the list of things that still need to be (potentially) addressed or fixed before I release the playable build:

• Improve the manner in which shadows are drawn
  
• Torches can be destroyed and drop items (like a certain super rad video
• game series featuring a very serious gentleman brandishing a deadly whip)
  
• pickups that get stuck in boulders
  
• completely get rid of backpack check
  
• completely get rid of hunter belt check
  
• completely get rid of warrior belt check
  
• completely get rid of item pouch check
  
• finish first NPC village including (finally) a vendor
  
• finalize dialogue bits and interaction with the NPCs in the mining prison
  
• redesign UI interaction with gamepad and keyboard
  
• implement save system
  
• finish burning village story events
  
• finish Tra'Tibowt boss fight
  
• updated impact sprites (like jumping on an enemy's head and stunning them)
  
• more general and universal sprites for the overworld encounters
  
• fine tune enemy and item placement
  
• Sort items based on category in inventories (clean up function)
  

I'm still on track to get you guys a playable build, but I still have to figure out the delivery mechanism -- like, it would be GREAT to start figuring out how to get Steam keys to everyone who still needs one, and give them access to a live development build that I update regularly before launch. I'll keep you all posted as I figure out the particulars on that as well!

That's all for this week! Have a great rest of your weekend and I'll see you next update!
-Matt ːcartridgeː