WARTILE - A Timed Based Game

[Michael Rud Jakobsen]

Hi Everyone

During the last year, our small team at Playwood Project, have been working on a new project called WARTILE.

Here is a short overview of what the game is all about.





It have been a crazy year and we have much work to do, but are excited to start showing what we have done so far, what iterations we have been through and
from today, start sharing our weekly progress with you.

[Michael Rud Jakobsen]

Today

Latest Battle Boards

[Michael Rud Jakobsen]

The first pencil stroke

I had just terminated my job as Game Designer at IO-Interactive, it was time to realize an old dream of mine.. to start a small game development studio..

First.. I needed a good idea...



And so it slowly began.. the brainstorming and when everything is possible, your mind is going everywhere, ending up nowhere.

But suddenly it came to me. When I was a kid I loved playing with miniature figures, give them a purpose in life and a reason to fight.

So I started to draw out a game where you would control a party of miniature figures into battle, in a fantastic medieval universe.

[Michael Rud Jakobsen]

A Board Game

Tom came along... (on the picture) and as he was testing the unreal engine and setting up the code foundation. I began building a (hard) prototype of a Board game.



We where making a mix between a turn based and real time strategy game, so playing it like a normal board game was challenging. Still making a hard prototype of the game really helped setting
a lot of the different game mechanics in perspective.

The physical board-game helped us talking about the order of everything, attacks, animations, movements and the cool down system.

[Michael Rud Jakobsen]

First mockup's

I had been working in the Unreal engine many years ago with the development of Recoil Retrograd (RIP)
But the new Unreal 4 is amazing for any graphic artist, and we quickly started to identify our art style.... or tried to.



We played around with a few different visual takes, but did not really nail the right feel or look.

Some of the key words for the art style was - Textural, miniature feel, board game and unique.

[unit23]

This looks very promising, im curious about the the actual gameplay

[Michael Rud Jakobsen]

It fights

Defining our art style compared with other games, while adding animations and effects to the Combat system.



Things starts to show. The combat system is working and the units can be moved around on the grid.

The combat code and animations are working separately, unaware of each other. This made it easy for us to test the timing and types of animations.

[Michael Rud Jakobsen]

Playable

Now with the system working, we could start play the game. With my daughter always around she where appointed to be our main tester



To move a unit, you pick it up and drag and drop it, within their move range. If they are placed next to an enemy, they will start auto fight each other.
The different unit classes will force you to think and time your strategy, since some units counter each others.

A unit based cool down system, makes sure that when you move a unit you cant move it again for X-seconds, leaving the enemy some time to counter or react on your actions. But you are free to move one of the other units not in cool down.

We decided to go for a clear visualization of the tile set and then combine it with a realistic/model look for everything that was not a tile.

[Michael Rud Jakobsen]

Looking better

With a fun multi-player game play, we set out to to improve the look and feel of the game.



The front screen and title was a mock up. We where trying different iterations on the menu art and layout style. Since most
of the story would be told outside the levels, the navigation, feel and mood of the menu was important.

New interactive objects was added. The roadblock spikes that can delay the enemy and the stone pot damage trap where some of the first ideas.

All the characters at this stage was still placeholders.

[m.orzelek]

This looks amazing!

[Michael Rud Jakobsen]

First model

With a lot of placeholder characters in the game, it was time to make our own characters.



We contacted a freelance character artist who was excited about the project, and started the first outsourcing job.

With the first character done, there was still great room for improvement, both with the 3D model, but even more with the concept and art style. It was clear that outsourcing key art, required a lot of communication, since iterations at this stage is very time consuming. ----We needed to do something different.

We learned from the experience and prepared for the next patch.

[DieByZer0]

The whole concept etc looks fantastic. Waiting for more progress. Good job so far.

[AdrianLazar]

Looks really good Michael! Say hi to Tom from me

[Michael Rud Jakobsen]

Hi Adrian, good to see you in here, I will invite you over one day so you can try it out... and maybe you will let me try Planet Alpha 31

[Michael Rud Jakobsen]

Second Model

We teamed up with MOOD, a group of guys we had worked with at Io-Interactive... really really talented. They made our first real knight lineup.



This was a step in the right direction, the art style got much more identity and we found a good balance between realism and fantasy. To begin with we aimed at making our characters look like real miniature models and when we got the second character back from out sourcing the result was much better.

Both we and our freelance 3D artist had improved a great deal, and we felt we where moving forward in defining our character style.

Unfortunately for us, our partnership with MOOD didn't last long, since they where busy and had to focus on own projects... this amazing one Fall of gods - maybe one day they will let me make a game on this IP.

[{TOBII}Rickard]

Second Model

We teamed up with MOOD, a group of guys we had worked with at Io-Interactive... really really talented. They made our first real knight lineup.



This was a step in the right direction, the art style got much more identity and we found a good balance between realism and fantasy. To begin with we aimed at making our characters look like real miniature models and when we got the second character back from out sourcing the result was much better.

Both we and our freelance 3D artist had improved a great deal, and we felt we where moving forward in defining our character style.

Unfortunately for us, our partnership with MOOD didn't last long, since they where busy and had to focus on own projects... this amazing one Fall of gods - maybe one day they will let me make a game on this IP.

Looks fantastic! Out of curiousity do you have a wireframe on that knight?

[Michael Rud Jakobsen]

Hi, I am glad you like it.

Here is a picture showing the wireframe, the low poly with baked maps (including shoulder pads ) and with texture maps (first iteration).



Hope it helps.

[DrLuke]

Very impressive work!

[Hapexi]

I really like the idea here! The first art map ( coastline ) looks stunning to me.

The concept on combining turn-based game with RTS seems really interesting, I would be very interested to hear more details about the gameplay regarding those aspects. Also I'd be interested to hear of the scale you are planning for the game. Is the player supposed to be commanding armies? With the current size of the map and units, it does not really convey the scale of whats happening, unless it is supposed to be very small scale.

Nice work, I was honestly surprised by my own reaction to your concept.

[Michael Rud Jakobsen]

The Game Rules

We haven't talked much about the game rules of WARTILE yet, even though that is key.



Personally I am torn in the value of a game design document, since gameplay iterations happens so fast that the documentation is obsolete before the ink is even dry (or document saved).
On the other hand, writing the rules and systems down on “paper” force you to mentally process every possible situation and hold mechanics up against each other.
This step is very healthy and any programmer on the team would appreciate designers doing that exercise before requesting a system.

Of course, it is a fine balance since blueprint in unreal 4, enable designers to make in-game iterations so fast, that test levels can become the Game design documentation.

A Game design document also helped us understand the size and complexity of the game, and reminded us to keep it simple and doable.

[Elendil]

Really nice one i like it.
And it's really good we an see the progretion of the game

[Michael Rud Jakobsen]

Gameplay Gyms

While making the design document, we also began setting up Gameplay Gyms, controlled environments where we could test the individual mechanics and try different level patterns.



In some Gyms we take a specific mechanic and test it with different level patterns to verify the different possibilities…. And fun factor.

Setting up these Gyms instead of a fully written design document is in my opinion a much stronger tool when trying to communicate the gameplay systems. They leave little to none room room for interpretation.

Spending time making these Gyms, with no other purpose than to test the boundaries of your game systems and level patterns, will leave you with a lot of inspiration and a wide range of possibilities to make interesting gameplay for the users.

[Michael Rud Jakobsen]

Thanks for the positive feedback, it means a lot.

I will during the next days and weeks, reveal more details about the game and not focus so much on our process and things in the past... but be patient, and stick around.

[J. J. Franzen]

This is looking fantastic. I really like the lighting work you guys have done. Very clean. Can't wait to see more! Cheers,

J^2

[Steve_T]

wow very nice, the environment looks great!

[gmike]

This is great, not my particular type of gameplay, but the things you have been sharing are awesome and because of that that game has been growing on me, i will definitively purchase it.

[Tom Looman]

Nice going guys! Keep it up the ocean looks sick

[VBlinds]

Love the concept, and the game is coming together very nicely.

I'm just learning game dev, so seeing your progress is very interesting and inspiring.

Can't wait to see more.

[Michael Rud Jakobsen]

Timing & communication before awesomeness.

With WARTILE not being a fast phased RTS, the requirements for animations is bit different. Being partly a action and observation game,
the animations had to look cool, but also communicate the state and outcome of the combat.

What is shown in the video, is prototype iterations.

We have tried out 3 versions -(and sorry for the mugshot of me, in the first sequence, best reference video I could find)

1. The fast phased, with fast blows, hits and deflections, with moving idle. Result was a lively but hectic fell, and hard to read when units where fighting in groups.
   
2. The Matrix inspired slow-mo, with a fast attack and long slow-mo on impact, to emphasize the outcome of the attack. Result was a "at times" cool effect in 1vs1,
   but clumsy and unreadable in group fights.
   
3. The fast attack with medium speed, followed by a short pause on impact, and then back to ready stance, made it
   easy to read the outcome of the combat and will look good, when animations are done right and the attack variations are added.

[Michael Rud Jakobsen]

Figuring out the look & Feel

So with Chris Whelan joining the team, we where ready to make an effort into nailing the look and feel of the environment art.

Of curse we already had a clear idea of where we where going, but we needed it to be painted on "paper".



With screenshots from the levels we had made in the engine, Chris was able to make a lot of fast environment pain over iterations, that could inspires us in the right direction.

[Michael Rud Jakobsen]

The Mood board

We where working with the first two of three environment themes at this stage. The coastline and Grass-field. Each theme should give the user a unique experience not only visually, but also in gameplay and level design.



Where the grass field was calm & beautiful with many open spaces, the Coastline would be wild and rough, with more narrow pathways.

We also aimed to make the environments like a small miniature model, a goal we have not yet fully reached.

[Michael Rud Jakobsen]

A hard hitting Viking

With a good idea of how our character art style should be, we started doing a few character art concepts. Also in a effort to get solid reference material for our 3d character modeller.



One of the campaign themes in Wartile is going to be Vikings, where you take part of their internal conflicts and embark on adventurous raid campaigns across the oceans.

In Wartile there is different classes and types of figures that you as a player control. One of the classes is the "heavy soldier" with high armor/ health and strength, the vikings name him a Brute.

During the game its possible to collect and unlock equipment (Armor) to the characters, that both change the looks and stats of the figure.

[Michael Rud Jakobsen]

A miniature model

With character concepts that we believed in, our 3D modeller started creating our first Viking character.



The end result came out really well, with maybe the detail level and poly count being a bit in the high end considering that mostly the characters will be seen from above with some distance.

The goal of catching the miniature model look, was pretty successful, in my opinion. Now keeping this look when importing into the Unreal 4 engine, rigged and with animations without loosing this miniature feel,
was and still is one of the greater challenges.

[Michael Rud Jakobsen]

Taste the sea salt

Hi everyone, it have been some time since last update, but we are more busy then ever.

I have been working on two environment Themes the Hillside and Coastline. Today I will show our progress on the Coastline. (Everything is Work in progress and not final artwork)



The goal is still to create an environment with a miniature model feeling to it. The Coastline is a bit desaturated compared to the Grass-field theme that will have strong and warm colors. The Cross in the background is a holy relic, that the Vikings can convert into a reward.



The Viking brute breaking the knight into pieces. Something I just got in for testing. The characters in WARTILE are supposed to be small miniature figures brought to life, and I thought that if they shatter into pieces when they die... it really fits the concept.

[zeOrb]

Oh, I'm simply in love with map design. Very unique and cool approach!
Reminds me this stuff, but in 3d and better.
Definitely looking forward to this

[Willpowaproject]

Niceee!!!!! The maps looks amazing!!! Can't wait to see more!

[J. J. Franzen]

These are just beautiful. I assume the maps are statically laid out and not procedural in order to get that excellent lighting yes? And are you using a DOF post effect for that blurred background? It all looks very good. Keep it up! Cheers,

[Michael Rud Jakobsen]

Hi everyone

Thanks for the nice words and the link, with the 3D- hex maps.

I remember this tiled board game, and it was an early inspiration (and still is). Today we have the art rule, that everywhere you can go, it will be a defined tile, and if you cant it will be much a much more organic and realistic part of the environment.

The levels are not procedural made, we might leave that for a certain game mode.. in the future.

The light setting and post filter will be key elements to create the effect of looking at a miniature landscape.

[FatMoth]

This looks really cool! Don't know how to do it, but for the miniature feel, maybe there is a way with post processing effects to put everything out of focus besides the center on the screen. Kind of like when you see photographs of small stuff like the attached image. Might be cool to try.

[Mortusnyte]

This is an amazing thread. Very good thought process through the whole project. I love turn based strategy games and can't wait to try this out. Keep up the amazing work, it is really coming along nicely!