[WIP] Mage Apprentice

Hi, I thought I’d do a weekend update every week to get some feedback from the forum, and maybe help out other dev’s as I can. I didn’t want to start this until we had something other than “hey, I bought the top-down city!” (not on sale but whatevs). Team is me and Andrew Luby, who’s a gameplay programmer. Currently its mostly just me, and Andrew is ramping into the project as his work crunch eases.

Goal: Finish major game features by the end of December.

The latest update will always be here:

This guy would be like the land owner of a small farm or something. He doesn’t have much but he does have his land. Not UV’d yet.

Still not in place as a gameplay element, but here’s the animation of it as it stands now.

This week/2 weeks has been fun, and a trial. When I’m re-rigging the same character for a 7th time… less fun, but animating characters, its been a while and I’m rusty so thats been fun.

This week felt a little random b/c I allowed myself to mess around and not stay 100% on task. I worked on some props and some buildings, in addition to working on my main task of getting the Skeleton enemy up and running. I didn’t get around to animating the 1 handed weapon, but got other things in a nicer place.

Here’s a version 1 and 2 of the skeleton

some RnD this week so a short update. Designing helmets, 1 handed attack animation, some building tweaks… however looks like I’m growin the art team my 200%, as in 1 more person! hah. But its a great one, so we will rpobably take a few steps back to step forward with better direction. We will be building out own town kit, not using topdown. I’ll still be buying the kts to look at and study, but we’ll make our own kits that utilize vertex painting.

Looking very nice :slight_smile: Reminds me a bit of Hardland (in a good way)

thanks, yeah Mini-Gore was one of inspirations. I love everything Timo Vihola designs.

Took a 2 week “break” to do some freelance vfx work. Back!

Big new, Got the title!

“The Misadventures of Todd”

I’ve been doing some ground work, getting inspiration concept folder together, testing out camera, writing GDD, hashing out story… thats a big one, b/c it affect how everything works together. I thought I had a good idea of all this but as it came down to brass tax there were a lot of holes… still are but now I see them and have been patching then up.

Following the twin stick shooter tutorial, I’ll bash those lessons into my game.

Started a sprint end of last week that goes for a month. Goals are to have am area of the level with houses, terrain materials, rocks, plants, trees and the player character able to run around, possibly fire his weapon.
Starting to put together the actual game part of the development. Building project, making class for character, getting animations together for the new rig… workin’ it.

I should add, I’ve been MIA but not from the project. Just working in a cave doing my thing. Figured it was time to get back to showing my work in progress.

Veg kit complete, including collisions on trees and stump. I will add more to the kit to build variety but this is the kit for the sprint that ends 9/4.
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Something I haven’t shown but made it a while ago in the “dark time” when I wasn’t very good about updates is the map of the world. This is the kind of thing that changes a lot but has been in a stable state for some time, so I think I can share it in its current state.

Finished the major parts of the terrain textures this weekend. I was worried about that task for the sprint. I haven’t made the terrain material yet so I don’t have an example of it all working just yet, which means there could be tweaks to the textures, but its all ready to bake down so hopefully the heavy lifting is done. I actually spent most time on the road and path textures, which are not show.
I can show you grass material which I have as a simple test. Some things like sand and dirt are going to be one color only, other things are going to be super detailed like the grass here. Potentially I may make another grass that is completely solid. Not sure yet. Texture tiling, is kinda small for the grass, but whatever its just a test
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Also needed to give the rock kit some love since it needs to blend into the rock terrain material. Again, props to Arid Desert on the marketplace for giving me a base to work from.
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Sprint ended with me just not making it on all that was listed. Got a lot done as you can see on the trello, but not the 3 buildings. I’ll change that to the building kit and move it to the next sprint. Also Andrew will start taking part in the sprints helping to get more momentum. Still have a LOT of color work to do.



Building kit has been a bear to finish. Its moving forwards, but woohf lot of pieces, lots of UV’s lots of textures to manage… getting there. Now doing high rez bakes for all objects. Doors and Windows done, Roof Tiles done. Stone work to do, and walls to do yet. Here’s a sneak peak at one of the houses as it stands in Maya. New proportions from the old style that matches the character much better I think.

House kit has gotten over the hump. I’ve marked it “done” for now, but it will, of course, be a continuing work in progress. Moved back over to nature. Made a pond and started getting some water veg. I kinda like how its shaping up. Also re-working the colors of the terrain, but more on that later.


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Based on some notes from my friend, I’ve updated the textures a little. oh, and tweaked the light and shadow settings.

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Blocking in staff FX for the fireball. Worked in maya to get a look on the sim, now getting it all blocked in and working. Notes on this, too detailed fire. Needs to be clearer shapes, less noise. Should have some animated gif’s of it soon.
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This guy would be like the land owner of a small farm or something. He doesn’t have much but he does have his land. Not UV’d yet.

Still not in place as a gameplay element, but here’s the animation of it as it stands now.