Okay, so work on the new character is done! He may look incredibly similar to the old one, but he’s had his proportions tweaked, a couple of rough edges smoothed out, and also he’s been separated into multiple pieces in order to facilitate changing costumes further down the line.
Also with the new model came a new animation rig, which means I could finally get around to doing attack combo animations. Also new is root animation, which while it’s hard to tell from the gif means that every time he attacks, he steps forwards a little bit. This helps with closing the range on enemies while attacking them, and looks pretty neat.
HA YA RRRAAAH
Also there’s been another big addition; Actual lighting! The previous versions I was working with were going for a flat-shaded style – in line with the Playstation 1 graphical style I was going for – but I always felt like it was lacking in atmosphere. The first few tests I did looked a little weird, with shadows that felt either too dark or too light, or just looked like plastic. To fix this, I’ve placed various ‘bounce lights’ around the scene to fill out the shadows a little more, and I’m quite happy with the results.
If you love it then you should’ve shone a light on in.
I also managed to show the game off at the monthly International Games Developers Association Melbourne (IGDAM) meet-up. Got a lot of great feedback from people regarding the new lighting style and animations, which was great because people definitely seemed to respond positively to it (And hogged my laptop for quite a time while playing it).
Next up; environments. The current environments all look incredibly samey and boxy, so I’m going through and doing a pass of having more varied, unique rooms. This should make navigation much easier for newer players, as well as giving them more reward for exploration. I’m hoping to be able to do one new room a week, so hopefully by the next IGDAM I’ll be able to show off a total of 4 new rooms, including a new double-story entrance room. With stairs and everything!