Sealark, an Oceanic Adventure Game by clairvoire » Long Overdue Update!

Long Overdue Update!

Update #9 · Mar 13, 2013 · 41 comments

Hello Folks!

I want to start by saying that I am really sorry for not posting any updates for so long a time. I have been posting updates on my personal blog, but I've neglected posting here, mostly out of stage fright. The idea that this message will pop into the inboxes of over 3000 folks, is pretty nerve-wracking. But I promise I'll work to get over that, and try to issue an update at least twice a month here with progress, from now on. I hope that will be alright. Thank you for your patience so far!

Now, for progress! I'm unsure how to quantify it, but I have spent most of the time, since launch, programming the game in C++. And of course, finalizing the specifics with gameplay, character designs, fish, enemies, levels. And I'm now at the stage were I can start animation work.

The drawing and event handling systems are done. Drawing is done using OpenGL, and events are processed by SFML's windowing library, which also gives me my window context. Key binding stuff is finished as well. Any key on any keyboard (or mouse) can be made an input, and it's possible to assign multiple keys to a single action.

The physics system was initially going to use Box2D, since I'm a fan of the library, but in the end, I decided to roll my own physics engine instead. This will let me write game logic more easily and consistantly, without having to worry about Skyrim style bugs, like fish rocketing into space or boats turning into horses or something (as cool as that would be.) I'm on the verge of fully debugging my engine, and I'm really proud of how it's turning out! I'll explain how it works in a later update, and maybe even get into the boring specifics of how I'm structuring my code. Yeehaw!

Right now, the bulk of the work is now sprite animation and background spriting. I've already got much of the ingame animations thumbnailed. The challenge will be spriting over these, with every class of every character. I'm not gonna lie though. Is a very daunting task. Like. Over 5000 frames of animation. *muffled weeping*

Oh! Before I forget too! One feature I wanted to add, since after the kickstarter finished, was Prestige classes! I already posted them on my tumblr, but I'd like to post them here too!

Prestige classes are available to NPCs as well as Dove. They change how the character looks, their stats, attacks, and will change certain bits of dialog too. How a Promotion is triggered is a secret for now, aha. But I'll reveal more as we go along!

Thank you for reading, hope your day is a good one!

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clairvoire

Chillicothe, OH Contact me

First created · 1 backed
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Website: clairvoire.tumblr.com

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