Week 06 - Devlog - Blast Till Last

Game Art

Mesh A pose

This week we've made the character Base mesh and 2 of the characters. Here you see the adventurer, fully retoped so its ready for rigging and animation. The texturing has been done with swatch textures.

A couple of props were also created and textured:
 

Destructible props:

• Crate
• Barrel
• Vase

Pick-Up prop(s): 

• Food can

Environment props:

• Trees
• Fence

More props for the pick-ups and environment will follow later. As for now, coming up with ideas for the looks of the platform is important: it will be destructible, consisting of rocks and wooden parts. 

Development

Movement

During this week we were able to re-implement core functionality of the movement mechanic. Starting from the scratch but with experience, we were able to focus on the resolution of the bug which would launch character in the space while walking over small debris. While it might sound like a funny glitch due to the nature of the game, it was game breaking. 

Before:


Now:


We were able to resolve the issue by changing the collision config for the character capsule. It was the least intuitive solution to the problem and took a a while to arrive to. 
Another important addition is new reworked shockwave mechanic.  While keeping the core principle discovered in the prototype stage, it became more sophisticated and with more intricate properties to improve gameplay depth.  Furthermore, the shockwave impact on playable characters was also added. 

Shockwave in action:

Camera

Before, we had a static camera who would not move at all. If we really want every feature of our game to add up to a fun, chaotic and alive game experience, it shouldn't feel like our cameraman just dosed off after his daily five donuts. Instead our camera should move around as the players move and fly to every corner of the map, which is what this new camera does a better job at.

It keeps track of every player, to be more exact it keeps track of the furthest distance between two possible players and uses this parameter to set the correct distance from the playing field to the camera.  

It also moves along the average position of every player to make sure it doesn't only zoom in and out. This adds up to a way more dynamic camera that adds that little extra "alive" feel to our game.