Howdy everyone, counted from January 2012, Grand Steam project has reached 8 month development time, been long time but we ain't stop progressing, and here we are, Lazcht, clea leshlick and hipon, informing you folks, on "What's up Grand Steam?"Click here to browse previous Grand Steam logs!
~Hipon reports:
Last month, we did a lot of gameplay and interface analysis. We really had a hard time deciding some elements in combat system, like Rival system. But i won't spoil that for now, since we haven't reached a decision lol.Development progress :
- Level select menu redesigned.
- More depth to combat system.
- New upgrade system.
- A lot of new sprites and effects implemented.
1. Combat system update : Usable items!
From our discussion last month, we noticed that the combat system was a bit bland, there's not enough action the player could do. From the discussion, we decided to add more features to the combat system. What is it? Usable items!So basically, you only have 3 inventory slots in this game, only 3. You could get items from killing certain enemy, you could also get items by beating the Rival, this one is pretty tricky, maybe i'll explain this on the next log.
Different kinds of items are available like SP Potion, HP potion, and some destructive AoE items like Bomb, Poison grenade. These items work pretty well in the combat system so far. What's better than throwing bombs to a group of enemies?
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| yeah, eat that bomb |
2. New Upgrade System.
We made new upgrade system for this game, basically it's like this, you are given limited chance to upgrade, and each upgrade you choose what do you want to upgrade, for example Dash skill, you can choose whether you want to upgrade the cooldown, or the dash range. Interesting isn't it? |
| before --after |
3. New Menu Design
We did some redesigns to the Level-select menu, we felt that it lacked intuitiveness and a bit messy, so, Laz redesigned it, and it looks better now. Here's the comparison :
~Lazcht reports:
I want to report some graphical stuff has been made/ progressed, aside from GUIs hipon reported above.My main progress since last log are:
- New sprites (lot of it)
- New HUD, GUI designs, icons
- New illustration for title screen, clouds background for menu
- New special effects, optimized assets for better performance
New character concept spoils
Some times ago we said to redesign the characters so here are them.Poker F. Ace
Her costume design influenced by steampunk + tribal + casual wear. This was randomly picked because story is not yet written by clea hahah. I wanted her image young, arrogant/cool looking, unique, not forgetting that she's a sword fighter so i didn't try to make her feminine/cute. (yeah girly girl is not even my forte -.- )Jack Potter
His design influenced by Victor (Devil Summoner), and Sneff from Chrono Cross. XD I want to make him look like a gambler, slightly annoying, and a bit narcissist. His costume theme is the same as Ace.
Their names are card/ gambling related, though we impulsively named them, we aimed to make catchy memorable names and easy to pronounce.
~clea reports:
Development has been going quite long, lots of trial and errors, lots of experiments, lots of decision making!1.Music
Since I have lots of time on this project, I can take my time to research and try out new things concerning music composition. Electro drums, light synth, heavy synths, violins, glitch effects, and lots more exciting stuff. There will be more music coming, expect around 5 new tracks.New tracks will be quite different from these two, as I will use different/new technique and approach (duh, several months have passed). I think it will be really cool and outstanding.
Bossfight; tactical destruction
Menu/Intermission; i think a lot, do you?
2.Sound Effects
Sword slashes, gunshots, UI sounds, skills, impacts, explosions, and many more. I'm getting better and better at sound manipulation, thanks to game project like this one! I always aim to make them nice sounding, unique, and memorable. I have to carefully maintain the volume and frequency balance between them, to make sure they sit nicely with each other, and be able to blend nicely with the music, of course.So when i can play this game?
To be honest, we're still not sure because this is the second complex game we've made so far (first one is Sword of August XD) yet (of course!) we're the first ones who want Grand Steam to be done.We'll keep you informed by writing logs like this. I hope you enjoy reading them, stay tuned for the next log! That's all information we got for now, have a nice day, thanks for your time being here! :)
~stellarNull out!
