Been a couple of weeks since the last log so figure it's time for an update. Unfortunately there aren't any cool looking new models or mechanics to show off but here's what has been going on:
The UIThat interesting bit of development that everyone* definitely loves to hear about.
I'm making it all myself this time around since it needs to be quite specific to this game. Previously I've not really cared about the UI, so just got third party graphics and chucked those in. This time though I've had to really clarify what the player will want to achieve, and so what information they will need to do that. The 2 biggest objectives are broadly to have your house and knights do the best, and the other is be a tycoon and make lots of money. If the player wants their knights to win then they may be wanting to quickly determine if their knights are in "pole position" out of the attending knights, when they will next be competing etc. On the other hand the player is just interested in getting as much money as they can - they will want to know visitor numbers, gold, and have a way to determine how their outlets are performing.
So I've sketched out various designs and have been looking at them, imagining that I'm trying to do, or decide on certain things and if / where I can do that. It's strange to me how much about the game as a whole I need to be sure of before I can actually do anything.
Anyway I'll stop waffling on about menus. Here are some graphics I've done so far.
Tournament logicUp until now I had created a joust event, which existed by itself in a joust tutorial scene. The 2 knights in the scene went over, competed and then finished.
The next step was to implement a full knockout event. This allows for the to player put down a tilt where they want, click it to start a knockout tournament and then all of the knights play a sequence of events in a number of rounds until the overall winner is determined.
This is nearly done, and that will mean the top level logic is in place for the archery and melee tournaments too once I go on to those.
MusicI'm not sure to what extent anyone else finds the process of music production for a game interesting so apologies if this is dreary waffle. I find this part fascinating though, and the auditory output of a game is of the highest importance to me.
I've been talking a lot to Alexei (the composer I work with) about what music should be for this game. The key things to think about for the tracks, is that they need to sound correct with a few things:
- Looking at in game menus, e.g. The equipment of knights, a vendors prices, a pause menu etc
- Looking at knights in a bitter sword fight, or jousting.
- Looking at some lords and peasants eating hog roast, drinking beer and having a jolly old time
It's a lot to ask of a piece of music. I might need to implement some kind of dynamic mixer which I did in the last game where different music fades in when you are fighting.
On top of that there will probably be 4 chapters set in different areas, and each will have a different flavour. It's been discussed before on this thread about the setting. So the first 2 will be in Avalon. The third will be Atlantis. The fourth will be Gulansharo: city of flowers (thanks Jubal
). So there will need to be 3 different sounds for the 3 fairly exotic locations. I don't think it will do to have generic medieval tavern music.
Anyway Alexei informs me that he's in the process of composing the first track - a main theme for the game. He's said it "should be really catchy" and "still have (a) melodic flavour". I'm always excited to hear his stuff. If you want an idea, here's a favourite clip of a tune he did for BioStation.
If you like that and have spotify
here is the full OST.
What's next?- Start providing some of the on screen information I was talking about above
- Create a static list of unique knights available to each house
* no-one