Roadwarden [Fantasy/RPG Elements/Pixel Art] [DEMO]

[Jubal]

Wow, two hours of speaking time? That's a LOT. I'm used to having to condense everything for my academic conferences into 20 mins, 30 at most (and for political conferences even less). Really cool and good that they went well!

[Aure]

What a fruitful week this was.

The dialogues for the tavern that I've been working on for weeks are now finished. Adding all the conversations for the guards increased the volume by a third, but the more I wrote, the more I was sure it was a good idea. The throw-away NPC now has a lot of personality, and I've added a lot of new things which will impact the game even in the later stages.



After finishing with this place, I took some time to draw. Two completely different areas:
1. A ruined village. The Imperial forests are dangerous and unfriendly, forcing the hamlets and villages to grow as slowly, as they can. If humankind affects the nature too much, too fast - the monsters arrive to take back what belongs to them.



2. At the edge of the swamp, a large tree stands for as long as anyone remembers. It has no leaves, yet slowly grows. To stay alive, however, it has to be fed by the locals, who put their offerings on an ancient altar.



Drawing still consumes a lot of time, but what now takes me a day or two, just half a year ago would be literally impossible for me. Or would require two weeks and dozens of redraws. Feels good to grow.

[Jubal]

It feels odd that the ruined village only has two small breaches in its stockade but most of the buildings inside look collapsed - I'd expect the stockade to decay far more quickly or be more damaged? Though I guess it depends how long you want it to have been abandoned/ruined for...

[Aure]

Thank you, Jubal! In my mind the buildings were purposefully destroyed and partially burnt, they weren't just consumed by time.

But it is an interesting thought. How long can a palisade really stand without maintenance. It's wood, after all.

[Aure]

I've made a huge progress as far as the graphics go. I now have enough material to spend a couple of weeks writing dialogues, encounters and modifying the game's features. I need to make some large changes, and all of them are going to be great.

Here are some examples of the latest advancements:
1. The druids' cave, locked behind a metal door. What can be found inside? Is it just a shelter, a prison, a treasure chamber? After all the first things you see when you get nearby, are the garden patches with herbs and veggies. 
And you can see how much your feedback can impact the picture.


2. The shop screen is looking much better now, though it still needs some work. Next stop - adding a separate icon to display the money in player's possession, replacing parts of the item descriptions.


3. A camp in a destroyed building, a part of the ruined village presented here last week. Iron and steel are rare and valuable resources, no wonder that someone would try to scavenge for them in an old, abandoned settlement.


I don't have enough time to take care of all the ideas I want to pursue right now, but there's a good chance that a new version of the demo is going to be available in August, Though maybe not, maybe I should focus on developing all of the core areas that the player can visit and quests they can be a part of.

I would love to know what you think!

(Bonus devlog!)

[Jubal]

Yeah, I think the main thing I'm interested in is how you're going to make the sheer number of possibilities meaningful in this - the choose your own adventure style options interacting with e.g. item availability, and then your whole additional multifaceted mood options system, gives you so many possibilities that you must have a lot of branching decision paths.

[Aure]

I definitely have to keep a couple of tricks in play, like the classic "fake" branching (when branches lead to the same point, but in a slightly different way) or "summarized" branching (like when an accessibility of an option is based on a summary of some points that you've gathered up to this point). These tricks have already a long history behind them. But as you may remember, this is kind of what I aim for - I want to cut away balancing battles and detailed visuals and put all of my effort into making the illusion as vivid as I can.

The game's world helps here a lot. Sure, some areas have quests related to other areas, some characters will move around or impact other places... But in general, most people have no idea what happens in other parts of the world. You move around, change your surrounding, but it's completely understandable that when you get to a new village, they have no clue what sort of trail is behind you. It's a very convenient part of my worldbuilding preparations. : P

Let me know if I'm too vague or you would like me to get deeper into some details.

[Aure]

It's difficult to decide what to showcase today, I hope it's fine if I drop a whole bunch of pics:

Here are some of the latest advancements:
1. The Roadwarden's world is growing! New areas are now also visible on the traveling map.


2. I'm currently writing a detailed scene for the ruined village that I've shared here before. The overall "exploration" system of this area is all set and done, and works completely fine. My later edits will surely change various areas and add some new content, but I'm happy about where this is going.




3. The shop screen is now much easier to comprehend and simply prettier. Thanks to the "Trade" button in the quick menu, you can also open the shop without having to choose a specific dialog option during a conversation.



4. The new section of the journal will now include NPC descriptions and, even more importantly, names. It's a solution born from necessity - I can't expect that everyone is going to remember all the character names and detailed information about them.


5. The dialogue I'm currently working on... Is referencing Scottish accents too cliche for fantasy writing in 2019? : P


And, of course, new rewrites, bug fixes, new content, quests...

[Aure]

After over 3 weeks of writing new dialogues, events, items, interactions and one large side quest for Roadwarden, all of this content is finally a part of the actual game.

Here are some of the latest advancements:
1. An example of how combat looks in the game. As well as the "escorting" quests. No grinding for XP, no following a character for 5-10 minutes. A couple of simple clicks, decision making and if you can, you prepare yourself before the encounter happens. Nice and sweat, with an open field for role-playing.


2. Time is going to matter, just as intended. If you postpone the quest for too long, you can still complete it - but it won't be a happy end for the quest giver. Also, you can express how your character is perceiving this situation.


3. My English improves with practice, and I have in plans taking a huge step back and editing the entire tutorial section. Yikes.


4. IDK, I just really like this NPC. : P So far, I like all of my NPCs. You will be able to recognize which ones I don't like by measuring how little to do and dialogues they have attached to them.


5. New inventory section! It still requires some improvements, but it's not too bad!


I'm really getting better at adding the content to the game files - in the beginning, I was spending days fixing broken code and trying to figure out how it should be actually organized. Now? A couple of mistakes, some oversights, a couple of hours and bam, everything works just fine.

[Jubal]

It all looks great

(Pernickety question, but... aren't birds definitionally bipedal?)

[Aure]

waaaait a sec...

[Aure]

Would you like to make an offering?

[Jubal]

As I replied to the Twitter update...

[Aure]

Hi there!

I'm currently editing some of the older scenes in the game, including the tutorial-prologue scenes, preparing to share the current version of the game with some testers. There's so much new content that needs some additional feedback, and I keep finding (and fixing) annoying bugs... I'm both excited and terrified. : P

[Jubal]

Nice

Something about the inside of the cave isn't right for me but I can't put my finger on what - the perspective feels off or it feels a bit flat somehow.