Well unfortunately Thrones has been put on hold indefinitely as I ran into some serious roadblocks which just aren't going to get knocked out any time soon. I could work around them but then the game wouldn't really be what I had intended it to be. With that said, I'm working on something new. I'm not going to jump into details as I really want to get this project much further along before I announce what it is or when it might get released.
All I can say is that the website is going to get a makeover, and eventually there will be news about this new thing I'm doing. One hint: It involves stealing things.
I've been away from working on this project for a bit and now I'd like to pick back up. Trying to get some motivation but it will come in time. Stick around for updates, I promise they will come soon enough.
If you register for the forums, you will be able to get access to any closed beta that is released in the future... So if you're interested in trying this game out when it gets to that time, I would definitely recommend registering for the forums!
Once the closed beta is released, only the people who were registered here before that time will be able to play in the closed beta.
So if you're lurking the site and checking the updates out... why not take a moment to register? It will not only guarantee a closed beta spot, but every new member to the site helps encourage me to work harder. Also, there is always the option of donating! (that would definitely encourage me to work harder!)
Either way, new progress updates coming this weekend. I've had a busy week but I'm going to try to cram in a bunch of progress between now and Sunday night.
Okay so first off, no new video this weekend. Unfortunately I've run out of time this weekend but I have managed to do an awful lot of work. So video should come maybe next weekend? With a lot more stuff featured.
I have made good progress with network implementation though. Players can now log in to their account, start a game (2 player pvp at the moment) and the game will load the map and all of the units, there is a turn queue that is generated which cycles through the units right now. Players can take turns moving their units and then use the "wait" action to choose a direction to face the unit and end their turn. So all this is working online now.
Next step is to make some various clothing to mix up what the units are wearing, I also need to still do skills and items options for the turn. I will most definitely be doing the skill stuff first, and items can come later. It is actually starting to become a game at this point. Once attacking and damaging are in, it will pretty much *be* a game. Maybe not a very fun one, but I will be able to play a match from start to finish very soon.
So that is the big update for now. I spent the past 10 hours implementing this networking stuff, and so far it is looking very smooth. Of course, that is because my computer is hosting the server so everything is done instantly... but we'll see how it works out once I have an actual game server running things. I'm still hoping to have some sort of early closed beta this winter. I'll be letting in pretty much anyone who registers an account here on this site. (up until the closed beta release, then any new registers will have to wait for open beta)
Ahoy! New dev log! So I just got finished with some important code... The login verification!
This actually verifies the player based on their account here on the site. So when you create a forum account then it is also your game account! I will look into adding nicknames here on the forum so you don't have to show your actual account name, for security purposes... but it shouldn't be too much of an issue right now.
Anyway, so the game now verifies the player, and logs them in under the proper account name. Right now the game jumps straight to the lobby where players can chat and also create and join pvp matches. However, there is an extra step in here I need to add... and that is of course, setting up the player's game account data. Right now there is no data, as it's just connecting players and letting them chat. But my next step is to check to see if the account has data created yet, and if not, create the server file that will store all of the players data (characters, stats, items, etc)
It will generate the data file and then the game will take you to the character setup page (instead of the lobby). The setup page will let you customize your player character (gender, skin color, hair style, face appearance, etc) and you'll also get to randomly customize your team of characters. Once you're happy with that, it would be either on to a tutorial page, or just jump straight to the lobby to let you start playing matches. I imagine the tutorial bit will come later, with an option to disable it somewhere. But I'd like to eventually add one to get players familiar with the game.
So yeah, gotta make the character setup page and generate the account data, and then it is on to the game lobby, where I need to use that account data to set up the actual game between the players. After that, it will be time to get started coding the network stuff for the actual game screen. Which will start off by loading the proper characters (based on that character data that will be made) and loading the proper map and stuff.
It's gonna be quite a bit of work but I'm up for the challenge. I think once I get to the point where there is something resembling a game, I'll post a video up of the progress. By "resembling a game" I mean just being able to start a match and the players take turns moving the characters and attacking (attacking might not damage or anything at that point, but it will at least function)
That's it for now. Once all this is done, the fun stuff starts... with adding in content! (plus the million other features of the game like rankings, support, clans, quest mode, etc... )
Been working on a better way to display characters... and it looks like I'm going to settle on the most optimized (but not as developer friendly) method this time around. It works great for the players but the files have to be stored internally (due to there being so many frames of animation and so many layers of clothing) and I have to import each set of animations into the game by hand... which is a drag. But the end result is a nice and fast game with great customization for characters. So I guess that's something to be happy about.
I was also messing around with color swaps and it looks like there will definitely be a good method for color swapping... which means players will be able to change colors of gear and their character attributes pretty easily and with very little limitations.
Here is a quick test of colorizing the body color to get a nice wide variety of skin tones from one graphic:
You will also be able to clothe your characters with many types of clothing and I'm thinking about how I can set up a way for players to actually dye their clothing/gear, so that you could literally dress your character in whatever color clothes you wanted. Though, I might put caps on this to prevent abuse... such as not allowing super vibrant colors or making your character wear pure white or black or neon green or whatever. I have a pretty fun idea for how gear dying will work also, but more will be revealed once I actually implement that stuff.
For now I'm going to finish optimizing character loading, and then I'm going to work on setting up camera movement and the turn menu (where you select if you want to move/use skill/use item/wait)
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