I’ve had to slow down on adding new features and debugging while I catch up with the art. I’m trying to finalize all the aspects of the first world so I can put a playable test build of Afterdeath up on the website. There are only a few levels left to add that require new content so I’m back to wearing the artist hat. I wish I had a dedicated artist so I didn’t have to keep switching roles or relying on my simple art style.
Last week I showed off some of the lost souls from Death’s collection that have escaped into the afterlifes. They will be hiding from Death in inconvenient locations to avoid recapture.
There will be several sets of five souls to complete, including the three shown here. Yesterday I materialized a Chopin so I think we will continue to see more souls in the coming weeks.
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first draft of the distant peaks of Hades
I’m also working to clean up my spritesheets and produce some background landscapes to scroll with some parallax in the existing levels. Once the art is taken care of and I’ve added some more data to the scoreboards, I’ll add the test build to the Afterdeath page and go seeking some playtesters while I continue working on Valhalla, the second afterlife.
Don’t you just love it when you wear the majority of the hats when going into a venture like this?
I’m liking the concept of this game tho. I can’t say that I usually play 2D platformers (I mainly play RPGs and sports games, when I have the time) but Afterdeath is on my radar.
I almost lost your comment within the hundreds of spam messages to delete.
I also don’t play many platformers. I’m terrible at the split-second reflexes they usually require, like the nightmarishly difficult Super Meat Boy. I had started making a platformer because it seemed simple enough for a first entry into the indie game scene, but I tried to infuse it with strategic qualities by making the angle you choose for your jumps more important than the timing of hitting the jump button.
Like you, I prefer RPGs and more tactical games. Once I have completed Afterdeath and a strategic co-op top-down shooter with procedural level generation, I will have the necessary code framework in place to complete the cyberpunk RPG I have been designing on the side. I am attempting to procedurally generate plots through simulated NPC emotions and goals so the end result should be a game that builds an engaging story from whatever you’re doing at the moment without scripts. With permadeath, a number of ways to interact with and manipulate characters, and a complex engineering system, I hope to have the game I’ve always wanted to play. It might take me another 2 years though.
You’ve just described the game that I’ve had conversations with friends, acquaintances, and strangers, about. That’s the dream game.
I initially followed you on twitter because the logo caught my eye, but the dialogue keeps up because the the’s substance behind the logo.
there’s*
Hopefully it lives up to our respective expectations. Currently it exists primarily in notebooks, spreadsheets, and diagrams but the designs stand up to scrutiny.
Maybe sometime I can tell you more about the specifics and learn what kind of playthrough you would have. It’s a little game I play with my friends. For example, one intends to synthesize a beverage that increases susceptibility to suggestion and sell it door to door, gradually turning customers into employees and building an empire as a mind-controlling milkman. The best way to learn what players want out of your game is to ask them.
I’m big on the investigative games like LA Noire, and Condemned (the first one), and Heavy Rain (which I played briefly, but not because I didn’t like it). But the problem with all of those games is that there are set scripts.
I’d like a game based on a local PD or FBI office that was completely procedural and dynamic. So if clues are missed, leads aren’t followed, or false leads are pursued too vigorously, cases take that much longer to solve, or even go unsolved without it being “game over” or “try again.” Maybe NPCs can even stumble upon something that could help your current case, or a case you have filed away. I guess a persistant, living world, where you just happen to be a detective/FBI agent.
The occasional “big case” can be picked up by your office/station and depending on your clearance rate you may or may not get to be the lead detective running the case, but other law enforcement folks can come to you and ask for favors/help, etc.
I have no idea how feasible something like that is, I imagine that it would take unconscionable amounts of time, and programming. But this is my dream game.