The past year has flown by. Been pretty busy with my job, but a slew of improvements have come down the pipe.
Quick List of 2017′s improvements
- New Ability Candidates: Void Zone, Hunters Trap, Wind Slash
- Terminus: New close quarters map
- Design Checkups: Tuning unhealthy abilities, smoothing rough spots
- Ritehaven: Playable main menu
- Code Refactoring: Clean the software cobwebs
- Bot Progress: Smart ability usage – yes, Navigating – Not yet
- Visual Effect Improvements: Readability improvements, new Post Processing effects, New Toon Shader
Coming 2018 improvements
- Itch.IO: Public playable build is coming soon!
- Character appearance revisions
- Culling out abilities on the chopping block *Cough* Pyroclasm *Cough*
- Physics & movement improvements
- Quality of life improvements
- Locomotion on Bots?!
- And much more!
New Ability Candidates
Not all of these candidates may make it into the final game, but they are up for evaluation. If we make story content, some of these abilities might end up there.
Void Zone
Calls a hunting abyssal area to the battlefield, chasing, silencing, and damaging the nearest foe.
Careful, it damages and silences you if you’re inside of it.
Hunter’s Trap
Place a small proximity trap that amplifies damage taken by careless foes. Lets you quickly turn a battlefield into a mine field.
This ability is a pretty dangerous for the unhealthy evasion oriented gameplay it can encourage. I wouldn’t get too attached.
Wind Slash
Send a tall slow moving blade of air outward. Deals heavy damage to airborne targets, grounding them in the processes.
This particular candidate is very useful as an anti-air technique.
We’ll see how these candidates do in playtests!
Terminus
Terminus is a new map candidate (very likely to get polished)
It will be the smallest arena and tightly focused around direct conflict with one another. Matches on the stage will be more intense and immediate.
The magenta capsules each indicate a spawn location. There is a single mana pickup and health pickup on this map.
Design Revisions
I’ve been taking time to tackle the largest design problems that negatively impact the gameplay.
This means tackling or adjusting abilities that don’t fit the design goals or are too far from the power curve.
This means fixing readability and usability issues that prevent players from grokking the gameplay or why things happened.
Target Indicators & Outlines
Enemy visual clarity is important at all times. I’m starting by solving this problem with every approach: off-screen indicators, far distance indicators, high contrast outlines. I’ll let players turn off the ones they don’t like. The goal is ensuring players can engage in the fast and fun gameplay… not hunt for the pixels that are a far-away character.
UI Tweaks
There are a host of small improvements to the UI like indicating when a use occurred or was attempted. The action lockout indicator is pretty direct, but matters when stunned, silenced, or rooted.
Ritehaven: New Main Menu
Attunement now has a playable main menu called Ritehaven.
It serves as a hub level letting players select their abilities and then experiment with them before heading into combat.
I’m working with Jarell to nail down a proper visual feel for Ritehaven.
Code Refactoring
The project has grown since the 2016 Global Game Jam where it started. This means taking time to clear the software spiderwebs and update to better approaches. I’ve broken apart many of the growing classes into more modular components.
Some benefits:
- Bots
- Option for dynamic maps
- New ability mechanics (summoned units, cross ability interactions, etc)
- More Status Effects (Stuns, Silences, Grounded, etc)
- Faster bug hunting
- Easier engine & code upgrades
- Improved performance
None of these are promises, but I’m optimistic.
Bot Progress
I have the Bot Shapers using abilities in contextually intelligent situations (prioritizing long range abilities when far away, defensive tools when vulnerable, etc).
I have the enemies using abilities in contextually intelligent situations. A robust long-term locomotion solution is still on the radar.
Visual Effects
Added the new Unity Post Processing Stack (motion blur, ambient occlusion, anti-aliasing, and other cinematic visual improvements). I also switched over to a new toon shader to give a better look. I’ll get around to adding new gifs to show off clearer environment, characters and abilities.
Toon Shader & Outlines
Ensuring a player can always pick out another player at a distance keeps the combat fluid and exciting. High contrast outlines can help achieve this.
Coming 2018: Itch.io Page
That’s right! Soon there will be a public itch.io page!
This means that you’ll have the ability to download & play the public version of Attunement: Power of the Gods!
I’ll post a link to the itch page when it goes live.
As always, thanks for reading!
Beware: The Gods are Watching…