Gamedev

Nortubel is good so far (At least to me).

Not only did I reach 18 levels and 6 cutscenes, I also tried tweaking stuff and adding some features to make it more helpful like being able to adjust cutscene speed.

I still have lot of ideas to implement in the game and is why I recently updated the story plan file in both Rentry and Google form.

Art

Didn't do much art this time, besides stuff for the game (Some even posted in art sites).

A dirty trick I fell into is tracing posed models in Blender but maybe I could get back at practicing construction and gesture.

Doom mapping

Made a really weak map for a first map.

Made a better map that is finished but the main project itself isn't (Look up Fore/vr Alone).

And then did a huge MetaDoom map that isn't playable to anyone else because of how PK3 files actually work.

What else?

Hope to make more Doom maps (And maybe try other games) but I still want to primarly focus on Nortubel and if that gets finished/good enough, a new game like a simpler platformer just to relearn Godot.

In day 6 this month I'll be off-line for some days due to IRL stuff.

Something that should've happened in 15 of November but was delayed.

Still, I'll take a break and then go back to work.

While at it, make sure to give me feedback about my game and maybe share it to others, so other people know about the game.

Also, here's a photo booth for fun.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JpPLu2KLd4o

Going back to Nortubel(?) and then a new setting: Krimb-Stone.

The inspirations for this setting should be obvious and it also highlights the “fake crossover” goal of my projects.

Added 6 levels and 4 cutscenes for this: Therefore 18 levels and 6 cutscenes in total.

You’ll also see relatives to the main cast.

Anyway, the passwords are "p4m3l4", "sh3lly", "b3rn4d", "b00k3r", "r1c0t0" and "phn34s".

* Added a cameo/guest appearance of Sarah from Dreams of Joy Departed, due to that game including a Nortubel reference.

* Added a Credits section/button in the game.

* Fixed a potential softlock in level 9, by allowing the Companion to return to the spawn area.

* Fixed a weird thing where the Crusher Bell clipped a few tiles before actually colliding with the floor by increasing its raycast (Not even sure how this happened, but before the fix it’d only work on the third level).

* (Hopefully) Fixed another weird thing where the Bell’s sound would be heard even with the volume settings being the lowest.

* New NPC type: “Trade” characters; Look for an item, give it to them and something happens in the levels.

* “Race” NPC where I tried to make the Player compete with fake AI in my limited skills.

(Don’t expect an actual system detecting the winner… maybe I could update the game just to add it later?).

* A potential system of using traps to combat enemies.

* A new Companion type made for the level used: Stella, Katrin and Pete’s cousin. She functions similarly to the Companions but instead uses “A” for the commands and “X” for jumping.

Stella is only used as a companion once, but she could inspire characters that act similar but with some differences, who knows.

* Enemy type: A guy that moves/left right and shoots a projectile based on the direction. Took a while to get this made how I wanted, because he could be a useful template for future enemies.

* Spitter Fish now can properly flip its projectile, so the “left” variation isn’t needed anymore.

* Nortubel’s horizontal moving plat has a new animation that is just a “flipped” version of the main loop; Nothing special but eh.

* Version of green endlevel door that only needs the Player.

Also updated the plans “doc” in both Google and Rentry form.

A hint for the next world in the next update is one with anthro characters, but I wanna make sure they look okay enough and in the way I want them to.

Again, if the game gets too big for some people, I’ll stop updating the HTML version and try to figure how to make the downloadable version not just being Windows only.

I got a lot of plans for this game, so somebody tell someone big and powerful to do something about whatever solar storm can happen next year and I also hope health/medical stuff doesn't get in the way either.

Development will definitely slow down in December.

Feeling kinda awful for weeks, at first I thought it could be stress related stuff and just needed to slow down the heart.

But I feel weird stuff in my head, like "loose parts", something "inflating" like a balloon, the empty space of my mouth feeling bigger than it is, what felt like a small "snap" inside my head...

Like what if I got a few broken veins or a tumor?

I'm usually a bit paranoid over health related stuff, so there's an aspect of emotional/psychological stuff to this.

But at night/when I sleep, I wake up with my head feeling light or feel like I'll almost get a stroke.

I even had an instance where if I swallowed (Empty mouth), my mouth would automatically open.

We all know what a "head ache" feels like, so what I feel has sensations on specific places of my head.

I've been told it could just be a flu/cold or something but my coughing felt like it had less to do with that and more to do with whether or not my brain needs more blood/oxygen.

I'm only a few days away from analysis and I hope whatever is going on, can't be that bad and there's solutions with no awful side effects.

Because I want to finish my game.

On days 13-15 I will be doing some health analysis and surgery stuff.

This mean my game's development will take a break but you can always check Project Nortubel on its GitHub page.

https://github.com/EyeBallTank/PROJECT-NORTUBEL-main-ish

New world: Hirdrih.

When you finish the 9th level, it takes you to a cutscene and then new levels based on this new world.

(You can use the password “l3300n” to get there).

It’s a tech/robotic themed world and there’s a lot of stuff in it that I won’t list in this post.

* Added an early iteration of “lore books”. You can find the first example in the second tutorial level above the red key door.

* Similar object is a variation of the info books that instead shows art and you can find it in the fourth level where you’ll find a globe.

* New NPC type: “Conversations” where 2 characters are interacting with each other and you can hear them talking but it’s a basic feature (I added these throughout the 6 levels after the tutorial ones; Basically, you can find them through the ones under the passwords: c4rr13, k4tr1n, m3lv1n, osc4r0, p33tt3 and ang3l4).

* Tried to fix an issue where things spawned into a level would carry into the next scene like projectiles such as the Soccer Ball or Spitter Fish’s projectile.

* New hazard/effect: “Poison”, something that slowly drains the characters’ health without activating their hurt frames.

* New enemy: Hirdrih servants, a penguin/seahorse mashup that acts as a turret shooting asterisks

* Another: “Hirdrio” which bounces off surfaces.

* Prefab: Computer windows that you can close with your melee attack

* Behind the scenes: Added alt sprites for level items/objects based on different worlds so it’s not just Hirdrih that gets its versions of pushable vases or keys.

Depending on how big the game gets, I may stop updating the HTML version and work on the EXE version (Full game still available on Github of course).

But as I work on this game, I would work on stuff for different levels, so it'd be useless if it meant the HTML version still had content from later but unaccessable levels.

Anyway, feel free to spread news about my game or something because I still won’t make a Twitter account and astroturfing in some other places isn’t working.

(Maybe I should focus more on work).

Also, a game called Dreams of Joy Departed by Horbror features a Nortubel reference.

I’ve yet to play that myself but I should.

(And I still got that MetaDoom map).

Also, my game was previously on /agdg/’s demo day 52 and now it’s also on /v/3 this year.

A mostly visuals focused update because I wanted to focus on making the game a bit less annoying to look at.

If I took a while (And end up taking a while with future updates), expect to be because of IRL stuff like events or work.

* Added rotation related export vars for the props to make them more versatile.

* Added an effect for endlevel scenes.

* Companion goes to idle states when the Player dies to avoid potential issues.

* Tried making the portal area in first level easier.

TILEMAPS

I had to add this, so I could make levels diverse, even if some tiles don’t look that good.

I even created sets for actual solid tiles and non-solid ones, including a “visual language” where pure black is used on stuff meant to be solid or interactable.

Not all of them are used, so they get to be used for later levels.

(And if you want to see the rest, it’s on Github).

PROPS

Made a lot of them, even if most look off.

They have a variety of sources from stuff I looked up, to some art like some paintings by Michiel Schrijver to even real objects from my life or dreams I had.

Again, the rest is on Github.  

SKIES

Something I had to be creative with because the recolored skies were boring and I even figured out you can have sprites as children of ParallexLayers (Since the props are technically sprites).

Though there was also the challenge of making sure some stuff is seen and not covered by the camera/level assets.

CHARACTER SPRITES

This had to change and I eventually embraced ¾ even if just for some poses.

I had to make the characters less detailed and thought of using Castlevania as some reference.

CUTSCENE ART

Now this had to change and had to be more interesting because this shows off the characters.

Even if the levels and gameplay look weird, the cutscenes had to look good.

But even if the cutscenes still look bad, I still wanted to make the presentation more interesting (And I guess i could fix art later)

My reference to how the panels move is inspired by Gravity Rush, due to its comic book style cutscenes.

WHAT ELSE

I’ve been thinking of what characters and settings to use and could even have to check some tutorials just to see how some new additions can work.

In case something happens to me, here’s some planned stuff, which could also change.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Ua-ShLy6Z346w-tCx2dfHLl5o2VNHW3KdFtUMO6fTlw 

This is mostly based on me guessing what I could make considering my current skills and what I managed to succeed on.

And this game in general is already too ambitious for my first game but I also like to think it could be finished or "good enough" in at least somewhere in 2024.

Another feature I thought of adding was optional cutscenes that exist to showcase more stuff related to the characters: Like an menu with cutscenes called “memories” that show like someone’s background or more details.

Because I thought of a “library” with texts but I could make it so instead, the texts are secret objects you can discover when exploring levels.

If I can’t do a proper slideshow style gallery, maybe I could do “museum levels” where you touch something and a piece of art shows up in a CanvasLayer.

Anyway, if you think my game looks okay-ish enough to be presentable, feel free to spread the news about it because I’m the kind of guy that refuses to touch Twitter.

https://rentry.co/obiyt

And here’s a pic i guess:

When i release the next major Nortubel update (In which i try to make the characters look cute enough), i’ll go back to this map and do more with it.

Any Doom/UDMF info is appreciated.

In case something happens to me, i might as well spoil my plans for Nortubel's main story (Which will always change depending on how development goes).

https://rentry.co/nortubel-story-plans

Another feature i thought of adding was optional cutscenes that exist to showcase more stuff related to the characters: Like an menu with cutscenes called “memories” that show someone’s background or more details about the character.

Because i thought of a “library” with texts but i could make it so instead, the texts are secret objects you can discover when exploring levels.

Like i said, this game mainly exists for me to showcase OC's and learn gamedev stuff, despite being too ambitious for someone's first game.

It's the next game or even 5th that could be more serious enough to have a better art style and production value (And that is IF my gamedev career goes somewhere).

Hope people don’t memoryhole when Tumblr banned NSFW stuff and then Twitter got worse because the people that complained about NSFW moved there.

And how Twitter essentially got worse because it got most issues that other websites had and became why even normal/casual internet users caught into the worst aspects of internet culture.

That last part is also to do with COVID obviously but still.

I hope that artists online get better at defending their stuff since they’re probably inspired/into critically acclaim artists that also had to defend their art.

And specially the same for Newgrounds considering its history.

Anyway, 2 Twitter users i still remember the names of are LeifBrandr and WhiteSarcophag1, so i hope to see them again.