Angelus blog

This time something new, and on begin I need public thanks to Zeelichian from magicball.net forum which agreed to help me with new design of character and prepared sketches of them. Bellow you can see effects of this cooperation and in the same moment small teaser of coming stuff.

Yesterday or I can say even today (I worked to late) I almost finished big part of changes in "new" animation system. It is very big step in project road to alpha version. There were a lot of changes that will speed up work and allow me to better control everything. Why new animation ? Because : It allow to shared one animation between models with different armature. There is changed communication interface:  game armature There is  made new animation format which is quicker, and more intuitive to debug. There is rewrote tools to export animations from blender. It support new format. It can extract only animations, only model or both. It's quicker. So you see there were a lot of changes. But maybe some of you noticed that I wrote new in quotations marks. I done it because this system isn't new   it's just extended old system. Truth that more than half of it was rewrite from scratches but even this new part of code base on old....

In weekend 27-28.10.2012 I will have presentation on http://www.zjazdtworcowgier.pl/ in Poznań. My topic is "The story of one man, own game" ("Historia jednego człowieka czyli własna gra") I will try to show in this presentation how different can be work at home and in full time job. And of course how it look when you do this two things in the same time. From other interesting things there will be show in real time of tools and L.B.A. remake game. Maybe somebody will come to it, time will show :]

3 months of break from writing new posts it's pretty long time. You probably think what changed in this time, truth is that most of the time I worked on things that aren't visible on first look. But they are still important part of my work on which right now I spend most of my time so in last 3 months: I rewrote lua integration with engine, worked on rtti, changed in few places class hierarchy and of course added few interesting mechanics that helped me a lot in development. Of course there are few visible changes too. One of them is first version of menu system. I don't think about it as final version but in meantime it should be enough. As you can see I test features on my test location which is visible on screens.  I go back to work because I still have a lot to do. So to next time.

And again I don't know how to begin this week update. I have few words and don't know how to continue so I will like always do it in some stupid way :] I still spend most of my time working on movie system. There was a lot of changes from last post and my ToDo list have still few of them. But everything start to take shape and now I trying to do some simple in game cinematic. Of course in meantime there were some unexpected behavior of game :] from crashes to moving everything on scene but not object that I want to animate. Movie system isn't only thing I done this week. Other things I worked on are:    *  upgrades in objects managing  *  cleanups in code to speed up compilation  *  some developers tools to trace rendering  *  adding some editor functions  *  and of course fixes a lot of them. So as you see project didn't die :] So till next week.

Another week of fixes and changes. This time many of theme were done in managing of game objects. To say truth they weren't necessary to create game but when you develop something bigger than simple pacman you see that there is need to have some mechanism that are intuitive and thanks to that development later can be speed up (I spend week now but in perspective of all development I will save a lot more). Other thing I work on is my movie widget. You probably remember it from some screens: As you see it's very simple tool that allowed me to create movies of objects in engine. Not characters but more like moving platforms, opening doors and things like that. I decided to finish this part of engine because I put it away in meantime of production (there were more important things to do then) but now I returned to it and do modernization of films. So here how it's look now : It's still under development and will take some time to finish it fully but even now i...

As I said last week I do right now some maintenance works so not too much to talk about. Fixes and cleanups of existing things mostly in tools. Other thing is that I had a request in one of comments on youtube: " btw, can you maybe record something from inside the engine where you build everyhing, i wolud love to see how it works." I will prepare some movie about this but I don't know exactly when :] So that's all in this week update.

This time small jump in numbers :] Last week in Sunday evening I remembered to write post but on end I was so tired that I went to sleep and forgot about it. So what happened in this time: On my long list things to do there are some that I put away because I hadn't time on them. In the end I decided to do them earlier because this list grown a little to big. So I adding undo to all operation in editor , fix some things that don't work the way I want, finish unfinished features and remove some unused things. Of course I didn't forgot about game I done big changes in physics most because I added weapons to enemies (handling bullets wasn't so easy as it look on begin). And a lot of small changes and fixes. So to summary I took some little break on developing new things and focus mostly on this existed. And for some time I plan to stay in this state because without good basis I will not be able make good game. So till next week.

On begin I wold like to thanks two people: You Tube user  rezoner1337 for publishing info about remake on  wykop  and gog.com forum user M2Grzegorczy for  this topic . It's really great to see that they shown such a initiative and to say truth the moment I saw this posts I couldn't believe. So what else left for me thanks you again. Second thing is the problem I was pinpointed by few people: there is no easy way to communicate with me. So I added email contact on blog because alexfont wrote that he couldn't found any. Maybe any of you have other proposition how to make contact with me easier? And on end progress of game: this week I spend mostly on AI and removing sliding of player. I will not say to much here because I plan to show both things in next movie which will have this time music created specially for game by Jesse Gorter . From more interesting changes is shown of discrete mode with animation and influence on gameplay. So e...

For interested people I created on blog pages with information about little big adventure remake and my indie portfolio.

And as I said last time new preview is available: As you can see a lot has changed. Right now I mostly focus on gameplay so I do test of AI (some of them you can see on end of movie), changes in fight, items managing, fix some problem with physics and many other things. To say truth I don't remember them all :P So I'm going back to work and till next week.

This time very short because around Tuesday I will upload new preview movie and you will see on what I worked from last preview. And I work very hard so everything work almost perfect so till next week.

From time to time I look at other indie projects. And lately under some screenshots I saw funny text: don't look on fps because game is not optimize. Ok, optimization will be done on end of project, this is only some quick prototype or things like that. I could understand this but not when on screenshot I see few simple objects sometimes terrain with sky. Sometimes people write that they have old computer that's why their fps is so low. But in most cases they don't give specification and sometimes this machine isn't such a weak. So today to my head came question were indie going with people developing game in such a way ?

In this week I done some important changes in technology and most of it was a very technical things so I will not write about it because it would be boring. But right now I returned to game and working on some fully gameplay features like updating item system, control system and AI of enemies:] On end some small art that I done in meantime of developing game.

This was one of the worse of week in few years everything because of nasty bug in engine. But lest start from begin. So happened that Little Big Adventure remake was tested on laptop with Nvidia Go7300 and from begin started fun with this card :] OpenGL have two extensions of frame buffer objects (extension to support writing to textures) ARB_framebuffer_object and EXT_framebuffer_object. Most new cards support both of them but some older had support only to EXT which wasn't included in my renderer. So I rewrote it and final effect was like that: This was around 10 April and from that time I had few attempts to fix this bug. I hadn't access to machine and in the end I didn't fixed it. But so happen to be that my brother came to home and have laptop with Nvidia Go 7400 on which is exactly the same error. I begun fixing this bug 3 days ago, right now on my clock is past 3AM (yesterday I went to slept on 5AM :]) and at last I found reason behind it. Bug was connected ...

On begin I will say that I didn't finished everything I planed for this week. I started work on harbor part of citadela island (you can see how it look bellow) and done some WIP of cave location.  From more technical things I worked or still work on: - mechanism of load screens  - two types of controlling character (classic and new mode)  - pad support to game.  And that's all for this week.

I have some good news in this week. - Thanks to people that I invited to cooperation with me were found a lot of bugs, irritating things and  I saw some fresh look how this game should develop in time. Of course big thanks to them from my side.  - I finished prototype of all locations in game. Of course they are simply placeholders where you see mostly shape of location but still this is big step in production because now in game you are able to freely walk to each of this location. You will need to believe me on word because today I will not show any screens or videos.  - I done a lot of fixes and optimization. In this week I won't do too much because in weekend I will be out. So till next week.

This is very tiring week. Right now only 3 more places left for people that want participate in testing remake. Thanks to people that participate I found some bugs, some of them are already repaired and some are still under work. But in the end I have faith that everything will work fine and I will sleep enough. From game features I resolved problem with shadows that maybe some of you see in all movies when camera move away from Twinsen. I do to some tweaks in lighting because there were to dark on maps. That's not everything what I done but other are still under development. So till next week.

After last week joke almost everything return to normal. Except that this time week update is pretty late. This week I started cooperation with 4 people which have access to game and I still search for 4 more people. It toke me some time to prepare everything what is need to such a cooperation. And after I finish on begin came some nasty bugs with OpenGL frame buffer object extension. Of course most of the work I done in meantime of normal production, so to my long list of different kind of task came another. But I'm happy because it's look like I finished most of it in week. There is one more good news I decided at last show next preview so have nice watching and till next week :]

Today I decided to finish the project and it's my final decision. I thought about it from long ago there is too much problems and too much work for one person. From now on I plan to only play games and relax :]

So as I said some time ago I looking for people which will gain access to actual game with all its features and bugs :] This week I will look for one person but as it is in life nothing for free :] I looking for person that would like to take care of script and doing changes in original story (exactly the part that happening on first island). Person that will take care of this will be added to credits as "writer" and will gain access to newest version of game. All willing to apply please send me message or do some comment bellow. But returning to this week update :] I done many changes in game and engine. Right now I do some preparation to speed up the game. This is rather side task because my main task is to allow me to do effective GUI, decals (posters, papers, leafs on ground), particle system and probably many other things. It's funny but the changes needed to do that are pretty big so I don't sleep to much and working on it. Of course like in almost ever...

This week is under sign of changes :] Last week I planned to show something this week but right now there is too much happening in game and I'm not satisfy with actual effect so sorry but this will be next week without anything interesting:] And on this short information I will end for today post :] and I have faith that very soon I will show effects of my work but right now I'm going back to writing.

Today I will not write about changes in game :] but about something still interesting. In very near future I will give access to actual version of project for maximum 8 people. What will gain select people:  - access to actual version of game (each new version will be released in 2-4 weeks),  - they will have influence on game,  - they will show in credits,  - and maybe some people will gain access to tools (I still thinks about it). How I will select this 8 people? I don't know :] People that I look for don't need to know programming, modeling and things like that. I just search people with ideas that will help make this game better, test it and show me my mistakes or maybe even help me in developing .  So till next week :]

This week I again late with post one day :] but yesterday I worked to late and on end I just go sleep. So on what I worked so hard? I changed my character animation manager. Before I had almost all information about animations wrote in code :] but this was stupid solution. My character class looked like big hack for this game. Any slightly change needed recompilation, I couldn't good control of animations and other problems like that. Right now I created system that allow me to overcome most of this problems. I have scripts which define how should animations be played in given situation. Bellow you can see example script: if (on_ground == 1) {     if (speed >= 0.1)     {         play("Run", true)     }     elif (speed >= 0.04)     {          play("Walk", true)     }     else     {         play("Stand", true)     } ...

This week wasn't better than the last :] of course I catch flu that take 3 days from life. Today I feel a lot better and I finished base navmesh implementation I begun earlier. Good news is that for some time I will focus mostly on game because engine have all basics elements that are right now needed.  So to next week :] Bellow screenshot from test map where I check navmesh.

This week was pretty hard on me and I didn't do too much in project. I still work on movies but good thing is that I finished system to the usability of old version and right now I add mostly new features (and do some fix of bugs that show in meantime). I want to believe that this week will be better than last :]

Right now I upgrade animation (movies) system in game so there is not too much to show again because most of test I do on small test maps. I think that I should have some base version of new animation in around week. Why I change it? Because it's not enough flexible, there is many limitation and problems. I want to eliminate them to make system more friendly. I think that this change will allow me to do a lot more than actual system. So till next week :]

Some screenshots from actual state of work (this time from editor) :] And this is only begin.

This week there are no bigger visible changes :] I mostly work on technical things. So sorry but there is nothing interesting to show, that's why there were no screens. Good thing is that I will probably finish them in 2-3 days and then return to gameplay again :]  and then there should be plenty things to show :]

This time very short:  In weekend disk from my server died. I had there subversion repository and thanks God day earlier it worked weird so I done copy of data. To this day I didn't finished it's configuration so it's main problem in development right now.  And how goes project ? I think that progress is great :] bad news is that I don't plan any new movies in nearest time, I will try to focus on project. Good thing is that I will probably put here some random images from development :]  So to next week.

I will begin from that I'm not sure if I'm happy or proud with this week changes. I know funny :] but it's true reason is simple I started working on content of Citadela Island and so happen to be that I found a bug and some things that were irritating because they slow down my work. So of course with optimism I fixed bug and here everything begin, bug was in tool to export meshes from blender. So all assets went to reexport on which I spent one day. Happy that I almost finished I notice that sometimes some models were weird. So again I check code and found another bug :] and of course in the same tool. Everybody know what was next, of course next reexport. Right now I almost finished it and started fixing this irritating things in my workflow. I use this opportunity to do some refactoring in code so it will take some time. On end I will share with you my thought after this week: It's funny like some ideas that looked so great at begun after some time of using are ...

Today something else than weeks update :] right now I finished looking for some stupid bug or I should say my mistake. Maybe this will help somebody so for some brief about it: I create object on empty map and then after removing it I get crash. Callstack in visual studio 2010 showed me only one call with some address and without any description. Of course in main thread :] Sounds great :] after some debugging I found that crash always happened on function glDrawArrays which is use in engine to render dynamic geometry and never on rendering objects. It was great because I could focus on this one place on dynamic geometry. And in this moment again I realize how much I need to learn and practice. I focused on dynamic geometry and searched there error for 2-3 hours but of course mistake weren't exactly there. Problem were on Vertex Attributes which were in my code enabled but never disabled. Crash never happened on rendering normal objects because they VBO ...

This week post will be short because it's late and I'm tired. And so happen to be that tomorrow like in other days I need go to work :] So here we go, first part of the post: Second part: And on end I will add only that everything what you see in this post can change in future and probably will change because right now I try to get wip (work in progress) version of island that will have good scale and feel :] And that is all in this week update as I said it was short :]

This post is little late but yesterday after return from work I fell asleep and woke next day :] This week I worked pretty hard on terrain system too at last recover Citadela Island exteriors. But of course it happened that I spend pretty much time on changing basic system of my engine code. You probably think why? Right now I have nice material system that allow me to create materials in most cases without modifying source code. But of course I didn't predict writing it that I will want to create terrain edition. I know now it's look so simple but then I forgot to create: system that allow to tell from code which texture should be use in material. good support of exchanging consts between game and materials. When I at last finished this changes there weren't enough time to finish other. So I ended on basic height edition and painting of terrain. I will tell more about implementation when I finish most of it because right now I'm not satisfy with it's imp...