Remember last week when I said one TF was done? Well the other one is now. So that means it’s on to the third TF and the big new quest in chapter 1. But that’s not all: There will be some more combat improvements after I’m done the new quest. I could probably do a release in December, but I’m setting my target for January since I want to make sure this releases as bug-free as possible. After all, the goal of this update was to clean up the bugs and leftover issues that have been in chapter 1 for a long time.
Urimas has finished most of the needed sprites but Aquillia might finally be getting her long-overdue redesign so that will require even more sprites. You know how much he likes sprites, right? He loves them.
Koops is out of town for a while, so instead Giga is handling the Aquillia redesign (she looks great!). We’ve also got some new portraits for characters who were a little neglected before, for example, you can now meet up with Mycela after her quest and talk to her about mushraunes!
Ask not where the parasitic fungus came from, ask where she got that amazing outfit from. We might also see some stuff from Wispy soon but it’s all chapter 2 so I’ll hold back on it for a while.
Witch Hunter Izana?
Don’t worry, I have not forgotten about Hard Mode. Depending on how things shake out, Hard Mode may come after the chapter 5 update (which is relatively brief, as it’s one TF and a new quest) or before. Either way, WHI’s update will also contain the new translation work (the translators reported they are about 40% done) as well as some bugfixes and possibly even some new stuff. As in, new characters, enemies, and/or quests! I won’t promise anything just yet, though. The new update will also benefit from all the changes to chapter 1 such as the new stamina meter and many code modernizations.
Fan Art!
My god do I love puppet TF. cough It’s Christine and Night turned into puppets! By Miraimiru! I love it!
And here we have some kitsunes turned into WHI-themed vampires by Toui! I have a bunch more art to go through but I’ll wait until next week because it’s really good and I don’t want to take away from the other art which is also really good.
I regret that I have but one blogpost (per week) to give for my fan’s art.
Curious IT’S NIKO AGAIN HA HA HA
It’s like a zen riddle. If there were a blog post that couldn’t be improved by Niko, would anyone read it?
One of the new TFs is DONE. All of the ability backend is DONE. All of the form backend is DONE. I am currently adding new areas and handling all the extra dialogue that comes from getting a new form. There’s also some new secret areas to find and some cool new equipment, which you’re going to need.
The art for the chapter 1 update is mostly done but we actually forgot some of the new talk sprites so those are on our “Do next” list. Urimas also forgot to make the rubber queen Mei sprites so those are on the way.
It is now down to just good old programming and writing. Productivity!
Fan Art!
Here we have a bit of Izana fan art, using her ankh symbol as an axe. Honestly it’s a great idea and I might just steal borrow it in the future. I can’t believe I didn’t think of it. Piece by PlayfulElegy!
And then we have this piece by Mugenbine depicting some OC latex drones. I have an unnatural obsession with these shoes and I prefer them over the basic hoof-shoe design. Will future latex drone characters use these? Maybe!
I am presently working my way through all the new abilities for chapter 1, along with making a few upgrades to the ability process. Modders will be happy with the new standard, it makes adding new skills to a character easier than ever.
There are over 30 abilities planned just for the chapter 1 update, though some are shared. I am also going to be adding some new meta-abilities, more on that when the chapter is ready to go. Once I’m done this, the backend is done and it’s time to start making new areas, characters, and… the 500 form handler cases of talking to a character in a new form. I suffer because I love you.
Meanwhile, Urimas is working on some tiles for chapter 2, Giga has completed the second TF sequence, Wispy promises to finish the chapter 2 talk sprites soon, and Koops is presently hanging out with a bunch of cats. I don’t know if any art will get done, maybe I can hire Niko.
With the translation code done and in testing, I have officially cleaned up the chapter 1 bugs and various engine improvements. So now it’s on to the new stuff! Wisphag transformation, new quests, balance stuff! It’s all coming in the next few weeks.
In other news, Koops has a bunch of cool pinups done and they just need some background stuff before they’re ready for release. Giga is almost done the second chapter 1 TF thing and then it’s back to talk sprites. Urimas… we don’t talk about Urimas. Even Wispy is getting in on the action and making some chapter 2 characters.
Fan Art!
Here we have a tender scene between Adina and Mei courtesy of Miss Eeries! This is double apropos because of the new stuff coming to chapter 1 which I have kept hidden on purpose, bwahaha.
The translation work for WHI is now “done”. I say “done” in quotes because I currently have Pyxxis testing it to make sure it didn’t break anything important, like a cutscene. I also probably missed some lines or something didn’t get translated, because there’s just under 10,000 strings to be translated so missing a few was a near certainty.
If everything goes well, I will be posting an update to WHI later this week, as well as instructions on how to get the translation and how to make your very own if you are so inclined. This is all community-driven, I set up the spreadsheets to provide machine-translations and allow the community to improve them. You just need to replace a few files on the hard drive.
You could also theoretically make English-to-English translations and rewrite the plot of the game, I’m not saying you should do that but you can.
As mentioned elsewhere, this will eventually migrate into a RoP translation. The basic code is exactly the same, and it actually works fairly well as it is, but it’s a lot of work on my end and it also makes my eyes bleed because I’ve been doing it for three weeks. I am actually looking forward to getting back to fixing the remaining bugs. Fixing bugs is quaint, cozy, non-threatening. I am safe there, safe from the spreadsheets.
Oh, Koops finished a bunch of enemy designs and a nice pinup, and is working on a costume for chapter 5. Urimas finished the chapter 1 sprites and is making some tilesets. Giga is working on a SECRET SEQUENCE in chapter 1 that I am really excited about.
Five Fans at Arties? Five Arts at Fannies? FANAF this sucks.
I haven’t seen the movie yet but I want to so DON’T SPOIL IT. I can only assume now it involves Christine and Night using a screwdriver to disassemble a set of evil animatronic robots. That, or Golem Christine spending a series of completely uneventful nights watching harmless robots wander around since their simple frames can’t damage her chassis.
And here we have some mermaids! I can’t say what the mermaid design is going to be because that’s Mario’s territory but I like the side-fins. These pieces were created by Mugenbine by the way.
And here we have a kisekae piece by Painted Necroz of Christine getting werewolfed! Or maybe were-dogged because those floppy ears demand a scratch.
Thanks to Justin Kinniger for commissioning these pieces!
Curious Cat is CURIOUS BACK
I think I made that exact joke last time Curious Cat went down. Maybe. Time is a flat circle.
Witch Hunter Izana’s translation code is almost in place. Combat is still untranslated, and there are a few buggy lines here and there that require investigation. I will definitely be done by next week (most likely in a few days) at which point I will be forcing the testers to play the game in a language they don’t understand to make sure nothing breaks. Bwahaha.
The code for the translations is universal and isn’t just for Japanese, any language could be used. In fact, you could make a translation to English and just change the dialogue to rewrite the story if you really wanted. Most of the translation code also applies to RoP but the UI would need to be readjusted since WHI uses its own UI in C++. RoP will get a translation baseline “at some point” but I really don’t want to debug anymore stray \n’s at this point oh it hurts.
Oh and Koops finished a chapter 5 pinup, Hund is working on some scenery, and Urimas finished the last set of sprites I need for the chapter 1 update.
Concepts! Queen Viras the Storm-Eyed!
Queen Viras the Storm-Eyed, conquerer of the northern kingdoms and, more recently, speaker for life of the Jeffespeir assembly. She believes she is the heir to the long collapsed Arulente empire, ruled by a powerful dragon, and has set about conquering the lands that belonged to that empire. She is also seeking a dragon to transform her so she can make good her claim.
She’s been making good time, too. She started her campaigns at 16 and already has the northern half of the continent under her thumb. Of course, capturing the former empire’s home province of Trafal has long been the real prize, but the heavy forests of Trannadar pose a serious problem for her cavalry-dominated forces.
Despite her prominence in the lore of RoP, we actually likely won’t meet Viras for some time. Her army is present in chapter 3 but she’s busy conquering the eastern provinces of Soswitch and then Quantir. Will she be an ally of our heroes, an enemy who will sell them out, or someone who couldn’t care less what a bunch of so-called heroes are doing?
Once again, giant thanks to BlueLily for making these awesome character and costume concepts for chapter 3. Now all I have to do is finish making chapter 2 so we can actually use them!
Bonus Concept!
There are some, shall we say, “Left over” ideas. Rubber pony suits, transformations, alternate colors schemes, that sort of thing. Maybe I’ll post some of them. Like these two unnamed nobles who got gooped. I make no promises on this being canon but this is a TF game so it’d be a shame to just leave a good idea on the table right?
Curious Cat
Continues to be broken. I may have to switch to a different service. Lovely.
That’s right, at the request of some Japanese fans I have started putting together a built-in translation handler for the Starlight engine. This is run using some text identifying routines and a bit of spreadsheeting.
The principle is simple: Extract the text, put it in a spreadsheet, and then use google translate to get a machine translation. The community can then input an improved translation, and the translation is applied at runtime using some simple (and fast) binary search algorithms.
It actually should (hopefully) not take too long to finish this, though it’s tedious work. The UI needs to have various strings turned into variables and then checked against a translation. Then I’m going to force Pyxxis to bugtest the game to make sure the translations all worked. After that, the spreadsheet will be made public so you can make a copy and translate the game to whatever language you want!
Chapter 1/2/5 will *eventually* get a translation handler as well, but as those are subject to editing and addition I won’t be making a priority of it. WHI is basically done (except for a possible future DLC) so I feel good about making a translation.
More Concept Art!
Queen Viras the Storm-Eyed has exemplary light and heavy cavalry units, who can dismount and fight on foot, but the desert peoples have always been lacking experienced light skirmisher infantry. She’s hired several mercenary companies from Yeto, and here they are.
The religions predominant in Yeto worship animal spirits, and it is believed that donning the regalia of an animal spirit lends you their power in battle. That, and some of them are probably actually werecats or werejackals and hiding it in places where partirhumans are not tolerated.
Will we run into any of these in chapter 2? I hope so but I can’t promise anything. Big thanks to BlueLily again for the lovely concept art. Next week is the final chapter 3 concept: Queen Viras herself!
Curious Cat
Is broken! Something is wrong with the API. No questions will be answered until that is fixed.
That’s right, it’s Thanksgiving. “Wait, isn’t that in November”, you ask? No, that’s Yanksgiving, celebrated by Yankees. As such I’m out of town, so production is a bit slower than usual.
Big improvements this week were for mods, allowing independent save tracking and making mods able to load their own title screen images without duplication in the engine directory. I also fixed some of the bugs in the modkit and will be finishing that up soon.
At the request of a Japanese user, I am investigating building in localization helpers to the engine. This may take a while to do, as even a small game like Witch Hunter Izana has over 300 files that need localization, but I think with a bit of automation it can be done.
I wasn’t kidding about that turkey update. Look at him, in jail where he belongs.
Concept Art
I mentioned that the city of Jeffespeir had been conquered, and House Ordinaci was wiped out. This is who did it, the armies of Queen Viras the Storm-Eyed, with her personally leading the cavalry divisions. Viras sees herself as the heir to the long-dead Arulente empire, and is searching for a dragon to transform her and make good her birthright.
These guys are the only military force in the city, posted up on the streetcorners to maintain order. Despite their major presence they don’t factor too much into the plot of chapter 3, they’re just here to make sure the city pays its tribute. As long as that happens, they don’t care what Jeanne and her friends do.
Next week we get to see the Yeto mercenaries fighting alongside this army. Their designs are so cool.
Fan Art
DB Palette made another set for Witch Hunter Izana, this time it’s kitsunes and I’m losing my mind at those fits. Cyrano looks like she was born to be a fox but Izana having extra bells on her hair is the real cute strength, to say nothing of the innovative mask idea.
Curious Cat
I’m starting to think that real cats aren’t even this curious.
We had our monthly team meeting today, and things are going shockingly well. I need 2 or 3 more sprite sheets and I will have all the art I need for chapter 1’s update. As such we discussed plans for the chapter 5 update. I was thinking we’d finish 55’s Sundress costume and possibly give SX-399 a costume since she needs some love, on top of getting the new TF for Christine of course.
I have fixed most of the remaining chapter 1 bugs and also added some new stuff (it’s now possible to “complete” the rubber questline by getting a sample for Polaris) and am going to now update the modkit. I’m adding some useful backend stuff like tracking which mods are active in savefiles to prevent loading conflicts, and if I’m really feeling gutsy, I might even do mod load priorities.
More Chapter 3 Concepting!
As a continuation of the chapter 3 concepts I asked BlueLily to make, here we have the current head of House Red, Canella de Cuorelli. Driven, ruthless, and a massive bully, Canella got where she is by always being willing to stoop lower and be more brutal than everyone else. Her House supports her because she kills people who are a problem, and humiliates anyone who might be a problem.
But what’s with the rubber fox suit? Okay there’s a lot of possibilities for how chapter 3 unfolds but BlueLily really likes the quest ideas where the party turns people into various monsters in order to get rid of them and who doesn’t love rubber fox outfits?
And here’s the not-rubbered Angeline de Insiati, current head of House Yellow. The youngest official head in the House’s centuries-long history, Angeline is part of a new wave of inventor politicians. In fact, she bit off more than she can chew, and hates having to sit in parliament because it keeps her out of the workshop!
Do not underestimate her. She may be young, but she sees the world clearly and will protect her House and its members from the machinations of the other Houses. If that means lobbing metaphorical bombs instead of literal ones, so be it.
Yes, she is allows to keep the arcanomechanical limbs in parliament. No the cannon is not allowed to be loaded.
Next week, we get to see the invaders who recently conquered the city. Look forward to it!
Fan Art
This week, db-palette made some fan transformations for Witch Hunter Izana! You can find the originals on his Deviantart.
First up we have the Shadow form. I love a good goopy TF.
And here we have a silver TF! Caelyn happily grips the blade of the sword since her hands are metal, right? If you liked these, go check out db-palette’s other work. I know I have, who would have thought an artist I’ve followed for years would play my silly old game.
Curious Cat
There were so many questions this week that I didn’t even answer some and am going to do them in next week’s post. Hope you like pop culture stuff.
I did a lot of useful, good, very important stuff in the backend. In addition to cleaning up bugs, I made it possible to embed effects in the ability script and to auto-generate prediction prototypes based on the act data. You can still override predictions if you want, such as for tutorial abilities.
All of that is nonsense to most players but it’s really useful stuff to modders, and to me (I make the game, hello) because it will cut down on those errors where the prediction shows a different value than the actual because I tweaked the balance later on.
I will be fixing up the remaining bugs in chapter 1 and getting all the engine upgrades and requests for mod features this week. Hopefully I can start on the new stuff for chapter 1 then.
Meanwhile, Giga was sick for a bit but is BACK and is working on the TF sequence for Wisphags. We got a new format this time I think you’ll all like. Urimas is making sprites and Koops has delivered the enemy concepts we’ll be using in chapter 1 and chapter 2.
Concept Art! Again!
Remember last week when you got to see concepts for two noble houses? Well this week you get to see concepts for two noble houses, but not the same ones. Contain your shock.
Here we have the members of House Insiati. Until very recently the families making up the great House were associations of guilds, rather than strict families, but the invention of a neurological-mechanical interface and steam power caused a rapid change. Over the last 40 years, Insiati went from the richest house to the most productive house, made up of industrialists, factory owners, inventors, and scientists. Getting your hands dirty is a badge of honor, and many promising students have their educations covered if they are prepared to apply to join the great House.
Once thought to be the clear frontrunner among the great Houses, the recent war and conquest of the city has brought their rise into question.
And lastly we have House Artezzi, owners of the city’s merchant and combat navy. In addition to their estates within the city, they have control over the assorted islands in the harbour area, own all the major shipyards, and are in a fraught alliance with House Insiati in hopes of getting at their steamship technology.
Being the House of the sea means they were the least affected when the city was conquered, and may well be able to survive entirely off their overseas possessions. Their House does have a serious problem, though. The elder members are clinging to power despite being well past retirement, and the youth want to change the ways of the House. The impasse has brought a flagging of their fortunes recently, with many younger members leaving in frustration, while others plot to have the elders “taken care of”.
Big thanks to BlueLily for doing these. Next week we’ll start seeing some of the named characters of the houses and possibly getting hints at their storylines.
Fine, Poll Time
GOT YOU, IT WAS A SURPRISE DMITRI.
One of the things I wanted to avoid in RoP was the reliance on bad ends because I think getting to keep playing as a new form is cool and fun. A lot of games have bad ends because that, too, is fun, and people really enjoyed the “Latex Drone Christine” thing from chapter 5. I think I will add some of those non-canon bad ends to the game, as dream sequences or future vision. I do want to keep the keep-playing format of the game as much as possible, but clearly the audience wants some bad end stuff. Not a lot, but 36% is a sizeable minority.
Every now and then you lunatics really surprise me. The dragon bad end ties with the werewolf ending? The dragon bad end! That was one of the ones I put the least effort into, having done a rewrite right before it was implemented. Alraune got the hate it deserves, but dragon…
Anyway, the reclaimed ending also got a surprisingly strong following. I don’t know exactly what to make of these results because there’s no clear pattern (HOW DID SKELETON SCORE SO LOW ARRGGH) which is not what I expected at all.
I was worried the bonus bosses were too tough but it seems the playerbase rose to the challenge. Next time they will be bullshit.
So while the price point was about correct, some people thought it was a teeny bit too expensive. This is actually expected because gamers tend to underestimate what the cost of something ought to be. 15 bucks is a real bargain, in my opinion, but it is what it is.
Another very interesting result, not least of which because 5 players were in those time chambers from Dragon Ball Z that exist as a narrative device to power up a character in a “satisfying” way despite all the power levels being made up anyway because it’s a work of fiction.
While nobody blasted the game down in 5 hours, a decent chunk did it in 10. Our testers estimated 15 was the expected play time, so you’re ahead of the curve. Stop being so good at games. I was expecting a bigger block to be sitting at 15 and very few at >20 but there’s a big block at the 20 hour mark. It’s a bimodal distribution!
Unfortunately, the Steam statistics do show me an average playtime but they don’t specify if the player beat the game or not, so I can’t really use that and the value would skew low.
Our musician did a great job and everyone thinks he shouldn’t be fired and fed to the camel spiders.
I wanted to do crafting in WHI both as a way to make the game less-linear (you choose who gets what upgrade when) while increasing the focus on combat, and apparently I achieved that goal. Fixed placements can add a lot when a chest has a good item in it, but a lot of them are chaff or consumables. WHI instead makes every chest slightly important, where you almost always get something useful but rarely get anything profound (except the Omega equipment).
The fact that a lot of people like it means it’s a strong candidate to appear in a future game.
If I do make another project in he future, a smaller number of more consequential TFs is the easy winner. I love battle TF games but there’s not much of a way to increase the consequence of each transformation and still maintain the 20 TFs that WHI has. Also Chic would probably kill me if I did that again.
People loved the art, what can I say. Look I’ll try to convince her to work for Bottled Starlight but she’s very fiercely independent.
Pretty stroke here for putting in-battle voices to RoP. I’ve already asked the VAs for some auditions. If you’re the kind of maniac who wants to voice a video game, here’s the audition document for chapter 1.
FUCK YEAH! OR to put it another way, yeah people want to see more of these characters. The DLC will happen if/when the game sells 10,000 copies so that will be some time. Chic is open to doing a sequel but obviously not right now, and I gotta focus on RoP for a while. Will the sequel focus on Izana? Caelyn? Cyrano? Or will it be a prequel?
Yeah it’ll be a prequel and it’ll be about Heron, the dog, and his adventures. Triple platinum best seller, baby.
Pandemonium Development 