After three expo showings in three months (SIX in September, Captivate in October, iFEST in November) and after adding a ton of new features and polish, the demo has become quite a feature-packed action hour of fun! Please give it a try, and let me know what you think on Facebook or on Twitter!
Would you like to know what I get up to on a sample day? Specifically, a day leading up to the demo's full public release? Well, you're in luck! Here's a list of what I got done on Monday, Nov. 25th.
TITLE SCREEN
Remove "Work In Progress" bar
Change "Design Demo" to "The Demo Version!"
Add Web link
Add twitter link
Add blogger link
Add Facebook link
Add Steam link
THANKS FOR PLAYING
Add Steam link
Adjust position of "quit for real button"
Change release date
EDIT PROFILE
Remove Bar crown
Fix button positions to be proportional to screen
INTRO
Test deeper shadows, less ambient light (ambient from 51 to 25, angle prev. at rot. 50, 147, -3 now sharper)
Fix broken textures of castle
GAME
Destroy stars and checkmate ribbon so they don't block "you unlocked" screen
Create high spaces for Granary
Debug Commands only enabled if UIO is pressed together
Add debug mode to show cursor position
BUGS
Pawn King disappears after Checkmate [can't repro in debug environment?] [posted on forums]
Identify odd "speck" in lower left quadrant, visible in Harbor 1 [menu camera was not excluding board spaces]
allowPlayerKingToMoveIntoCheck not checked when entering state Turn Start
Sliding pieces not checking number of pieces between themselves and target when tested by CanCapturePieceIfOtherPieceMovesToXY
Enrage tutorial: bishop is not re-selected
After a piece has been enraged and moved, it can't be deselected if selected later in the game
Upgrade tutorial: could not select pawn
TEXT
Update intros for Act 2 and Act 3
Update summaries for all three acts
Update "About" text for Abilities and Magic
Upgrade tutorial: eliminate "captures create energy"
Update text for all four tutorials
Enrage tutorial: change "granary" to act 3
SOUND
Find or create Star sound
Find or create Checkmate sound
Find victory music
Find defeat music
Add Star sound
Add Checkmate sound
Add victory music
Add defeat music
Add Execute music intro (same as tutorial)
Reduce volume of spell casting
Add sound effects to Granary Menu
Add sound effect to "To Battle"
Add sound effect to vignette fade before battle
"Games are a series of interesting decisions." -- Sid Meier
New Features And Additions
It was a short week and I had a hurt shoulder, but I still managed to cram a bunch of stuff into the game!
An "Execute" move that lets you handily take care of a single, straggling enemy piece wandering about the board. It's cinematic and satisfying.
AI that does a full analysis of each move, including whether it's a mistake (unforced error) or a trap.
AI that has difficulty levels, which are limits on the number of mistakes and traps it can attempt over the course of the scenario.
"Sick" enemy pieces that have a nifty graphical treatment and a special AI override that makes them push for your home row. If any reach that spot, the game is over!
Full design support for high spaces. These are board spaces that pop up a bit, slowing down sliding pieces and subtly altering the landscape.
A new chess logic engine that is faster, deeper, and more robust. This was a badly needed update, as it was becoming rather difficult to debug AI problems.
Ruminations on Target Audiences
Chess Heroes may have Peter Pan syndrome. Not the desire to be eternally young, but the problem author J.M. Barrie faced when trying to turn his play into a success. After moribund results from adult audiences, he ensured kids from a local orphanage were scattered throughout the theatre. Their raucous peals of laughter loosened the atmosphere, and soon the adults joined in as well. Had J.M. Barrie not introduced kids into the equation, adults might have written it off as ... to quote the Disney movie ... poppycock.
I bring up Peter Pan because the most enthusiastic, ecstatic players of Chess Heroes are children. The aesthetic is soft and approachable, the controls are intuitive and easy, the pace is self-regulated, and the visceral feedback of the pieces knocking into each other has them jumping up and down in their chairs. Adults -- and we had several fans with beards -- tend to be more reserved in their judgement. This is something to keep in mind should it be presented to, say, chess teachers, or parents: they may underscore the value of what we have here, because they have lost touch with the simple delights of childhood.
Goals of the Demo
I'm sure folks are wondering why the demo isn't ready yet. The reason is: I want it to be packed full of so much new material that people can't justify NOT trying the full version. And the features that I'm adding are -- exclusively -- features that would be added for Act 1. In a sense, I'm pushing back the date for the demo, but not the final product. The goal is still Act 1 in December.
Kindle Fire?
I can't shake the feeling that missing out on "the tablet Christmas of 2013" would be a huge mistake. Can I possibly whip up a smaller version of the first Act into shape so that it's available on a tablet (say, the Kindle Fire) by then? We'll see!
A wee bit blurry. Sort of how we felt after eight hours of talkin'!
This weekend, Corey and I brought Chess Heroes to iFEST, an independent game expo at its annual stop in Seattle. We hit the road out of Eugene at 5 AM, cruised into Seattle (blasting Paul's Boutique) at about 9:15, and drove to the address specified by the Seattle Center.
When we arrived, the navigator voice stated our destination was on the left. We looked to the left. It was a demolished building. Uh oh!
After a laugh and few choice words for modern computational touchtronic navigational assistance, we figured it all out and were set up not thirty minutes later.
The folks running the show were great (thanks for the help, Terry!), and Chess Heroes won a bunch of new fans. There was one hair-pulling incident, involving a special chess piece that would disappear and break the game. And it only happened on the Windows version! Ah well. Something to ponder before the demo goes live!
Corey noted that the people who "got it" the most were kids and other game designers who were at the show. For kids, the accessible nature of the game was a big plus, and the animations really made an impact (especially the Rook shooting the Pawn!).
The Rook's special move never failed to make a smile!
And then there were kids who really got into it, pushing their pieces around like tiny Caesars and jumping up in down in their chair as they captured pieces.
This young man raised his arms in victory and shouted "FOR NARNIA!" We did not correct him. =)
Meanwhile, game designers talked about their love of strategy games and the appeal of trying to inject something fresh into the game. Our line was "We're taking chess in a new direction, and we're trying to see if it leads to a cliff or a verdant forest." Or, as an A/B test, "We're taking chess in a new direction, and seeing how far we can go before we get pitchforked." Proper chess folks did not set our table on fire, thank goodness, so I think we escaped that sad fate.
Finally, there were the normal gamers who just got hooked and would not stop playing, even retrying certain scenarios over and over until they won.
It took him ten tries to beat this scenario. Far from being frustrated, he voted us best in show!
At the end of the day, my beliefs about the game were reinforced.
Kids and game designers will be our biggest fans.
It's easy to dismiss the game until you play it (and then you can't stop).
Therefore, I have a serious marketing problem on my hands!
I also heard (from the fine folks at Zachtronics) that the name of the game might be a liability. It's chess, but not chess. There are no "heroes" with capes and swords. Sort of like how their game Spacechem was neither about a) Space or b) Chemistry, and that was not a good name for the (excellent, well-designed) game! Something to think about, surely.
Also from the Zachtronics camp was a suggestion to make a sequel in space. Little did she know... that was the plan! =) [but first, ship version one!]
Before I wrap up, I want to give a quick shout out to the lovely indie devs of Seattle I'm slowly getting to know, as I somehow end up there every other month or so:
At this time tomorrow, Corey (the musician) and I will be driving back from iFEST in Seattle. That's three public showings in three months, and it's pretty amazing to be in the middle of it all.
I've also been extremely active in the local business community, working with local game developers and entrepreneurs. I'm sowing seeds, basically, and what will pop up? I don't know, but I believe it will be good!
These expos and outreach programs carry a heavy cost. Since we're in November and Act 1 isn't ready yet, you can tell just how much of a hit my schedule has taken. However, the upside is more time on foundations, and making the game as widely appealing as possible.
So when's the game coming out?
November is now the month the demo will be released. After that will come an IndieGogo campaign for pre-orders, then a full release of Act 1 in December or January.
Oh yeah. I ran the game on an iPhone this week. Want to see what it looks like?
Pretty much the same, minus the shadows!
The game looks and plays brilliantly, even on the tiny screen. Along with a very, very consistent request people have made ("I want to play this on a tablet!"), these results have cemented my decision to not only support Windows, OS X, and Linux, but iOS and Android as well. While it will ALSO have an impact on my schedule, I can't afford to "leave money on the table," as it were!
Big thanks to Unity for making that possible. =)
What's new this week?
Along with the iOS build, I added full support for Check and Checkmate (which was waaaay deeper than I thought it would be). This satisfies a consistent request from chess teachers. I included a toggle as well, so I'm not tied down as a designer.
I also added "victory stars" for your performance in each scenario. This is another feature people have asked for, and -- silly as it sounds -- it really brings home the idea that it's becoming more of a "real" game.
New website! New website. Soooo much better than the old website. Check it out!
Finally, I realize I haven't been doing a good job keeping this blog up to date. I now have a Friday newsletter I e-mail "shareholders" (aka indie game dev support group), and that will help me keep this site fresh as well.
The 2013 Captivate Conference took place in Austin from October 4 to October 6, and Chess Heroes was one of ten finalists for their indie game competition. Since I also have a lot of family in that area, I flew down from Oregon for a taste of that Texas heat (which I adore) before digging in for a northwest winter chock full of game development.
Dylan, my brother-in-law, is a film producer. He kindly stepped up with the expo assist, which was awesome.
Everything worked out in the end, and it was a good trip, but it was a pretty rocky start!
During a flight stop in Oakland, I discovered that the Steam Greenlight page I had set up was "live," not "waiting to go live." It had no screenshots and a bare minimum of descriptive text. Whoops! (and make no mistake, there were several other assorted expletives) Why was this a big deal? Well…
When you launch a game on Greenlight, it gets immediate exposure on Steam, and then the results determine how long it continues to get that exposure (measured in hits). The page needs to sell the idea to its maximum potential in order to build up enough… uh… steam to get to the top. And I had no screenshots and a video that started out with story instead of action (a common mistake I should have avoided). Only 33% of visitors were voting "yes," while the page helpfully informed me that games in the top 50 averaged 50% or more. And the early comments were 100% pure troll, e.g. "lol nope." I was not a happy camper!
The flight was boarding as I rapidly took screenshots from the latest build, uploaded them to the page, and apologized for a sloppy start. Then I spent the next couple of hours in the air, unaware of what was happening on the internet and unable to make changes. When I touched down, I was distracted and irritable: I couldn't alter the video (because my PC was in Oregon), my jump start on Greenlight was a dead fall, and the next day would be filled with family time, preventing me from sitting down and trying to hammer out a solution.
To be fair, the scenery was wonderful.
The conference started with a keynote by Warren Spector. It was odd to hear him say "I don't know anyone who is doing the art, the design, the programming, and sound effects by themselves these days, not since Richard Garriott" while Chess Heroes -- a direct counter to his statement -- was on display only 100 feet away. Ah well!
Thus began three days of standing on my feet and talking to people non-stop. Sure, it was tiring, but there is no better antidote to online trolls than seeing people sit down in front of the game -- sometimes skeptically -- and then stand up minutes later with a glowing smile and exuberant words. Another benefit is being forced to work the pitch over and over again until it was polished and smooth.
"Chess Heroes is a modern take on chess that draws a lot of inspiration from video games," became my opening line. If people said, "I don't know how to play chess," I'd respond: "Great! This is the game for you!" And if they said, "Ooh, I love chess," I'd reply… wait for it… "Great! This is the game for you!" Of course, the pitch would diverge after that point, but you get the idea: I was looking for feedback, and it was almost universally positive.
Chess with Friends. I wonder if Zynga is already doing that?
By the second day, I realized that recording some of their reactions would be a good idea. Here's what they had to say, straight from the show floor!
After the first conference day, I fixed the few bugs I found, caught up on business e-mails, and checked the Greenlight page. Lo and behold, it was 15% of the way to the top 100, in only a few days, after a disastrous start. It was way behind the pace of other popular games, but then again, Greenlight is over-populated with traditional video game material: shooters, platformers, strategy games, and the like, Given enough production value, they are probably (I'm guessing) guaranteed a decent "yes" rate. Chess Heroes is not only visually divergent (in a lo-fi relaxing way), but sits in a crowd of "traditional games with a twist" titles that are easy to dismiss.
It's been almost a week since the Greenlight page launched -- with no advertising and only a handful of links on community forums -- and it's sitting at 21% of the way to the top 100. I'd prefer to skate to success, of course, but I'm prepped for a marathon, and I know that when people play the game, they like it. Validation and marketing plan, all in one!
I've uploaded a shorter video to the Greenlight page, and I have a task list nearly three pages long. There's plenty to do until I show the game at iFest in Seattle on November 9. If you're in the area, you should come by: it's a free show!
This is it! Chess Heroes has taken its first steps into the wild!
I compiled a list of 60 people whose opinion I trust and respect, and sent them links to the game today. This is a big step for me. It's sort of like the first time you leave your child at someone's house. If they get back in one piece and everybody's smiling when it's over, I'll call that a success. Until then, I'll be in a corner, gnawing on a frozen towel for comfort.
And reading this tweet, over and over:
@Oreganik Wow, Chess Heroes is so similar to a dream game of mine that exists only on notebook paper. Looking awesome!
— Christer Kaitila (@McFunkypants) September 17, 2013
Christer "McFunkypants" Kaitila is a bad-ass indie developer who consistently crushes it with game jam entries, and hosts a few of his own, including #onegameamonth. (Which I totally signed up for then immediately bailed on, due to hurricane levels of WTF in my life) His support means a lot to me, and he sent back some excellent feedback that -- no joke -- deeply altered some of the core level design concepts of Chess Heroes.
I also got help this week from Jon and Jon (Jon Rush of Battlecry Studios and Jon Heiner of Realta Entertainment), who helped me solve a texture problem that was bugging me.
All I can say is, developing a game by yourself just means you get the biggest credit on the box. There's no way I'd ever be able to do this alone.
The past week has seen the game transformed from a mostly-stable, silent, hands-on demo to a rock-solid downloadable demo that's alive with sound!
I wanted to be able to send the game to interested bloggers (like the fine folks at Geekenstein) without a full page of stuff "that should be there." I also entered the indie game competition at the Captivate Conference. The game must represent itself well, without me holding its hand, and I think I'm getting pretty close.
After a thorough round of testing, I'll be posting it live to the internet.
Hoo boy.
Major additions this week (September 8 to September 14)
Music Manager to handle transitions, fades, etc.
Audio Manager to handle sound effect calls
Integrated 18 sound effects. A mix of custom recording, remixes of base sounds, and direct downloads from freesound.org. (note: all sounds will be original on game's release)
"Quit Chess Heroes" menu now available on all screens (before that was created, you had to kill the process to exit. heh heh)
Revised cinematic for Upgrade spell to show Pawn transforming
New cinematic treatment for boss abilities Wither and Riptide
Revised logo graphic and added "Pre Alpha Demo" to title screen
Keyboard input to acknowledge instructions, open menus, etc.
Bug Fixes of Note
Fixed "Unlock All"
New users no longer get the "Continue" option
Title screen buttons now sit at screen percentage, instead of fixed height
Various interface issues cleaned up
No longer possible to "soft lock" the game using Enrage on a piece with no valid moves
Indicator arrows match camera rotation
Camera rotation does not snap back to default after each move
What is Chess Heroes about?
You are a chess King who's pieces have mysteriously disappeared, just as your kingdom is invaded! You must take back your pieces and rebuild your army, then travel abroad to learn new skills and ancient spells that will help you overcome a sinister foe.
What is a Tactical Puzzle game?
You fight the enemy in a variety of scenarios that are short and fun. The board can be any size, and there are no rules on the number of pieces on the board. This means you'll encounter a new challenge each time you play! The tactical puzzles are designed to reward skill and experience, while new players will get a sense of accomplishment as they "unlock" the secret of the puzzle after a handful of tries.
How is it like chess?
Each chess piece moves like it should, so players with only a passing experience of the game will be right at home. And the King earns new pieces one at a time, giving totally new players a chance to learn how to play, by playing!
How is it different than chess?
In Act 2 and Act 3, players will earn Special Abilities and Battle Magic, which put incredible power in players' hands. They'll need it as they face down bigger and bigger groups of enemies, and to beat the unique bosses at each location!
What are Special Abilities?
Special Abilities alter the player's view of the battlefield by turning Pawns into a resource. For example, the King can sacrifice a nearby Pawn to move as a Queen for one turn, while the Rook can launch a Pawn across the board to capture an enemy piece, destroying the Pawn in the process! Each piece has their own Special Ability, and as the campaign to take back the kingdom goes on, Pawns will become more and more valuable!
What is Battle Magic?
Every time a piece is captured, magical energy is released onto the battlefield. The player can use this energy to accomplish wondrous feats, like moving a piece twice, upgrading a Pawn, freezing an enemy piece, and more!
How long will it take to play?
The demo features twelve scenarios across three locations, and it takes most people about 40 minutes to an hour. The final game will have eighteen locations across three acts, as well bonus challenge levels! I'm also considering a scenario editor, cosmetic unlocks, achievements, and other stuff that's fun to play around with.
PRODUCTION
When is Chess Heroes coming out, and what platforms are supported?
Chess Heroes will be released in three acts on PC, Mac, and Linux platforms, starting in the Fall of 2013. (I'm aiming for early November) Those who buy earlier acts will get the later acts for free, which is a bargain, since the price will go up each time! It will start at $6, go to $8, then stop at $10.
Is Chess Heroes coming to mobile?
A lot of people expressed interest in playing the game on a tablet, and I really want to make that happen! On the sunny side, I'm using Unity, and the game will be a snap to port. On the cloudy side, releasing a new title with little to no publisher support on a mobile platform is … dicey. At best. So, hopefully, by starting on PC platforms I can build an audience and some awareness of the project, and work towards an eventual mobile release. It's a business decision at the end of the day.
Will Chess Heroes be released on a console?
I have a background in console development, and I would absolutely love to put this on a console. Once again, Unity and a simple interface save the day, and once again it comes down to a business decision. I wish I could just smash a bottle on the wall, wail away on a guitar in a thunderstorm, and raise a middle finger to mature fiduciary practices, but a mortgage and kids really change the calculus on things, amirite? But seriously, it can happen, and hopefully will.
How many people are working on the game?
If you count the musician, then two. I mean, I count the musician. Like a one, a two, a one two three? Er. Sorry.
What?
It's just me, Ted Brown, working on the game. Corey Jackson is creating the music.
Chess Heroes had its first public showing at SIX, the Seattle Independent Expo, on September 2. And the reception was incredible! It was almost unbelievable how positive people were when they saw and played the game. Nobody walked up, played it, and tried to sneak away, for example. Nobody gave half-hearted praise as they scooted away from the table. It was all good! In many cases, it was extremely enthusiastic! To say that this was a "tremendous boost" really doesn't do it justice, but I'm technically on vacation right now and capturing emotions with highly specific poetical nuance is not high on the list. =)
I want to give huge thanks to everyone who skipped a bit of the Penny Arcade Expo to see us at SIX, and to everyone who spent some time with Chess Heroes. Another huge round of applause goes to my wife, without whom it could not have gone as smoothly!
That's us. Now you know what we look like! (but when you read this, I hope I still sound like Morgan Freeman in your head, instead of one of those singing chipmunks)
According to my wife, this was a typical crowd watching Chess Heroes on the big screen we had in the corner. Other times, the station looked like this:
People sat down to try the game, and often played through several levels. Other people liked to sit back and watch the animation, comment on tactics, and sometimes heckle friends who made silly errors that let their King be toppled!
Without a doubt, this was a worthwhile trip. I know I'm supposed to be on vacation after working every day for a month, but I'm so stoked right now that I can't stop thinking about it! (which is why I'm sort of straddling the line with e-mails and blog posts, heh)
I'll post a FAQ later today, but to answer a common question: Chess Heroes will be out, in some form or another, by November of this year. It will be released in three waves, once for each act, and those who buy it early (and cheap!) will get the later releases for free.
Thanks again! And like us on Facebook if you want a chance at winning $20 on Steam on September 5th!
Wow! What a great week. I started knowing what I had to accomplish (adding character to the chess pieces via animation), but had no idea if (a) it would work and (b) how to actually do it. And then when I got (a) and (b) done, I had to worry about (c) getting it into the game!
I'm happy to report that the results are in, and measured by the "it feels good" meter, animating the chess pieces and tying that to a rigid body collision system really hits the mark.
The Pawn, for example, hops around from space to space, with a little squish and squash action on his base as he does so. And of course, he headbutts pieces he's trying to capture. Spunky little guy, isn't he? The rest of the pieces each have their own "personality" and set of animations. I can't wait to show you!
Collaboration!
Two other great things happened this week: my good friend Corey gave me a CD of musical "sketches" of him trying to hone the dual themes of the game: the bright, clear sounds of the Light side, and the heavy, warm sounds of the Dark side. It sounds great so far. He is a gifted musician, and I'm incredibly honored he will be taking the time to help me out on this.
I also sat down with my friend Jim, a senior designer at Zynga, for the first ever playthrough! Jim gave me clear-headed, well-articulated design critiques and suggestions that are extremely valuable. But the key emotional takeaways for me were the words "I'm impressed" and "It feels good to capture pieces." Rock on! Especially since I'd only finished integrating the animation system that morning. :D
Identification!
Jim also helped me figure out exactly what Chess Heroes is, in terms of genre classification. I was straddling the line between Tactics and Strategy, but it didn't really fit the definitions, and I wasn't comfortable with the "high concept" summary. But he helped me realize that, based on the scenarios I've designed, it's a "tactical puzzle" game. I've crafted each scenario with specific intentions in mind, and hopefully this will clear up any confusion from future players.
That's not to say I can't shift gears later, and offer a more strategic take in later builds or acts, such as a meta-design similar to the classic Heroes of Might and Magic. Time (and feedback!) will tell!
Market Penetration!
Ew! Really? Ok. Um.
I had to rejigger the website for Oreganik (it was pretty... boring) and make one for Chess Heroes. There's also a Facebook page, so please Like it if you'd like to get the updates and occasional funny game-related news snippets.
Preparation!
I'm actually writing this on Saturday, as I've shifted to a 7-day workweek schedule until the Seattle Indies Expo (SIX) is over. I was stoked to discover it will be next door to PAX, so if you're there on Sunday, please drop by and say hello!
Here's the hit list for the week. I'm considering posting the remaining list online. If I get a SINGLE E-MAIL saying that would be good idea, I'll do it. :)
On Sunday, September 1st, Chess Heroes will make its first public appearance at SIX3, the Seattle Indie Expo. This was not part of "the plan" until it was announced, but I feel like I can have the build in presentable shape by then.
So! Thus begins the Road to SIX. And, honestly, the journey started last Monday, so we're halfway to TWO or something. I have a laundry list of stuff to do, and here's a list of what was accomplished last week.
ART
Value study of the Castle (this is where I use shades of gray to "sketch out" what will eventually be color values on the model. It helps makes things cohesive when actual color gets involved)
Windmill Model and value study
New chess piece model: Pawn King
New chess piece model: Harbor King
New chess piece model: Scarecrow
Hi-rez King
Hi-rez Pawn
Hi-rez Bishop
Hi-rez version of Oreganik Logo
ANIMATION
Created an in-game cinematic system for camera and actor control
Scripted the intro sequence.
DESIGN
Added "boss battles"
Integrated the Pawn King, Harbor King, and Scarecrow
Added Boss Ability functionality (sort of like a unique spell)
Created a boss ability called "Riptide" (it pulls pieces towards the boss, and they can be swept off the board)
Created a boss ability called "Wither" (shrinks pieces on the XZ axes and limits their movement to one space)
Finished the demo scenarios for Castle
Finished the demo scenarios for Harbor
Finished the demo scenarios for Granary
Switched demo flow a bit, changed the order you get certain spells and abilities
TECH
Discovered and fixed a handful of bugs
This week I'll focus on re-modeling and texturing all of the chess pieces, then animating them in game, to give them a bit of "life." (the example I give is Pixar's wonderful short "Luxo Jr.") I also need to set up business stuff so I can accept money for the game! Very important.
On an unrelated note, even though the game code framework is holding together, and I can add new features (like boss battles) fairly seamlessly, I am fighting a huge desire to go back and re-engineer the game "properly" now that I understand exactly what it is I'm making! I understand this is common...
I apologize for not posting steady updates, but things have been fairly busy at Chez Oreganik. (and it's pronounced "or-eh-gan-ik," as it's a portmanteaufromhell of Oregon and Organic with a special K at the end for technical clout)
I spent most of the day yesterday fine-tuning an algorithm to properly simulate the sea foam that's generated when ocean water pushes back and forth against pier posts. And, yes, it makes me giggle uproariously that I got to spend an entire day exploring an artistic expression of nature's mathematics. =)
If you remember the last post, things were very basic looking. It's getting better, I think. What you can't see is the motion of the ocean, which is on an exponential sine wave. It flows out, flows in, then settles for a moment before starting again. It feels like I remember the sea to be.
As for what's missing, shadows are definitely on the list, and that's going to be "free" once I get Unity pro. The look of the water is "eh." The colors are not be final, either, but then again, the board really "pops," so I'm still thinking about how to best represent the board squares (maybe as chalk outlines on the pier?) What's important is that all of the textures are hand-painted as tonal values, and I can go back and adjust in Photoshop as time permits.
The Harbor Stage of Chess Heroes (work in progress)
There are going to be three stages in the demo: a Castle, Harbor, and Granary. Today I restarted the Castle, as the old model wasn't really up to snuff. Here's today's progress:
The Castle Stage of Chess Heroes (3D Model, work in Progress)
The outer walls are very plain, but won't be seen in the game. However, most of the interior will be visible during the intro, so I spent time on the buildings to give them a bit of Mediterranean flair in the geometry. (you can't see too much of that at this angle however) The central tower is based off of the King piece, and will be featured in the intro and opening scenarios.
After I add props and get the tonal values locked down, I'll mock up the intro sequence to make sure everything looks good before investing time in textures. And after THAT comes a Windmill model for the Granary, and after THAT, well... I'll be done creating scenery for the demo!
Today, the Chess Heroes demo reached a milestone: functionally complete! "All" that remains is the art pass, scenario fun pass, then playtesting and final bug fixes.
Some folks say "ship a broken product and fix it live." I disagree with that proposition. =)
Because the blog has been quiet (I'm working on the 7dRTS compo at night, among other things), I'll let slip a screenshot of the art in-situ. This is not final, in other words, but it gives you an idea of the style I'm going for: simple, hand-painted textures and soft colors.
The past two days have been a bit slow. I've had to spend time working on the business plan for Oreganik LLC, and I've been going back and filling in any cracks I can find in the demo. This includes updating the look and functionality of the survey questions and inserting them into the flow of the game, and revamping the magic spell UI to be all purty and such.
One thing I learned at Neversoft was to make sure the build could be run, start to finish, each Friday. This provided a clean slate for the next week, and usually prevented any gnarly hacks from putting down roots. Now that Chess Heroes is chock-full of stuff, I'm going to incorporate that into the schedule.
It's extremely excited to be this close to Feature Complete. I thought I'd be here weeks ago, but being part of a family and several communities takes all sorts of odd bites out of the day. It's totally worth it, of course, yet I find myself longing for a cabin on an island where I could... er... sit inside and work all day.
Having hammered the menu aesthetic into a cohesive form, it was time to fall upon the actual gameplay interface, and knock that into place. Ideally, games don't need to hold your hand through every simple action: you want it to feel like you're pulling on clothes that fit exactly as they should, without a tailor fussing about, or an instruction manual to refer to.
But when I sat people down with an early prototype of Chess Heroes, and they asked "which one am I," when there was a single white King, on the left, facing off against three black Pawns, I realized that there would have to be more handholding that I originally thought.
I'll admit, I spun my wheels for a bit, desperate for a way to indicate to the player what was going on, without using ugly in-game menus or text. Finally, I decided to pull up some videos of an old-school tactics game: Heroes of Might and Magic II. When I saw the cursor icons, I realized: that was the core solution!
I'd shied away from custom cursors in Unity before, because they rendered at game speed instead of hardware speed (imagine a target reticle following your mouse, and only catching up when you slowed it down). But in Unity 4, they introduced hardware-speed custom cursors!
Happily, I went to game-icons.net, found some likely candidates, and went to work. Here are the results so far:
This changes the cursor into a "verb," so to speak: select, move, kill, etc. The next questions players have are: what is the subject ("who is doing this verb?") and what is the object?
Without the ability to dynamically draw an outline around mesh objects (I believe that's only in Unity Pro), I fell back on an old "cel-shading" trick: increasing the scale of a mesh and reversing the normals.*
It's not perfect, but for now, it's Good Enough. You move the mouse around, and the cursor changes to a Pointing Finger when it goes over a chess piece. You click, the piece glows gold, and the finger now has an X on it. You click, it's deselected, and the finger goes back to normal. Ah! Select and deselect.
You select the piece again, then move the cursor around the screen. You highlight a space, and see a boot: walk here. You highlight an enemy piece, it glows red, and the cursor becomes a sword: capture this. It all makes sense! That's a happy place to be right now.
* Everything in a game is drawn with triangles, and every triangle is one-sided. The side it faces is represented by the normal (I don't know why it's called that!). Imagine a perfect one-way mirror: one side is transparent, while you can see your face on the other side. That side is where the normal is facing.
The concept of "Flow" is a state people can enter when they are completely immersed in their work, fully engaged at such a level that they do not notice the passage of time. This is how you can look up from a good book and realize it's after midnight, or why kids always seem so surprised to see their parents come in after their two hours of game time is up. "But I only played for an hour!" they might say. (and when they do, a game designer gets their wings!)
Jenova Chen (Creative Director at thatgamecompany, makers of Journey) has a great primer on Flow, if you want to do some more reading on the subject.
When it comes to games, a team seeking to put their players into "flow" must do everything they can to not interrupt play. This includes loading screens, long cutscenes, dropped frames, and other glitches that basically scream "THIS IS NOT A REAL EXPERIENCE."
In the first stage of its development, every screen in Chess Heroes was its own level. This made it extremely easy to prototype quickly, and altering the "flow" (lower-case f!) through the menus and into the game and back out again was easy, too. But! Now that the game is getting into a more final state, I have to reduce the number of level loads so that "Flow" is maintained. This means smooth transitions between menu states, and clever ways to hide the frozen state of a game loading the next level. As you might expect, this is taking a bit of time, but with the look and "flow" finalized, it's worth it to finally nail down the "feel" of the game. This starts with the menus, flows into gameplay, then pulls back out again. So far, it's been a treat, and I'm ecstatic to be working on a fully realized polish pass, instead of hastily rushing through with a "good enough ok ship it" mentality.
And yes, when they say the last 10% of the work takes 90% of the time, they weren't joking. It really burns through the working hours, but at the end of the day, it's absolutely worth it.
The woman in the unemployment office lowered my resume and looked at me over her librarian glasses.
"So, you know computers. You should be able to find a job."
"Sorry, no, I'm a designer. Not a programmer."
"A designer?" She swiveled in her chair. Fingers flew across the keyboard, tapping a rhythm punctuated by a solid whack of the Enter key. "There are a few graphic design positions already in the database. What about that?"
I tried to be polite as I let out a mute sigh. "I'm not a good graphic designer. I know that from experience. And I do game design. It's a different discipline."
Turning slowly to face me, she handed back my resume and looked at me as if I was an exotic plant left in a parking lot. Clearly, I would require Special Attention And Care. YESTERDAY
I woke up feeling refreshed, which is never a good sign. It's usually a sign that the good Lord is ready to test me. And when the dog started howling like foreign invaders had dropped from stealth planes onto our lawn and were fixing bayonets, I knew I was right.
So after spending the weekend cleaning out our garage, cleaning out our fridge, shredding a mountain of old documents, and remembering to get the trash bins to the curb the night before, a car had the decency to punt them fifty feet down the road and empty the contents onto the road.
That wasn't why the dog was howling. It's because our neighbor had come over to let us know what happened. Oh, well. The dog and I will have differences about what's worth a howl now and again. Comes with the territory.
I threw that image in there because I was getting Wordy and I dread losing your attention! Long story short: we cleaned up the mess with the neighbor's help, it was easier than expected, and the sun was shining in Oregon that day.
Still, I had a fully functional demo that looked like crap. This is the week I Try To Make It Look Good, so I wiped the slate clean and gave it a go.
Lo and behold, a few hours and several false starts later, I had The Look I Was Looking For! I'm as stunned as anybody, by the way, especially my former Art Directors. All of them used special tongs to handle my Art Suggestions.
Despite that, I hope you agree it's appealing. Just... please... don't call it graphical design. It's just a production phase I'm going through!
And yes, I painted those fluffy clouds! Arigatou gozaimasu, Kazuo-sama.
It's been another great week! There's progress every day, summer is coming to Oregon, and... er... I have no idea what the game is going to look like! Honestly, this kind of honesty gets me in trouble sometimes, but when space wayfarers from the year 45x923 (Zircon era) pass over these bits with their data scanners, they'll nod and say, "that boy spoke some truth!" Yes. In the Zircon era, accents that echo the American southeast are all the rage. But really, I've been getting consistent feedback that takes two forms: "Wow, yeah, you need to drop the chess thing pronto. Very confusing" and "Wow, yeah! This looks great! I'd love to play a chess variant like this!" There's not a lot of wiggle room there. It's either ditch the chess concept, which is the "factor x" that makes my humble tactics game stand out conceptually, or keep it and risk alienating a huge swath of potential customers. Will the game still be called Chess Heroes when it's released? Watch this space! New Features
A progression system is mostly intact: title, zone, area, scenario, handling player progression, saving profile data, etc. And the way I'm organizing the files is slowly becoming set in stone. I usually spend way too much time in this area, and sometimes make the wrong guess, so now it's functionality first, dev-accessibility later.
The game knows if it's in Demo mode or not, knows if it's in Debug mode or not. There's alternate progression models for Demo and special scripts for debug.
You can lose if an enemy piece reaches your home row, and win if you reach their home row.
There's a nifty help system for pieces that zooms in on the piece in question and brings up a diagram showing how the piece can move. It does this automatically when you load a scenario with a new piece or ability.
The AI will signal when it has no moves (which is possible if it only has pawns left) and pass the turn back to the player.
Pieces topple over and fade when captured. I love that it took all of two lines to make the toppling happen: 1. add rigidbody 2. rigidbody kick
New particles go from a sacrificed pawn to its "taker." This effect needs to sell better, but it's a start.
Open Questions
What's the look and feel I'm after? What suits the game best? Can it stand on its own as a casual turn-based tactics game? Scratch that... can it stand out as a casual turn-based tactics game? I have to come up with a hook beyond "it's cleverly designed," I think.
A Legendary Encounter Goes Badly I had the opportune chance to sit down with an industry legend today and show him Chess Heroes. It did not go well. First, he correctly assumed I chose chess because the pieces don't need amazing art and animation. So I felt he and I were on the same page for a bit. Then he hit me with the same argument I often use to take down crazy mashups: the Venn diagram intersection. What that means is one "idea" has a group of fans, and another "idea" has its own group. People intuit that putting the ideas together means getting both groups of people, when in fact you're only getting the intersection of the two. And in the case of Chess Heroes, he felt the slice was infinitesimally small. So, one reason I chose chess was to lower the barrier to entry to a turn-based strategy game. I'd then layer mechanics on top of that to increase depth for the game I was trying to make. His responses to that were:
People who don't play chess will be put off because chess is intimidating.
People who do play chess will be upset that I'm trying to "improve" it.
You can't really deepen a game that's been unchanged for hundreds of years.
Therefore, the game concept is unviable and not worth pursuing.
This left me in a precarious situation. I respected his opinion and knew that, from a certain perspective, it was correct. At the same time, I've received thrilling feedback on the pre-alpha build, and deeply believe it can succeed given another perspective.
The Other Perspective
That "other perspective" is fairly straightforward: As a game designer who lives and breathes it as an art, I'm experimenting with the playspace defined by chess. I'm taking it back to its roots as a strategy wargame, then bringing it up a separate evolutionary branch that sprouted right around the time Final Fantasy Tactics came into being.
I'm not trying to appeal to hardcore chess players. They are not my target market. Nor am I trying to improve chess. I'm playing around with the rules and making something different. Is it better? That's not for me to say. But it's interesting, and it's fun, and that's what I'm all about.
Now the question is: am I right? Is this a good idea that I have, and I'm acting the part of the visionary before his time? Or is it a grandiose fallacy, and I'm playing the fool ignoring his naysayers?
Time will tell. But I have nothing to lose by finishing it and releasing it. At the end of our lives, the things we regret most are not the mistakes we make, but the chances we didn't take. Chess Heroes is one of those chances. Let's go.
