[Blog] Vampire Killer Beaumont Engine - Jan 2023 Update #02 (Patreon)

Trello Board

Although I remember spending a long time "perfecting" Elayne's jump a while back, I've come to believe that the jump height is too short. She can still make the jump across 2 block wide gaps, but it's a bit less forgiving than in our reference games. Even Simon in CV1 has a slightly easier time with jumping up to a higher elevation across a gap. But I decided to go back and research our reference material...

Comparison: Jump Heights

At first, I thought I had made Elayne's jump height too short (first image), but after checking, it matches up with Castlevania 1 and Castlevania 3, but falls short of Curse of the Moon (generally the better game to reference). So perhaps it's not an issue to worry about, though I've noticed that even Simon jumps just a tiny bit further. So, I'll have to determine how I feel about this and what tweaks I should make. Whether I should increase the distance ahead or the distance above...

While I'm inclined towards increasing the jump height, I can't simply do that since my collision system will cause the player to be pushed out of the blocks. So I'll have to make the two systems work together if I choose that direction.

Current Goals:

A lot of my primary concerns right now are tweaks and bug fixes, which is a slower, more nebulous process. I can change a lot of things under the hood, but such things will not always be obvious, and thus progress would look less apparent. 

So, I think my next goal should be giving the game a facelift by drawing new sprites. As you've seen in previous posts, many of Elayne's actions still use Simon from CV1. If possible, I'd like to give you a playable demo either this month or the next month. Having a full sprite sheet for Elayne would be ideal, even if they're still janky.

The game is currently playable, even if it's not finished. Designing original assets for Elayne and setting up a custom level is all that's left before I can give you access. 

Here's an early whip test -- that is absolutely changing; that butt is way too much!

Don't forget to eat & sleep.