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Inner Circle Update for April 22 2019! (Patreon)

Published:
2019-04-22 10:47:27
Edited:
2019-04-22 10:59:25
Imported:
2021-05

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Content

Hey guys!

I really apologize -- we discovered a host of issues at the tail end of implementation of the new features for the Pure Onyx release, and Mr. Kittyhawk and I have spent a very stressful week debugging.  We're making a lot of progress however.  Admittedly, we overdid it with the new back-end stuff for this release.  We should have left the new AI system for the next one, but no turning back now :D.  

Most of the other issues involve the physics engine not syncing up with refresh rate and input system, and you end up with nasty microstuttering and flickering between character animations.  There's still ongoing testing to do, but have it running very smooth now, and we designed an impromptu fix for the input system for this release and have a much better grasp on how to get it to behave for later.

Needless to say though, your feedback will be incredibly valuable on this one :D.

Anyways, we'll be continuing the crunch this week to round out remaining AI issues and anything else that comes up.  

The good news is we're still making progress on animations/artwork even in the midst of all this.  We're working hard to have the majority of Onyx's move set animations ready ASAP after this release so that we can start integrating them with the new animation/input/combo system code. 


Art Style Experiment

I've been looking for an artist to do some high quality promotional art for Pure Onyx, but in the meantime I figured I would test myself and try to get the hang of a high quality soft shaded style (seen at the top of the post).  This is really stretching my painting skills, but it's giving me an opportunity to level up, so hopefully it works out.


Updated H Animations

I'd like to give you guys a preview of the updated Splicer vs Onyx H animations, but some butthurt person has been reporting my unlisted Youtube videos for nudity, so I'll need to figure something else out first.   I also need to renew my video software >_< (everything happens at once :D).  If the release takes longer than a couple days I'll be sure to post it!



New Onyx Jump / K.O. Artwork

TK and I have made a lot of progress with breaking down the move set poses for Spine, but I've only got the art for Jump and K.O. updated enough to show off.  Let me know what you think! (P.S. dat old Jump face x_x)



Junkyard Map WIP

Ubercharge has started on a new junkyard level, and we've got a (unprocessed) render of the the first map's foreground to show off :D.  This is the first time Uber's gotten to utilize on our project all of the advanced terrain techniques he learned a while back.  He's also been working on matte painting details for the other maps.

Files

Comments

Anonymous

I think your own promotional art is just fine. It lacks that professional personal touch but it's solid in its own right. As long as you keep most of the pieces in the game's cartoony style, I don't think you need to hire a professional artist, especially with your financial situation. The new KO style looks better with the skin shine lowered. I do think the outward curve between her knee and her lower leg is a little harsh, though. Jump looks great, could do with some falling physics on the hair. I don't like the beaten path in the junkyard map, it looks too convenient (Prince of Persia flashbacks) but other than that, looks neat. I also especially enjoy the detail and light on the ceiling of that matte painting composite image. As for videos, Dropbox or Google Drive should work fine, maybe even Vimeo or Dailymotion. Just watch the high traffic loads.

Anonymous

Sad to hear about the trouble with the AI and physics but keep up. Your testing with some promotional Art looks good, even a Bit to massiv tits and butt for me :D dont gut me wrong i like onyx body but from this point of view it look very massiv. :)

Gilver

New to your patreon, love what I see. Keep up the good work!

Anonymous

The anticipation is killing me. But it'll be worth it I'm sure! :)

MB

I second Mango's concerns about hiring a promotional artist. You've mentioned multiple times that money is tight and you're worried about cash flow for the project overall. At the same time, you already have pretty good promotional art, and can use the poses you are making as part of the game as new promotional material. I think you guys need to get into a more secure financial situation before you should consider expanding the team further, or outsourcing any work.

Anonymous
>>22027316

I agree with this idea. Your works are mostly good enough though we do not know about your standard. MATM patreon reached 15k a month once. I don't think people left just because there were no playable demo presented. I think they left for there were no signs of workflow being hardened after two years. What I mean by "hardened workflow" is, beyond certain point work should be mostly predictable in terms of difficulty and time consumption. Like creating and adding art assets with known method used before. MATM spend too much time on exploration compared to exploitation. So I hope you guys would be able to utilize known game engines like Unity or Godot for MATM too after finishing PO, rather than reinventing the wheel from the scratch.

MB
>>22027316

"MATM spend too much time on exploration compared to exploitation." Nail, meet Hammer. I honestly was hyped for MATM in its original form. All the artwork refinement is nice, the engine refinement is nice, but I would have played the game as-is back then, with just more levels 'stacked on top'. I think the fact Ero was pulling 15K month at one point means a lot of other people would have too. They could (should, imo) have pumped out MATM, working on these improvements in the background, and then used them for "MATM 2". Essentially do what they are doing now with Pure Onyx funding MATM, but with MATM funding MATM 2.

QuestionablyInsane

Mango is on point about quite a few things there. I do think you are good enough do the promotional art. I do want give some ideas on where to take that Promo even further... So yeah I think the pose is great! It’s a strong pose that shows Onyx’s tough attitude while also showing off her body. I don't think having her topless is the right choice though as naked is less visually interesting over a jacket flowing in the wind... You could maybe have it be a bit torn though for cheesecake factor... But yeah Nakedness implies vulnerability and it clashes with the strong pose IMO… But yeah I see why you want the nudity because you are trying to sell a porn game! So where I think nakedness would be a cool idea would be is in the background... I could see you doing something like the first 2 Borderlands covers where you have images behind the character in the foreground that is masked in a splotch like pattern. In the splotches you could have screen caps of your H- animations. But yeah behind all that you could just have a moody cyberpunk city silhouette. Also I think you can go farther with Onyx’s facial expression. She looks kinda like she’s lost in thought rather than having a “Come at me bro!” look. So like more eyes forward and chin down and brows furrowed. (AKA the Kubrick stare) For bonus points you could take your art and try your hand at making the image look like a moody watercolor. Look at the band “Perturbator” ‘s CD covers for the look I’m thinking of…. Also just listen to Perturbator to get ya in that cyberpunk mood :P But yeah there is this cool YouTube video I’mma send ya to make an image look like a water color in Photoshop. <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zJ8R3egJ_84" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zJ8R3egJ_84</a> Now for level design. Again I agree with Mongo that there is a too convienient path in the garbage… But I think I got a few ideas to fix that. Since you have a jump animation you could throw a car or something in the path here and there which the player has to jump over… Also making small bottlenecks in the path might be fun… like squeeze the trail in spots so you and the enemies have to funnel together. Also you could stand to add some verticality into you levels… Like scaffolding that enemies jump down from and you can climb up to and you can make the path go up and down hills to add visual interest along with adding some depth to high and low attacks, like you have to do high attacks on enemies higher up a hill as low blows wouldn’t land. Actually I’ve been meaning to talk about your level design… Visually they are really good… Gameplay wise I’m not too keen on the walking on a flat plane from left to right until you get to the boss layout. I think it’ll get repetitive very fast when the only variation in fights is enemy configurations. I think stuff like verticality and level layout will add a much needed gameplay interest to your game. Stuff like this fight has a giant pit so I have to work around that. This fight has enemies high up shooting at me. This fight is in a small room. This fight caught me off guard because the enemies smashed through the windows! This fight I need to break a door down fast because more waves of enemies are coming in soon and I don’t want to be overwhelmed! Also having branching paths with doors and whatnot could add a bunch of potential, especially if you have colectables for like a gallery mode or something. Metal slug had this cool level design set up that there were like 5 different paths you could take but then they all wound back up towards the same final boss at the end of the level… So you had to replay the game like 5 times to see all levels. (They didn’t allow for backtracking) But yeah you could also go with the Main path with a couple side paths to grab goodies… Or have like 2-3 paths that will take you to the final boss at the end of the level but then have side pathsa that dead end but snag ya goodies… Off the top of my head what might be cool is a level with a bunch of Pits and if ya fall down you have to finish the rest of the level underground with creepier underground enemies until you find an elevator to the final boss… Anyways that is a lot… Sorry for the novel… Hope it’s helpful in any case!

Anonymous
>>22027316

Exactly what you and Anonymous said in the replies. But then again, I think they were doing this from an artist's standpoint and overlooked the business stand point. I don't blame them wanting to churn things out perfect and to their exact tastes, but I guess that's how the world works, you get them interested in something, you've only got this window of opportunity to seal the deal.

Anonymous
>>22031911

Those are some very good points you made. But I think for that they may have to work on the physics and how the game detects objects that can be interacted on, what constitutes a wall, a walkable floor, a climbable ladder etc, and I don't know, but I think that might be a bit of tough work... But yes, very good points!

Anonymous
>>22031911

Its amazing how many side scroll games are coming out these past few years. All with interesting new ways to make the genre advance. I don't expect pure onyx to redefine the genre, but the team are fortunate to be able to take what they like from a wide variety of existing titles. <a href="https://www.slant.co/topics/6404/" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">https://www.slant.co/topics/6404/</a>~side-scroller-games-on-steam. Based on this I'd say that pure onyx is far from done and that breaks my heart as I want to see more MatM.

Anonymous
>>22027316

All this talk about money this and money that has me super worried. We're a ways off before Pure Onyx is complete, unless the scope of the game is a few simple levels with amazing art there's still lots to do. I don't even want to think how long MatM is going to take... raising money concerns now is well troubling.

Anonymous
>>22027316

I totally agree. I was also hyped for MATM as it was 2 years ago. I respect their efforts on their artworks. Those are art assets never before. Hate to pinch it but no one can be free from time and budget. Eromancer and his team are very talented in art but doesn't seem so in project management. Actually these types of pitfalls seem pretty common in Patreon and every indie things. They start small, but once they get more cash flow it's hard to resist to temptation of adding new features to their work with more resources they get. But most of the time, things you've never done before takes several-fold more man-hours to do than you've expected. I understand their desire to complete masterpiece in every detail but sometime you have to compromise. There are things that people take more focus while playing the game(character sprites, enemies, battle, H-scenes...) and some less (backgrounds, little details...). So it's very important to make a point, on which part we'll take exploration for uniqueness(MATM Universe, storyline, character designs, H-scenes, certain part of rendering details...) and what not.(Using proven game engine, existing tech for the rest part of the renders) Purpose of doing this is not to give up your ideas but to make your project competent in fields where you can be competent. That's how success is being made. By hiding shortcomings and highlighting your excellence. Though you might not like how MATM looked as it was 2 years ago, it could look different for other peoples eyes. I know Eromancer would feel bad about my comment, for it feels like giving up what they've dreamed of and compromising to the reality. But often, throughput-first approach yields better result than perfectionist type labor in a long run. Please do not underestimate the importance of management. Though you put a lot of efforts on lots of parts, people will score it as a whole. So I hope MATM team would have this kinds of "project management" concepts and timeline in their plan though it might be hazy for now. I really hope this project would thrive and want to see MATM2, 3 ... series. PO will draw some money, for sure. But it feels like PO isn't HOT as much as MATM for people around. If you prepare to get MATM project on the stable orbit and present your roadmap, I'm certain that it won't be hard to get 15k a month back and even more. Thank you for reading this.

Anonymous

Third comment for this post... I don't believe anyone here intends to sound drama-ish. I for one want Pure Onyx to be a huge success and get back on the MatM bandwagon. Instead of concerns and what ifs I will say I'm loving what I see and agree with most of the comments here that there is much promise in Pure Onyx and what it can bring to the table. Personal request, just make sure she's bent over while that promise is being served :)

QuestionablyInsane
>>22040289

Oh for sure! Eromancer and crew, know that my long winded comments are not attacks. I just want to be a constructive as possible and I too wish you guys all the best luck with pulling your projects off.

Anonymous
>>22040289

Bent over forwards, backwards, sideways, pretzel-ed, hopping on one leg with the other cuffed to an arm over her head.

eromancer

We're making a lot of progress :D. AI is looking quite good now, but we're still finding behavioral bugs and want to spend another day getting it more stable. We also still have a bunch of loose ends to tie up, but I believe we've got a handle on all the major issues and are out of the woods.