Large Post: SpunkStock news, Ocean planet theme, mechanics, options menu. (Patreon)

Hey everyone! This time around is going to be a bit of a busy post. There is quite a bit I want to talk about. In previous weeks I have been talking about "things behind the scenes" that had been keeping me busy amongst trying to keep pace. I'll get into these one at a time. 

Also, Alongside this post I will be posting Groupie's High Res art if you are in that tier! 

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Starting with SpunkStock news:

I stated before this may not be too exciting for a lot of you (mostly because I didn't want people to expect new content), but the news is SpunkStock getting an official Chinese(Simplified) translation. It has almost been seen to completion, and is currently in a review period. It will still be a couple weeks, and possibly a bit more for preparation before it is put onto Steam, and Itch.io. If any of you are proficient in Chinese, and are interested in testing the early translated build feel free to send me a message! A few more eyes on the build would be most welcome!

This took me a little while because SpunkStock was not set up for localization/translation before. I needed to make quite a few additions, and changes to get things ready. The nice thing is that this could open things up to more translations with minimal effort on my end now that the project is set up for it. Before deciding on that fact though, I will be observing how the Chinese translation does.

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Next up is some management stuff. After some initial organization, our new Sound Designer is currently working on the first batch of SFX. We're looking forward to the new member on the team!

Alongside that, I had been looking around and getting some things organized on my end for VA casting. I have reached out to a small list of VAs who I would like to be a part of Starbreed! This process is still quite early, but I thought I would share that I am starting to get the ball rolling on this end of things.

The sections that will be voiced will just be the in-game transmissions. Dialogue in the hub will likely not be fully voiced. It would be nice to have some voice over in the Hscenes, but I may not address that until a later date.

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As for the traditional progress update:

As you can see at the top of the post, the Ocean planet's theme is now finished, and implemented! Thanks again Wishful Simping ^^.

On the development side, first up was the Transmission dialogue.

It is still a bit rough in places, but the base of it is all there.

Next is actually that the large ships properly destroy the catwalks.

As mentioned before, the objective is to destroy these ships before they get the chance to attack the buildings.

I also implemented the underwater passage sequence.

Animations are still a bit rough, but the water will rise while you are in there. You will need to boost a bit to get out of the passage before it fills.

What if it fills? The water is essentially treated as any other obstacle, if you are underneath it, you will take damage at the same rate as if you were colliding with a building.

Overall it is not fatal if you do not boost, but you will take damage.

Moving on is Siren's abilities:

Siren's passive is Bioelectricity.

The player is engulfed in electricity. You will electrocute any nearby enemies automatically. This will likely be more useful in some stages than others. The zapping animation itself is almost non-existent right now, and will be worked on in a later week. This passive will also likely be subject to rebalancing (The actual range will likely be increased by quite a bit to make it more practical).

Next up is Siren's Active, Heal Drones:

As the name implies... it's heal drones.

Simply hold Siren's ability, and you will consume thrust to slowly heal yourself.

With the base work done for the new mechanics, I started working on a quick Options menu for in-game.

Visuals are still Unity defaults, but they are all functional. You will now be able to adjust volume levels, and make simple control adjustments. Invert Y, and Look Sensitivity will be applied to both mouse and gamepad. (Oh! I also changed the pause menu to use the right logo... for some reason I never realized it still said "Star Lust" until now.... lol)

"InvertY" Essentially inverts the Y pitch. (Down on analogue means moving up). This option is for those who are used to the more traditional flight controls (like in StarFox 64).

That pretty much sums up the week!

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This next week will have a bit of SpunkStock work involving the translation, but aside from that, the main focus will be the boss of level. It will be a space ghost ship.

Considering this boss does not require rigging, I am hoping it will take a bit less time than the other bosses, allowing me to polish up dialogue, and some particles.

As always, I'll keep you all posted! Catch you next week with some boss action!

-Regulus