Arbiter - Monthly Recap - February 2021 (Patreon)

Hey all!

This'll be a shorter update as frankly I've been more focused on programming and research this month than production, but hopefully things should ramp back up again next month. 

I've more or less finished my greybox blockout for the demo level, so you can run through it with all the different traversal mechanics and enemy encounters (aside from the boss). I spent a good chunk of time after that using some clever camera tricks and mods to more aggressively study how different assets are made in some of the games that inspire me. 

I mostly studied Dark Souls III and Automata, looking at how they construct their terrains, skyboxes, horizons, etc. and how/why their methods differentiate. It's all been incredibly informative and I'm glad I did it, as it's cleared up a lot of unknowns for me that were blocking (scaring) me from production.

Afterwards, I started partitioning my level into different areas/sections so that I could construct the various terrain meshes. I'm not using a traditional terrain editor since Arbiter has a lot of floating islands and such that would make more problems than it solves. Instead, I'm simply sculpting the individual pieces by hand, and accentuating them with more generic pieces later. 

I've also been making lots and lots of cliffs (which I oddly enjoy?). Big cliffs go brrr.

I also did some bug-fixing for the new sliding mechanic, and I'm still making small polishing adjustments here and there as I see them. Right now I'm in the middle of finishing the terrain pieces so that I can start on the environmental props (trees, rocks, etc.) to fill in the borders and space. All in all I can safely say I've reached some level of comfort with the level design stuff, I'm just in the process (slog) of producing all the assets for it. After that, I'll do some proper textures and whatnot so they don't look like mush.

I think in the coming weeks/month I'll start experimenting with lighting too, as while I have some stuff in mind, I still haven't nailed a specific colour palette for the level. I'm sure that'll be its own learning curve in and of itself, but I'm looking forward to it! I've learned over the years just how important lighting is and how much it can carry a scene, so I want to make sure I get it right.

Anyways, sorry if this update's a little boring, hah. It'll probably be like this next month too, but eventually I'll get to a point where I can start showing off this damn level. I promise to show more off the second I'm comfortable with how it's all looking. Until then, thanks for reading and take care!

Cheers,
Jordy