Day 2: Geography and Climate

(this is for the TIGSource World Building Challenge, found here.)

Map of the Samar province of ValgaP.S. Scans and digital art coming soon

For the length of this World Building Challenge I will be focusing on the province of Samar in the world of Valga. Samar is split up into five regions: Borg, Figan, Malsad, Vendus, and Kahir.

Borg is a hilly and somewhat dry region of Samar. To its west are the arid plains and dry beaches. The east is covered with long stretches of rolling hills and winding rivers. Its mild climate, abundance of rivers, and generous vegetation has led to it becoming a densely populated region. The capitol city of Borg is located along the banks of it's large central lake, depicted in the map above. To its south is a large mountain range which stretches for the better part of the land mass, marking the southern border of Samar.

Figan, contrary to Borg, is a sparsely populated region. To its southeast are dense rainforest-like forests and particularly humid weather. Its climate cultivates all manners of spectacular creatures, but many find them to be rather... voracious. To the northwest of the Figan islands is a more marsh-like environment, a perfect home for many reptilians and the like. The populace here is sparse, but it does exist. To the far east are a small set of recently discovered islands which no explorer has yet returned to recount upon.

Malsad is the self-proclaimed "royal capitol" of the Samar province.(more on that later) Malsad features the heaviest population of the entire province and nearly the entire island is covered in buildings. In the center of Malsad are a group of mountains and a great rivers which runs down to the southern coast.

Kahir is densely forested and receives rain for much of the year. Nearly the entire island is covered in trees and flora, and it teems with wildlife. The intense thickness of the forest seldom allows light to pierce the canopies, and often the forest floor is nearly completely dry. The people of Kahir often live in seclusion.

Finally is Vendus. The northern half of Vendus is rocky and mountainous. To the north are a great mountain range that is said to be impossible to cross, and as such it marks the northern border of Samar. Many rivers flow down from the frigid ice caps of the Vendus mountains, giving the central section of the region healthy vegetation and plentiful grasslands. The southern section of Vendus, its long-reaching peninsula, shares a partial representation of Kahir's climate. It is forested, but no where near as densely as Kahir. Some of the same plants and animals may be found there as well. This southern section of Vendus is it's most populated area, having a major trade city on it's eastern tip. Vendus has the highest biological diversity of all of Samar's regions, with Figan coming in second.

Day 1: World

(this is for the TIGSource World Building Challenge, found here.)


Many a mystery it is, the origin of our world.

However the origin of Valga is not a mystery, for at this very moment it has been conceived from the furnace and bellows of my intellect-- Get to the point, you say? What? Blasphemy.

*Ahem*

In the beginning, there was nothing. Yet, also everything. The universe, known to the people as Va'lun, yet existed in it's perfect, wholesome state. Yes, Va'lun was perfect... then. The seven original beings, known to the people of Valga as gods, inhabited Va'lun. Of the seven gods were Vaati, Venci, Maya, Ooin, Koren, Jalga(pronounce the J as a Y), and Horan, all who will be introduced later.

The gods, put in simple terms understandable for your meager brain, were bored. And furthermore, they did not get along. After unquantifiable stretches of time, their quarrels met end with compromise. They agreed to separate from each other. Each god left to exist in their own plane of the universe, which today are the seven planes of Va'lun.

However, this separation sanctioned further boredom. To alleviate boredom, the gods all eventually began tapping into the powers of the void, Vanir. In the universe, there is nothing, yet also everything. The ultimate sum of all matter in Va'lun is zero. Tapping into the Vanir allows one to control the universal existence of all matter, manipulating what exists and does not exist beyond the laws of physics as we know them. Some call this black magic.

Eons then passed, and the gods had so heavily used Vanir, irresponsibly, that pockets of negative matter existed scattered about throughout Va'lun. And then the goddess Maya made a grave mistake, attempting to clean out negative matter, they offset the universe's balance. The matter count was no longer zero. In an infinite instant the matter, the world, and the heavens compacted into an infinitely tiny and infinitely massive sphere. The gods were crushed, quite literally. With the last bit of their life force, they agreed to surrender their crushed bodies to circumvent their doom and restore the zero-balance of Va'lun.

It happened, and they died.

In the next infinite instant, the universe exploded and expanded infinitely to create existence as is now known. The gods were not entirely dead, they yet existed as ghosts--Omnipresent spirits which only managed a meager half-existence. With the final remains of their power, the gods put forth a plan. They would create a world which would self cultivate. It would live, flourish, and grow on it's own. And it would be given one ultimate goal--The resurrection of the gods.

This world, of course, was Valga. Vaati, with her expert analytical abilities, identified the best hunk of rock she could, shaped it into a sphere, and flooded it with water. Venci, with his burning tenacity, shaped the land of the world, set it's core ablaze, and gave it's tectonic planes their first, infinite push. Maya, ever so sorrowful for her mishaps, created weather cycles and the first forces of nature. Ooin, with his careful and deliberate touch, created the first non animal life forms. Then Koren, a master of mediation, created the first language and left scrolls of immense knowledge for the emissaries they would create. Jalga, then, with her careful and loving attention, created the first animal as a derivative of Koren's first creation, which would form the base for all other animals. Then finally, Horan, who spent the last remnants of his energy casting his soul into the earth, so he could ever-so-deliberately track and guide the progress of life toward their ultimate goal.

This was, and is, Valga. It's relatively small, compared to our planet. Do not fret, though, for in the coming weeks you shall learn the true meaning of "big things come in small packages.", for the world of Valga is yet vast and bountiful.

2012

Hi internet, it's been a while.
So it seems, after all, that the world did not end at the split infinity of a second following the end of December 31st, 2011.

Fun fact: This year, 2012, will end on a Monday. Today is Sunday. Is that relavant? I don't think so, actually.

I'll be taking a slightly different direction with my "hello, new year!" post than everyone else probably is. I don't want to summarize my year of 2011. I don't want to reminisce or some crap like that. Instead, now is a perfect opportunity to reflect on my faults and what I did wrong, for it is in your own faults that you may eventually find the way to a better self.

I spent way too much time doing nothing.

When I say "nothing", though, I don't mean I loafed around being entirely unproductive, although I admit there was quite a bit of that as well. What I mean is that I spent too much time trying to be productive and not being productive. I would agonize over a careful plan in my head, trying to come up with a perfect solution to a problem. I told myself I didn't do this, too. Yes, I denied that I did this to myself, which I now see fed the problem due to my own denial.

And then I was too inhibited. I often let inhibitions, reservations, fears, doubts, pressures, etc. overcome me and reduce me to an unproductive whiner machine. And trust me, I whined to myself a lot. Spending too much time being inhibited by these feelings further fed the problem because I was not able to get anything done. I didn't deal with these problems, and they self-perpetuated. Just how it goes, I guess.

I also let my doubts maim my confidence. Confidence is a surprising key to creating good work. Sometimes someone can have the potential within themselves to do great things, they just need the confidence--the belief in themselves--to realize it. For a long time I confused confidence with arrogance, I must confess. But now I see the difference.

Upon reflection, it's apparent to me that these problems were not separate, and such is the way of things. I felt that, recently, as I identified and attempted to deal with one of these problems, the others would lessen too. The connection was obvious.
Ultimately though my problems manifested into a boulder. But it was not just any boulder, it was a boulder I drug with me on my shoulders. Not only did it slow me, but it fatigued me and drained me. And now I'm casting off this boulder. I'll always remember the boulder, though. I'll remember my experiences with it, so that in the future I know not to put another boulder on my shoulders, because I know how badly it affects me.

Peace out, internet.
Have a great year.
I hope you may all realize your flaws,
and overcome them.

Hey, I'm learning Japanese

ああ！これは凄いです！


So, yes.
(そうですね？）


I'm really bad, but I'm working at it.
Hope is to start making stuff in Japanese as well eventually.
Plus, how can you possibly go visit Japan without speaking Japanese?
You can't, without your hand being held.
No, I want to adventure.
I'll probably still make a fool of myself anyway!
Like that time I emailed Pixel about Rockfish and probably sounded extremely silly.
(because I had to use Google translate a lot--I didn't know how to say most of the things I was trying to. Fantastic!)


Plus, emotes.
(^o^)/！！！！！！！
かわいい
かわいい
かわいい
かわいいよ！！！！！！！！ですですですですですです

Just kidding. I'm not like that... I swear!!!

Level Editor Project

Here's a WIP screenie of my new level editor project. I'm making it because my other preferred editor, Ogmo, has been missing some features that I'd like to have.

It's a fully UI editor--You create and configure your entire project within the application. One thing I disliked about Ogmo was having to write out project XML's. It was nasty...!

I also tried to remove a lot of the redundancies and complexities of Ogmo. Some of the properties just felt pointless, and having to sort through a manual and tutorial repeatedly to find the info you want felt.. Well, unintuitive. That's why I'm placing such a heavy focus on getting it all done within the UI.

I disliked Ogmo's limited layering system, so instead my editor uses numeric z-ordering. I find this a lot more intuitive because in Ogmo I'd sometimes run out of layers to layer on my background tiles. The only way to get around this was to add in a whole new layer in the project file. A whole new layer just for maybe one or two tiles? Aaaaahhh... My level loading code got pretty nasty because of stuff like that. I also added rotation, scaling, and indefinite grid-snapping. This lets you use this editor easily as either tile-based or otherwise.

And finally there will be a "map" or "universe" editor. It's for designing the position of each level in relation to each other so that you can build your world-map visually. This is a feature I'm very excited for, because in my experience connecting levels has always been a painful and relatively blind process.

So, this post is running pretty long, but all in all this is my desired level editor. I'm very glad that I've made this and it's been very rewarding so far. Don't be fooled though, there's still much more work to do. When I'm "done" I'll release it (since it's a generalized tool) for anybody to use. Along with it I will also include the source code. Behold, my terribly kludgy Objective-C code! Har har.

See 'ya!

Also: If you want to follow the editor's progress follow me on Twitter @BlueSweatshirt(link in sidebar) or keep an eye on #OperationLevelEditor.

Concept: Action Tactics

Hello! Today I'd like to talk about an idea I had for a game. I'll go over the basic concept and then some specific details of how it should work. And most importantly, I'll talk about why. For one, I think this is a neat sort-of-hybrid-idea and I'd like to share it. And for two, I think it's good, as developers, to share the thought process that goes behind design decisions. So, here we go!

This idea focuses on the action(or battle, if you will) system in a game. It's a combination of what I like about both action games and turn-based games. In action games, you get high-tension combat with a focus on mechanical skill.(usually!) In turn-based games(particularly RPGs, I suppose) you get to coordinate groups of people and plan strategically. But for me, I've always wanted an action game where I control a party. That's very difficult, of course, since in an action game the action never stops. Well, this idea is kind of a cheat.

You have two groups on a playing field, presumably the player's party and the enemies. There are turns. Each whole party gets their own "phase" where they coordinate their team's actions. Within a phase each unit in a party has a turn. During their turn the player controls them like they would in an action game. Turns are limited based on time. Time, because, in an action game the action always goes on. Limiting by time is the most logical conclusion because you don't want the flow to stop. Time also happens to be a key balancing factor in most action games, so you keep that element. Overall, it helps the battle feel much more like you're playing an action game.

When a single unit's turn is done, it very quickly switches to the next unit. When everyone's turn is done there is a phase switch. There is never a pause.

Units can also "wait", forfeit their turn. Doing so adds the current time they had left to their next turn, so they can do even more actions. There are a few reasons for this. One, so that the player is not left waiting for their character's turn to end if they don't need the rest of their time. Two, to add another element of strategy to time. For instance, some powerful attacks may require more time to execute. It also rewards the player for using their time efficiently, another element of action game pacing.

For spells/skills/etc there would be hotkeys rather than menus. Menus take time to scroll through, and that really doesn't work with a time-based system.(that's why action games don't really have them!)

There would be no way to survey the battle and gain your bearings. It all just happens. During the enemy team's phase the camera does not shift focus to their units. Instead, you keep an eye on your own. In an action game you're never really afforded omniscience-- You have to observe with your own eyes, so the same concept is applied here. This also lets elements of stealth and deception come into play, which do sometimes play a role in action games.

Remember the goal here is to bring the turn-based game elements and benefits while maintaining the vibe and pace of an action game. If I wanted to do it the other way, and make a turn-based game with action game elements, I might do things like add menus to choose skills from and let the player be omniscient of the playfield. But in this case, I want to keep those action game elements. Where you're not some puppeteer, but instead directly in the action.

Secrets, Novella, and Nutella

Hello!
Unlike the usual trend of musings and teasings, today I'm simply going to talk about what I've been doing. While, yes, it is a tease, it is not entirely a tease on game development, something which I think I talk about for the majority of my time on here. So today I'm going to talk about art, writing, UI programming, and film.

Art
In my art class I just finished a surrealistic painting. Is it good? I don't know! But one thing is for sure: I need a ton more experience with acrylic paint before I'll be able to satisfy my personal expectations. I also need to work on my steadiness with a brush-- It's something I'm not used to using, so I tend to get pretty shaky with it sometimes.

I've also been working on my digital art skills for video games. Sure, I've done legions of sketches and stills, but it wasn't until recently that I've gotten interested in drawing/"painting" my game art rather than using low-res pixel-based art. I think it will propel the visual aspect of my games to new heights. And while, yes, I do have a certain love for pixel art and also for low-res art, it does not fit in with the kinds of games I'm looking to make. Also, I'd rather not do pixel art just for nostalgia's sake. And finally, aside from all that, it's been very refreshing and fun doing hand drawn game art! I'm enjoying it a ton.

Writing
I've begun writing a short novel in the spirit of NaNoWriMo. I missed the actual event, so I'm just doing this for the sake of it. I think pushing myself to write a 50,000 word novel in a month will seriously propel my storytelling skills. I'm just over a week in and I'm already building technique like crazy. I can't guarantee the novel will be any good, but it will exist. So far it's relatively cohesive, but we'll see if that changes. Once I'm done I'll be putting it up at my site for download.

UI Programming
Macs are awesome to write UI with. My nuances with Xcode aside, I've found designing and programming UI with Cocoa to be a pleasurable experience. Some things, like populating a table, require somewhat crazy amounts of effort in the eye of a beginner like me, but now that I've learned how all the pieces of the puzzle fit together I'm finding it to be a very effective and well thought-out model with lots of flexibility. My current project is a UI level editor for a secret game project I have an idea for. I'm making it both for the learning experience and for it's application, because I can see this game as being one that requires a ton of level design. If the level editor comes out any good I'll open-source it for all you peoples. I'm going to try to make it as user-friendly and efficiently coded as possible. *ahem* Let's see how well that works out.

Film
I'm beginning work on a short series called "Zombie Fast Food"(name may change). You may or may nor recall me making a trailer for this series earlier this year. Yes, well, so far they're related in name only. There is zombies, food, and survivors though, I assure you. This project is being done for my film class at school. The main goal with this series is to gain experience in a wide and balanced variety of film making elements and to use my surrounding resources well. Visual storytelling, cinematography, post-production, pre-production, makeup, etc. There are lots of run-down and rickety buildings amidst a forest-like setting here, so I thought that would work perfectly for a somewhat-cliche zombie movie. It breaks off from the zombie movie cliche in that it's not really a horror or action movie, per se, it's more of a drama. We'll see how this goes.


Anyway, that's all for now! I'll post results as soon as things materialize.

Wondering how Nutella got in the title? Keep wondering.