Inbetween!

We are in-between jobs for now, so we've finally had a little time to spend on developing Lemniscate.

One of the biggest problems we're facing (especially me, Geril, as I'm a graphic artist) is the dark, grey-scale aesthetic of the game. If you've seen posts from us from before we've announced Lemniscate, you might have noticed that we like vivid colors and flexible characters. We can't really do that in Lemniscate, it'd go against the game's theme. The graphics are so literally grey that I only use a single texture file for BaseColor, AO, Roughness and Metallic (on different channels).

The other problem we've run into is with the adventure aspect. As with point-and-click games, things that are obvious for the developers aren't necessary so plain to see for the players. We might think that it's logical to wash off the stench of waste water by standing in the shower while the water is running, but this might feel illogical in a video game environment where you open air vents with crowbars.

We are trying to solve both of these problems with the Inbetween. The Inbetween is, as the name describes, a dimension in between dimensions. Here, the player can find clues on how to progress in the game. In this dimension, we're also letting all our closeted frustration with the dark spaceship out: lots of weird shapes, unnecessary colors, tons of particle effects.
We're trying to make the place seem otherworldly. The player character sees these forms and colors because his brain can't decode what he's seeing. He's only able to move inside a bubble there, a bubble that is unaffected by time.

The clues are going to be cryptic and visual, without any text. For example, if you have to blow a fuse to get to the content of a closet, you're going to see a red poof in the distance, and a red shape a bit farther, that represents the contents of the closet. When you walk closer, you'll begin to see the surroundings of the closet. The important objects are going to appear in vivid colors, while the others are going to be darker, and only there to help the player recognize the part of the ship.
So, yeah, the cryptic game gets another cryptic layer. But at least this one's colorful.

You can get to the Inbetween in the final minutes before time resets. The 'reset' itself is a wave that goes through the ship, but a few minutes before that happens, there is a smaller wave coming to warn the player of the approaching reset. After the small wave, rifts appear in the dimension  in certain parts of the ship. These rifts can only be seen from up close. From afar, you only see barely visible blue sparks. The locations of the portals are worth memorizing, they won't always be at the same place, but they don't appear at random, either.

We'll continue to work on the game and will post more updates in the coming weeks.

Progress, hard work!

Hey!

We are properly progressing in the development of Project OLP, FINALLY. This week we got lots of things done, like equipping and picking up weapons, and playing proper animations on slopes (and slowing down and speeding up according to the slope's angle). Also we're working on a new map.

Here are some pics and gifs:

The map

Slope blendspace:

Weapons

See you next time!

Sketchfab!

Spring already!

We spent the Easter holidays (and the rest of the time, too) working. All of the 4 characters are slowly becoming functional, and we’re discovering more and more possibilities in Unreal 4 (though it already killed one of our laptops…).

Alex is working on a pickup system that is going to be very important in the game, as the players will be switching weapons frequently. We have two functional characters so we can also begin to test the local multiplayer elements soon. (And there will be a video of it.)

About the comic… It’s really late, we know. It’s going slowly because the 4th character’s design is still being worked on. But we joined Sketchfab, so in the meantime you can look at our 3D models in all their glory!

Cole_v25 by carpaintergeril on Sketchfab

Other ones will be uploaded to: https://sketchfab.com/carpaintergeril

March update

Hi! I'm Lussy.

...It's been a while..
I got home from Korea a little while ago, so I'm still jetlagged and grumpy. But being there helped my mental health a lot, so now I'm ready to dive into work again. ...I mean, I would be but I have a few months of school left, so until I graduate, I don't think I'll have much time for anything... Finals. Sigh.

So while I was away and wasn't paying attention, Geril found a REAL programmer for our project. An actual programmer who can actually program AND actually DOES program. Not procrastinate. So yeah! As I still have very little grasp on what's going on, I'll just let our new programmer tell you how the project's doing. If everything works out though, I'll be able to switch back to the role of a designer and texture(/3dmodel/background/everything else related) artist soon. And I'm really looking forward to that.

***

Hi! I'm Alex,

I'm the new programmer for this project. I can also help out with German and Italian translations if we decide to include them in the game.

I hope you'll like the videos we make about the game, its features and maybe some of its funny glitches. I joined this project because I liked the story behind it and I want to be a part of this 'game-dev-gamers' team.

What I'm working on right now is some basic movement, and functions for blueprints. I'm still trying to get used to Unreal's hierarchy.

Hopefully with me on the team the rest of us don't have to get involved in the blueprint madness too much, so we can speed up the project a little bit.

What I aim to work on soon, but still don't know how exactly, are some grab functions and fluid character movement to make the gameplay look awesome.
I hope you will enjoy my videos and updates on the project.

***

PS: March's comic may be a little late, but it's already in process,
PPS: It looks like we'll be migrating to Unreal 4.

Movement test!

Hello!

Here's a video for you:


Just a quick update on how we're doing. As you can see, we're experimenting with different controls: a fixed, side-scrolling camera with 3D movement. It works out pretty well. The only awkward thing about it is how sometimes you can't determine where you are in the 3rd dimension. We're planning to fix this with a small circle of shadow below the player, and a more dynamic camera.

P.S.: Subwoofer required for full experience

Story time!

Hi! We're going to share some information about the game's world. It's going to be a bit technical so bear with us. The next story post will be focused on the actual story and the characters.
So... here we go.

The story takes place on Koronite, a world made up of irons. Along with this iron based world there are other kinds of matters on the surface which make life possible. Water is rare to find, clean water even more so as the seas contain lots of iron mixed in with mercury.

Magnetism is what makes the continents, mountains, air and water move. The planet has such a high voltage that it could shatter on its own, but the energy is contained by resistors (gigantic natural poles).

The atmosphere is slowly eating away the hills and mountains by oxidising them. Millions of undiscovered minerals lie hidden deep inside the planet’s inner layers among with organic living irons.

The reason why life is possible in this world is because of the plants as many of them are able to extract iron from the air as well as other sources and incorporate them. They then give off the materials they don’t need -  the ones that are needed for humans to live.

The life forms here are either based on iron or have evolved to survive in this environment. The people living on Koronite essentially adapted to the planet, their bodies able to process some of the iron. As such, they are heavier and sturdier but they regenerate less and more slowly. Their fur is strong but prone to rust if it’s not taken care of regularly. Breaking one of their bones may take tonnes of force but once broken, it stays that way. They can also have parasite-like irons consuming their bodies, or living with them in symbiosis. 

The planet tries to get rid of outsiders on a daily basis, these are the more recent inhabitants who haven't evolved to process iron, yet they are determined in surviving at any cost.

The surface is varied. In some places the ground is hot and sandy, elsewhere it is cold with crumbled metal. There are endless oceans that look like large mirrors and also seemingly never-ending are the chasms, floating mountains made of dust and slowly moving damp cubes of metal.

While life is everywhere in its own stubborn form, the inhabitants are fighting an endless war against nature using steam and sparks. After centuries they can finally say the surface is theirs. The problem is, the surface is not the only layer the world has.

Before conquering the surface life only existed deep below it. The creatures were primitive and less able to adapt to changes. Their large bodies remained as caves between the layers of the planet. As it moved and changed, the surface became more stable than the other layers. Water carved long caverns that became the home of simple and more complex creatures alike. So while the surface keeps changing, under it, chaos is the only natural order.

The average inhabitant stays far away from the deeper levels - they have enough trouble on the surface already - yet there are people who use the caves to remain hidden, to do things under everyone’s feet. They have to fight other creatures or nature itself for these places, so it isn’t very common.

About one and a half centuries ago, it became forbidden in most regions to work, develop and transport under the surface. Only mining could be continued and even that was kept under close supervision. Recently there have been revolts across the world. Leaders came and went, laws faded and became rewritten. Nations changed names and conquered new lands.

These new, neutral areas of land - or as their inhabitants called them, “free terrains” - were captured by hired mercenaries. Without a flag or a name the conquered lands could become inhabited to form a new nation of their own.

In this unstable world, to survive, beggars can't be choosers.

Our protagonists’ lives start out from the village in the valley of Maron.
They separate for a while after but their past and goals ultimately causes their paths to collide soon enough.

names not final

Pictures of our progress 02

Hi, I'm Geril. I'll just post a few pictures again so you can see how the project's going. You can expect more of these posts regularly.

Since my English isn't very good, Lussy's translating and putting all the posts together.

Have a nice day!

Pictures of our progress

Hi,

Since we haven't written too much about our game's world in the previous posts, we'll now share some pics. 

Everything shown on the pics is still under development, and not final.
(In the meantime, we're working on a tutorial. We hope to post that too, as soon as possible.)