Update: Some production screenshots and delight for the UDK version of Cyka

Can't show you the textures just yet...

More development screenshots are available on the Screenshots page, down under the "Cyka Kickstarter demo (Unity version)" section.  These some screenshots are just something to give you to look at just for now.  They are just showing the wireframe models of the Unity-developed Cyka demo and using a placeholder sky texture, as the terrain model textures and sky textures are not yet finished.

But what's cool about these pictures is that they're showing one-fourth of the total map size for the playable region for the Unity-developed Cyka demo.  To give you a sense of scale, click on screenshot 03 below, look at one of the triangle faces, and place your mouse cursor within one--that's just about the size that one character will be on the terrain.  Now imagine about 50 of similarly-sized units engaged in confrontation with 50 other similarly-sized units, and you can begin to imagine the elbow room your playing field will be in this demo.

Screenshot 03

Some of this terrain map will be what actually gets left untextured and released for free use on the Unity Asset Store.  This entire map when finished textured and animated will be in the pack of three game-ready terrain maps made available for purchase for $10, provided with many prop assets to allow people to make it look like their own terrain.  We're not afraid of selling the terrain because the terrain in the final game will look better defined than the more general-purpose terrain pack and there will be so many terrains in the official game that will pale even this large terrain size in comparison.

Also in development right now for this demo:

• models of several types of trees, rocks and plants are being made
• high-resolution sky texture being created and rendered from scratch in a separate 3D program
• initial character models are being modeled (animations come next)
• concept buildings are being conceptualized in both 2D and 3D
• creature designs are being done in 2D at the moment
• textures for the terrains are being done carefully (but not yet shown here)
• game logic for both demos are being plotted out

Again, more reveals of the Unity-developed Cyka demo are coming this week.

~ ~

Progress is coming along quite well for the UDK-developed Cyka demo as well.  So far, we've tried some tests of terrain as both generated using the heightmap terrain editor and as imported modeled terrain meshes, to weight out their advantages and disadvantages for us (some as memory usage, environment destructibility, ease of assembly, etc.), and we're definitely going with the terrain editor option.

UDK makes it pretty easy to create an impressive terrain quite quickly, so the test to be sure about our approach was worth the time.  Though, UDK is such a robust engine with tons of amazing features at your disposal, some obvious and some not-so-obvious, and personally, it's still quite the learning experience for me as the chief developer (currently the sole developer, at the moment).  I am proficient in using Unity, which I've been using for years, but UDK I'm rather new at--I've only adopted it this year--and so I want to be totally up to speed with UDK when I finally hire my team of developers.  Though, it's time-consuming learning while you utilize.

It's been worth taking the extra time to learn how to best utilize the engine--and thanks to a wealth of learning resources, that's been happening with no problem.  I'm mastering this engine quickly, and I can see how even more amazing this version of Cyka is going to be.  The original Unity-developed version will already be loads of fun (cross-platform-style), but this UDK-developed version of Cyka will be very amazing to experience on Steam.  The contrast between them will be one I think gamers will thoroughly enjoy.  (Of course, Kickstarter supporters who pledge at the $50 level will get both the Unity-developed standard Cyka (four copies of this version, in fact) and the UDK-developed Cyka: Steamed Edition.)

I can't wait to show you the work I've been working on so far!  Since I'm working on more than one thing at a time, I'm working non-linearly, going between different aspects and working on them a bit at a time, so that's why I don't want to show them off just yet.  But I'm sharing the untextured examples of my Unity work just to whet your appetite a bit.

- Brian

Update: EVERYONE will be able to play Cyka

Cutting straight to the chase, we're making two versions of Cyka so that anyone on any preferred platform can enjoy the game.  Excuse me.  [Writer does a little dance.]


One game, two experiences


One version of Cyka will allow gamers on PC, Mac, Linux, iOS, and Android to play together online cross-platform, and now, we've already began creating a version of Cyka that will be exclusive to Steam called Cyka: Steamed Edition.

We've said earlier today that we're working on two different playable demos for Cyka.  Well, this is why we're doing such--to provide a playable example of each version of Cyka, to show our supporters a good taste of what they'll be supporting soon.  And really, this came to us just as a great solution.

Cyka: Steamed Edition


As we've mentioned before, Cyka: Steamed Edition will be a special version of the game built just for Steam to best take advantage of Steam's features.  One problem we were having in making Cyka available for Steam was that it wouldn't be able to play cross-platform with other non-Steam versions of the game, namely the mobile versions, and so we wanted to make a special version for Cyka that would justify being available only just for Steam.

But what's new about the development of this Steam version of the game is that now it will be a very different experience from the original non-Steam version.  While the two versions of the game will play the exact same way in terms of gameplay, the major noticeable difference about Cyka: Steamed Edition will be that it is created using the Unreal Development Kit, and so it will have visuals in a league of its own compared to the standard Cyka game for non-Steam versions built with the Unity Engine (which will still be one beautiful game).  The environments will be noticeably more destructible and interactive as well.  It will feel like its own game because basically it is--it's a version of Cyka built uniquely with UDK from the ground up.

In addition to the visual upgrade, Cyka: Steamed Edition will be able to utilize Steam's matchmaking service, Steam Achievements, Steam Leaderboards, Steam Cloud save service, co-op multiplayer and in-game chat (though some of these features will be on the non-Steam versions, too).  As the Steam version of Cyka will only be able to use Steam's platform Steamworks, the game will cost lower than the non-Steam desktop version of Cyka, it will include the Cloud Quest mode, and there will be free exclusive content for this version as well.

Pick your store soon...

...now soon including Steam!

Recap


So, let's recap just a bit at what we're looking at here:

• Cyka (standard desktop version) (PC or Mac standalone; Linux supported via web browser version)
• Cyka (standard mobile version) (iOS or Android)
• Cyka: Cloud Quest Edition (PC or Mac standalone; Linux supported via web browser version)
• Cyka: Cloud Quest Edition (iOS or Android)
• Cyka: Steamed Edition (exclusive Steam edition for PC and Mac)

Phew!  And then you can also include the free browser-based game, Cyka Free (a scaled-down single-player single-mode version of Cyka with four playable maps and is totally free to play), but that's merely to a scaled version to whet gamers' appetite for the one of the richer multiplayer version of Cyka.

But how?!


But you might be wondering, "How are you now able to do this now?  Weren't you having problems with using the Unity game engine before?"

Well, we're able to do this now because after many hours of searching, we finally found a solution to the problem we were facing before in dealing with Unity's terrain system (two simple little scripts that solved our problem were sitting in the back of a Unity forum, waiting).  But now with Unity back as an option, while we sure didn't want to abandon using Unity (in order to keep Cyka truly cross-platform), we also didn't want to abandon this new version of Cyka we started developing on UDK--which before our solution we were looking at being the only version of Cyka to develop then.

But then we remembered that we were looking for a way to justify having our game on Steam, which wouldn't have allowed cross-platform gaming to non-Steam games (such as a mobile version of Cyka).  We had already had this idea of a "Steamed Edition" on the backburner of our ideas for quite a while now, but we recently just put the two situations together here.  We wanted to do this version of Cyka using the UDK that we started making and we always wanted to have the Cyka experience available on Steam.  So, in light of just recently finding a way around our problem with Unity Engine, we asked ourselves, "Why not make make this UDK-developed Cyka be our Steam-exclusive version of the game?"

So these two ideas just came together so beautifully and just in time for our Kickstarter crowd-funding effort!  Cyka: Steamed Edition finally gives us a way to justify both building a UDK-developed version of Cyka and providing an exclusive version of the game for Steam as well.   It fits in well with our development planning, and though it's taking a little readjustment to our Kickstarter plans (again), we think it'll be well worth it.  (Plus, we also really didn't want to give up that rather clever title--I mean, "Steamed Edition," for a special edition of a steampunk-themed game that'll be exclusive on Steam?  There's no way we're letting that one go!)

Supporters can get them all!


Many of our Kickstarter supporters can receive both the non-Steam and the Steam version of Cyka.  But we're making this so that any supporter both during and after our Kickstarter campaign receiving any version of the game can fully enjoy the rich experience that is Cyka--and you'll get to taste that experience very soon.  No matter which version you pick up, you'll enjoy the game, and no matter which version you'll have, you will have thousands of gamers to play with.  We will explain just what offerings we have in mind for our Kickstarter supporters on the next upcoming article.  Stay tuned!

- Brian

Update: Change of plans (and what it means)

I've tried.  I've really tried.  But for this game Cyka, the Unity Engine's just not working out.  Simply said, PolyKhrome just needs a better game engine for this game.  We need a better toolset with more options like better texturing options, tessellation and advanced lighting features and a far more memory-efficient terrain system.  We like the Unity Engine and really would like to use it, but PolyKhrome would rather have a successful game than an abandoned project due to us wasting time trying to find ways past Unity's technical limitations.  So now Cyka is being developed with the Unreal Development Kit, and really, we probably should've gone with this from the beginning.

Ah, the relief!

Now, with this change does come some changes in our plans as well.  The immediate change is that the targeted platform is reduced, because UDK currently only supports development for PC, Mac, and iOS.  So Cyka development will focus on those platforms.  The iOS version will still play cross-platform with the PC and Mac version.  We're losing a couple platforms here, but we're going with what's going to help make this project successful with completion, and that's UDK.

Another change with this switch, though for the better, is that Cyka is going to get a major graphical boost now--something closer to the original vision for Cyka, in fact.  In fact, thanks to UDK's memory-efficient terrain system, we can make the world of Rhye in the game feel bigger and livelier than ever.  In fact, that's largely part of why we're switching.

The biggest reason why we're switching is simple: Unity currently makes it quite difficult to create a game of Cyka's scale for both desktop and mobile platforms.  While we could just make the 100+ explorable regions in Cyka as meshes, the process would take just way too long to do, and we want to get something playable pretty soon.  Trying to work around the technical limitations of Unity's terrain system would cost us too much time and effort, and we've got a goal to meet.

As usual, this effects our plans with our upcoming Kickstarter soon, as well (which has been in planning for about three months now).  It takes time to set up a Kickstarter, because you have to do a lot of planning (and re-planning).  Believe it or not, we'd only see about 50% of any Kickstarter funds going towards the actual game development, due to various costs.  Kickstarter wants 5% and Amazon would take 3-5% for credit card processing fees, and then there's applicable taxes, pledge offering production costs, shipping costs, 5% going towards KickItForward, and now a 20% royalty to give to Epic Games to figure into the costs (they consider such efforts as Kickstarter as applicable for royalties).  But we'll get to that pretty soon.  In fact, we really need to get our Kickstarter started by this month.

Before we can start talking about Kickstarter and go through with raising financial support, we have to show them something with promise, and UDK's definitely going to help us there.  I want people to totally love this game as much as I love it.  We have to sell this game just right.  We want to make sure that perfect is what folks will get.  UDK will help PolyKhrome do this.

- Brian

By the way, this effectively ends our platform poll.  Thanks to those who participated.

Update: A first demo and an early look at Cyka himself!

Hey, folks!  You can download our first demo released this week here (available for Windows and Mac)!  It's just a simple development demo built to show just how big one region in Cyka is.  Keep in mind that this is a development demo, and it's kept rather barren here to showcase the terrain size itself.  This is demo "1a" because we're releasing updates to this demo soon (you can expect two more, demo 1b and demo 1c, within the next week).

Screenshot from demo

You're exploring this map in first-person view, which is unlike in the game, where characters will roam around in third-person view (by default, though they can roam in first-person view as well).  There is a "README" file that provides a few more details about this demo, but basically, this map is about 10 square miles (16 sq. km.) and it's just one of about 100 persistent-world regions you can explore in Cyka.  As a note, in this demo, you're traveling across it at a much faster rate than the actual characters will walk and run (though, even in the game, faster means of transportation will be available in the game).

This demo is a big deal because it helps convey the sheer size of one region, and gives you an idea of the scope of this game.  Each of the ten main continents in the game will each feature around 8 to 10 different regions similar to this map's size in the demo.  When you do the math, that means you'll have about 80 to 100 square miles (or about 128 to 160 sq. km.) of fully-traversable in-game terrain with the game, plus the additional continents that will be available for Cyka as downloadable content!  Yeah, for an indie game, this game is straight-up huge!  And for the kind of persistent-world gameplay Cyka will have, it has to be.

Also making news today, we have a first look at Cyka...we mean the actual character Cyka!  You've been waiting for some kind of concept of our lead character Commander Cyka for a while now, and there are several designs in development for Commander Cyka, but we thought we'd share this early concept of Cyka, to give you a basic idea of where we're going with his design.  Here you go:

Commander Cyka, in the metal!

This concept design feels cooler when you listen to it with Foo Fighter's "Bridge Burning" playing (well, maybe I'm just saying that because it's in my personal soundtrack while I work...).  Anyways, this rough concept design merely reflects the general idea of Cyka's design--by no means will the final form look exactly like this.  In fact, it's missing his royal helmet, emblem, body (obviously), and quite a lot of other details you'll see in the final design, and this design will look rather naked.  You'll see in the future released concept designs of all our characters retain a feeling of both medieval classiness with hard rock/heavy metal attitude.  There are a number of designs we're not ready to share just yet (yeah, we know--we say that a lot), but we work better not sharing our latest designs immediately.  We want good first impressions of our work.  We're putting a lot of care into designing our cybernetic steampunk alien robotic world-exploring royal commander.  Holding ourselves to a high standard, it's a quality thing with us and we're working to make sure it's worth the wait!

On to other news, if you follow us on Facebook or Twitter, then you already got this update before this blog did, and generally, those places are where we'll give our latest updates first.  If you haven't already, consider following us on Facebook or Twitter.  The first 100 people to Like our PolyKhrome Facebook page and leave the comment "I want Cyka!" (or something of that nature) will get a free copy of the game (Windows or Mac version) when its completed.  And an official Cyka Facebook fan page is also in the works.

By the way, in case you didn't know, we have a poll (right below the "Search This Blog" search box to the right of this blog), titled "What platform(s) would you play Cyka on?" and with choices and everything.  If you'd be so kind, you can help PolyKhrome out by simply choosing all the answers that apply to you (you can choose more than one answer).  Your input would help us out--a lot, in fact.

You see, we're currently experimenting with game engines, and while Unity seems to be the first choice, if Android and Linux demand just aren't high enough, we might just go with the Unreal Development Kit for Cyka instead.  And if mobile versions aren't significant enough in the poll, we might postpone the mobile version of Cyka to focus on working on the desktop version, doing the mobile only after finishing the desktop version.  But if Android and Linux versions are of noticeable demand, and/or if mobile versions are of noticeable demand, we'll carry on with the Unity Engine as we have been, to best provide the game for as many platforms as possible (something not easily done with UDK or CryEngine SDK).

And finally, you can view more new screenshots like the one pictured above here by visiting the Screenshots page.  They are screenshots of what you'll find on the simple development demo, showing a concept design of a map in Cyka to reveal just how expansive a single region is in the game.  There's also a screenshot showing you where a secret little path is on one area of the mountain (there's two subtle paths in the mountains--find them!).  Expect future screenshots of this map to blow these developmental screenshots away.

- Brian


Correction: This terrain is 100 square miles big, not 10 square miles!