Working to enter demo into 2013 IGF

Processing...

The title's pretty self-explanatory--I'm working on the Cyka demo to enter it in the upcoming 2013 Indie Games Festival.  That's actually why I've been kinda silent lately--I've haven't had time to update my blog like I should.  I've got a lot of work ahead to do in just a comparatively short time to meet the IGF deadline, but I've got a lot of work done, too.  I don't have time to make snapshots or comfortable enough producing a half-working demo just yet.  I still plan to release one as soon as I can, though.  My plans keep changing (well, life keeps changing them for me), but hey, life goes on.  Later.

- Brian

Technical difficulties @_@

Not an actual picture of my situation...yet.

It's been a crazy past month, but I've finally got my computer back to seemingly functional order.  It got infected by some kind of malware that even Malwarebytes couldn't even detect. It took me about a month of trying to search through all my files to detect the problem, and eventually, I just had to save what I could to an external hard drive, start my computer all over again, and re-install all my programs and settings.   And yes, it takes a month to do that!  One frustrating month.

Anyways, even though my computer's crashed twice since I've done this complete re-install of everything (and I'm not quite sure as to the exact nature of those crashes yet--whether they're related to my previous problem or something else completely coincidental), I think it's working well enough to resume my work here again.  Right off the back, I can show you some of the assets I've been creating, and in a very cool way.  (I've been waiting a while to finally use this--just click on the cube icons to start the interactive viewers.)



Here's another one (one I've had for a while now).



Expect more of these.  Play around with them.  Have a blast.  (Also expect some web browser applications posted here soon enough.)

Onward to other news:

• My new website for my game assets and custom assets division for PolyKhrome, Powerhouse Game Assets, is now open to previewing, though it's still in development and being updated.  This will help PolyKhrome generate revenue to go towards the game development, and, well, until the Kickstarter is started.
• I'm still building my team, and it's just a matter of finding time to organize that time.
• I'm organizing my Cyka assets to throw together a demo, to whet some appetites out there.  That's still going well, and pretty soon (for the millionth time, I know), I'm drawing closer to my goal of a Cyka Kickstarter.
• I'm working on a side game project designed to be a casual game--again, for revenue.  But it's still fun.  And it'll be some reduced in scope and size and of a different style of gameplay than Cyka.  A little refresher to cleanse my palette of Cyka from time to time.

Anyways, thanks for hanging with me, and for the 1,000+ views thus far (and think--I haven't even promoted this site very much yet!).

- Brian

Update: Good progress (with one setback), Linux and OUYA

Powerhouse is almost finished!

Hey, folks.  It's been a while, but it's been quite a busy while for PolyKhrome.  I've got a lot of assets created for the Cyka demo, some development video of me making these assets almost ready to share, and I've got some of the basic framework for the gameplay up and going, and I will show them...as soon as I can remove the vicious malware that's plaguing my computer.  -__-" {Of course!}

Yep, my PC's sick.  I'm writing this post with my netbook, which thankfully I still have, and all of my files seems to be okay on my infected computer (that is, when I can log in long enough to see them before the computer totally freezes up).  I'm running every reliable malware scanner I can find.  As I've got over 800 GB worth of occupied hard drive to deep-scan through, and my computer begins to freeze up after about 30 minutes or so, it's taking a while to do this via a series of smaller custom scans.  Anyways, when this minor setback is over, I'll compile my work done so far and post up a preview demo of, well, my demo.  Demo of a demo.  Funny.

But that's not all I've been doing all month of July--I've also been working on the Powerhouse Game Assets website, which is relocating and almost ready for business.  The picture above is from my tiny netbook, so it's truncated a bit there.  Selling game assets will greatly help with Cyka development (some people make up to $100K a year selling assets!), so it's been a top priority for me, as well as this demo.

Some other good news is that since Steam will be supporting Linux pretty soon, expect Cyka: Steamed Edition for Linux as well as Windows and Mac.  Also, I'm involved in a couple other side projects, including a Community Game project being lead by Peripheral Games (my iOS game idea won the contest they were holding), working on the development of a game clothes creator program, as well as producing a fan-created animation for my previous engagement of Operation Moogle--all of which I'm using to bring more attention to Cyka.

Cyka will come to OUYA.

And finally, I thought about it for a while, and I finally decided that PolyKhrome will put Cyka on the Android-based OUYA when the game is finished by next year, even with some exclusive content.  It's a risky console to support, but it's something I think might be worth the chance (and for $99, the price of that chance isn't too bad at all).  I still have some questions about OUYA, like how are they going to promote creative quality games away from an inevitable sea of mediocre unambitious games and shovelware.  But, in any case, Linux fans are really growing in buying indie games right now, over 43,000 OUYA owners will be looking for games next year, and PolyKhrome really can't afford to miss this sweet opportunity, as risky as it might be.  In fact, I am confident Cyka can be a big hit on OUYA--if it lives up to its potential.

Anyways, just wanted to check back here, just to let you all know that the game's development is still alive and well.  So stay with me, folks--we're progressing.  ;-)  (And I do mean a "we" pretty soon--I've got some prospect developers for Team PolyKhrome.)

- Brian

Update: What I'm doing right now?

Right now, I'm working on a larger demo that will feature three distinct terrain maps, with each one to specifically-tailored to showcase three of the most distinct and important aspects of the game.

Just for this demo, they run like different stages to select, though in the game, they'll be traversable seamlessly across one continuous world of terrains.  Each map in the final game will represent only a single region on a single continent.  For the demo, one map will specifically showcase the battle engine aspect, one will showcase the environment exploration aspect, and the last will show the resource-collecting/stronghold building aspect of the game.

Each of these will be important aspects that are stressed about this game, as this game will not only be a preview to those interested in seeing the biggest aspects of this game in action, but also as my biggest accompaniment to our Kickstarter (I feel that a mere video for this game is simply not enough--you need a good demo).

So far, I'd say it's about the demo is about 40% done, and I'm looking to get about 60 to 70% done by this time next week. Most of everything is not textured yet (I leave texturing last). Production will pick up in the next two weeks, as I work hard towards a checkpoint and as I'll be recruiting helpers pretty soon.

I'll confess that, though I have good experience in making games, everyday I grow from this process. This is indeed a learning process, as well as time to explore. Some things are second nature to me, while some other things are a whole new experience for me. Some things I'm finding I need to invent, as they're simply not out there, such as developing my blue grid in the game to conform to the form of the uneven terrain--that takes some problem-solving to think out.

I'm also preparing to employ my other service Powerhouse Game Assets next week. This is good, as I really want to get that rolling, too. If assets are sold, they'll be that much more help towards the production of Cyka.

It's not easy to be the director, the designer, the artist, the developer, the producer, all while striving to be the financier, being my own teacher about new things and being the promoter all at the same time, but it sure is one interesting experience, though one I'd be glad to share with other future PolyKhrome developers.

I have more to share later, but that's it for now.

- Brian

I just fixed my Wacom!

Succeeeeess!

Don't know how or why it worked, but I fooled around with my Wacom tablet some more and tried someone's "whodathunk" suggestion for getting it to work again and I got it working again.  I don't know if the fix will last or not, but I don't really care--it's working for now, and now I can paint my textures easier again!  This fix saves about $200-$300 for a new one.  Anyways, back to full speed with production!

Update: Some new screenshots and concept art

Yeah, this terrain is huge.

Hey, a brief update: Check out the Screenshots and Concept Art pages to see some new pics.  Their textures are not yet finished, so I just left them untextured for their showing just for now.  And please don't mind the funky placeholder textures of the green montane terrain and basic color of the canyon terrain--I'm still painting their textures and I don't want to show them just yet (hey, textures take time!), so I used the simple and crude in-game-engine texturing just to make it easier to see the Commander Cyka model.  More pics are on the way, and video showing my production of this is being compiled..

- Brian

Unity 4 is bringing changes to Unity and Cyka development

This is epic...

Unity 4 is coming out soon, and it's looking to be a real game-changer for Unity-developed games (such as Cyka).  Basically, thanks to Unity 4, not only will have characters in Cyka move a lot better in the game thanks to a new Mecanim feature, but now PolyKhrome can offer Linux gamers a standalone desktop version of Cyka (though, a platform-independent web browser version of the game is still planned), we can offer some optional DirectX 11 features for the PC version of Cyka, and we can provide some better shadow effects to the mobile versions of the game.

Jake "virt"Kaufman

I can even complete this game by myself now, if need be, thanks to the time-saving Mecanim feature and the further-improved updates to Unity, which is already the most streamlined workflow of any game engine around.  Though, I'd still love and plan to hire at least an animator, an environment artist, a character/prop artist, and another programmer, not to mention hopefully manage to gain Jake Kaufman for the music and assistance with sounds.

(By the way, if you've never heard of Jake Kaufman's work and don't know why I'm excited that I'll be inquiring him later on his soundtrack services, check his demo reel out and then please check this work out.  I'm a huge fan of his work, and I know that if I can get him (and he does seems to be pretty accessible), he'd definitely help bring out this game's awesomeness.  No guarantees, but we'll have to wait and see, and first get the game more together.)

Even though UDK is still technically more powerful than the Unity Engine, this next Unity release is going to be huge, and make Unity Engine even more a strong contender for indie game developers.  They own the Mecanim technology (they bought the small company who developed it for them) and it comes standard with Unity 4, which is something unlike anything other game engines really have right now (not even UDK, even with its robust animation system, has something quite like this).

Unity's parkour dude, running with Mecanim

Mecanim is a feature that allows you to use one animation you create for one model to be adjusted to other sorts of animated models, and have that animation adjust to the model and adjust smoothly between other animations.  It's just a fantastic feature and it's one that I've been watching them develop for a while.

It not only makes the characters look incredibly fluid with more natural motions in action, but it runs incredibly well on platforms without a heavy memory and processing cost (it runs even with mobile devices!), and most of time, it saves developers time.  Go here to watch a video to see Mecanim in effect.

There are so many goodies that Unity 4 now brings to the table that I will postpone the Cyka: Steamed Edition demo for Steam (developed with UDK) just to focus on fully utilizing Unity 4 for the standard non-Steam DRM-free cross-platform edition of Cyka (which would also save me from giving a whopping 25% of my Kickstarter funds just to Epic Games alone, just to use UDK at first).  I'm still making Cyka: Steamed Edition, because I still want a Steam-powered version for both PC and Mac.  But right now, Unity 4 really came at a great time, and I really want to give the main cross-platform desktop and mobile versions of Cyka my full attention with Unity 4.

- Brian