Greetings Pioneers!

It’s been a week of long hours but epic progress this week. We’re debugging the new inventory, creating new armour sets and big boss fights…

Here’s what we’ve been up to:

John – Lead Designer

I’ve been pushing the team like a slave driver all week in order to get the work done that we need to for SXSW.

Matt – Art Director

The Paladin armor set has been on the cards this week, baking and exporting the components that will be interchangeable on the characters under suit. Been working closely with Joe on this one so everything is structured the same in engine ready for swapping of the individual parts.

Lee – Technical Director

This week I’ve fixed a few very rare crashes with the AI. I’ve also been working on perfecting the combat with the new Juggernaut. It’s taken longer than hoped just because of what we are trying to do with the combat for these larger creatures.

Tristan – Senior Developer

This week I have been working on implementing the save functionality for the new inventory system as well as working on bugs with the inventory overall.

Yves – Senior Developer

I have been working hard to eliminate all of the bugs to do with our new inventory and build features.

Joe – Environment Artist

Big push this week on getting the Cybermancer armour model, textures and weighting complete and in-engine!

Ricky – Developer

Cleaning up the UI visuals after getting the new system functionally complete, all the while  squishing bugs.

Marcin – Designer

This week has been all about tooth pain and the Juggernaut. Lauren, Lee and I have worked quite extensively on polishing its various behaviours, reactions and attacks, from a charge, stomp, death and all the way to its reaction to being pulled and smashed.

Lauren – Animator

This week I have been working with Marcin and Lee on the Juggernaut encounter, animating attacks and finishing moves. We wanted the encounter to feel amazing, and although it’s got a while to go before it’s ready to go in game it’s looking pretty sweet. No sneak peeks just yet, you’ll have to wait and see… 🙂

Simone – Concept Artist

Hi Everyone! This week I’ve been working on new scopes for our weapons, such as Iron Sights. Also this week I’ve started work on a list of different utilities beginning with the Small Wall Storage unit.

Andy – Lead QA

This week I had the opportunity to briefly get into the engine and carry out some remedial tasks for the new inventory system. Once these were complete it was business as usual, I tested the new armoury, lockboxes, drop bags and audio as well as the new inventory. It appears we have loads of cool stuff coming your way very soon

See you in the fray!

-Team Flix

 
Greetings Pioneers!

Things are moving along swimmingly this week. We are finishing up the new inventory system to be feature-complete, hooking up the UI and upgrades and testing the new storage utilities. We have also been making some key adjustments to the Materialise Module, allowing for modifications of existing structures.

Want to fortify a wall? You will be able to simply aim at the wall with the fortifications modifier active and the matching fortification hologram will automatically be selected. Want to add a light? Simply aim at a wall or ceiling with the lights modifier. After today we will be in the debugging stages of these features so hopefully you won’t have long to wait before you can play with them!

John – Lead Designer

Paperwork and more paperwork, and spreadsheets! In the midst of all the numbers I’ve been planning for our SxSW visit with Andy and helping the guys structure gameplay footage and prototypes for our next milestones. Some of which we’re hoping to give early previews of at SxSW! In addition to this we’re looking at degradation, which leads me to a few design questions i’ve got for you;

1. How would you feel about food stores in the game, farming, depreciation of resources and the like?
2. If we were able to add either progression (XP, more unlocks, utilities etc.) or Enemies and drops (Juggernaut fights and boss style encounters etc.), which would you, the community like to see first?
3. New Weapons, Armour or New Tool upgrades/Smash “moves” and Combo’s – which would you like to see first?

And finally…

1. Is gibbing (blowing heads off your enemies or pulling apart an Ika using the Tool) high on your priority list? (In multiplayer this could be interesting…!)

Marcin put this together from one of our design discussions following up from the work last week for those people interested;

Beyond this i’ve been working through the UK Tax Relief forms for the amazing people at the BFI to sign off so that we can put the funding back into production. FUN! If any of you are UK based Indie Dev’s who want to talk this process through with me, feel free to drop me a mail at info [at] flixinteractive [dot] com

I can’t wait to get back to designs and work through the new inventory crafting and items this week coming!

Matt – Art Director

Been working with Marcin on more polished destruction visuals for the build assets this week which will be appearing in our next build update! This has involved making multiple components break properly and fall apart with particles and sound effects so the bases feel more real!

All my efforts for the next fortnight are on helping to polish the new UI, Modelling block outs for the new Bolt Gun, and the armour set game meshes for the Paladin.

Lee – Technical Director

I’ve been working with Lauren this week trying to get the IKA landing properly so they can perform one of their attacks. It’s getting there but will need more work. I’ve also been making a few changes to neutral-aggressive fauna like the Swamp Walker so that if you do get into combat with them your Turrets will help protect you.

Tristan – Senior Developer

This week we have been making a push to get the majority of the new inventory system completed. I have been working primarily on the crafting station as well as the new save version for the entire inventory system as well as helping out with the new module upgrade logic.

Joe – Environment Artist

I’ve finished off my tweaks to the high-resolution model of the ‘Elephant’ and done a basic colour pass. Today I’ve moved off that to prioritise finishing the model of one of our two new Pioneer armour sets – the Cybermancer set! Exciting stuff!

Yves – Senior Developer

A massive grind at the new inventory, this will form the backbone of new game play elements to come out in the year.

Ricky – Developer

New Inventory system, I’ve been converting the Build Menu into the new Inventory system so it is still useable, aswell as seeing to the needs of the new Modifications which are going to be available in it..

Marcin – Designer

Marcin is away right now and cannot answer the phone. If you’d like to, please leave your name and message after the inappropriate image of me on holiday…. beeeep

Disclaimer: This pic is over 3 years old and Marcin hasn’t had any time to party hard since then… 🙁

Tom – Character Artist

Finished off the game model for the ‘Bear’ this week! this monster really needs a name, so lets see some suggestions in the comments people 🙂

Amar – Audio Designer

These past few weeks I have been giving the game audio some much needed TLC!

I have been working on the forest and swamp ambient sounds and the placement of them in the current map. In the new map I have been working on the waterfalls; small, medium and large each having their unique features. Also creating underwater sound effects as well as the wind.

For the enemies I have worked on improving the IKA and IKA viper reaction sound effects and the various Stalker growls. The hives have also had some work for the damage sounds, spawning enemies, and destruction has also been added which needs integrating within the engine. Generators, Micro Construction Kit, and the armory bench now have sounds for when they are activated, active and deactivated.

Currently I’m working on the sounds for the Juggernaut, such as the various growls and burrowing.

Lauren – Animator

This week I’ve been continuing setting up landing on the IKA with Lee. I have also been prototyping what we call creature limb gibbing. This essentially is having the limbs of creatures break away when they die (or explode). The next stage of this should eventually be that you will be able to rip small creatures apart if two of you smash it in opposite directions. Yay alien gore!

Simone – Concept Artist

Hi Guys! This week I’ve been working on changes to the Sieger creature, working with Matt on some new scopes and the all new and shiny Bolt Launcher for all your rainbow shooting needs! Okay it doesn’t shoot rainbows (dreams dashed all on the ground), but it’s pretty awesome looking!

Andy – Lead QA

Hey, my weeks has been focused on the new modification mechanic, making sure all the lights, doors and fortifications work as intended. It’s actually made building and fortifying a base much easier and more instinctive. I also spend some time of the Steam forums replying to comments from the community. John also asked me to come up with some merchandise ideas for SXSW and although I have a few, it’d be cool to see what kind of things you guys could come up with. Feel free to tweet us or message us on facebook with any ideas you have.

See you in the fray!

-Team Flix

Greetings Pioneers!

We’re making great progress on the new inventory system this week, setting up lock boxes, drop bags, and recovery of items on player death. We’ve also been smashing bugs and continuing work on new features and creatures including the IKA Drone featured in last week’s blog update.

Here’s what we’ve been up to:

Matt – Art Director

Started breaking down the weapons into their respective parts ready for our modular system. The new system will allow up to 20 different variations of weaponry across stocks barrels and grips, so as you can imagine I’ve been a busy boy. This also includes blocking out new weapon parts for our grenade launcher and bolt launcher.

Our first few sets of character armor are undergoing some heavy duty work as well this week, so expect to see it enter the game shortly after the new inventory is running smoothly.

Lastly I’ve been setting up improved destruction visuals on our build assets that went in last week, which will hopefully be ready for our next hotfix/build!

Tom – Character Artist

Just finished up the high poly model of ‘The bear’ this creature gives you those kind of hugs that are just to die for.

Lee – Technical Director

This week I have continued with bug fixing and making optimisations where I can. I’ve also continued with the planning of Allied AI which the player can build and control. This should then allow the player to set up AI Patrols or able to help the player as they explore the world and keep the native creatures in check.

Tristan – Senior Developer

This week I have been working on updating our weapon trace logic so that it’s ready for the implementation of different damage zones on AI and players. We are looking forward to the days when we will be able to SMG headshot an Ika in the face. I have also been doing the usual bug fixes. More specifically to to do with foliage (indestructible trees were not a feature) and melee (hopefully no more random one hit insta kills).

Lauren – Animator

This week I have been continuing work on the Allied IKA Drones, setting up their blueprints, attack animations and landing states. This is very much work in progress, they have a tendency to blow eachother up at the moment!

John – Lead Designer

This week I have been working on a load of different systems with the team including a design that consolidates the ways you interact with the world when using the Energy Harness (Right mouse button). It’s evident that people always need basic build and resource gathering interactions and so we’re moving those modules/their effects to become a staple part of the Tool itself and not optional Modules.

The real focus has been on looking at how we’ll handle all of the loot drops in the game including items, resources and energy. Our system had become crazily complicated and so we cut it all down into the following categories that we want to implement as the staple interactive components within the world:

• Targets
  • Have HP, can be destroyed, can be smashed, produce either an Item Generator or a Pick-up when destroyed, e.g. Enemies, KO’d enemies, Sac Plants, Turrets, etc.
• Item Generators
  • Have HP, can be destroyed, cannot be smashed, produce Pick-ups when destroyed, e.g. Trees, Rocks, Structures, Utilities, Corpses, etc.
• Pick-ups
  • Have no HP, will time-out if in the world too long, instantly go into the player inventory when interacted with if the player has capacity, has a Unit Weight for the purposes of Inventory Space, e.g. Energy, Resources Materials/Food, Inventory Drops (either individual items or groups of inventory items, such as a player inventory that drops upon death or a weapon crafted in an Armory)

This lets us form a foundation for all inventory drops that will be hitting when we release the new inventory system sometime within the next few weeks. This also has some crazy links to player Armour and the Robotic Allies that we want to implement too.
One weird, unrelated question that I want to ask is – how do you feel about certain armor types having HP of their own?

Yves – Senior Developer

This week I have been working on Modifiers. This is a system that allows for the recognition of a structure so that the appropriate fortification can be selected automatically, this should make fortifying your bases that little bit easier! In addition there will be a modifier for the placement of lights and doors within other structures. I have also been debugging like a boss.

Ricky – Developer

This week I’ve gone to a place that I don’t know where I’m going to. Mysterious things will undoubtedly happen. I am surrounded by colour. There is a vast expanse above my head. All thought has begun to evaporate from my mind. I only seem to think of food and meow. I’m losing touch with Meow meow. Meowww.

Marcin – Designer

The Inventory is beginning to take shape nicely, so I jumped onto the work needed for the objects that let you interact with it: the Lockbox, the Armoury (crafting station), and the “Lootbag”. Matt has done the models a while ago, and I was finally able to put the objects together and see them working.

On top of that setup I have been making necessary system preparations for the blocks destruction effects update. The blocks’ visuals have already changed twice since those were last touched, so it’s long due. As for the designs John and I have looked into unifying the functionality of the Energy Harness module, as well as making the fortification system much more user friendly in the nearest future.

Simone – Concept Artist

This week I’ve been working with Matt to finish and refine designs for the grenade launcher and the engineering station as well as start work on the Bolt launcher and the repair station/purifier.

Joe – Environment Artist

I’ve spent all week working on removing the red arrow from the Laser Posts. It’s a mammoth task and I don’t expect to get it in until early summer.

Just kidding, I’ve mainly been working with Ricky on the implementation of visuals for the new inventory HUD, creating and assigning various icons, descriptions and shaders. I’ve also looked at HUD graphics for shiny new things such as building Modifiers, the Armoury and the Lockbox, and added holograms for the Industrial Fortifications. Today I’m working on tweaking Tom’s awesome work with the ‘Elephant’ creature (name TBC…).

Andy – Lead QA

I often find myself writing the same things (more or less) in the dev blog. However this week, as recommended by the witty Matthew Clark I am going to talk about Knitting and Happiness…apparently.

I know nothing about knitting, but the trick to being happy is fixing bugs, and bugs I be fixing. By finding excellent reproduction steps. Been hunting down those elusive crash bugs this week in particular.

QUALITY ASSURED! ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)>⌐■-■

See you in the fray!

-Team Flix