Gemini revived!

So I started working on Gemini again last night. For the moment I am going to say the project is revived. I actually enjoy working on it, I just find it hard to get motivated enough to get back to it when I take a break

I added a new character, a new location and defined one of the key characters that I had been skimming over. I now have the first act scripted, well keyed. I need to write the dialogue and all that but for the better part I have the overarching story for the first section complete. I also have the start and end points of the middle act which is more game based than story based anyway but I need to fill it in to get it right.

The concluding act I have an idea of in my head but I'm not sure how things will pan out yet. I'ts a wait and see type of moment

The wall is a wall, pre-rendered cutscenes and 3d me!

I have finaly begun the arduous process of compiling the story of Gemini for scripting. I have post-its on my wall. I have to say the process is quite fun to do once you get started. Crank up the volume on a youtube playlist, grab a drink and start writing and sticking. It even helped me come up with some great new characters and a cool baddie. I have noticed that even the wall is limited in space so I may end up building the story in the 3 acts seperatly. (you have to have heard of 3 act story structure in english class...)

I have also decided to consider possibly making 3D prerendered cutscenes for the intro and ending. I am already decided on doing a styalised opening cinematic but I may wind up creating a cool "realistic" video opening with nice looking characters.

The final thing I want to mention is the FREE face generating software I discovered today. It lets you easily make a 3d head model that looks kindof like a pair of source photos. The only problem is that I have been having trouble getting blender's hair system to work on them. If I can I will use it to render cutscenes and possible the in game sprites... and I went to all that trouble on the vector sprites...

Template finished, lots of rules

So I have finaly finished working on the template for the RPG I am working on. Boy it took ages,  and I was only tracing someone's pixel art template to get a nice vector one! I think it is quite good and am very proud of it. After I have filled in a few more of my character sheets I will start vector spriting my characters.

The sprite to the left is an example of what a character may look like. It is my first attempt at drawing the lead character. His likeness will probably change quite a bit but this should give a gist of the style of graphics I am going for.

I finaly got round to reading the rules and boy are there a lot of them! Many of them I would expect but I was suprised to learn that I would have to include a splash screen at the start of the game (and they are strict about its presentation, very!). Not only that but there is a file size limit. Not overly suprising and It realy just presents a bit more of a self limiting challenge but I hadn't even concidered it. It looks like some of the fancyer looking sections I have been planning are out. The limit is moderate, 50MB, not tiny but not cutscene and audio friendly. I was planing to include some of my "dream scenes" set to songs that I love and that have inspired me over the years to make games/ other art but now it would be a true challenge to fit them in. Hopefully I will get to keep a couple of them. 

Well I have a lot of planning left to do. I cant start map design untill I have the story cemented so I will begin on cementing tomorrow. I also need my list of items, attacks, baddies and party members so I can finish designing the battle system.

A title and a logo

 So I spent a large part of the day working on a title and story for my RPG. I have the basic plotline worked out but need to fill in a few gaps allong the way. not only that but I managed to throw together a logo for the game (it's actualy an old photo of me vectorised).

So the battle system is my current main concern. The majority of the planning has been done but I need to compleat the character list (playable and bosses at least) as well as a list of all weapon upgrades, spells and items. I'm well on the way though. I'm not sure If there will be "states" probably sleep and poison at least. 

In tearms of length I know it is a competition entry so It shouldn't be too long but I'm aiming for it to be between 8-20 hours depending on sidequests and how good you are at solving my fiendish puzzels. 

Apart from this project I will hopefully enter 2 more games that are a lot shorter but inovative in different ways. One is a platfromer that uses only one button, the seccond is another "eyetracker" game. This time a FPS. The main problem with FPS games is the dedication it takes to put the graphics togther. Unless I deside to styalise them in an easy to make way it means a lot of poly modeling which is why I will leave it 'till last. Not only that but as it is 3d I will wind up having to code in in Blitz3d which I havent touched for about a year!

The other two projects are kind of secondary entries that I would like to make some day, hopefully for the competition, but if not some day. Right now however I have to focus on Gemini, who's story I am quite proud of.

Retro Remakes, a game for Helen

So right when I am working on my ultra fun high octane fighter I hear about this competition run by retro-remakes. It is a bog-standard game creation comp except for one entry category "A game for Helen". Basically it is a competition to create a game that can be played by the mobility impaired.

Obviously if I were to just create a game following these guidelines getting it to the right people would be a tricky task, that is why I have decided that I will put the game I'm working on currently on ice (always a bad choice) and enter the competition to support the cause. I was unable to come up with a way to make the full version of my game compatible with the constraints put upon me by the mobility impaired controls (mouse and left click) so I have decided to work on an RPG... could Final Fantasy be influencing me? I have never wanted to work on an RPG before...

Anyway I have the basic movement engine up and running (in game maker) and I am now going to begin working on battle systems and character design. The entirety of my source material will be released free to encourage others to mod and edit it. The thinking behind this is that more of these RPGs will spring up that are fun to play for everyone, disabled or not.

The way I hope to avoid falling into a trap of developing for only the niche is that I will go about creating an RPG and only the controls will be affected by the constrictions.

Here is hoping it is a success