KickStarter Himeko Sutori, tactical JRPG, 100+ unit armies

[SirSingAlot]

darn, i was so looking forward to Creepy Girl Army 1

 

[Nathaniel3W]

Thanks Crooked Bee for continuing to follow my painfully slow developments. I had been hoping to work on the game full time with some Kickstarter funds, but I'll just keep plugging away on nights and weekends for now.

darn, i was so looking forward to Creepy Girl Army 1

Ha! Well SirSingAlot, you may still get your chance. All you have to do is a recruit a whole LOT of random characters. Surely some of them will end up being identical.

I just wanted to post a quick update here with some new screenshots and stuff:

Combat animations:

Improved lighting and particle effects and stuff:

And I've got a lot of under-the-hood improvements that you don't see here, but I hope to show off a new combat demo video soon that will show ranged attacks, mid-battle dialog, victory conditions, and lots of new content. I'm still a long way from finishing the game, but at least I'm at a point where I can actually list the things I still have to do.

I had been hoping to finish the entire game engine, release a demo, and then beg for Kickstarter funds to buy more content, all by October, but maybe I'll have to shoot for next spring or something. We'll see how it goes.

 

[Tzaero]

Looks pretty good so far.
I'd be down for a kickstarter if you showed off some more features or plans atleast for the overworld and political bastardry.

 

[Mr. Pink]

Any plans on making the artstyle more cohesive? I don't think 3d shadows and spritework should go together...

Looking forward to this game.

 

[laclongquan]

It look like a turn based tactical game.

Problem number one: when we use large formation, which codex powergamers can prone to do, it might put heavier demand on graphic hardware. Well, not problem as such but it pop up on my head first thing.

Problem number two: when we use large formation, which codex powergamers can prone to do, it can put heavier demand on AI processing time. We are talking about longer time between turns here. it is the weakness of Turnbased combat, especially large scale battle. You might want to think about faster/skipping animation to save time. AND how to reduce the time process and display units in action.

Problem number three: Not as such but Himeko Sutori is better name than Princess Child Story. The first name is hard to understand, yet somehow familiar (due to much Japanese influence in games) but the second name is a bit too generic.

 

[Nathaniel3W]

Tzaero, thanks. I'm not quite confident about a being able to launch a successful Kickstarter, but maybe soon. I have some plans for the overworld and plenty of political bastardry. I just need to get them written out for everyone to see. I have the roughest of outlines here.

Mr. Pink, you know, that's been a challenge since the first day. At first I wanted to make something as graphically simple as FFT, but there were no ready solutions. And the more I tried integrating 2D characters into 3D environments using an off-the-shelf game engine, the more I saw that they didn't fit in well. I've tried uniting them visually with the outline filter, but not everyone likes it. I tried giving the characters shadows to make them fit into the 3D world, but I know the shadows can look especially jarring when the sprites have their edges facing toward the light source. Games like Paper Mario got away with unabashedly drawing 2D characters (and even driving the point home with turning and bending things to emphasize their 2-dimensionality). I guess I'm hoping now that my players and I can just accept that these are 2D sprites.

And laclongquan, you raise some valid points, but I've found that the number of characters really doesn't affect performance much. Each character adds a whopping 2 triangles that have to be drawn. (Each one is just a rectangle.) In 100-vs-100 battles, with each army having 10 squads of 10, the battles move pretty swiftly. I actually had to slow down the combat quite a bit, adding more wait time between actions, so that the player can see who is attacking and damaging whom. Adding more units and more characters will of course increase the amount of time it takes to finish a round, but the combat is pretty simple (you can move, melee attack, ranged attack, and hold position) and the action moves a lot faster than say XCOM, which usually involves no more than 6 vs 6 at a time.

And I decided to go with Himeko Sutori exactly because I thought it sounded like a Japanese company trying to market a game in an English-speaking market. Those are the classic games that I love, and that's what I'm trying to recreate.

 

[Perkel]

Tzaero, thanks. I'm not quite confident about a being able to launch a successful Kickstarter, but maybe soon.

This is the reason why you have chance to actually run successful kickstarter. Unlike some other guys who posted here you know that your ks have little chance right now. It means you have some bigger picture look what others ks idiots lack.

Things that would improve potential kickstarter:

- If you have some experience in IT. Tell about it. It doesn't matter if you worked for bank or shop. It will mean you are no random modder.
- IF you are random modder with no experience then school. Yes getting bachelor also legitimizes you. So if you finished some school then also mention it.
- If you are random modder and didn't finish any IT oriented school. You need to work on your game to show that:

- you have no trouble creating game in therm of performance. aka FIX FPS FOR TRAILER. If you have barebones game like yours where you don't have much on screen (and 2d characters at that) fix the framerate to at least 30fps. 60fps would show you have some skills. In other words you have the skills to actually build game and not be weighted down under shit ton amount of bugs eventually releasing game in 2028.
- Work on art. Stylize graphic approach. You currently are using realistic theme that is resource intensive (you need to ton of time to paint textures and work out your meshes). Realistic graphic looking game needs to be either stylized or good looking. Your game looks like unfinished NWN2 mod currently.

Here is what i am talking about:

That game is still good looking even now. If you look at complexity of those scenes you will know that you could create assets for those levels in less than day because meshes are extreamly cheap to make. BUT IT DOESN't mean you should go for kiddie look or something. If you don't have ability to create such work out your kickstarter to include artist money.

- FIX YOUR CAMERA. Free moving camera is neat in FPS you create tactical combat game. CLARITY should be your concern. IF you set up camera and lock it also it means you can work more quickly (you don't need to render what is behind building or ever create those assets in some cases). Also if you fix camera like in above screenshots case your textures don't need to be so detailed.

- UI show nice workable UI even if it doesn't work. For game that will be all about working with UI you need to show UI that is nice.

NOW GENERAL THINGS:

- story lore and so on. No one will give a shit about random battle maker these days (unless it is fucking deep as bottomless pit)
- gameplay. What it will be all about. THIS IS IMPORTANT. You don't need to show it in trailer just tell what is your design for battles and other stuff and better be good with it. RPG codex is place when you can freely talk about it and get proper feedback.
- your business plan. Why do you need money, how you will spend it, will you work beside this project etc. This is crucial for no name people. Knowing 30k€ is not some artificial number is much better for people who want to pledge money.

 

[Nathaniel3W]

Thanks for all the pointers Perkel. I'll be sure to include my bio in the Kickstarter campaign. (My day job involves programming in python, writing algorithms for finding patterns in big data, and crunching the numbers on Spark clusters on AWS.)

The game runs perfectly smoothly on my home desktop (i5 4 cores, with an older Radeon). I just used crappy screen recording software that was trying to write to a spinning disk instead of an SSD. When I record the next video, I'll be using a Mac with i7s, more RAM, and an SSD.

I can see what you mean about needing to stylize the 3D assets more. I just don't have the time and skills to model everything from scratch--I bought these from the Unity Asset Store (but had to go through a lot of effort to make them usable in UDK)--and I can't make them more realistic, and besides more realistic wouldn't necessarily fit well with the sprite characters. I could try to unite everything visually with filters--like I did with the outline filter, but maybe I could do more to unite the colors.

Since that first video, I've also changed how the camera works. In the video, it climbs up and down when it passes over things like houses. Now it stays level the whole time and I think it looks a lot better that way.

I'm adding a few items to the battle UI--buttons for switching from melee to missile attacks. The biggest part of the UI is in the menu system, which is incredibly complicated (from a programming perspective, that is. It should be perfectly simple to the player). And if people play this game the way I play most tactical RPGs, then you'll be spending a lot of time in menus switching your characters to new classes and putting on new equipment.

As for story and lore, I have a lot of specifics planned, but I'm focusing on getting the game engine totally working first. And as excited as I am to tell my own story here, I do want to let players imagine their own games too. I won't condone plagiarizing anyone's work, but I think it would be cool to see someone make a Game of Thrones mod, or retell FFT on the scale it deserves with huge battles. And considering how many people are making RPG Maker games, I think a lot of them would like to make a game in a totally ready-to-use 3D game engine, with all the possibilities that UDK can unlock.

And as I get closer to finishing the game, it's easier for me to estimate where I want to use the money. Basically, I don't think I'll spend a single cent to pay my own salary while working on the game. By the time I'm ready, the game engine will be pretty much finished, and I'll just want to buy more assets. (I've been working with some artists and a composer, and I'll want to pay for them to really flesh out the game.) But in some ways I'm tempted just to ask for something tiny, like $5,000 to spend on the professional licenses I need to sell the game, and get a couple more spritesheets and some premade music, and just release a short game and the dev kit. I would love to get a million-dollar Kickstarter and release a total AAA competitor, but I also think that would just add unnecessary years to development time. I think I'll probably end up asking for $10,000, and then set a lot of stretch goals.

 

[Mr. Pink]

As a fan of SRPGs and someone who always wanted to make my own, I'm pretty excited to see one getting made by someone solo.

Regarding art direction: I would give up the unity stock assets and work with simple placeholders until the game becomes more realized. Do you have a specific vision or style of what you want your game to look like? Any art or pictures that you want to copy/adapt?

 

[Nathaniel3W]

As a fan of SRPGs and someone who always wanted to make my own, I'm pretty excited to see one getting made by someone solo.

Thanks. Making a game solo is pretty demanding, but I think I'm proving that even something on this scale can be done solo if you're dedicated enough. A Kickstarter in the future though certainly will improve things a lot with more artwork, music, etc.

Do you have a specific vision or style of what you want your game to look like? Any art or pictures that you want to copy/adapt?

I don't really have a specific look I'm going for, but I really do wish I had a dedicated concept artist and 3D modeler. I just grabbed some of the nicer assets off the Unity Asset Store (https://www.assetstore.unity3d.com/en/#!/content/13757 is the one you're seeing the most of), and I'm going to stick mostly with the same artist, and maybe some other assets that blend in with his. I'll keep improving my level design skills, and maybe I just need to mix things up a little more, as much as can be done within the constraints of a grid battlefield. Of course, if I can land a big enough Kickstarter, then I'll get unique assets made and hire a professional level designer, but I think if I can make do with what I have for now, then that's what I'll keep doing.

I'm really glad to see things coming along and glad to see some interest here. I'll keep coming back and posting and hopefully you guys can keep me pointed in the right direction.

 

[Perkel]

You mentioned that you will "finish" engine.

IF you could include playable proof of concept like one level with some mechanics and something that works you can easily ask more than 10k.

10k imo is good goal for one person. If you will show good pitch then those 10k either way will go up to something minimum 20-30k.

As for art. Like i said current art is kind of doesn't really fit sprites. Imo to realistic. Like i said think about stylization. Just for example few filters in photoshop on textures could completely change how game looks.

 

[Zed]

Jap-style tactical combat game... with no sex scenes. Bold.

 

[Nathaniel3W]

Jap-style tactical combat game... with no sex scenes. Bold.

Yes, indeed. But as-is, if the player unequips his armor, then his character will walk around naked. I don't think I would know anyone who would get excited about that, but to each his own.

In other news, I took the forum's advice and started a Kickstarter Reminder signup over here. Anyone interested can enter their information and I promise to never ever sell your email address to spammers and I will only send you 3 emails: One to tell you when the Kickstarter starts, one to tell you when it's about to end, and one more when the game is ready for sale. I was hoping to do a Kickstarter this fall, but I think I'll get a better response the closer I am to finishing the game, so I'll wait to launch, probably in spring 2016.

In other news, I'm adding ranged attacks to the game right now.

That's going to add a whole new dimension to the combat.

I'm also adding child-size sprites, manual squad creation, people who don't just stand there marching in place. And everyone kneels down when their HP is low. More details and screenshots here.

Thanks everyone very much for all of your input and help.

 

[Nathaniel3W]

New dev build gameplay video up on YouTube. Check out ranged attacks, new character classes, new equipment, and a bunch of bugs I need to fix.



The rogue automatically targets the weakest enemy. The ranger can launch ranged attacks. Ranged attacks let you damage the enemy without risk of melee counterattack, but ranged units and casters take 1.5x damage in melee combat. Next up I'll be introducing the barbarian, who targets the strongest enemy, but does extra damage. With different combinations of units, you can make specialized squads or well rounded squads and play as you like.

 

[Mr. Pink]

ranged units and casters take 1.5x damage in melee combat

Is this nessessary? Why not just give them less hp? Or ranged damage resistance.

 

[Crooked Bee]

Ranged attacks let you damage the enemy without risk of melee counterattack

This sounds potentially overpowered. As Mr Pink said, perhaps you could ranged damage resistance to some (types of) units.

 

[Nathaniel3W]

Is this nessessary? Why not just give them less hp? Or ranged damage resistance.

You comments show me that you already see that I need to do some balancing. I don't want players to just fill their armies with only ranged units. I want melee units to tear up ranged units when they fight one-on-one. I think that trying to protect your ranged units by keeping melee units in front of them (either in the internal squad formation, or on the larger battle map), at the same time trying to attack enemy ranged units using your own melee units, is going to be a fun part of the battle, and I want to encourage that.

Why not just give them less hp? I have a formula that calculates everyone's max hp, and I think I would like to keep that formula consistent. Also, players like bonuses, but not penalties. And I think they would like seeing more damage more than they would like seeing less hp and less damage. Maybe I need to display more information to let the players know what damage bonuses are going into effect, but that's another issue.

This sounds potentially overpowered. As Mr Pink said, perhaps you could ranged damage resistance to some (types of) units.

Yes, definitely has potential for being overpowered, and I'm trying to find a way to balance that. In particular, I need to reduce the amount of damage the mages' AoE attack does. (I also need to up the damage on those rogues' daggers.) One other thing that I'm going to do to add balance is give shields a very significant defensive bonus, so that knights will be able to shrug off those missile attacks better. They won't be invincible, but they'll be able to take some abuse. What I'm imagining is this:

Knights on the front line of a melee squad will have heavy armor and shields, helping them to mitigate damage. They won't be huge damage dealers.
Rogues in the second row of a melee squad will get targeted less often (unless the squad is flanked) and they'll pick off enemy casters in melee because they attack the weakest instead of the closest unit.
Clerics in the second row of a melee squad will hopefully keep the knights healed up and won't get targeted too often (but of course, if they have less hp than the knights, enemy rogues will target them first)
Barbarians in a melee squad will target the strongest enemy and do extra damage, but they won't be carrying shields, leaving them more vulnerable to both melee and ranged attacks. These will be the units you want to take down a boss unit quickly.
Casters and ranged units will be able to dish out damage from afar, but you'll need to keep melee units in front of them for protection, because they're weak in melee. The usefulness of ranged units should depend largely on the player's ability to place them and protect them.

 

[Nathaniel3W]

So I decided I needed a new logo. I've been posting new screenshots showing off new content and stuff that I'm learning in all aspects of game development, and with lots of new screenshots at Greenlight, I decided I needed to replace the "creepy girl army" screenshot I had been using as my game's cover art. Here's what I'm going with for now:

Now, I know what that looks like. I want this game to evoke a certain classic in the genre. I just hope I'm not overdoing it. But just in case, I do have some backups that I might go with instead. Any thoughts?

 

[Mr. Pink]

i still think himeko sutori is a stupid name.

even as a jap it sounds weird.

 

[Ninjerk]

I think you should not do that.

 

[Mustawd]

So I decided I needed a new logo. I've been posting new screenshots showing off new content and stuff that I'm learning in all aspects of game development, and with lots of new screenshots at Greenlight, I decided I needed to replace the "creepy girl army" screenshot I had been using as my game's cover art. Here's what I'm going with for now:

Now, I know what that looks like. I want this game to evoke a certain classic in the genre. I just hope I'm not overdoing it. But just in case, I do have some backups that I might go with instead. Any thoughts?

I think you should reconsider the logo. Unless you want to be sued by these guys:

 

[Nathaniel3W]

Yeah, maybe I should change the logo... I've had a few people recommend the red/black version. Then again, maybe upsetting a big RPG studio would make for good publicity. :3 No, I should change it...

And Mr. Pink, yeah, that was kind of the point. I'm an American who picked what sounded like the kind of Engrish title a poorly translated Japanese game would get. I think I hit the nail on the head if it sounds wrong to an actual Japanese speaker. I just hope the title doesn't get in the way of your enjoyment of the game.

 

[Dreaad]

You know, what I've always wanted in one of these games. The inability for ranged units to fire when adjacent to an enemy, less chance to hit, or at least to suffer an aoo.

Just a thought.

 

[Nathaniel3W]

That's possible to do, and I was thinking that later I would repurpose my engine for use as a more traditional tactical RPG where you control one unit at a time. I think that sort of feature would make more sense there. But then again, I've also seen this, which makes me rethink the whole short-range penalty:



That, plus the Lord of the Rings movies, which I'm not saying are realistic, but they do show how deadly a high-level fantasy archer could be at short range.

 

[Ninjerk]

Probably a penalty to getting rushed with a shield or kicked in the dick while you're nocking an arrow