Indie Call of Saregnar - a Betrayal at Krondor-inspired RPG

[Rhuantavan]

Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/CallOfSaregnar

https://www.callofsaregnar.com




https://af.gog.com/game/call_of_saregnar?as=1649904300

Spoiler

This is Call of Saregnar, a (BaK & RoA-influenced) low-magic story- and exploration-centric RPG that I've been developing for the past couple of years. If you want to know more, just hop over to http://www.callofsaregnar.com.

If you want to support the development of the game, please check out my development diary on Patreon.

Thanks for looking!

Note: Screenshots updated 22. July 2018

 

[ERYFKRAD]

Like I said before, BaK vibes are hella strong with this one.

 

[vean]

I hope you're making an entity manager, AI, physics, etc together with this.

If this is just a renderer and your first project you might find that the way you're made it doesn't fit well for developing the rest of the engine and then you'll cry and abandon it.

 

[Rhuantavan]

I hope you're making an entity manager, AI, physics, etc together with this.

If this is just a renderer and your first project you might find that the way you're made it doesn't fit well for developing the rest of the engine and then you'll cry and abandon it.

Don't worry, I believe I know what I am doing

On the code front I already have a number of subsystems in place: data parsing, lua scripting, world entities management, a conversation system, an inventory/skills/attr system, a rudimentary turn-based combat system, etc. Some of those have to be rewritten or modified since I moved to 3D, but I don't see any forthcoming problems.

 

[Excidium II]

I like the grafics. Looks propa old school and not asset store garbage.

 

[Rhuantavan]

I like the grafics. Looks propa old school and not asset store garbage.

It is 0% asset store garbage

Edit: I'm a liar, the lighting/clouds system is 100% asset store goodness.

 

[Wayward Son]

Can't wait till twenty years from now when this is done (Just kidding, don't ever get discouraged, you'd better finish this)

 

[Jaesun]

Good luck on this!

 

[Rhuantavan]

I've been working for a couple of days on an inn. Here's the result:

 

[Wayward Son]

Looks nice. You're doing a good job and have inspired me to attempt to learn Visual Basic to try and make a dungeon crawler (again again)

 

[Rhuantavan]

Looks nice. You're doing a good job and have inspired me to attempt to learn Visual Basic to try and make a dungeon crawler (again again)

Thanks! Heh, my first language was VB. I even did a 1min dungeon crawler back then

 

[Rhuantavan]

Playing with lighting...

 

[Wayward Son]

Daamn, looks good. Like really good. Keep going man.

 

[Rhuantavan]

Thanks man, much appreciated!

 

[zwanzig_zwoelf]

The ground texture appears more pixellated, as in lower res. Maybe I'm nitpicking, but for me it looks like a minor (yet somewhat frustrating) inconsistency. It's not as bad as encountering a small crate with a 2048 texture slapped on it in the game with the target res set to 128 ppu, but still.

 

[Rhuantavan]

The ground texture appears more pixellated, as in lower res. Maybe I'm nitpicking, but for me it looks like a minor (yet somewhat frustrating) inconsistency. It's not as bad as encountering a small crate with a 2048 texture slapped on it in the game with the target res set to 128 ppu, but still.

It is lower res, yes. I did it for saving memory since each tile uses a different texture altogether and tex upon tex it might consume a lot. Still, I am not sure if it does consume so much mem, so I might have them in high res later... gotta study the subject, since I am not very familiar with 3d stuff.

Edit: I have doubled the terrain tex size and the memory impact is minimal... what do you know.

 

[zwanzig_zwoelf]

The ground texture appears more pixellated, as in lower res. Maybe I'm nitpicking, but for me it looks like a minor (yet somewhat frustrating) inconsistency. It's not as bad as encountering a small crate with a 2048 texture slapped on it in the game with the target res set to 128 ppu, but still.

It is lower res, yes. I did it for saving memory since each tile uses a different texture altogether and tex upon tex it might consume a lot. Still, I am not sure if it does consume so much mem, so I might have them in high res later... gotta study the subject, since I am not very familiar with 3d stuff.

You can make several large textures which contain 'sets' of unique small textures that can be UV mapped to the tiles and re-used accordingly for tiling and stuff. Re-using the same texture over and over should be somewhat cheaper on the memory, but if you're using too many tiles, I think it can slow things down, and the possible increase of polygons required for this task can also cause problems.

Also, if you're desperate to save the video memory:
1. Try turning the mipmaps off (looks like you've done it already);
2. Use crunched compression set to the max value when possible;
3. Add an option to change the draw distance if you're planning to keep the textures this way to let low-VRAM cards run the game + avoid setting the minimum resolution too high (e.g. 1280x720+);
4. You could also add a check to replace the textures with simple color materials if you're too far away from them. Could sacrifice some performance (potentially fixable by making the check occur every once in a while...), but if you're using unique textures, then it could be a nice way to save some memory AND keep the draw distance pretty high.

 

[Cosmo]

Playing with lighting...

Your night color is perfect, don't change it.

 

[Rhuantavan]

You can make several large textures which contain 'sets' of unique small textures that can be UV mapped to the tiles and re-used accordingly for tiling and stuff. Re-using the same texture over and over should be somewhat cheaper on the memory, but if you're using too many tiles, I think it can slow things down, and the possible increase of polygons required for this task can also cause problems.

Also, if you're desperate to save the video memory:
1. Try turning the mipmaps off (looks like you've done it already);
2. Use crunched compression set to the max value when possible;
3. Add an option to change the draw distance if you're planning to keep the textures this way to let low-VRAM cards run the game + avoid setting the minimum resolution too high (e.g. 1280x720+);
4. You could also add a check to replace the textures with simple color materials if you're too far away from them. Could sacrifice some performance (potentially fixable by making the check occur every once in a while...), but if you're using unique textures, then it could be a nice way to save some memory AND keep the draw distance pretty high.

Thanks for the info. Like I've said in the edit, the current setup uses little memory anyway. I've tried to have the textures crunched to 50 quality, increased the terrain tiles size to 512px, and the scene above uses only 110.3 MB. I do have the mipmaps on, since without them it is very jarring to the eyes.

 

[Siveon]

I have to agree with everyone so far, those early screens look pretty good. You can still get the Betrayal at Krondor vibes but in a relatively higher resolution. The lighting is also stellar. Let's hope its more than just a pretty face.

 

[Rhuantavan]

I have to agree with everyone so far, those early screens look pretty good. You can still get the Betrayal at Krondor vibes but in a relatively higher resolution. The lighting is also stellar. Let's hope its more than just a pretty face.

Thanks! I can only say that I have grand plans for the game: it is my life project after all Don't forget that it started as a glorified text-based rpg, which in my head already had to have other strong features (story, characters, combat, etc), since it had no 3D graphics. Although I had to drop one of the best features (Star Trail-inspired map travel and camping) once I added first-person exploration, I believe the game is just a bit more enjoyable now, as the original lacked exploration mechanics.
I can't say if I will finish it in 5, 10 years from now, but I will definitely finish it, since I care for it too much.

 

[ERYFKRAD]

Did nealiios ever have a look at this?

 

[Siveon]

I have to agree with everyone so far, those early screens look pretty good. You can still get the Betrayal at Krondor vibes but in a relatively higher resolution. The lighting is also stellar. Let's hope its more than just a pretty face.

Thanks! I can only say that I have grand plans for the game: it is my life project after all Don't forget that it started as a glorified text-based rpg, which in my head already had to have other strong features (story, characters, combat, etc), since it had no 3D graphics. Although I had to drop one of the best features (Star Trail-inspired map travel and camping) once I added first-person exploration, I believe the game is just a bit more enjoyable now, as the original lacked exploration mechanics.
I can't say if I will finish it in 5, 10 years from now, but I will definitely finish it, since I care for it too much.

Hopefully we'll all still be alive by then.

 

[Rhuantavan]

Did nealiios ever have a look at this?

No, but he saw and liked a screenshot

 

[Alchemist]

Playing with lighting...

Man, I just love the atmosphere of this night scene. Even with just these few elements, it already feels mysterious and interesting to explore. The low draw distance and fogged-out silhouettes in the distance really add to the effect.