Hi Folks!
An ongoing part of me now working on Hellscreen (close) to full time is that I am better able to relay development updates to you.
This will be a fairly frequent insight into what I am doing with the game and will often be behind the scenes and work in progress GIFS.
Some of the stuff won't be final game quality but will serve to show how the sausage is made.
I hope you will find it interesting and maybe even learn some tips and tricks as I learn them!
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So what have I been up to this week?
Well, aside from visiting EGX in London, I have been working on various level design sketches for #blocktober.
Blocktober is a yearly event that happens in October where game designers post on Twitter work-in-progress versions of levels they are creating.
Sometimes they are retrospectives, sometimes it's for new projects but it is always interesting to see levels at an early stage.
I decided to participate this year as a way to keep experimenting with new ways of creating cool maps and to really push how Blender (the 3d software I use for Hellscreen) to be a quick way to build levels.
Below you can see how I sketch the initial idea using edges as well as using Blender's annotation tool to make notes. I like to do these sketches fairly quickly and get them 3D so I can run around them fairly quickly, so I can iterate and improve fast.
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As well as many 3D level sketches, I also have also been working on some abstract VFX for some entities.
These again are just at the prototype stage to test if I could get a rough version of what I want in my head working.
Below is a living machine type effect and really gives a weird vibe. I am looking forward to working this into other artwork to create weird creatures.
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Here is a quick test I made to see how easy it is to get random light flickering using just shaders & textures. It still needs work but is a good start (and sparking all kinds of ideas!)
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Finally, I put one of the newer monolith models into the map/quick travel system.
The monoliths all will be designed to feature an element from the level they represent.
The map area is still in its infancy but its fun to jump there and have a "world within a world"
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That's all for now, hope you are digging the progress. Of course, the above is the tip of the iceberg as there is always little bug fixes, sketches and the rest which take up time. Stayed tuned more updates in the very near future!
Cheers!
Jamie D
Hellscreen Dev
https://twitter.com/uk_resistant
https://twitter.com/Hellscreen_game