Hey Dreamers! Adrian here.
May was a busy month for us over at Team Nemo! We've been toiling away at story sequences in our pre-existing levels, building more Befuddle Hall challenge levels that we mentioned in our previous update, adding new play mechanics and decorations to our Slumberland level, beginning to polish up the game's user interface, and so much more!
But over the past couple of weeks, we've been putting together a very important part of our game; the opening cutscenes. This is part of our push to start polishing up the beginning of the game for our next backer release which we'll have more information on soon!
Starting the Game
Part of our goal with the introduction is to build a sense of mystery and intrigue for Nemo's latest adventure, and we start our story set up with a conversation with two celestial figures, our homage to the introduction to the classic film 'It's a Wonderful Life'.
Speaking of influences, if other elements of our interpretation of Little Nemo's outer space looks familiar, there's a good reason for that! We also took some visual inspiration from Georges Méliès' 1902 film 'A Trip to the Moon' and John Craig's illustrations for the Smashing Pumpkins 1995 album 'Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness'.
A Trip to the Moon, Georges Méliès, 1902
Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness deluxe album cover art, John Craig
After asserting the increased number of nightmares children are having as being a threat, we then cut to our hero Nemo, caught in his own nightmare. We wanted to make sure our intro got players into the game relatively quickly, so this sequence will be entirely playable.
We've shown pieces of this Nightmare sequence in previous updates, but with Chris' awesome background art and assistance from designer Max Kunze, the sequence is now in a playable state!
There's still some additional polish to add, as well as a bit of dialogue and context for the sequence, and other surprises as well. Before we move on to the next section, however, let's highlight some of the background elements that we're put together by Chris!
The creepy nightmare eyeballs that watch Nemo as he explores the Nightmare!
A mysterious figure appears in the distance! Who could it be?
A Quick Slumberland Update
While we're patching together the opening to the game, we still want to make sure we're working on new areas of the game as well. Which is why Max has been hard at work on new mechanics, hazards and biomes that you'll see in Slumberland toward the end of act 1 of our game as well!
At one point, Nemo and his party will have to explore the Barracks, a dangerous part of Slumberland where that is well defended by the (perhaps overzealous) Slumberland guard. This early look showcases a work in progress where Nemo must contend with said guards dropping heavy weights on all who try to slip past them!
Max has also spent some time reworking the overall map of Slumberland, adding new twists and variety to each biome. Here's a look at the new layout for Slumberland's Kitchen area, which will also feature its own unique mechanics and hazards!
The Slumberland Kitchens, divided by two central skyway bridges
Finally, we're working on locked doors that can only be unlocked by hitting switches and solving puzzles with one of the four playable characters in our game, starting with the Princess, who players will get access to for the first time in Slumberland. Here are some concepts drawn up by Chris of some of the switches you may come across:
Conclusion
This is only a small showcase of all of the progress we made this month! Our goal for June is to continue to polish up the game's introduction, adding new mechanics such as the game's shop for buying abilities, upgrades and collectables, polishing our cutscene UI and getting every story sequence from the beginning through to our game's second level. From there, we plan to have a fully featured release for backers very soon, and to have regular updates to those playable builds on a consistent basis from that point. So stay tuned to this space for all this and more in the coming weeks!
Until next time, Dreamers!
~ Adrian