Welcome to July’s development update!
This month’s update is a little shorter than usual, but nonetheless we’ve been working on some neat things that we’re quite eager to show off. Let’s get right into it, shall we?
As it tends to do around this time of year, a few of us got caught up in family and personal matters that needed to be tended to. While we experienced some unexpected speed bumps, we’re hoping to make up for lost time by pushing out the first handful of playable builds to our VIP backers as soon as possible. Below is our updated development schedule that better reflects the current status and internal goals.
There’s not too much to show on the programming front this month as we’ve been busy working on setting up our island and integrating it with our voxel terraforming system along with a host of fancy things like water shaders and yes, improved foliage performance. Voxels can be rather experimental on the scale that we’re working with, but the team is doing its best to ensure that it all comes together in the end!
For July we took to working on transferring concepts into 3D models and developing both new and older animations to our most recent standards seen in previous blog posts.
Building Concept Art & Models
The Sauropod House is the largest shelter available for housing animals in Prehistoric Kingdom, holding up to two-three fully grown sauropods at a time. Equipped with internal washbays and soft haystacks, your gentle giants are sure to feel right at home.
Back in March we first showed our new Nursery design which has since been updated to bring it up to scratch with our more recent building textures and style.
Animation
For July’s assignment, our animators completed the basic animation sets for the ceratopsian rig and bison (as first seen in May’s update). Meticulously watching over dozens of real world references from modern day relatives the team hoped to capture the many nuances and physical movements that are to be expected from the bison family. We’re extremely happy with how both the sets came out, and we hope you enjoy the new ceratopsian cycles!
https://youtu.be/ri76DLOOBgY
https://youtu.be/lcT07tDqbeA
Since switching over to a more generalised retargeting system, we swiftly revamped the hadrosaur animations to look far more alive with added weight and movement to their body.
Check out the new and improved run and walk cycles below (yes, we misnamed the first clip, but it’s not our fault – it’s the sneaky post-production, we swear)!
https://youtu.be/rk5b1Cpm0kI
https://youtu.be/mTFa-AkYWjU
Park Map
Inspired by real world zoos, the park map features a fullscreen stylised view of your island – showcasing all structures, animals, and infrastructure within your park.
It was important for us to retain as much open screen space as possible for players to take quick screenshots with while also offering a quick way to jump to each exhibit and check its total internal area with a quick glance.
The team’s composer has written another ambient track to play along with your busy paths, various construction sites, and roaring attractions. Genetic Wonders is a musical love letter to one of our biggest influences and inspirations. Using some classic scales and techniques, fans of paleo-media should feel right at home when this piece begins to appear.
https://soundcloud.com/byronmckay/genetic-wonders
New Creatures
July reveals some of our most colourful and unique animals making their way into Prehistoric Kingdom’s Early Access. Prenocephale prenes, Tenontosaurus tilleti, Thescelosaurus neglectus, and Lambeosaurus lambei; welcome to the park!
Finally, we would like to present all of our Early Access ornithopods! Aren’t they gorgeous?
From left to right: Edmontosaurus, Iguanodon, Dryosaurus, Thescelosaurus, Ouranosaurus, Tenontosaurus, Lambeosaurus, and Parasaurolophus.
Ontogeny Sequences
After our lovely keepers have returned from their studies, we have concluded that tiny ankylosaurs are best ankylosaurs. This month we’re presenting our favourite little moss rock, chub duck, honkboi and… noodle ... face?
Alt. Skins
As we begin to approach the end of alternate skin reveals we’ve got a handful of classic creatures with some rather splendid designs.
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And to finish it all off, during July we had a small resurgence of texture mods for the pre-alpha demo thanks to KroftyFennec’s awesome Allosaurus and Triceratops skins based on the work of a certain Fred Wierum and Saurian. Neat, right?
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And that concludes this month’s DevLog! It’s shorter than our last few, but we are aiming to come back with even more news, images, and gameplay updates. We tried experimenting with cutting down on the amount of text per blog post to make it more accessible, so be sure to let us know what format you prefer.
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If you would like to check out our past blog posts, you can head to the official one here!