Hi there, Lightbringers!
In this week’s dev blog we are pleased to announce that the first animation patch for Empire of Ember has finally been implemented in the game!
This first pass includes improved first-person animations for the different styles of combat; that is, melee, bow, spell and staff attacks.
These improvements will be most noticeable during melee combat. This should make the animations feel more responsive, cleaner and balanced than before. The main difference now is that players will need to use their reflexes to block attacks in time, or cancel attacks in progress. Melee users will now be able to block with a magical shield, and also have a new unlockable “shove” ability to counteract enemies that are using shields.
Implementing the animations for Empire of Ember hasn’t been a bed of roses all the time, as there have been some very challenging moments. Most issues have been a consequence of the hired animators not properly testing their work in-game. Even animators with 20 years of experience had trouble copying FBX files from Maya to Unity, or would not know how to use an animation controller, for instance.
This has unfortunately slowed down progress. Improving the game’s animation has taken about four times longer than expected, and has been more expensive than originally planned. On the bright side, all the setbacks have given main developer Kevin Jenkins the chance to make other improvements that resulted in a better outcome and thus, a better game.
Further additions to the animations are planned for the future, but as these are not a pressing concern anymore, the developers will focus on other fixes for the moment.
Since the Steam Early Access release in late March, the dev team has been working really hard to polish the weakest parts of the game. All feedback from users has been very useful so far to introduce new features as well as helping fix bugs, so we welcome you all to try the game and let us know how it can be further improved. You can have an impact in shaping Empire of Ember and helping it reach its full potential!
If you would like to help us, please wishlist and follow the game and tell everyone about it! You can also follow our progress by joining our community on Discord, Steam, and our Social Media channels: Twitter, Facebook and Reddit.
See you soon! Take care and have a great week :)