Specters of the Enclave

So lots has happened since I last updated, but in short:

Bruce and I have decided to go all-out on the project and have contacted artists to start work on the game logo and concept art. What’s more, we have two capable programmers writing the game code for us (based on libGDX, Box2D and Tiled). So this leaves Bruce and me to focus on the myriad aspects of game production that sorely require attention that has not been given thus far.

Over the past 2 years we’ve been working on story (which is badass and will blow your minds!) and we’ve delved heavily into the gameplay aspects that had been left vague until recently. After several weeks of intensive work, we essentially have a fully developed combat system (with special formulas for calculating damage received/given based on players stats relative to their enemy’s); we have a much greater awareness of the techne or skills/spells one can learn in the game; we have a much fuller idea of what the mindscape will look like and how one will navigate it; we have the basic map for the demo level (the Water Temple) laid out; and thus everything is falling into place. By the end of the month, we’ll have the logo done, the Water Temple fully mapped out and 99% of all the gameplay nailed down. Of course, we will continue to produce new songs for the soundtrack every month as well. Bruce has also continued to write the dialogue for the game and we may or may not include a text-based demo when we launch the website in October.

We hope to pour all of our resources into a playable demo that rocks your socks off and then disseminate the demo through common fora to drum up some interest. Then we’ll re-evaluate our options and determine whether to go forward with pre-orders, pay-as-you-please, or kickstarter. The tentative release date for the demo is Dec. 31st. Obviously, we’ll be in need of testers prior to release, so I will abuse my friendship privileges and demand that certain parties involve themselves in testing perhaps as early as mid-November.

Expect great things from us!

Ruinous Laments

It’s been a long while since I’ve updated, but I have been producing content.  Here’s the most recent song I made.  It’s bgm for ruins found in the game.  Hope you like it!

 

New Song

I asked someone to name this one for me; and she certainly pulled out all the stops and forsook conventions. I have to admit, I like the title more than the song now.

If I had to classify it, I would say it’s a little like Hisaishi Jo from his 80s phase mating with 50s sitcom themes.  Yes, indeed it is.

There are still lots of strange inconsistencies in the song, but I don’t know how to fix them and I wanted to move on. So here’s my song from March.

Awareness

This is the song I made for February.  I plan to use it as the song that plays at the splash screen for my game (which I’ve finally started coding).  I’ve also started taking a course online from the Berklee Music school @ coursera.org about music production.  I hope to figure out how to make these songs have better sound quality.  Simultaneously, I continue to study music to make sure that the only thing that improves about the songs won’t be the sound quality.

 

Peaceful Sea

This is my song for the month of January.  I’m putting out at least one song per month as a way to continue practicing composition.  I’ve also started studying several music theory/music training tomes and hope to exhibit certain aspects of my learning through some of these songs.

This song was kind of fun because I originally had wanted to do a Celtic themed song, but failed to get a grasp of how to do so.  Thus, instead of not making a song this month, I just figured out a nice chord progression and slapped together a melody within two hours.  Add two more hours of figuring out instrumentation and adding embellishments and two more hours of tweaking notes and mastering the thing and voila you have 4 versions of the same concept chord progress+melody.   The idea was to create a tune that could be used throughout a video game in multiple different contexts.  I only uploaded one to youtube, but the other ones can be found at opengameart.org for those who are interested.

Here’s my favorite version:

Drawing Practice for Conscientia XI

Recently I have been working on projects that are longer term and so I have fewer finished drawings, but I’m trying to increase the quality of them.

Drawing Practice for Conscientia X

The stuff I’ve been doing recently.  Yes, I’m still at it.  And while there’s life left in me, I will continue to try to finish this project.

Viracocha’s Demise (epic sounding song)

So I had been wanting to create an epic track (something you might see in a movie trailer or in some awesome battle).  This is what I came up with.  Thanks a ton to the friends I asked for feedback.  I’ve tried to changed all of the parts you guys mentioned for the better.  Let’s see if you like it now.  (As always, it’s best to listen to this thing with headphones on).

 

Practice for Conscientia IX

These are probably the last drawings I will do with pencil and paper.

These are practice drawings done with my new Intuos4 tablet.

El Bosque Encantado

This song marks my one year anniversary.  It has been exactly one year since I decided that I was going to make a video game despite lacking any and all of the skills required to do so.  Over the course of the past year, I have done many things to work towards that goal I set for myself one year ago and among these things has been the study of music theory and composition.  I’ve tried to apply all the things I’ve learned during the past year in the different songs I’ve made over the course of that year.  This piece is my first stab at orchestral music and it’s probably my best yet.  My favorite part of it is the adventurous string interlude at around the 2:00 mark.

I’m looking forward to a time when I look back on this one and derisively declare it to be horseshit.  But until then, I’ll be thankful that I’ve been able to make it this far.  I hope you enjoy listening to it and if you want an .mp3 for it, just leave a comment or pm me and I’ll send you one.