Game & Map Screenshots 12

Not finished this yet, but as I'm bored and lonely I thought I'd share prematurely. :biggrin:
I've omitted the fire braziers for no reason.
I've got several other maps on the go. Still not settled on a technique for gluing them all together stylistically so I'm trying to get the distinct regions fleshed out and then mixing and matching elements from one to the other to make everything feel consistent.

Credit to PandaMaru for the bulk of the building tiles. Still need to back track to figure out where the trees and land tiles originally came from. If you have any idea, please let me know.

@Lomaxient I can't zoom in to get a closer look, but I think it looks pretty nice overall. I have almost zero experience with real mapping, but as a player, the one thing I would recommend is to make some buildings where the entrance is to the side rather than all from the bottom of the map direction.

You can always have the paths going up to the side or maybe put something that looks like an awning or cover or something to indicate that there is a door/entrance there.

It always just looks strange that all the entrances to buildings face down/south/wherever the bottom of the map is.

And maybe the fancier building should be a tad bigger? Since it gives the impression that it stands out from the other buildings.

But like I said, I think this looks really good.

Here's one of my forest areas. The animated features can't be shown in this screen grab, but hope you guys like it of course. You're gonna have to imagine the waterfalls.

@Lomaxient Again, this looks really nice. I really like how you did the paths and a lot of the shadows. Great job!

Just one oddity. The shadows for you lamp posts don’t seem to match the rest of your shadows. The lamp post shadows are as if the sun is directly overhead. The rest of the shadows are like the sun is to the left or lower left of the screen.

Ahh yes! Shadows are the bane of my existence!! Some I've drawn in sloppily, others are part of the original assets. These are certainly elements I should take a closer look at in the future.

I intend to create shadows for all the cliffs facing in an easterly direction too. Just a nightmare to get everything consistent.

@Lomaxient In fairness, I don’t think I actually look that closely when I am playing a game. I usually am focused on other things. So how much anyone would notice is debatable.

Well, we both noticed it and my pedantism knows no bounds! For now I'm going for "good enough". Gotta stitch the world together first.

Water autotiles are my bane, BUT, this time I managed to make something that's not completely square bonky. There's a semblance of natural curves! :kaoswt: I swear y'all Ima get the hang of this pixul arts some day...

I'll keep workin' on this - I'm not totally happy wid the south-facing bank - but I feel like I'm on the right track at least!:kaoluv: (The characters are placeholders, ignore 'em)

@alice_gristle I spent a long time getting the hang of non-boxy autotiles, and I still don't think I've got it quite right. So take it from a fellow sufferer, those are well on the way to being great.

I agree with you about the south facing bank, and I think it's because you've got those bits which appear like they're coming forward, but the bits beside them don't have a corresponding thick line a pixel up to show they're further back. Why would only the forward bits have that line? Hope that's clear, but I don't think it is.

@Kes absolutely, sweetie! :kaoswt: Since postin' that, I've made the next iteration, which is this:



"Here, Dante, we have the betrayers and the traitors, endlessly forced to do and re-do their water autotiles, while a persnickety customer hovers over their shoulder, coming up with idiotic changes..." :kaophew:

@alice_gristle that's much better. Well done

This is mindblowingly good and yet so simple! I loved the artstyle! ❤️

Is there anything else about the game you can share?

Started working on maps for both inside and outside, however I still feel that both of them lack something. First time posting here by the way! Hope I'm doing this right!

@KaiserOblivion This isn't an aesthetic that I usually comment on, as I'm unsure of some of its conventions, but one thing did strike me, and that was the inconsistency of your window placement.

In the first map, red house at the top has the window as I would expect to see it. The white house down and to the right has the window slammed up against the edge of the wall. The white house bottom left has no windows on the ground floor, which seems an unlikely way for anyone to live. The third map has microscopic windows, while in the fourth they are more in proportion (though still a bit small for my taste).

I feel rather conflicted about this lab, so I'm curious about what do you guys think. It's meant to look cluttered and disorganised, but I feel like I might have potentially gone a bit too far with the amount of objects in it. Any feedback on the room as a whole, or specific objects would be appreciated :kaoluv:

@KaiserOblivion I'm not terribly familiar with this art style and I don't have a sprite for comparison. But just a couple of thoughts.

#1 Is that a clothesline in the upper left corner of the screen? If so, I think the line might be missing. At least I can't seem to see it.

#2 It took me a bit to figure out the red things are barrels and they seem rather large compared to other assets, including door openings.

@Mac15001900 I like the overall appearance of the lab. It looks pretty cool.

I think one thing that might help is on the table in the middle, if maybe some of the objects overlapped. Like some things were set on top of other things. Right now they seem artificially too separate. If that makes sense.

And the 2 element type things in the upper left and right corners seem a little odd in the still image. But Maybe they are actually animated and look differently in game.

...my maps are pretty large...can I perhaps post a video of them instead of screenshots?

Go for it. According to the first post in the thread:

Great! OK, for a bit of background...these maps I am showing are only a few (there will by many, many maps, different biomes etc) and they are nature-based.

There will be some villages etc, but in other maps.

These maps will all be filled with various wildlife (birds, mammals, fish, insects etc) that the player (which is a cat) can hunt, interact with etc. I have them evented and ready to add, just making more maps at the moment. So, these are just the "base" versions of the maps right now.

Features which are shown, but not to full extent, is the swim system, time system (yes, there is night as well and the wildlife will change depending on time of day), hotbar system, hunger/thirst/sleep system and the hide system.

If anyone is interested, I'll probably upload another video when these maps are populated.

Hope you all like it! :kaoangry:

The sound design makes this and when the kitty jumps into the river. *chef's kiss!!