jamesprimate on April 28, 2016, 10:15:10 AM:

going to bring this past the bump because its definitely the best live gameplay video we have so far 

JLJac on April 28, 2016, 01:53:36 PM:

Haha yep, garbage worms are going to get the bezier curves in their polish pass!

Update 529

Working some on alternate food sources. First up, pop corn!



These "seed cobs" require a spear to open. Once you've opened one, you can eat your fill from it - it allows you to max out your food meter. However, once opened it will go stale (like the other two in the gif) for many cycles, I have the default set to 7-10, but it's tweakable on James' end.

The idea is that these are sort of a limited resource where you have to make some interesting decisions - you can get free food, and all you need, now - but then you won't have it for later. So coming across one of these you'll have to ask yourself if you REALLY need it right now.

The ideal tactic I imagine is to be using them mainly when moving between regions. It has previously been sort of a problem that you manage to collect enough "karma" to pass into a neighboring region, but once through the gate you starve because you don't know where the food is in the uncharted territory. The alternative is to get some food in your starting region and then move out - but then the time pressure can be really rough. So with these, you'll be able to scope one out but save it until you're doing your rush for another region - then you can fill up before moving out, giving you a bit of a softer start in the next region.

JLJac on April 29, 2016, 11:05:20 AM:

Update 530

Food sources pt. 2, Water Nuts. These guys are originally hard little seeds, that can in fact be used as rocks for throwing at enemies, and are completely inedible. If you dip them in water though, they become a delicious frog egg kind of watery blob.



How much of a pain getting them to water will be, is completely up to James over in level design department. Sometimes they might grow very close to water, making it easy to just plop them in and enjoy. Other times, it might be a long haul where you have to ask yourself whether it's worth it to bring them with you, as they do occupy your paws that could otherwise be used for carrying spears or catching bats.

jamesprimate on April 29, 2016, 09:35:55 PM:

^^ gooooood point, im def going to use that :O

jamesprimate on April 29, 2016, 10:15:06 PM:

none! or at least very little. its a sandbox, with multiple ways through every path, so we really want people to experiment and discover things for themselves. in fact often when showing the game we see players finding solutions that we didnt even anticipate, which is amazing! handholding would spoil that i think.

that said, im working on the tutorial right now, which is few rooms of environmental puzzles forcing the player to learn basics of control and game mechanics, perhaps with a little glowing holographic helping hand 

JLJac on April 30, 2016, 07:27:38 AM:

Update 531

Food pt. 3, jellyfish!



The jellyfish float on the surface in shoreline region, behaving perhaps a bit more like a portuguese man-o-war than an actual jellyfish.  They are a pretty straight cut food source - you just collect them and munch them down in 3 bites like most other edibles. I did want to add something to make them a little bit more exciting though, so they do have sticky tentacles. The tentacles don't stick on every collision, but swimming through them there's a small chance to get tangled. If that happens, the jellyfish acts as a buoy making it harder to dive down, which might be a slight annoyance. After being stuck for a little while the jellyfish will stun you momentarily and then let you go. It's easy to get away though - just get out of the water, or even just do a swim-jump up above the surface. Or better yet, grab the thing and gobble it down!

jamesprimate on April 30, 2016, 10:38:44 PM:

ah, this is a very good question! long story short: in order to get the game out to players sometime this decade, we had to prioritize. so the initial release will be the single player mode, followed a little while later by a large update focusing on multiplayer and NG+ gameplay.

JLJac on May 03, 2016, 07:00:07 AM:

Sorry about the quiet atm, crunching for a big Adult Swim deadline!

jamesprimate on May 04, 2016, 02:14:59 AM:

one thing thats been interesting(?) to realize over the course of showing rain world at various conventions, interviews and events, etc., is just how much information needs to be conveyed in order to give a person an idea of "what the game is about". I usually try to gauge a person's interest first and give a series of shorter answers that work by themselves, but also can be stacked up and elaborated on if the person seems like they are willing to go deep into it.

this article isnt entirely accurate with some of the details (i was either misquoted a few times or *really* tired for whatever interview it was taken from), but is also kind of spot on in how it presents the game. details or not, the author totally gets it, and thats pretty encouraging: http://www.gamesradar.com/rain-world-wants-you-to-feel-bad-for-killing-its-hungry-enemies/

JLJac on May 04, 2016, 07:17:57 AM:

Update 532

Adding some scavenger specific items. The scavenger lantern:



(The graphic of the actual lantern might change a bit, I'm reusing another sprite atm which I'm not 100% happy with)

The scav lanterns are very valuable in Shadow Urban, as they are strong, reliant light sources that can be carried in one hand and don't struggle/flee like the Lantern Mice.

Scavenger fire spear:



The fire spear is a spear with a fabric around the top, apparently containing some powder of some sort. These are terrifying when being used against you, but can also be a valuable resource as they're a very powerful offence. The sneaky game design trick here is that while they appear super terrifying when used against you, they don't actually make the game much harder, as you die from just a normal spear already. Contrary, scavengers attacking you with these might provide a small benefit as that gives you the chance to get your hands on one.

As you might notice, these items are basically purely better versions of already existing items. The idea with that is not to ruin the balance of the game, but to provide a reason for interacting with scavengers. Scavs are the only source of these goodies, and in order to get your hands on them you'll need to either trade with, be friends with or fight the scavengers, each with their corresponding consequences.

jamesprimate on May 04, 2016, 01:27:52 PM:

yes indeed! not sure if i can properly announce it yet, but it will be at one of the big booths

anyway, pls come say hi!

jamesprimate on May 04, 2016, 02:31:42 PM:

I love you guys, haha. Never fails to amuse me when we're slaving over putting in some huge overly ambitious systems, the thread can always be counted on to keep us on track with what's really important: cute Slugcat interactions!!

Quintupled!

JLJac on May 05, 2016, 01:14:56 PM:

Still deep in crunch. These last couple of days have been about 6 updates worth of progress, but not enough time to assemble a single one! We'll debrief you guys a bit as we come down on the other end!

jamesprimate on May 16, 2016, 07:00:52 PM:

ah yeah! it needs to happen and there is absolutely no reason not to... other than that its messy and time consuming and rich with infinite feature creep potential 

the description is a little jargony for my tastes though, i hope we dont come across like that haha

jamesprimate on May 17, 2016, 09:49:49 PM:

ah yeah! for the level editor, its not so much the move to unity as 1. that it has to run on super outdated tech (instanced within Adobe Director), and 2. that it has become *insanely* complex and unintuitive at this point. We'd likely need an equal amount of time to develop that for public use as the game itself! Also, since the game world has become so huge and factoring in the eventual multiplayer rooms and all of that... i feel like the last thing people are going to want is *more* maps, lol. But I could be wrong!

jamesprimate on May 19, 2016, 01:07:00 PM:

placing in magic mushroom consumables, so now its officially A Real Video Game:






GUYS THIS MONTH HAS BEEN SO WILD YOU DONT EVEN KNOW!!

jamesprimate on May 23, 2016, 04:14:10 AM:

what a brave soul! 

jamesprimate on May 23, 2016, 12:41:06 PM:

shockingly little tbh! we have some insane deadline that were trying to meet right now, but its mostly testing and bug-hunts and touch-up stuff, trying to get the experience right.

the past few weeks have been wild though! i find it hard to find a place to begin to talk about it. we've been living in an echo chamber for years (well aware!), so having it going through legit testing by normal gamer types has been seriously eye-opening. not in a bad way necessarily, just that its quite apparent that a lot of the cool systems of the game are completely opaque, and so now were trying to find ways of making it so you dont need to read 284 pages of devblog to be able to see some of them.

jamesprimate on May 25, 2016, 10:58:26 AM:

ohhh, good suggestions! we're exploring a couple ideas around this as well, but yeah its on the list 

jamesprimate on May 26, 2016, 07:57:58 AM:

ah yeah its a little strange. the "fall out of screen" aspect was part of the previous "one screen = one room" design paradigm from the alpha, which we moved away from significantly, and most regions have none of this issue, opting instead for pits that have bottoms, and generally offering alternate routes, etc.

however, there are 2 aerial regions that we have that are built around this "fall out of screen" death-drop mechanic, and its impossible to go back now. I think if we firmly establish it that "in this region you fall down" and add some visual indication, might be clear enough.