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March Progress Update!
🕑 Added 2018-03-14 06:06:41 +0000 UTCHey everyone!
We’re less than three weeks out from the Battle Test 2 release, so this update is not be quite as lengthy as our usual ones. We still need up to a week or so to get Battle Test 3 (BT3) ready, so the plan is to release it for the $3 tier at the beginning of April and we’ll finally be back to posting monthly updates at the beginning of the month. The good news is Ubercharge completed the battle/portrait lighting rig that we intend to use throughout the game, and I’ll be using it to light the portraits for BT3. The results are better than our previous ones (you’ll find an example below), and it takes far less time to configure. Some other big news is that we’ve updated all of Malise’s base files (we had a pretty huge list of fixes piling up) and in doing so took some time to improve upon lingering cosmetic issues / act on feedback we’ve received. The result is a new face, a slew of body fixes, material edits, and new hair. Here’s the list of topics for this post (I’ve updated these sections since the last IC update):
- Malise Updates Part 1
- Malise Updates Part 2
- Ubercharge’s Battle / Portrait Lighting System
- H Artwork / New Processing Test
- AltairPL’s Coding Progress Update
- Ubercharge’s Map Progress
- To Do List
Malise Updates Part 1
TK and I went through probably three different variations of Malise after Battle Test 2, and it’s been both very frustrating and a solid learning experience in how to manage stylization with the new art style. Our most realistic version, which we put three days into, looked great on her own but simply didn’t mesh with the body, hair, or other characters. While that sucked, it did help me to learn what features work with our style and what doesn’t. For the past few weeks I’ve been studying artists like Jon Troy NIckel and Paul Kwon (League of Legends), as I think segments of their work are approximately the level of stylization we need for faces/bodies. At any rate, our work resulted in quite a few changes. Here’s the version we are going with.
Below you can check out the new face model, as well as the more realistic one we passed on. The most obvious change is probably the much better eye shape. You can also expect better facial expressions once we’re done.
There were also a host of changes/fixes to the body. The biggest difference however is probably the hair, which I know some people felt was too plain. One especially good thing about the new hair is that it should be much easier to pose.
Lastly here’s a small set of some random shots showing the (almost) finished face. The hair wasn’t done yet when these were captured. Please let me know what you think!
Malise Updates Part 2
Since we revealed the above changes last week to the Inner Circle crowd we’ve done some additional work, and I’ve rendered a new set of images to illustrate some of these as well as show some expressions on the new face.
Here are the images (no processing, these are straight from the viewport).
And here’s the list of edits:
- I’ve finalized the hair material edits.
- We’ve further sculpted the hair and bangs (sharpened the points and tried to make the bangs look more natural and mesh better with the new ponytail by messing em up a bit). Check it out in the images below.
- Finished a set of fixes for her mouth and teeth position, which were making expressions with an open mouth generally weird.
- We’ve completed other miscellaneous fixes such as her cratered rib cage and this nasty underboob deformation that I’ve expertly hidden until now :D (I think).
- TK re-rigged the holsters, which now work perfectly (shown here with a heavy twist on the thigh).
- Improved skin glossiness and sub-surface scattering
- TK has completed the transfer of suit morphs/configurations to the new body shape.
- Forgot to mention this previously, but the suit’s highlights will be subtler and less distracting with its new material, but still be obviously shiny.
Ubercharge’s Battle / Portrait Lighting System
The goal of system is to simplify the battle lighting process so we don’t need to move lights around for every environment (something really time consuming as you saw from our work on Battle Release 2). To accomplish this, the vast majority of lighting for portraits and battle artwork will be done in post. Here’s an example of Ubercharge’s initial test.
The system works by using a lighting rig consisting of eight (nine including the dome light) light groups. When I render out a battle portrait, I simply have to render each light group individually, and then I’m done with that portrait for good. This will also work for enemies. Then, using Uber’s black magic, we can actually blend those light groups’ intensities and color in post to create lighting for any environment we may come up with in the future. All three of the very different lighting examples in the image linked above were generated with the same set of renders. Eventually we may even be able to do this in-game in real-time, which will cut down on the hard drive space required for portraits by a ton.
Here’s a preview of the Battle Test 3 portrait lighting, which will use the new lighting rig as an opportunity for me to get some practice with it.
H Artwork / New Processing Test
I’ve started working on some H artwork and took a couple tests to completion. I’ll likely be putting these together intermittently over the next few weeks and hopefully by the time we need them I’ll have a full H skill chain or two ready for one of the releases.
I’ve also been testing out some new processing effects, including depth of field and chromatic aberration, both of which are present in the above images. Uber taught me how to add depth of field entirely in post, which is a pretty great benefit of the 32-bit workflow. I’m using the chromatic aberration (color bleed around the edges) effect largely to add to the retro film vibe. I’m considering carrying this processing over into battle and elsewhere now that we can blend effects better.
While we're at it, here's one of Neon's HDR processed portraits for BT3.
AltairPL’s Coding Progress Update
If you saw the Inner Circle updates this month, skip to the “***” symbol for the new stuff.
Just before I decided to take a break from the battle engine overhaul, which resulted in URGE’s conception, I made 2 serious mistakes. I left the targeting system untouched AND I made no notes or comments about it. Both came back to haunt me when we started releasing Battle Tests... the 1st Battle Test had some serious issues with invalid actions being performed, and the 2nd one was riddled with similar unwanted behavior, mostly caused or made apparent by fixes for issues from Battle Test 1. What a mess...
The only thing I could do in a situation like this was to finally rewrite the targeting system, but after starting this, I've learned that all action progression was depending on more or less vanilla RPG Maker behavior and some other wrong assumptions. So, the only choice I had was to redesign and recode the whole action progression with new target determination in mind.
The new design was relatively simple on paper, but actually coding its prototype required some pretty nifty work. I must admit I'm very happy with both the speed and the results. Suffice to say, just this one thing eradicated most of the current problems with in-battle actions. The new system is not only less buggy and more stable, but also allows for some additional action features to be implemented, including one or two already done or planned. Also, while implementing it, I've made a lot of notes about things that may require some more attention sooner or later - possible death-traps (including stuff actually related to character/enemy death), things to optimize, good places for planned features and so on.
A lot of work, but well worth the effort and time. It still needs a lot more work and testing, but after a while I got fed up with it, and since Ero required assistance with something entirely different, I've changed gears for a while.
***
What Ero needed from me was some answers about how well the engine handles diagonal stairs. As some of you remember, the last time those were used in a game was in the “Old Town” maps from v0.02 (area with Splicers and Stigmata), which was a long time ago. In the Old Town maps, diagonal stairs were handled by a 3rd party script, which did its job, but was extremely limiting and a bit clunky. On top of that, it's nowhere near being compatible with my implementation of map levels/layers, so I needed to code it more or less from scratch. Problem here was that stairs are pretty much a part of movement code, which was in shambles and needed to be dealt with before I even started adding to it. Fortunately, I made some conceptual design of stairs mechanics pretty quickly and gave Ero his answers, so he and Uber could continue working on maps with stairs while I revamped the code needed to handle it. Suffice to say, all movement code was updated, some hard-coded things were replaced with more dynamic counterparts, a lot of stuff got cleaned up and better organized and diagonal stairs are now fully functional.
After finishing the stairs/movement stuff, I needed a short break from coding. Since some things related to battle still require some kind of overhaul, I've spent a few days on writing a short novel detailing what and how they need to be done – it should help a lot when the time to actually overhaul them comes.
With this out of the way, I turned my attention back to the battle stuff. The first thing after getting back to coding was to implement the sprite layering system required for bloom and HDR processing - gonna spare you the gory details. Portraits should look much better in Battle Test 3, with hopefully not too big a performance price to pay.
The next thing on the agenda is the aforementioned "notes about things that may require some more attention sooner or later". It's my current work-in-progress, but I'm already very glad I started doing it now, because it helped me to eradicate one critical issue I thought was limited only to holds, but as it happens, could occur pretty much for every action. I really hope this will finally make the battle engine rock-solid.
Ubercharge’s Map Progress
Eromancer here again. I helped Uber out with a block-out diagram for his new map, for which he intends to use his procedural shaders that I showed off during the monthly update. He just got to the point where he is able to test them out, but so far it looks like they will perform great. Once he got it working this example took all of a few minutes from plain geometry -- no texturing or UV mapping required.
Here’s a set of images showing his progress from the initial block-out stage to the mostly finished geometry (still needs to add props).
To Do List
Here is a broad version of our to-do list for the next few weeks. I’ll probably add one of these more often from here on out. I’ve checked off stuff we’ve completed since the last Inner Circle update.
Eromancer
- COMPLETE: Some remaining Malise hair edits
- IN PROGRESS: Update Malise battle portraits with her new version
- IN PROGRESS: Create upper body exposed portrait versions once TK has the suit ready
- COMPLETE: Work with Uber to recreate his battle/portrait lighting rig in Daz
- Continue experimenting with Police H skill artwork
- Calibrate Daz lights for HDR processing (currently doing this in post and it’s resulting in degraded dynamic range)
- IN PROGRESS: HDR processing on Neon/Malise’s new portraits. I learned batch processing in the program we’re using for this and completed Neon’s portraits, but may do them over with Uber’s battle rig lighting (shouldn’t take long since it’s all procedural).
TK
- COMPLETE: Update Malise’s Maya scenes to reflect the new body edits
- COMPLETE: Transfer updates to alternate suit configurations (zipper open, etc)
AltaiPL
- COMPLETE: Implement sprite layering system required for bloom and HDR processing
- IN PROGRESS: Continue work on battle engine
Ubercharge
- COMPLETE: Finish battle and portrait lighting rig in Maya
- IN PROGRESS: Continue work on maps (here's his current progress on the geometry for the new map)
Post BT3
- Paint Malise armor damage concepts for TK
- TK and Uber to begin sculpting / implementation for Malise’s armor damage
- Enty launch
- Update Neon and her base scene files / prepare Neon's armor damage
- Help Ubercharge with Splicer overhaul
- Start Ven overhaul(?)
Comments
Somnovox
Oh, sure. I just thought I would ask since I don't think I had seen it mentioned yet. Hope things are progressing to your liking!
Mebbe once we're back to regular releases and there's more room for constructive discussion about stuff like gameplay or H scenes or what not. For the most part I'd like to focus on getting the technical stuff related to the new art style fleshed out for now.
Cereliona
Specifically the Guilty Hell guy closed his off to new patrons because his game is coming out very soon.
Could be as early as tomorrow if testing goes smoothly. Once we get past v0.06 and have more regular major releases I want these minor releases to be more exclusive to the Inner Circle crowd.
it will be mostly in the first april week with "maybe" the battle test 3 :D ... what i would like to know if there is a future update plan on how the guys want to release the tests and the demos for the game in kinda an over all progress route
MangoFishSocks
Could you give us a quick update on when the next Inner Circle update will be posted?
Somnovox
Maybe they will address it, themselves, at some point. I only brought up the question and said it'd be cool and probably useful.
Yeah I was referring to Guilty Hell. Oh? You meant that he might have intentionally capped it? My bad then, I didn't know he could do that. Why would he do it anyway... It's more money.. So... Anyway if it's not mentioned in Enty's terms & conditions, you should be pretty safe...
I'm not disagreeing, but it might be why they don't want to do it?
Somnovox
Other content creators and developers do it just fine. In any case, just an idea. They shouldn't feel obligated, but I thought it might be cool. Another way to communicate with patrons outside of Patreon, another place to link content, and a place for like-minded people invested in the project to hang around and chat, if we like.
Might be overwhelming, thinking they have to be on there all the time providing interaction for us.
Are you sure they do and not the creator? I know that Guilty Hell guy capped his patronage or something -- or stopped accepting new patrons. Not sure of the details.
Hey Eromancer, ok totally off topic here, but I just discovered something about Enty.jp. I was previously donating monthly to another game on that platform too, and recently I discovered that they actually impose a maximum number of patrons allowed per developer. So you might want to look into that, incase you port over and you realize that it kinda restricts you on how much you can receive...
AltairPL
Portraits lighting will be different in upcoming Battle Test 3 - I think you'll be happy with the change :).
That part of the map is also supposed to be somewhat dark. Maybe there are better lit areas where it'll be far easier to see more.
Yes. I'm also had no problem seeing models in the last bettle test. It's not a massive problem. So still fine with your process. I'm just suggesting as a person who been working in visual contents field.
during the battle test i didnt had any problems seeing the character models, it all looked fine and nothing was to dark for me... maybe also a problem of light settings on the screen .. hm maybe that could be fixed with a "light" setting in the game or sth like it
Rendering images with backlight, the image looks dynamic, but people see just silhouette. It is really nice for poster or trailer. But to see object you also should show volume of the object. that's why i'm suggesting to add front highlight.
This is my personal opinion. Since you changed to render characters with behind light, characters are actually dark. In the battle test the map was pretty dark also. So it is very hard to see character. All character's suits are also dark color as well. What is your primary information in the game?? Character? or high textured model?? or enemy?? If you re-render your character with front light, players will easily watch your characters.
Maybe it'll work similar to the lust system. Each h-attack adds on another layer/changes portraits to reflect they've been h-attacked x times, probably goes up to three h-attacks/three layers would be my guess until you can get them to an ARIS unit. Maybe change their expressions in their pose portraits. Standing idle and bukkake third layer without rend-armor or high lust, maybe they're really annoyed and trying to flick some of it off. Ready to attack having trouble trying to keep a grip on their firearm, etc. After rend-armor or a high lust they're licking it off a finger, smearing it around. What have you.
MangoFishSocks
They did state a while ago that that was supposed to be a feature, showing cum in subsequent portraits and showing armor damage on the characters in the overworld. Personally I think the latter is just a quality of life thing but the first one would add a large layer of quality and effort, what with having additional portraits.
The way I understood it is that if any regular H-scene applies...fluids, those would persist on the character model through the current fight/the next fight, etc, wouldn't have to be a special scenario like you describe (though that would be neat too). Might be tough to implement, and probably wouldn't persist in story/dialogue sequences.
MangoFishSocks
How would a bukkake system work? Put one of the girls in cuffs or bound by rope in/after an H-sequence and then allow the other enemies to also get an H-sequence on that girl, adding more and more layers of cum? Or have an enemy wrestle with one of the girls to put her in cuffs or bind her with rope, and then have all the enemies rally around her with a situational H-sequence who then all cum at the same time and plaster the girl?
Somnovox
Curiosity, have you thought about(or am I simply unaware of) a discord server that patrons can chat on, give feedback, etc? I think it would be a nice bonus. I can understand if that seems out of the question. - Edited for redundancy.
Probably not for v0.06, but it's a lot more practical now that I'm getting better at 3d liquid simulation :D
Any plans for bukkake system in the next release/the near future?
so onxy is a hidden police force member that is interigating some bad guys with pleasuring foot- and boobjobs ! while marlise and neon are trying to destroy the currupted police forces =P
Getting more hyped for these new releases and the progress ahead, keep it goin!
myself yourself
ufff then im rly exited for this one :D
There'll be some twists you'll like, but full biomonster-type enemies wouldn't make sense in this part of the story.
myself yourself
aww prefer more variant of those less humanoid creatures instead of the typical male gangbang... although lesbian is fine :D
But that's not how female armor in games work Mango, you've forgotten the rule already?! Repeat after me; "the better the armor protection, the less visible it is!"
AltairPL
Attack of the Clones :P Seriously though, time will tell.
MangoFishSocks
Oh yeah I did see that but forgot it even existed. Thanks for linking. Personally I'd prefer to see *some* armor on her, like on her shoulders, back and thighs 'cause she is law enforcement. None on the good stuff, of course. Also giving her a mask to hide part of her face and covering her hair or giving her different hair color variations would make it so that the female cops aren't just 1 person copied.
AltairPL
In case you haven't seen it, here's the post with fem-cops: <a href="https://www.patreon.com/posts/august-progress-13624119">https://www.patreon.com/posts/august-progress-13624119</a> Though keep in mind, that her design may change a bit, since she was made using older methods and stuff.
Somnovox
I can see where you're coming from, at least that was how I felt when I became aware of the project and they started making changes to the art. Now, I look at it like this; I'd rather they make the very best game possible. As far as I have seen, this is shaping up to be the most professional, refined, and interesting ero game, ever made. I literally know of nothing that can compare. I would be surprised if anything comparable to this existed. They very clearly have not lost sight of the fact that the game is an ero game, but they are making it a deeper game, with a heavy focus on aesthetics, which I can appreciate. So, while I think no one would want to fund this game's development(or any, for that matter) in perpetuity, I feel like I owe it to myself and the developers to give them the benefit of the doubt that they are going to complete the game, with the caveat that if it ever becomes no longer in my best interest to support the game, I can simply not support it any further. Keep in mind, continuing to fund the game means you're funding the development. Once you've given enough to pay for the full version of the game, on release, they do not require that you fund it further. Personally, I really enjoy the in-progress information they release along the way. It's an added value that I appreciate as it gives me insight into the process, which I really enjoy learning. It also gives their intended audience the opportunity to voice their concerns and maybe help them make a better game, not that they're beholden to us to make changes based on what we want, though they've shown they consider our opinions. I also think they are aware of the concept of feature creep/bloat, and development hell, how things can become massively larger than originally intended, with no way to complete. At least, I think they are aware. So, in my opinion, if they end up with a really good ero game, great. If it turns out to that the game, minus the ero content, can stand on its own, even better, because that would elevate the whole project. If funding this game's development gives them the experience to really make knock-it-out-of-the-park ero games(and just games in general) down the line, and the financial incentive/ability to do so, I'm all for it. I can't wait to see what they make in the future, too.
MangoFishSocks
Fem-cops? Lesbian femdom? Sign me the fuck up. Also big vote on the Splicer variations.
dd209
Have to agree with Jondude. The new art is definitely pretty amazing, but it feels like the entire project was completely rebooted last year. Too late now, but I think in hindsight getting the game out the door with a reasonable amount of content should've been the priority, and the art reboot saved for a sequel, mini-projects or downtime.
Fem-cops will also have H skills. Considering having two different versions of Splicer enemies.
Faithel
Wow that's some serious work going on here. Glad to witness this development.
myself yourself
erm the only new enemies they are going to face are the police?
There'll be some story sequences with her in them
lul
So Ven won't be in v0.06?
Splicers still need to be converted to the new rendering engine, so will only be messing with stuff for Police currently. Stigmata still needs some work too.
Haven't focused on Neon at all for this test release -- i'm simply re-lighting and processing the current portraits. Will need to do the same thing we did for Malise after BT3 (see 'Post BT3' in the To Do list section)
To some extent it's not an option. Ven for instance will need conversion to Genesis 3, and all materials (for all remaining characters) need reworked for the new rendering engine. Ubercharge is testing someone who may work under him to help with clothing props that we think are necessary (Splicer's outfit, some props for the Syndicate characters). That being said, v0.06 won't contain any enemies or areas from v0.05, so I wouldn't be worried about it being the same.
MangoFishSocks
I disagree. The graphic overhaul has been a huge setback, but the base that was created back in v0.03 and v0.0511 is either still here or laid important groundwork for the new direction, and they've made leaps of progress since making that huge decision. Thing is, most of that hasn't had any real meat to it yet: it's just butter. Preparation for the main course. It also feels like that meat is about to be thrown onto the fire, with the lighting work coming to fruition and H-scenes being previewed.
Jondude
While the improvements are fantastic, please don't get caught up in redesigning everything. Personally it feels like no real forward progress has been made while you've been improving everything you already have, which is kind of a bummer. I mean with these new changes I feel the next actual demo won't actually contain anything really new.
MangoFishSocks
Excellent progress. Malise's suit looks much more realistic now and Neon looks great as well. Still no blue lipstick, though. ): Will the H artwork previews be solely police-focused for a while or will you experiment with other enemies as well after BT3?
JAM
I am certain that if most things go as planned this game will reach 10k per month, the amount of effort put in is honestly outstanding, good job.
Hmmjon
i wonder is lighting behind model ? wouldn't it be better in front of model ?
What?! still no lipstick? blasphemy, make neon alive again! Na just kidding :) Its Eros baby and i thrust his decisions ;) Even if i am in love with the old style the new malise looks simply stunning! i know some people complain about the changes and long time to see results. But for me absolutly worth it. Keep going with Joy for this project ;)
Antilles
Damn, really loving how expressive her face is!
Somnovox
You know, I was thinking to myself, "I do remember liking Malise better before..." then I looked up the old art. I stand turned 180 degrees. I prefer the new Malise to the old one, and that's not just because it's an updated fancier version. The proportions look better, the style is more interesting, and overall it's a huge improvement. All along I've really enjoyed seeing the improvements to the characters, but also the backgrounds, props(items, vehicles) as well as the enemies.
Shriekykite
I'm going to miss Malise's wholesome 70's pornstar look from the previous iteration. Everything is looking great though. Amazing to see what you guys are doing these days.
