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The Tetra Interface
🕑 Added 2015-04-08 12:09:05 +0000 UTC INCOMING ESSAY A.K.A. SUPER WALL OF TEXT (Don’t ever say I don’t keep you updated!!!) I mentioned a few days ago that I've been in the midst of designing a new interface, now dubbed the ‘Tetra Interface’ that will simplify using commands, skills, and items in battle, as well as give some direction to the game's skill system. I've decided that implementing this system will be one of the main objectives of V0.02, and after three days and nights (maybe? I have no idea what day it is) of furious design fueled by the new ‘The Prodigy’ album I'm ready to present the basics of it as well as other plans for V0.02. Note that the preview battle image is completely smoke and mirrors (it was done in Photoshop... actually implementing it will take quite some time). The Tetra Interface revolves around groups of four icons, called “tetrads”. Each icon is called a “tetra glyph”. A tetrad houses glyphs of similar type, and the different tetrads are basically simplified versions of what were previously menus in the battle system. Each character will have a Command Tetrad (Attack, Guard, Skills, Items), a set of Skill Tetrads, and an Item Tetrad. Once safe zones are introduced into the game, the player will be able to equip and customize glyphs into the characters’ tetrads via either changes to or new windows in the menu. For V0.02, they will come pre-loaded. Eventually, a character will have a Skill Tetrad for each weapon type, for which they can swap out at will in battle with the ‘W’ key. In addition, the outfit type that the character is wearing will affect what tetra glyphs can be equipped, thereby acting almost like a class. The new interface makes for quite a few changes to battle, all for the better in my opinion. A big gripe was that it was tough to navigate the menus during the madness of battle, and would be even tougher once more skills and items are added. With the Tetra Interface, every skill or item can be accessed with *at most* 2 key presses. Basically, a glyph is selected with the arrow keys/directional pad. Up selects the top glyph on the currently active tetrad, left selects the left, and so on. Once you know the positions of the glyphs (which you should, because you will be setting them), you won’t even have to look at the tetrad to see what you’re doing. Now is probably a good time to refer to the battle preview image: http://i.imgur.com/ab9Ucnc.jpg When a character gets a turn, the orange Command Tetrad appears (just like the command window previously appeared). To access the Skills Tetrad (color depends on character and outfit type), it is by default left on the Command Tetrad, while the Items Tetrad (gold) is by default the right glyph. Additional major changes to the battle controls include that ‘Attack’ can be accessed at any time during a character’s turn by pressing ‘Z’. Likewise, ‘C’ will swap to the other character if her ATB gauge is full, and even more importantly holding ‘Shift’ will Guard. Guard will no longer require a turn to use, and it will also have an impact on blocking H skills (I haven’t decided on the extent yet). There’s however a cost for guard which will keep you from perma-holding Shift, which I’ll get to in a bit. You’ll see in the battle preview image that miniature versions of Malise’s Skill Tetrad (red) and her Item Tetrad (gold) appear next to the Command Tetrad. I actually just added this concept, with the idea being that you can see what’s currently available for use, as well as what is on cooldown (yes, this system will allow for the possibility of cooldowns on certain powerful skills and items). My plan is to make these optional, as they are a bit much to look at for a new player, but I could see an advanced player wanting this option. And now is probably a good time to check out the pretty glyphs: http://i.imgur.com/esqfurV.jpg Time to drop another bomb on ya. The SP system is changing up in a big way. If you’ve played recent ‘The Elder Scrolls’ games, it’ll make sense. The big thing is that SP will regenerate over time in battle, and will be much more of a fluid commodity as opposed to something you have to refill with items every few turns (that would just get dumb once the game gets more advanced). Remember I mentioned that Guard has a cost? Well, whenever you hold Shift to guard, SP regeneration will stop. You’ll also take a hit to your SP whenever you successfully guard an attack, so it must be used wisely. WE’RE ALMOST FINISHED (not really). Check out that battle preview image again. Notice the sweet mugs of Malise and Neon beside the parameter bars for those baddies. The idea is that you’ll be able to see who an enemy is targeting with a skill, meaning you can better determine if you want to take defensive action or possibly interrupt the skill. Lastly, you’ll notice in the upper left corner a widget depicting Neon’s armor health. This component still has some design to work out, but basically the character’s outfit becomes vulnerable once they reach a certain level of lust sickness (the level depends on the outfit). I’ll probably make a post exclusively about the armor damage system once the kinks have been worked out a bit more. A fucking page and a half later, and I think I’m finally done. Refer to the following lists for full details on planned changes for V0.02 and features of the Tetra Interface. Major changes currently planned for V0.02: • Known issues to be patched • Introduction of the Tetra Interface and associated battle control improvements • Addition of new H-defense related skills and commands • New SP system featuring SP regen during battle • Addition of armor damage mechanics • Additional artwork for armor damage and 'assist' scenarios (character attacking ally's H-attacker) • New artwork for Minor and Advanced Lust sickness • Addition of vocal effects and sounds for H content • Enemy target display during battle • Map scene character movement improvements • Advanced shadows on map scenes • Addition of items for random encounter rate reduction In V0.02 the Tetra Interface will introduce: • Simplified command/skill/item selection in battle • New icon based visuals for commands/skills/items • Optional hotkeys for Attack, Character Swap, Guard at any time during a character's turn • Greatly improved control over the Guard command. - Will no longer require a turn - Will activate whenever Shift is held • New/Revised Skills and Items menu for equipping skills and items for battle • New H-Defense related commands Planned features of the Tetra Interface beyond V0.02: • Cooldowns on Skills/Commands/Items • Passive equippable Skills/Items • Custom tetrad layouts (change the positions of skills/items/commands) • Real time swapping of weapon types during battle • Armor/outfit type specific skills Also, word is you guys liked the music in V0.01. Thanks! It was all done by yours truly! I’m working on summoning some even more insidious co-conspirators from the electro/industrial/metal realm to contribute to the soundtrack, so it should be pretty badass when it’s done. Now, discuss!
Comments
I really like this menu-tetra glyph thing. I can't wait to actually try it out.
Faithel
Great, thanks for this nice brief =) Good work. Keep on ! ^.^ <3
Alxmir23
i guess the shoe icon comfirms kicking,nice
So, Patreon didn't save the edit I made right after I posted this... this is what the second image link was supposed to be of: <a href="http://i.imgur.com/esqfurV.jpg" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">http://i.imgur.com/esqfurV.jpg</a>
This looks amazing Eromancer :D Only one thing, when you're building the new interface, think about the people who only plays with his left hand (͡ ͡ ° ͜ ʖ ͡ ͡ °)
DragonSin
Hey, i just pledged and i'm new here (sorry if i screw up somehow) but do i need to wait for the next month when pledges get taken in by patreon again or will i also receive an email in a few days?
I was actually going to ask where you got the music from. I loved it, so good job with that. I'm definitely looking forward to hearing more.
I was actually going to ask where you got the music from. I loved it, so good job with that. I'm definitely looking forward to hearing more.
Binaners
Should we ever expect seeing a feature allowing them to change armour during battle? Making that an option will allow for some more interesting boss fight mechanics, such as changing to an armour that the boss's big attack won't be as effective against, but making it balanced by making the armour-change take like one turn or two.
Trooper38
when will we see new enemies or new h attacks on current enemies?
I'm aiming for June, maybe July at the latest.
I can probably best answer by giving you a little example of how the process goes! Since everything is pre-rendered each art image has to be rendered and processed from scratch (unless it's a very minor change such as facial expression or something). Basically all of the costumes and what not exist as 3D models that I can fit to a character's body model. So, after the clothing model has been made once it doesn't have to be made again, it just has to be fit to the body model and then often morphed somewhat to account for the character's pose. Poses also only have to be made once, as they can be copied between characters, though adjustments almost always have to be made when copying a pose to another character or for another outfit. Once a scene is ready I have to set up a camera and render out all the separate 'passes', which are then composited in Photoshop. Each outfit/character has a set of scripts I made to help process, but a lot of manual work is done, including painting armor damage and, uh, juices. This basically has to be done for every image. In game, the actual equipment change is very simple. It just runs through a function every frame to see if a specified set of parameters has changed for each character, and if so, it updates the art appropriately. When a character's equipment has changed, the game catches that and if it needs to it hunts down the image file that corresponds to the new armor. But yeah, a separate image file for every combination of status effect/pose/etc. needs to exist for each outfit type, so it's a pretty huge task.
Yeah, in V0.01 Guard is pretty useless aside from spamming it to regen health. The idea is that the 'hold Shift to Guard' thing in combination with showing the enemies' targets will make for a really functional and interactive mechanic.
Correct! X (or whatever you have 'Cancel' mapped to) will still function in the same way it did in V0.01. If you are in the Skill or Item Tetrad, X will back out to the Command Tetrad, and pressing it again will swap characters. I'm considering eventually putting in an 'Expert Mode' control option that does away with the Command Tetrad entirely (since both Guard and Attack will be able to be accessed via hotkey), and starts the characters' turns on their Skill Tetrad. You would hold X to display the Item Tetrad with that option on. Basically this would reduce the # of key presses to access a skill to one.
PhatsM
Really jazzed about seeing how this whole thing will turn out. Sounds like it will be an entirely different and improved build, which is great because I thought the first release was already pretty solid. But what I'm really looking forward to, not to undercut your hard work on the battle system, is the new art. On that note, I've been wondering since you first showed off images of the different costumes: Do you have to remake every H image and sequence to reflect every costume or weapon change? To me, if you had to start over for each one that would be even more impressive, but also make me as a player want to see every H scene with every costume variation even more so just for the slight variations that might result in posing. I've never looked into 3D modeling so I don't know, but is it something much simpler where you already have the framework for the poses and just have to load a different image for each costume and then tweak it slightly instead of starting from square one for each costume? Since this is in RPGM I can't imagine costume changes work anything like your typical rpg with gear change such as Dragon's Dogma or Dark Souls.
Trolo
The two-button strategy looks really good. The original combat speed (as it is now) is fine by me, you can always pause with Spacebar (if you want to *enjoy* the graphics), but the reworked system seems a lot more strategically complex... Just a quick note, maybe it would be better to use other key than Z for attack, because of different keyboards setting. Keep up the good work!
SpinalDethpizza
Dude..... This is absoulutely brilliant! Once you get the target kinks ironed out this is going to be one of the most, if not the most, intuitve combat systems I've ever seen. Period. Mind official blown.
dudman
Nice, love the aspect of the new interface, and to be honest I love how you're breaking the RPG maker mold with every step you take, it just make the project all the more interesting and more enjoyable. And to be brutally honest I can't wait to test out the new system, it seems a lot more fluid and instinctive. But out of curiosity, do you have an ETA for the next demo?(It's really out of curiosity, haste does make waste) And honestly you rock!
I think it's good you put a bit of a nerf on the guard option. It's quite easy to let one of the girls "Take one for the team" and just re-gen the other by spamming guard. Looks good!
Aryn
Honestly, this is really nice and I dig the icon use like that. Conveys information really quickly and minimizes the menu clutter.
Frost_Octavia
Sounds awesome, I can't wait for the next update. Just a clarification on how the Tetrads work though. Say Skills is Left. If I hit Left, does the Skills Tetrad replace the basic combat one? So now Left is whatever the left Skill is and Right is the right Skill instead of Items? And if that is the case, is there going to be a "back out" command to take you back to the basic combat one?
This is way better than expected looking forward to see the ladies in the new version do some kicking
Alxmir23
quite simply, i like it a lot,especially the h defense in a way reminds me of the upcoming dungeon and prisoners game defense having many type of commands when you are h-attacked (kick,bite,struggle,submit)
