DragonBlossom: The RETURN

[Arkenova]

Hello lovely people of the VGR forums, this is Arkenova, the Creative Lead of DragonBlossom, speaking to you once more after a rather long, unexpected hiatus from the forums. (Okay, I should had dropped a note but I didn't know I would even return counting the months that has gone by. Actually, to be honest, it's been a YEAR and some months, so yeah.)

Anyways, calling back to the roots of the old thread that has been archived, you will notice that quite alot has changed over from the original concept of this developing indie title, including the overall metamorphosis of the sprites, characters and even the storyline!

Spoiler

I took the liberty to recreate the sprites..

FROM THIS:


To this~:

Now do I have your attention? I hope so because I had been honing in on my pixelart ability with some helpful advice from several pixel artists as well as practice.

With that out of the way, let's blow this popsicle stand! (Okay, no more EarthBound references for awhile.)


*logo not final

What Is DragonBlossom?

An indie 16-bit action adventure platformer with RPG elements based off of elements from the Donkey Kong Country, Sonic, Klonoa and Okami, alongside many others. Choose between Adventure or Classic as Ayasuka and her friends are sent into an journey that rooted from the distant past on mains to stop an evil force from taking complete control of the Kingdoms.

I know I have explained some of the storyline on the old thread but this game, as much as it's going, still has issues to get out there. Though we have some progress with the indie game however we are still lacking in tileset (environments) artist as well as enemy design. Reason is because I have enough to handle with writing, concept, pixelling and even other means.

In fact, there's even a very early prototype gameplay video I am about to share to you.


This video was made by a fellow member of the team who has permission for use.

Guys, as much as I don't want to sound like I'm begging, people are noticing this game has the potential to be an awesome project and whenever that is going on, you can and will get nervous. It's alot of pressure but I know that as long as we keep our heads up, we can and will get this finished. As I said before, I have alot on my plate and we will need all the help to get this thing really going on the move.

Examples of Sprite Animations:

*some are unfinished/beta
These sprite animations are of courtesy of TanjatheBat as part of a collab effort. She's one of the members of our team and another thing, this was used with permission to post.

Spoiler

Our Team So Far:
DaPhyre, dA, Lead Programmer
Farraja, dA, Assistant Programmer
TanjatheBat, dA, Animation (Character)
FancySass98, dA, Backup Musician (Problem: He needs another Musician to collaborate with since CoN has school)
DaveMajor7, Newgrounds, Sound Design

We're pretty much covered for the position of Musician since we have a replacement in mind.

*Mao's sprite needs revamping btw.

Mechanics: We're looking at Ayasuka homing in towards the Donkey Kong Country games with some combat involved (far left), Seichi is a combo of weapon combat (something like a staff combat scenario) along with stealth and pacing (middle) and Mao is the combat heavy, Action RPG (something like Dust: An Elysian Tale). (far right)

All will have some form of exploration involved.

Interested? Contact me via Note, Skype (it's on my profile) or dA. I will be more than glad to drop you details of the project at hand. Thanks for your time!

Oh and another thing, head over here (if you want to know).

[Arkenova]

Okay, a brief update.

Teamwise: We are moving from the Unity engine to GMS engine as I speak, mostly because to the fact that it's much more simple. Our Programmers are on the move with the process and it shouldn't take long to reset everything about up to the way it is before with Ayasuka being the main playable character for now. Other characters (such as Mao or Seichi) will be playable later in future builds.


I have yet to find out when SAGE comes around again to find a window of time to be able to release a demo for a booth. (Usually, it's done in late October but then again, I have to check on the Sonic United site.)

Spritewise: Majority of Ayasuka's sprites are nearly done and next to be done is Seichi's before we get to the final character, Mao, who currently needs to be revamped. As of now, we have several concepts of how the menu system should work. Like I said before, we're still lacking in terms of enemies/envionmental tiles.

[Cold Spike]

I've been using GMS for a few months now. It is much simpler ^^. I don't know if I can really help out too much, I have a lot on my plate as well. My Skype is 'tyleraw2' if you want to chat, though.

[Arkenova]

Engine Overhaul!

We still have a long way but the project is officially in GM!

Still looking for help. Look in the help wanted thread in the first post!

TEAM UPDATE
OpenLight, from Newgrounds, has joined the team as our composer!

[Kelvin]

Do loops like this actually serve a purpose? Honestly, they were impressive for the first Sonic game to showcase their physics, but other than that, it's totally worthless; just something that makes the player have to stop moving for a second to watch their character run a loop, then continue progressing through the level...

Actually, a thought just popped into my head, and I ended up rebutting myself. The loops DO serve a purpose: in 2D Sonic games, taking the high road was usually harder, but was rewarding by giving the player flatter terrain to traverse, and thus cut down how much time it took to complete a level, while loops, for the most part, were kept on lower paths. While it doesn't explain loops on single-path levels, it does at least give them some meaning.

So now I'm curious; does your game ask players to beat levels in as short a time as possible? Cuz if so, loops make a fitting punishment for players who fail to stay on the shorter paths.

Man, sometimes I drive myself crazy when I ask a question and then immediately come up with an answer after I've said/typed it. :/

[EDIT]
Looking at that screenshot again, I noticed a red marker on the loop. I'm guessing this marker changes which tile layer the player can collide with depending on which direction they're moving when they hit it, right? That's the only reason I can think to have a big red block sitting there.

[Arkenova]

Do loops like this actually serve a purpose? Honestly, they were impressive for the first Sonic game to showcase their physics, but other than that, it's totally worthless; just something that makes the player have to stop moving for a second to watch their character run a loop, then continue progressing through the level...

Actually, a thought just popped into my head, and I ended up rebutting myself. The loops DO serve a purpose: in 2D Sonic games, taking the high road was usually harder, but was rewarding by giving the player flatter terrain to traverse, and thus cut down how much time it took to complete a level, while loops, for the most part, were kept on lower paths. While it doesn't explain loops on single-path levels, it does at least give them some meaning.

So now I'm curious; does your game ask players to beat levels in as short a time as possible? Cuz if so, loops make a fitting punishment for players who fail to stay on the shorter paths.

Man, sometimes I drive myself crazy when I ask a question and then immediately come up with an answer after I've said/typed it. :/

[EDIT]
Looking at that screenshot again, I noticed a red marker on the loop. I'm guessing this marker changes which tile layer the player can collide with depending on which direction they're moving when they hit it, right? That's the only reason I can think to have a big red block sitting there.

There's no time limit involved in the normal mode, maybe in time attack mode, and we're currently looking to fix it up into something more unique.

[Ithinkitskevin]

You should put camera sway!
I feel like the game is just... rigid...

[Arkenova]

You should put camera sway!
I feel like the game is just... rigid...

That because it's early in development. Things will change over time.