Saturday Squanderings

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It's that time again.

I spent my Saturday morning rockin' out to some minibosses and other random youtube video gamey music interpretations... which led me (completely on accident)  to this. I had no idea that a sub sub internet culture existed solely to glorify Guile's theme song.

I suppose if any track were worthy enough to beat every single other piece of music in past and future history to a pulp it would be His.

Birthmark, indeed.

-Matt

Scheduled Updates are for Wieners

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Oops! Typo-city. What I meant was, scheduled updates are for winners. Anyhoo, feast your peepers.

I'm starting to catch up with coloring all the old black and white Nocturnal Transmissions, so I'll have some brand new ones on the way soon.

Catching up - yes - despite our recent obsession with that show, Jericho. Thanks Netflix (and Eric for recommending). And yes, I'm usually the one who's late to the party. But what a party. I was pretty satisfied with where the series ended (or, according to most, violently and prematurely ripped from the womb) and I am looking forward to finishing up the journey in comic book form (aka Jericho: Civil War).

Sweet post-apocolyptic cancelled early goodness aside, expect colored updates on the old stuff every Monday and Wednesday... maybe even Friday if I wake up feeling extra saucey.

Heheh. Wiener.

-Matt

Saturday Morning Cartoons

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Just in time for 'em with a new Warpaint:

Man. Typing up that title brings back a warm squishy wave (or at least a mild slosh) of nostalgia (kinda sounded like I was talking about some sort of unusual fluid problem), remembering trying to drag my elementary school weary husk out of bed early enough to catch Saturday morning gems like Exosquad and The Tick. All while cramming my face with over sugared balanced breakfasts and toy commercials.

Where have all the good cartoons gone? And I mean those bizarre-high-drama-but-still-made-for-kids-and-to-sell-action-figures shows like Batman: The Animated Series, or X-men. Have all the Westerners been replaced by Anime? Maybe their like still exist and I'm suffering from a bout of Ignorance brought on by an extended lack of cable TV.

Maybe it's time to call Time Warner, purchase a box of Capt'n Crunch, find couch and a TV somewhere.

... Sort of makes my next stop sound like prison, actually.

-Matt

Concepts and Barbaric Bugs

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Not too many NEW newness to report on Savage today besides some gameplay tweaking and minor (but annoying) bug squashing, so I thought I would share some concept sketches from mah little pad:

Excuse the crudeness of the drawings and if they come off a bit... savage (Haha Heehee ho... *ahem*).

Anyhoo, cruel and unusual punishment aside, next up on the to do list is to inject some fight into our enemies for our barbarian to squish, get some serious AI in there, some combat (XP, stats, the like), and maybe some items... Ooh! And don't forget run-on sentences!

-Matt

Colours Are Magic

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And I have proof:

It looks like there will finally be an update schedule I can commit to (who says dudes are incapable of such feats as this) thanks to Eric - weaving his magic wand all over the dry erase board and whatnot.

Mondays and Wednesdays will see new Nocturnal Transmissions comics (as soon as we inject some pigment into the old hags) - huzzah!

-Matt

New Warpaint (finally) And Other Junk

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I never thought it'd happen again, but here ya go:

Progress, as promised; featuring the coloring talents of one Eric Hansen - forgive my curtained physical jubilation!

 

I don't know how this escaped my attention for so long, but I've recently become addicted to a couple games on Kongregate. Kingdom Rush, for one, is probably the only reason I've been interacting with the internets on my computer for the past few days.

Speaking of rad, I've always been a big fan (drooling mongloidish addict) of Mount and Blade (or Mount & Blade, or whatever) and Mount and Blade: Warband. BUT! That coupled with a shiny new mod for vanilla flavored Mount and Blade that goes by the name of The Last Days (of the Third Age) of Middle Earth has me breaking out in gooseflesh, fevers and shiver spells when I'm not getting my damn fix.

The mod is incredibly detailed - like if you tried to shove all of your paperback versions of Tolkien's works into your damn hard drive and then digitally run around with a Rohirrim slaying Orcs hither and thither. Super sick (like the good kind), despite having a very unwieldy title... Let's try to acronym-ize it to make it less... ( TLDotTAoME ) - Ack. Nope. I just bashed my shin into an angry vowel.

-Matt

End Transmission.

 

 

Back On Track

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Ok - first off, I'd like to say that I will endevour to update this dev journal for Savage much more frequently and on schedule (which I'll get to later - probably every Friday). That will keep me going on this project and force me to produce a playable demo very soon. Cautious optimism is my bestest friend.

Anyhoo, on to the updates! (in bulleted form for now, with some screenies)

  • Completely scrapped and redesigned the engine with more efficient code and to make everything more feature friendly
  • Fine tuned and added new animations (new attacks of all kinds and states, lifting, carrying, pulling, pushing, skidding)
  • Added a humble lighting engine where a "fire" object illuminates and casts shadows
  • Created a player naming system
  • New text system with dialogue trees
  • Started on a melee impact system
  • Widescreen format
  • Ramps, stairs, ledges
  • Created and added some menu and dialogue box sounds

      

 

So, there we have it - ugly untiled graphics and all. More to come soon!

Savage Update

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I thought I'd post some screens for Savage and let the interwebs get a look at this thing I've been monkeying around with. I'm still pounding the kinks out of the engine and might have a little demo version of the game ready to be fondled, caressed and wholly abused by those so compelled in the coming months.

      

   

 

     

 

 

What is best in life?

It's (still) Alive!!

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Still kicking. So much has happened since this dern place was last updated. Where to begin? 'Beau and I relocated to Austin, Texas the second week of January to fantastic results. I've still been working on Savage when time permits, and now that the dust has settled from of all the busy ( Halloween wedding, out of state move and life change will do that, sometimes ), we can get back to updates!

Mmm... updates.

We were fortunate enough to move in above some really cool neighbors, one of whom is doing some awesome coloring for the coming Warpaint pages and is quickly becoming a huge contributor to the site and all the random projects going on around here. His name is Eric Hansen. And you will know him by the trail of dead. Or something.

Observe our refreshingly unexampled fervor:

But, yes. Supremely blessed and happy to have him on our side.

To the future!

 

p.s. I also couldn't let this hilarious tidbit from my 7 year old brother's history class activity book go unnoticed:

Diminuative Undertaking

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For the Emperor, indeed.

 I have been supremely excited about all the goings on in the Warhammer 40k franchise lately what with the recent release of Ultramarines, the film, and the slow, steady drip-feed of information on the Vigil Games MMO, Dark Millennium and Space Marine (bom bom BOM), the game. ... And, who knows! - if all goes well, we might even get some games/films with some more inspired titles! Keep your chainswords crossed.

Fanboy puns/awful jokes aside, I loved Ultramarines, despite the low production values. My mortal coil would be shuffled loose (and I'd probably poop) if the team responsible were given a bigger budget to work on a sequel. Seriously, the lads at Codex Pictures who threw the film together deserve a medal. Or a Space Ork head on a pike. That ought to satisfy, I think. I sense myself getting off track - The film is going to be screened FOR FREE at select theaters at the end of this month stateside. I am totally going (or, deploying. *geekishly amused chuckle*) to the showing in Los Angeles on Sunday.

I thought It appropriate, too, what with all the hammering going on and the comic's esoterically nerdy subject, to upload these little guys (For those interested (who I'm willing to wager are very few): two tactical squads of Ultramarines and a captain whose colourschemes I altered to suit my newly discovered Crimson Fists fetish):

 

 

Dear Internet - Hopefully nothing too incriminating is given away in the background...

  I also gave Dawn of War II a try. So far, melikes what meplays. I was wary to try the thing when it was released due to all the backlash it got for straying too far from the series' particularities established in the first Dawn of War and it's myriad expansions... but I am enjoying myself - so nyah.

Ok. No more Warhammer, now. I promise.

-Fitz

End Transmission.