Work on William and Sly 2 is going very well. I think I can safely say I’m close to the end (meaning a few more weeks of work). I have a fair bit of world building left to do, but I have all the game mechanics in place and most of the animations done at this point. The music is also completed.

The look of the game has changed somewhat significantly since that last screenshot, but since I’m rather close to the end now I’m going to forgo posting any more shots so you guys can have some surprises. I’m really excited to see what people think of the game. Fun times ahead! :)

Wow, this blog is bumpin’ now! I figured I’d answer all the comments on my last post with a new post rather than a bunch of comments.

First, here’s a picture since this post is long. :3 You probably will never get to see this in its entirety anywhere else since it’s the very back layer of the game:

***

@ Matt: Or anyone who wants to send me an email: Luke(at)particlasm.com. I should put an email link on the side somewhere…

You can post your ideas here too, though.

***

@Victor: Thank for the ideas!

I’ll start out by saying I don’t believe in artist block. I’ve always felt that every drawing or painting (or anything, really) is a struggle and you just need patience and discipline to get through. Obviously patience will run out at some point and you move on to a new piece of work, but the more you can hold that off, the better your work will be. Everything we make will go through an “awkward teenage phase” (as one of my art teachers liked to call it) and it’s best to just grit your teeth and plow onward ‘till it’s at least somewhat acceptable. Artist block is just an unwillingness to practice the hard stuff or work in spite of frustration. Even a perfectionist can make himself happy if he keeps on trying. The key is allowing yourself to enjoy the process and wait for the outcome to be great.

Now, I’m not saying I’m any good at getting over those humps. I just find it a lot easier to call it what it is and realize I’m just being lazy, haha.

***

@Somebody: I always felt that way about RPGs after I played Chrono Trigger. I’m definitely flattered you feel that way about WaS! :3

I know what you mean about the gameplay, too. I always try to put gameplay first, and in spite of my more recent failed attempts, I think I finally understand what I need to do. Platformers are my favorite type of game, so I feel very comfortable making one. WaS2 should play just as well as the first one, if not better.

***

@Lachlan: There aren’t any rustling leaves (at least not yet, I’ll see what my particle system can do, hehe), but the trees have 4-5 layers of parallax on them, so when you move they look really voluminous. The screenshot is just a very small sample of what I hope to get in there. I’ll definitely have lots of pine trees, maybe some waterfalls too.

Also, The music is fantastic, if I may say so myself. ;)

The look I’m going for on this game is that eerie pre-storm coloring you get mid-summer when the thunderheads are rolling in. I wanted the first game to feel really grand, but I had to sacrifice that because my tile system was pretty limited. The rainy day worked well because I couldn’t do shadows. This game has dynamic shadows and 12 layers of parallax and tons of layering possibilities on every tile, so I can build it as a whole working composition rather than an assembly of parts.

As far as story goes, I’m on the same page you are. I’m going to build the story indirectly with things like the signposts in the first game and little journal entries. The game starts with William complaining that gnomes stole one of his journals, so a sidequest will be to find the missing pages. I though this would be like the mushrooms in the first game except they would have more of a purpose than score (which I don’t think anyone really cared about). I’ll keep them sparse and short, though, so they’re a nice resting point rather than a choppy distraction.

Also, no talking foxes. Sly is smart, but he’s not a human. :3 No boss battle, either. No one liked that, lol.

Hooray, I was able to pass the point of no return! Work has been going pretty smoothly with William and Sly 2 (should I actually call it that? Maybe I’ll go “world 2″ like Fancypants…), so I thought I’d post a screenshot to make you all drool. :3

I’ll try to do updates more often, though I don’t really know what to post since I don’t want to wreck the impact by showing everything before it comes out. I suppose only the most rabid fans are still coming here after two years, so I may as well give you all something to feed on. FEED MY DARLINGS!!

I’m still not entirely sure what the story is gonna be about. I’m planning to have a bit of back story in there, but since the graphics and music seem to be setting a mysterious dramatic tone I feel like I should have some character drama. DRAMA!! But maybe not. I have to animate characters, after all. ;) Maybe they’ll be invisible characters, or long dead characters. I can steal the only good idea Looming had (if you haven’t played that, btw, don’t bother).

What else would you guys be interested in seeing on here? I could always write scathing reviews of crappy flashes I watch, that’s always fun. I really should post my art, but that seems like work. Does anyone know of a good wordpress addon for art galleries?

P.s. I dedicate this post to Lachlan, who made me feel guilty for not divulging more information. :3

P.p.s. Divulging sounds rather gross doesn’t it? Like: I had the flu and divulged my dinner all over the floor.

Oop, did I just say William and Sly 2? YES! Haha, I’ve actually started it and now that I’m making a post about it I’m going to feel obligated to finish it.

I also released a new game (Azurefish) a few days ago. Here’s a link to the sponsor’s site: GOGOGO!

Here’s the newfangled Sly. I’m doing it in 3D because I want to do a lotsa lot of animations and I love animating in 2D about as much as swimming in a sewer. (Which means not at all, in case that wasn’t clear…) I used to do 3D all the time when I was a kid so it’ll be nice to actually use those skills for something. I was a little unsure if I could make something good enough to fit with the other graphics I have planned, but I think this turned out really nice!

I’ll give a plug to Blender here since that’s the program I’m using. It’s actually really amazing; it’s completely free and pretty much industry standard in what it can do (meaning cloth, hair, fluids, etc). This model I made renders instantly so I’ll be able to render the animations really quickly which is nice. You can see I even used hair on the chest and tail! Everyone should go try it out! :D

Well that’s it for now. I need to update this thing more, lol…