Making Enemies

Here is this week's update video:

We've been working on the enemy AI. So far we've got the enemies from previous videos with the saw blade hands and some new flying enemies. They both sort of just go towards you once you're in their alert range or if you shoot at them. It' tricky when there's a lot on screen.

Here are some more character faces. We only got eight right now, so why not put Megaman as joke filler to complete the square? I don't know, maybe because it's stupid.

Whatever, check back next week for another update.

New Faces

And here I am, back with another update. First, the video:

We've had to decide how we wanted to make the character faces, and this is the kind of thing we came up with.

For a time, Eddie was gonna just draw the pictures in real life, scan them in, and shrink them down to pixel size. They looked pretty good, but it was a bit too much effort just for small face sprites. So instead he just figured out how to draw them directly at that size. Huh...

Here's a few new NPC's. You may recognize some of these designs from our old Fallen Leaf demo if you ever played that. Except they don't look like shit.

I'll close out with a nice screen shot.

So that's it for now. Check back next week for another update.

Warning: Boss Approaching

Hey people, I'm here with another update. This time we've got more to show than last week. First, the video:

So yeah, the coolest thing we did was create the first boss fight. It's also nice to see some actual gameplay for once. We didn't want the first boss to be too easy so it's kinda tricky, but like most bosses, there's a pattern to it. We want the boss fights to be the kind that are easy after you know what to do. So this boss alternates between firing a laser and dropping bombs over you. You can't damage him while he's charging the laser though, so you've got to try getting hits in while also dodging the laser.

 Here's a better look at the boss. That's the dude who pilots it.

Oh yeah, and the beginning of the video features what will be the starting area. We didn't go overboard with the size, so it's just a few houses. There's also a neat fountain thing.

And lastly, I can't forget to mention that we finally made some sound effects for the game. You can hear them in the video.

So that's it for now. Check back next week for another update.

Making Houses

Well there's honestly not much to show off this week. That's partly because we spent half of the weekend playing the Wii U (which is pretty cool. Gotta love New super Rehash New Super Mario Bros!).  It's also because I spent a lot of time writing the story and fixing glitches that no one even knew existed.
So anyway, let's get to the point of this post. We got houses! Check it out in the newest update video below.

Obviously it's empty at the moment. For now it just serves as a basic template for the design. Below you can see some different variations on the same kind of house.

We also increased the characters jump height to make the potential for platforming greater. Either way, it's hard to tell what's right for that until we start making the actual levels which will hopefully be soon. There's still a lot of work to do though, like making more kinds of enemies, sprites, etc.

And that's it for now. Check back next week for another update.

Get Them Feet Wet

Here I am, back with another update.  I'll just post the video first.

We got these metal/concrete things now. Some of them are in the air suspended by stuff in the background, and others can just be placed in the ground for aesthetics. The Parallax in the background has been tweaked a little bit to look more realistic as well

Jump-through platforms work now, too, and you can press down and jump to fall through them.

 That's a jump-through platform on the bottom right above the water.

 There are also animations for the water which didn't even exist before. The water basically slows you down a little bit when you walk in it and let's you jump a bit higher. There's going to be a breath meter in the final game and an upgrade that takes it away allowing you to get to secret areas or something.

The HP is displayed at the top left of the screen. There will be HP upgrades, so here's a picture showing how that will look.

And that's all for now. Check back later for more updates.

Fleshing Things Out

Here's a quick post with another video showing off the things we've put together this week. First, the video:

 We're now calling this the Power Plant Project until we come up with an actual name.

Art-

The background for this area is finally done, or at least it is for now. It's no longer just a solid purple color, and instead has clouds, factories, and a touch of yellow. There are also a bunch of pipes strewn in through the ground. They're pretty cluttered here, but it's only a test map after all. You can see the different kinds of details we've made so that each pipe can look different.

Gameplay-
I've been messing around with a few things, and managed to come up with two useful things: conveyer belts, and fans. The conveyer belts work like any other conveyer belt you've seen in a game. Some push you left, and some push you right. It's pretty simple. The fans actually came about by accident, but they're still pretty neat. They basically just push you up if you're in the area above them. Eddie hasn't done proper art for them yet, so in the meantime you can look at the bullshit I was able to make.

And that about wraps up this update. Check back later for more. I'm thinking about making this a weekly thing, but I guess that depends on how much stuff gets done each week.

First Video of the Game

Hey everyone, I'm back with another update. This time I've actually got video for you to see thanks to me finally finding a decent video recorder. Check it out below.

This video basically shows off everything we've done since starting from scratch. It's a test map featuring the new engine in action with the slopes, and the new combat. You can also look at the animations I had mentioned in the last post. As you can see, there's a sword and a gun which both act differently. The gun can shoot fast at a long range, but is weaker. The sword is short range, but will be stronger and also provides invincibility frames if you're able to keep connecting hits on the enemy. The enemy here, by the way, is very basic at the moment as it just rolls back and forth. We've yet to add in any of its attacks, though you still take damage just from touching it.

That's about it for now. Rest assured that we won't be starting from scratch again as everything seems to be working out so far.

A New Start

So, as fate would have it, just as soon as we started this blog... we began going through the biggest change to the game yet. Funny, I know. Honestly, it's more like a complete overhaul; basically, we've started from scratch. Really, I must apologize to the four(three?) of you who have been waiting patiently for the next release.
So, what's the reason for all of this? To put it simply, the game was becoming a mess due to our own incompetence and lack of experience in making any kind of game at all. After recently gaining new inspirations from other games, and studying our own flaws, we felt it was simply best to just start with a clean slate.

The first order of business was fixing up our art direction. For one, the sprites we made had the obviouse flaw of relying way too much on black outlines. This made them cluttered and larger than they needed to be. You can see an example of a character made with both styles below.

The new style is on the right.

The sprites are also animated very well now, but you'll have to take my word for it until we get a good video recorder.

Here's a look at the main characters.

We've also learned a bit about color, and will be more conscious when choosing what colors to use in the game. It's important that everything looks good together after all.

 

 Here's a shot from the new game so far. It's basically a test map at this point.

Something you might notice in the screenshot above is the addition of slopes. They're something we really wanted to have in the game since the beginning and finally decided to put effort into getting them. You also might notice that the resolution of the game is different than before. We chose to zoom it out a bit to give the player more room to see, and to give us more options with level design. We also chose a 4:3 aspect ratio since it looked the best, and is the norm for most platformers.

We also looked at some of the core gameplay mechanics and made changes. A platformer where you shoot things should be fast paced and fun, not slow and clunky. That's why we made the basic weapon spammable, and allowed the player to shoot while running. It's just more fun that way.

See all those bullets? Spam that shit.

The story is entirely new as well. I won't go into too much detail there, but we think it's way more interesting than what we had before. Admittedly, It's still going to be riddled with cliches, but it's the better cliches. It's all about robots, evil scientists, and an entire planet nearly covered with factories... You know, to have a nice visual motif.

The music also needed some touching up. I've always felt that the 8-bit chiptunes I made just didn't fit with the game, especially with the way it looks now. Thankfully, I've recently discovered soundfonts and how amazing they are. I managed to find some that were made from SNES sounds and got to work. I'm still learning, but here's what I came up with so far.

http://soundcloud.com/uebo7/snes-style-video-game-song-ice

http://soundcloud.com/uebo7/snes-style-video-game-song

http://soundcloud.com/uebo7/snes-style-video-game-music

http://soundcloud.com/uebo7/snes-style-video-game-song-1

http://soundcloud.com/uebo7/snes-style-video-game-music-1

These probably aren't even done, and some of them are a mess, but they're interesting.

And in case you haven't realized it yet, the game is no longer called "Fallen Leaf" as that doesn't make any sense anymore. The new title of the game is... well, we're still working on that. Naming shit sucks. Oh, and speaking of that, our new company name(if you wanna call it that) is Neon Leaf. It sounds way better than Bobby's Pants, that's for sure. We would have used Fallen Leaf, but can you believe there's already a "fallenleafgames" here on blogger? Whatever, you know, that's fine... They can have the stupid name.

And one last thing that I want to say about our new approach to the game is that we'll be planning things out a lot more. Sure, it means it'll take even longer for a playable demo to come out, but it also means that a more solid product will be made. We wouldn't want to get tangled in a mess again.

Anyway, that's it for now. Be sure to check back for updates on the new game's progress, and know that we won't be restating again any time soon. I mean, I hope not.

About the Music

This will be the first post talking about and showing some music from the game. I'll be posting tracks that I make here every now and then, but that doesn't really guarantee that they'll show up in the game or sound the same if they do. It just means that they're worth listening to, I guess. It's just too early to know which tracks will make it in or not.

Anyway, the music for this game is being made in FL Studio, and it's basically chip tunes. I still don't think I have the right technique for it yet, but it sounds close enough.

This is the Main Theme right now. It's what would play at the title screen.

This is a variation on the main theme. We're planning on having different versions of some themes that play in different areas of the game for different reasons. For instance, this version might play during a cut scene or something.

And finally this is another variation on the same main theme that would play somewhere else.

Well, that's all for now. Look forward to more music being posted in the future.

Fallen Leaf Introduction

Hi everyone, and welcome to our blog. My name is Logan, and I'll probably be the one writing most of the entries here. This is our first post so I suppose I should go over a few of the details of Fallen Leaf and talk about how this project started.

It was about 9 months ago when my cousin Eddie and I were sitting around and thought "Hey, we should make a video game.", and so we did. Oh yeah, and my brother Chase decided he wanted to help out from time to time as well. Anyway, we didn't actually know what we were doing - and it's fair to say that we still don't - so we're just slowly making progress. Still, progress is progress nonetheless.

Here's a shot from how the game looks right now.

So, what kind of game is Fallen Leaf? Well, it's a 2D action adventure game. It's inspired by some of our favorite game series such as Megaman and Zelda, although Fallen Leaf is shaping up to be more of a linear, story driven game in the vein of something like Cave Story. We're also going to be focusing on having lots of characters with side quests and whatnot.

The story so far is pretty cliche as far as anime and video games go. You know, you've got an ancient evil, a girl falling out of the sky, and an average boy who happens to get caught up in everything. Hey, we're not professional writers, but hopefully some of the charm will make up for that.

See? Right out of the sky...

Since this project has been going on for almost a year now, it's pretty amusing to go back and look at some older screen shots. They look like crap, to say the least. However, that just means that we're getting better. It also means that anything posted here might end up being changed at some point in the future. Everything from the story to the art is constantly getting reworked, so who knows.

Ew man, just look at that.

Okay, that's better.

Anyway, that's about it for this post. I'll try to keep this blog updated semi-regularly, but there's no promises. It just depends on when I feel like it, really. Oh, and don't forget to check out some of the character art on the side there.