Progress Report

A quick update on some of the progress I've been making since we last spoke. I've been working on the game a ton - it almost feels like a new golden age, which is good, because there's still a lot of work to be done before it even nears completion.

Apart from the major scripting breakthrough I recently experienced, I've also been working on a mountain town this past month, after finishing up the snow town I mentioned last time. I'm really proud of the maps I've been coming up with for this project, so I hope people will like them. I'll tell you one thing, though, I am about sick to death of making mountain/hill maps, because the geological architecture is a real pain in the ass - getting all the levels to line up and look decent. I've gotta start working on some caves for a change, especially considering that I only have one cave dungeon so far in the game (don't worry, there are more coming). But the mountain area attached to this town has a pretty neat atmospheric effect that I'm really excited about (no spoilers!).

The other thing I just had to tell you about is that the other day, I discovered the extent to which you can customize animations (which are mainly used for battle skills, but can also be exploited in other ways). This is one of those "duh" moments, and you're probably going to tell me it was obvious from the start, because I did know there was an animation editor, but the significance of it didn't really dawn on me until I was looking at it recently. Maybe I was avoiding it because I don't feel that animation is my strong suit. But I dug into it a little bit, and, tedious though it is, I'm not totally helpless.

This is great, because it gives me more customization over my skills, which is important, since the magic spells I have planned are a really important aspect of my game, and the default animations that come with the game - while good - had a few holes that needed filling in. So I've been spending obscene amounts of time over the past several days modifying and adjusting animations to my needs. It's kind of mind-numbing at times, but the potential is honestly a bit thrilling. That's one more thing that's going to take a lot of work before my game is finished, but one more aspect that needed to be figured out that is beginning to fall into place!