Progress Report: Level Design is now Complete!

Hello, i hope you had a Amazing week!

This week i've managed to reach a big milestone of the project development: Completing the level design for the demo.

Also the previous system that managed the rooms present in the game and its connections has been greatly improved so rooms are easier to place, link, maintain and change making my time as a developer way easier

The post preview you can see the one of the debugs that show the connection of the map and where it leads to

The game demo will contain:

•24 rooms to explore

•A few tutorial-style rooms at the start to teach controls and mechanics

•About 2 rooms reserved for the upcoming save point feature

•Two main pathways toward the end of the map, they interconnect in places and meet again at the end of the demo

•Plenty of ambushes and items scattered throughout, so go mess around and find out!

Every room is decorated with the tilemaps and assets I made earlier.

I also added a bit of atmosphere with particles like falling leaves for the forest part of the region and a firefly-like motes in the cave areas.

NPC Emotes

Characters can now use emotes. It’s a flavor feature, but it also helps at a glance:

whether you’ve been spotted

if a lewd attack is incoming

if an enemy’s poise broke

or if they just reactivated

I’ll keep adding more over time.

Emotes give enemies more personality, and watching their reactions is honestly a lot of fun.

Some of these were inspired by the MMORPG Ragnarok Online.

Whats Next?

The demo closed beta test is getting close.

I was aiming to release it last month and missed that deadline as it still a very difficult thing to estimate and i still have diffictulties with it, but development is moving fast and nonstop!

A closed beta should be ready soon.

Before that, a few important features still need to go in.

Save System & Save Points

Save points will sit in the rooms reserved for them.

Like most games, they let you save your progress and pick it back up the next time you play.

The save system will store:

Your current save room (this also acts as the checkpoint when you get defeated)

Player level

Ambush zones you’ve cleared (once cleared, they stay cleared)

Current equipment durability

Barriers you’ve opened

Save points will also work as a hub where you can:

Restore all your items

Restore all HP / MP

Restore all equipment (optional)

Title Screen

This is the screen that opens when you launch the game. From here you’ll be able to:

Start a new game

Load a saved game

Tweak a few basic settings

I’m skipping title-screen artwork for now so the demo can come out faster.

Player Pause Menu The pause menu will show a few information of the player, like:

Level

Attributes

Current equipment durability

Equipped items

Return to title screen

And will allow you to tweak some basic settings from the game as well

I’ll also add some small handling for BGM and environment sounds.

After that, I’ll start intense playtesting.

Once everything feels solid, the closed beta can begin!

Thank for your Interest in the project

and a Special thanks for all my supporters, i hope you can enjoy the playtest soon! 🙏

Level Design, Consumable Items and more camera features

Level Design Sneak Peek

I’ve started putting together all the systems and assets I’ve been developing over the past months to create the actual rooms for the demo.

A couple of rooms are already ready, and I’m currently working on the overall concept and layout of the area that will be featured in the demo.

I might still adjust some rooms later based on feedback and as the project expands with new features or regions.

I’ve been using LDtk to plan the macro design first, then carefully building and refining each room.

Once the rooms feel solid, I’ll move on to the final stage of demo development: the save system, main title screen, and player pause menu and some minor tasks on the development list

Consumable Items

To make exploration a bit more rewarding, I’ve added a consumable Items!

We all love a little reward, don't we?

Here’s how it works:

•Find and approach an item to pick it up.

•Once acquired, it appears in one of your available item slots and can be used with the “Use Item” key.

•You can hold up to 4 items at a time and cycle through them with the “Change Item” key.

•Reaching a save point fully replenishes all items to the maximum amount you’ve found so far.

•For now there’s no full inventory system,so the items are stored only in the player’s item slots.

•For the demo we currently have three items:

Life Crystal – Restores some of the player’s HP

Mana Crystal – Restores some of the player’s MP

Magic Thread – Fully restores all clothes durability

The system is fully working, now and it's already integrated with the previous sfx and vfx system

Make sure you find them all in the upcoming Magic Girl Azalea demo!

New Camera Features

I’ve also added two new camera modes:

•Locked on the X-axis

•Locked on the Y-axis

Plus a new component that lets me switch camera modes in different areas of the same room.

This gives me much more precise control and greater freedom when designing the levels.

What’s Next?

Level design will take a little while longer to finish,I want everything working as well as possible with the current feature set.

Planning, creating, testing, and decorating the rooms takes time, but the good news is that this is definitely the last major milestone untill the release of the demo!

After that, I’ll move on to the remaining small components on the task list, do some polishing, and start internal playtesting.

Once that’s done, we’ll prepare the itch io page and begin the project’s first closed playtesting!

Thanks for your continued support 🙏

more updates coming soon!

New Tilesets WIP

Hello! I hope you're having a wonderful week!

Today I bring a showcase of the new tilesets I’ve been working on over the past week.

It’s still very much a WIP, but you can already feel the new atmosphere they bring to the game.

My current focus is building the core tiles that will make up the rooms.

I’m creating modular pieces that combine well at different angles, along with some basic tiles and just a few decorations to break up the repetition.

Once the foundation is solid, I’ll move on to finishing the last missing features needed for the demo release.

There are still a few issues with the tiles shown here (and some variants missing), but I’m actively fixing them.

My goal is to have all of these tilesets completed by the middle of next week, along with everything I need to keep moving forward.

Thank you so much for your support, it really means a lot!

Aphrodisiac Water Hazard

The first level hazard mechanic for "Magical Girl Azalea" is now complete!

Meet the "Aphrodisiac Water"

"Do not mess around with the pink-colored water. Even though it looks cute, harmless, and smells wonderful… it will mess with your body." — Commentary by a Veteran Magical Girl

These shimmering pink pools are most likely the result of forest water sources tainted by plant-type demons living in the area.

Their roots slowly taint the water over time, turning it into this sweet-smelling, dangerous liquid.

While some enemies are immune, most humans and even many demons are highly susceptible to it.

Overall Moving through any water bodies (even shallow ones) slows down your movement speed, but the aphodisiac ones come with a extra effect on top of it:

Aphrodisiac water Effects:

•Rapidly corrodes any equipment that isn’t specially protected

•Applies strong arousal buildup + HP damage on contact

For the game's demo release we'll have the shallow version of it, which is:

•Wearing boots → Boots gradually take damage, but you are fully protected from arousal and HP loss

•No boots, but wearing tights → Tights slot equipment corrodes + you receive roughly half the arousal & HP damage

•No boots or tights → You suffer the full effect from the aphrodisiac

The Capra demons aren’t immune to this effect, so push them into the water and watch them squirm if you can

Whats next?

This, feature is almost complete and i just need a final run of testing and i'll proceed to the next features, which are:

•Gates and Gatekeepers

•Objects

•Player Current Target HUD

Thank you for following and supporting the project it means a lot, and i hope you have a nice week! 🙏

And see you soon!