Hunter's Lodge DEV update.
Main menu GUI



Finally done with the main menu

Took forever i hear you say. I agree. Ended up taking many many many times longer than i had initially thought it would, but that's usually how it is lol. I can't for the life of me understand how some people do this so fast. I have been working on this almost every day, and it still took forever. Maybe they hire little helpers? I mean seriously, making a game and doing art at the same time is outrageous. What the fuck. 

A few things to look out for while watching: 
  • The backgrounds aren't static — each environment has its own subtle effects and atmosphere.

  • The ruined castle has its own rain/water, mist and environmental effects.

  • The castle hallways have dust particles drifting through the light from the window, alongside a much quieter and more distant soundscape.

  • The haunted forest has layered mist and falling leaves with different depths, speeds and movement. This is done in hope that it'll give the a otherwise 2d image a 3d illusion of sorts.

  • The ambient audio is different for each environment and is designed to feel like part of the space rather than just background noise.

  • Had a last minute idea to add a "press to continue" splash screen before the main menu. I think it turned out alright and it just adds to the whole custom feel thing.

A surprising amount of work went into making all of those little things behave properly behind the scenes. In particular, I spent a rather embarrassing amount of time making sure the environmental effects could run indefinitely without slowly eating the game's performance. The problem was that animations like the condensation streaks and dripping drops of the ruined castle BG would not delete once they had finished doing what they do and would therefore keep accumulating and eventually start eating ram and bogging down. It wouldn't really be a problem if i left it like that. The average player won't spend much time there, but i don't want a half-assed game. So i spent a lot of time getting that right.

I'm really happy with where it's ended up, though. It feels much more like Hunter's Lodge now rather than just a collection of Ren'Py menus. And that's very important to achieve if you ask me. If this game is ever going to stand out, it can't appear to be just a run of the mill ren'py game. 

Now that that's done and dusted i can move onto the next thing. I had initially planned to implement the journal gui system right after the main menu, but the main menu has taken so long that i think it's best to put that on hold and instead to some other artworks first. It has been almost two months since i posted Krystal and i really don't like leaving you guy high and dry, even if it might seem like it some times. I'm going to make a poll for what comes next so that you, my beautiful patient supporters can get your wish as to what i'll do next.