October Update
Author: From Steam
Date:
Sun, 28 Jan 2024
Game: Grappledrome
Genre:
Action, Indie, Early Access
Developer: 800 North
Release Date: Mon, 13 Feb 2017
Developer: 800 North
Release Date: Mon, 13 Feb 2017
Hello all,
We continue to focus on the opening of the singleplayer campaign. In our last update your saw some concept art of the eye stalks which are a part of an inspection tunnel the player will find him/herself in at the start of the game. Like any piece of entertainment it's critically important to capture the audience right at the start so we're spending a lot of time thinking through the game's opening moments.
Last update you saw an inspection tunnel and some ideas for the eye stalks you'd see along the path. We've done more along these lines and begun modeling the interior. In addition, we also some objects that you'll see at the beginning that we're calling "Hypercubes". These are very large structures that will give the impression of human souls marching to their doom in the Grappledrome...the eventual fate of the player!
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These are meant to imply, in a surreal sort of way, a prison-like atmosphere. You'll never actually go inside one of these structures...at last not in a normal way. We want the spaces in the singleplayer game to have a distinctly surreal feeling and that includes how chambers connect with one another. In short, we want to "break the rules" a bit so the spaces in the campaign don't feel too much like the real world. If we do it right there will be a dream-like quality to it all (or nightmare I suppose since humanity is being tortured for all eternity in the Grappledrome).
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As for other work, we are working on some new weapons which should be ready in a reasonable amount of time. They were sidetracked for quite a while but we've gotten back to them now. We will likely make the new weapons a part of a bigger update to the Steam build so you can check them out. We'll do some updates to the Multiplayer as a part of that build as well.
As for non-visual work...a lot of time has been put into NPC AI. Some of the underlying support for NPCs was done quite a while ago but we've built on that now and done some experiments to see what kinds of enemies seem right for the campaign. We experimented quite a lot with procedural animation which was pretty fun but ultimately won't be practical for all NPCs. You'll almost certainly see elements of procedural animation filter into the game as there were some fun ideas that came out of the experiments.
That about covers it for now. Back to work!
The Devs
We continue to focus on the opening of the singleplayer campaign. In our last update your saw some concept art of the eye stalks which are a part of an inspection tunnel the player will find him/herself in at the start of the game. Like any piece of entertainment it's critically important to capture the audience right at the start so we're spending a lot of time thinking through the game's opening moments.
Last update you saw an inspection tunnel and some ideas for the eye stalks you'd see along the path. We've done more along these lines and begun modeling the interior. In addition, we also some objects that you'll see at the beginning that we're calling "Hypercubes". These are very large structures that will give the impression of human souls marching to their doom in the Grappledrome...the eventual fate of the player!
These are meant to imply, in a surreal sort of way, a prison-like atmosphere. You'll never actually go inside one of these structures...at last not in a normal way. We want the spaces in the singleplayer game to have a distinctly surreal feeling and that includes how chambers connect with one another. In short, we want to "break the rules" a bit so the spaces in the campaign don't feel too much like the real world. If we do it right there will be a dream-like quality to it all (or nightmare I suppose since humanity is being tortured for all eternity in the Grappledrome).
As for other work, we are working on some new weapons which should be ready in a reasonable amount of time. They were sidetracked for quite a while but we've gotten back to them now. We will likely make the new weapons a part of a bigger update to the Steam build so you can check them out. We'll do some updates to the Multiplayer as a part of that build as well.
As for non-visual work...a lot of time has been put into NPC AI. Some of the underlying support for NPCs was done quite a while ago but we've built on that now and done some experiments to see what kinds of enemies seem right for the campaign. We experimented quite a lot with procedural animation which was pretty fun but ultimately won't be practical for all NPCs. You'll almost certainly see elements of procedural animation filter into the game as there were some fun ideas that came out of the experiments.
That about covers it for now. Back to work!
The Devs
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