I'm trying to get a public demo of JARPUG out within the next few months. That means it's time to start making content! I've done a lot of art and level production pipeline work. It's fun and I'm feeling like I'm ready to go full speed on this thing. Hopefully that pans out.

The Great Indoors

I spent a lot of time working on different solutions for indoor rendering, ranging from one-sided "inside edge" rendering to varying the levels' grid density. I ended up prototyping several different solutions for this. It all got pretty technical and frustrating, but in the end I went with the super simple solution of making a new tileset that has thinner walls.

A simple "sharp" block tileset ended up being far too fat:

"Inner edge only" interior walls looked okay but didn't really provide the diorama look I'm going for. I didn't like how complicated that inner-edge detection logic ended up being when interacting with the existing tile system. And they were pretty annoying to work with in-editor.

I briefly experimented with making smaller grids for some levels. Making multiple grid sizes in a single level seemed wildly complicated, and this dialog summarizes what's wrong with the alternative:

The end solution is dramatically simpler and makes me feel a bit dumb for spending so much time getting there. Each tile block in a JARPUG level has four separate corners that get picked based on their neighbors. The new "narrow wall" tileset's outer edges are very narrow, while its middle edges are the normal width. This makes for tiles that can easily fill the grid while still having very narrow divider walls.

I also added the ability to "UV2 paint" detail textures onto tile blocks in editor to speed up the application of things like that kitchen tile texture overlay.

Details

While the base of JARPUG's levels is built up with these handy tiles via custom editor, I still have plenty of detailed art that doesn't quite fit into a clean grid! I had a fun time modeling piles of lil' details for the game's world. Especially indoors.

Kettles, mugs, and fridges! A surprising lack of lamps. I spent a ridiculous amount of time on those cabinets.

I made a roof-less building tileset so I can plop custom-modeled roofs onto things where appropriate.

Also: porchlights and a fake-inset sidewalk grass tileset. I'll probably do the same fake inset trick for things like forest trails in the future.

Level Transitions

I generally won't spin the camera around like this when entering doors, but I like that I can. Pointing the fade in's "hole" at the pug helps keep it in focus for the player when moving through doors. Marking doorways with labels seems like a nice way to help players keep track of where they are, as well.

Monster Time

I modeled some super scary enemies that are sure to terrify any dog. I've hooked them all up with some preliminary AI and skills in-game, but they're still far from shippable.

a noisy shrub

a bird that is too large

rats

the front door

How Work Do

My wife travels for work, generally to meet with collaborators. We often make a family trip of it. I mostly work on gamedev alone, but she figured it'd be a good idea for me to visit a workspace while we all got out of town for a bit. I spent the last three-ish days in Amarillo on a "work retreat". It's been a long time since I managed to work full days, and even longer since I did that around other working people. It's nice.

She and the kid seem to have seen most of Amarillo's toddler-friendly attractions by now, though. I guess it's time to go home.

Bye!