As 2022 came to a close and the New Year begins, the team had a slower week regarding development. With 2023 expected to bring some big things to Depths of Erendorn, the team have started to lay the groundwork for a busy year! The wizards of coding have been working on improving the camera in the engine and fixes for server crashes. Additionally, the animation team has continued to update movement cycles for the Character Classes of Erendorn. Finally, the VFX team create some mystical fireworks to celebrate the New Year. As always, join us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Reddit for daily updates on Depths of Erendorn. Alternatively, join our Discord for all the latest! - now let’s get into it!
Programming
Client
On the client side, a lot of work would be completed to fix some of the issues regarding the camera. A breakdown of the work done on the camera as well as others can be seen below.
- Updated the Camera movement to better handle the height offset and it now tracks the floor correctly.
- Fixed an issue which allowed the camera to go underground.
- Fixed and improved camera lerp function.
- Implemented a camera Height lerp function.
- Fixed an issue which stopped server connections from being disconnected.
- Added an experimental backdrop behind the dungeons to cover the last few remaining holes that can occasionally happen.
- Camera movement updates are now frame-rate independent.
- Fixed Dungeon locations mapping display.
- Fixed Event locations mapping display.
Server
Looking towards the server side, the team would fix a couple of issues causing crashes within the server. Many other additions were added to the game throughout the week by the team, a breakdown of which can be seen below.
- Active Effects are removed from entitles when they change session.
- Fixed a server crash when reconnecting to ongoing adventures when the entity is inside a dungeon.
- Refactored subzone monitoring.
- Increased subzone activation radius.
- Adjusted enemy group spawn distances.
- Added party disbanding on disconnects.
- Added party data to dungeon sessions.
- Made casting abilities before the combat starts impossible.
- Fixed a server crash when failing to place enemies in the world.
- Fixed handling of entity updates when getting a new adventuring session.
- Removed a combat start delay on entities joining a combat part-way through.
- Joining a combat that is ongoing now generates a turn order log.
Animation
To start the new year, the animation team have been updating some movement cycles for the Twilight Elf Assassin. Both the animations for the Elf's combat idle and the weapon being drawn have seen updates over the last week. These cycles depict the Assassin as hunched over and trying to keep a lower centre of gravity. Both of these will aid the Character Class in remaining stealthy during combat. The team would also take the time to implement additional movement within the section of the cloak that hangs below the waist. In doing this, the team has added more fluidity to the animation which in turn gives the overall feel of the cycle a bit more realism. Examples of the animations created throughout the week can be seen below.
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Visual Effects
As the year came to an end, the VFX team worked on a post that would be used on New Years' Eve. Starting by creating some firework effects in a variety of colours and shapes, the team would find a couple of issues in creating the exact types of flare they want within their fireworks. Choosing to implement the fireworks over the initial settlement, the team also set to work creating some videos at multiple different angles to show off the fireworks in their full effect. Overall the team has created some impressive visuals that were used to usher in the New Year in style. Examples of the fireworks over the initial settlement can be seen below.
That’s it for this week’s devlog, but have you seen our monthly roundup of December yet?!
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