This week saw significant progress across various development teams as they worked towards enhancing different aspects of our game. The 3D modelling team dedicated their efforts to crafting a new set of armour, while the set piece design team focused on refining the textures and design of 'The Rising Sun' tavern and other elements in the game world. The client-side team worked on improving the handling of request responses and adding new features like the ability for summons to spawn and join battles in the world. Meanwhile, the server team concentrated on optimising movement and code for open-world enemies, introducing a roaming system, and improving pathfinding in combat. The environment team continued to work on optimising geometry and textures for the castle ruins, while the animation team made strides in creating new animations for dogs and other creatures. Examples of the progress made across all teams can be seen below. 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!
3D Modelling
This week, the 3D modelling team has been hard at work blocking out a brand new set of armour for our game. Taking inspiration from the design of a human knight, this new armor will eventually be modeled for other characters in our game as well. The team is experimenting with bold new shapes to make up this protective gear, resulting in an exciting and fresh look. Despite the challenges that come with creating such intricate designs, the team will continue to work on this exciting armour over the coming weeks. We can't wait to see the final product and how it will enhance our game's visuals! Examples of the new block out for the armour can be seen below.
Set Piece Design
This week, the set piece design team has been busy with their work on the textures for the initial area of Erendorn. They have made adjustments to the secular levels of certain items to ensure that they don't look out of place and give the appearance that they are more clean. In addition, the team has been focused on perfecting the design of 'The Rising Sun' tavern, a much-needed place for players to rest and unwind after a long day of adventure. They have taken great care to ensure that the ambience of the tavern is just right and that it feels like a true haven for weary travelers. Finally, the team has also fixed additional decals in the area, ensuring that every little detail is accounted for and that the game environment is as immersive as possible. Examples of the updated aspects of the intial area can be seen below.
Programming
Client
This week has been mostly about updating a number of classes that handle responses from Server commands sent by players as well as allowing Summons like the Zentragal's Charged Spiderling to be called into battle in the World and more. Additional work completed by the client-side team can be seen below.
- Updated how request responses are handled across the project to conform to the new method used by the Server. The format of generic request responses has been upgraded to be more consistent and provide better error detection and feedback on failed actions such as attempting to cast an ability without the required resources.
- Added the ability for Summons to spawn and participate in World Combat.
- Added the ability to inspect party members equipment and stats.
- Worked to improve the player Inventory widget layout.
- Added template for the Droval ability Wounding Lunge and updated their animation controller to be able to play the corresponding animation.
- Updated the Combat Grid Material.
- Adjusted Interactable Collision.
- Updated Nav Data.
- Updated the Nav data loading/storage to use an expanding buffer.
- Developed a texture generation class to use with the new Grid.
- Continued working on setting up an ability tracker in the character creation menu, partially implemented but requires some adjustment to get changes in real time.
- Added an indicator on inventory icons to denote two-handed weapons.
- Added in a new highlight effect to slots in the vendor window to indicate which item is currently selected.
Server
This week, the server team was busy on some movement optimisations and code, especially for the open world. A good chunk of time was spent on implementing the first version of a 'roaming' system for groups of enemies in the open world, causing them to wander around Erendorn's open areas, perhaps to even bump into a group of players if they're lucky, or unlucky, depending on how you look at it.
A medium sized refactor was also done to the pathfinding code used in combat to determine what tile an enemy will try to move to. Now they can respect what tiles their allies are already walking towards, but can still ignore tiles their allies are on their way through, but not stopping at.
Finally, a connection timeout now exists for the Dungeon server, meaning if you crash or never connect to the dungeon server, it will let the server that sent you know you never arrived after a period of time. After this you'll be handled as a disconnect and reset as appropriate for a normal log off. Additional work completed by the server-side team can be seen below.
- Fixed Mutex deadlock whilst a session is closing down.
- Started work on a Cache system.
Environment
The environment team has been hard at work this week optimising geometry and UV mapping the castle ruins to prepare for destruction and displacement. They have been exploring simulated destruction methods to achieve a realistic look for destroyed parts of the structure, making sure that every detail is just right. Additionally, the team has been testing displacement methods used in conjunction with textures to give the brickwork on walls a high-fidelity Nanite-ready appearance. This is all part of their effort to create a highly immersive game environment that looks and feels realistic to players. Examples of the process the team under-went through the week can be seen below.
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Animation
This week, the animation team has made great progress on a number of key tasks. They created an animation blend for basic dog attacks and updated the animation blueprint, making sure that every movement is smooth and realistic. They also created a copy of the dog animation blueprint and assigned it to the Husky, adding a tail pose to create an even more lifelike appearance. In addition, the team re-imported the Skyhound mesh, re-adding the wings to the model. They have been working on adding wing animations to the winged-canine, allowing the Skyhound to use the movement cycle set and fly seamlessly through the game world. Finally, the team updated the fly height position of the Wasp and Eagle, previously set too low. Examples of the animations created throughout the week can be seen below.
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That’s it for this week’s devlog, but have you seen our monthly roundup of February yet?!
