Zetheros
Developer
Hey Exanimates,
This week we've been working on a few different things, but mostly we've been focusing on procedural weapons.
To talk about procedural weapons we probably need a bit of context. Some people seem to think that we mean taking a sword handle and sticking a mace head on it or something. So we'll explain what these procedural weapons are and why we're doing it.
In Exanima weapons don't currently have greatly variable stats, but they do have different features, and just their shape and the distribution of mass can change how they feel to use and make them excel at different things. This will be further reinforced by a more accurate damage model, the ability to dynamically change the grip and orientation of your weapon, and some new combat manoeuvres. Basically, from a gameplay and itemisation perspective, changing some stats is not enough.
Right now we have one warhammer, or one poleaxe, they're always the same and we know what to expect. Rather than add a few more variants, our approach is to break very specific weapons' construction and elements into many parts (as many as 9 so far), then making many variants of each part, applying some deformations, procedural materials that always look different, and finally aging, damage and dirt.
This means that instead of one poleaxe or whatever, we will have thousands, with varying features and proportions, quality levels and conditions. Every poleaxe you find will be unique, and it might just be the perfect one for you. There will always be new weapons to find, admire and muck about with, and a detailed quality system. There's always lots of variety, even within a specific context. It's important for itemisation, but also world building.
This week as we looked at more historical examples, methods of construction and employment of weapons we obsessed over details. More modularity means more weapons, but it can also limit how we approach the design of a weapon, and we want to be able to do anything. We needed a way to override parts of the modular system for more unique designs. We also want the weapons to look realistic and authentic, details like dirt accumulating where different shaped components meet are important for the overall quality level.
These are some difficult problems we ran into (or created) this week, so the procedural weapon system got more complex, but we have already solved them and it's all rather good. We also made progress with our procedural materials, we now have metals, wood, leather and cloth, and mostly just need to make some additional variants of each. The whole system in general has moved from something a bit WIP to something finalised and well optimised with really good tools.
These new improvements do mean we don't have as many ready assets today as we thought we would, so we'd rather wait until next week for some screenshots, when we should have a bit more to show you.
Have a great week!
-the BM team
This week we've been working on a few different things, but mostly we've been focusing on procedural weapons.
To talk about procedural weapons we probably need a bit of context. Some people seem to think that we mean taking a sword handle and sticking a mace head on it or something. So we'll explain what these procedural weapons are and why we're doing it.
In Exanima weapons don't currently have greatly variable stats, but they do have different features, and just their shape and the distribution of mass can change how they feel to use and make them excel at different things. This will be further reinforced by a more accurate damage model, the ability to dynamically change the grip and orientation of your weapon, and some new combat manoeuvres. Basically, from a gameplay and itemisation perspective, changing some stats is not enough.
Right now we have one warhammer, or one poleaxe, they're always the same and we know what to expect. Rather than add a few more variants, our approach is to break very specific weapons' construction and elements into many parts (as many as 9 so far), then making many variants of each part, applying some deformations, procedural materials that always look different, and finally aging, damage and dirt.
This means that instead of one poleaxe or whatever, we will have thousands, with varying features and proportions, quality levels and conditions. Every poleaxe you find will be unique, and it might just be the perfect one for you. There will always be new weapons to find, admire and muck about with, and a detailed quality system. There's always lots of variety, even within a specific context. It's important for itemisation, but also world building.
This week as we looked at more historical examples, methods of construction and employment of weapons we obsessed over details. More modularity means more weapons, but it can also limit how we approach the design of a weapon, and we want to be able to do anything. We needed a way to override parts of the modular system for more unique designs. We also want the weapons to look realistic and authentic, details like dirt accumulating where different shaped components meet are important for the overall quality level.
These are some difficult problems we ran into (or created) this week, so the procedural weapon system got more complex, but we have already solved them and it's all rather good. We also made progress with our procedural materials, we now have metals, wood, leather and cloth, and mostly just need to make some additional variants of each. The whole system in general has moved from something a bit WIP to something finalised and well optimised with really good tools.
These new improvements do mean we don't have as many ready assets today as we thought we would, so we'd rather wait until next week for some screenshots, when we should have a bit more to show you.
Have a great week!
-the BM team
