It's been a while and mostly due to my day job being crazy because of covid. Had some time off lately so I've managed to start crafting the first "variation" tileset and that's snow/ice, and with it, the first snowy level - "Snowy Pass". It's a mountain pass between two peaks, which leads from the first quarter of the map to the second. Easy and short level, specially compared to what's planned with this tileset for the remaining 4 snowy levels.
Initial preview videos show it as a very simple tileset, no variations, details... There's one enemy type, a winter-coat pirate that chases after the goblin after it notices it. There's also an icicle trap that can be triggered by the player to hurt the enemy... or goblin, if not careful.
What I've added now is some... life to this little area. First of all, there are snowflakes falling down slowly. They aren't actually touching the ground, if you look carefully, but that's the intended effect, I want them to pop-out of dark background and not actually go through the ground. Maybe it will look better otherwise but so far I like this. Second, I've added a moving platform. Just because it's the first snowy level you'll encounter in the game, doesn't mean there should be only the most basic platforms hanging in the air. And in the end, I've created 2 animated tiles. There's a bunny hole with blinking eyes inside and... a snow hare, showing up behind the platform edge. Now that I'm looking at the video, I realize it lacks some depth. No worries, I'll fix that with some shading soon.
And with this, the level is mostly done. The way the game has been built from ground up allows me to easily update graphics later or even change the levels without too much hassle about compiling & building future versions.
Next, to the caves and underground mines!
