Roughly a year ago I started toying with a project that would evolve into our next game. A few boxes and the vague notion of "mermaids" would kick start the development.
This time I would start working with a designer who has a strong creative vision, welcoming on board Nemi, a digital artist whose work you can find here : Twitter.com
The game would use sprites early on for testing and experimenting with ideas. During this time we developed the basics of movement, combat, and plot. We would add an editor to our team and the story has since come unto its own, and I can't wait to share it.
Using Blender I would start bringing these characters to life and thanks to the incredible Fimpossible Tail Animator asset I was able to capture the dynamic flow of their tails in-game.
Another challenge, and a continued source of tweaking, has been their motion under water. It's my goal to make them move fluidly, while carrying some momentum, without disrupting gameplay and combat. Underwater levels in games have a foul reputation for the movement they typically force on players, so this will be a source of testing and tweaking, most likely, until release.
The game features over 30 enemies with progressively more difficult move-sets as players grow more powerful themselves, making them a constant threat over time. Most enemies carry a mer-folk design in theme with the game's setting, but there are a variety of oceanic creatures that will challenge Keena as well.
The game's roughly 1/5th done, with a large number of assets and content still required. Getting a pre-alpha demo up and ready to show was an important first step for us, and I'm very excited about the results, with a notepad full of improvements that still need to be made, but the process was time consuming and polishing content that will inevitably be changed is always a bummer.
The game's release is set simply for 2024 for now, but if you'd still like to show some early support please wishlist us over on Steam : Store.steampowered.com
Thank you for reading and I'll see you next time!
DevDre,
Carrionwave
