Devlog #2: It's Been A Minute
I’ve got some major news! In the few months since the first devlog, I’ve improved my mental health, explored some of the fundamental components of art, built a whole new PC after my last one crapped out, and most importantly—released my first public playable build!
Go Play It
Now that there’s an official playtest for my game at chaotycgames.itch.io/project-curwen, you can go play right now!! I spent the weekend fixing up anything broken that I could find, tied up a number of loose ends, and made a build that’s live! It’s a pre-alpha build, so the level will be replaced by all new ones in the coming months as I build out more meaningful levels for the game. So, be sure to play it and give me feedback so I can make the new levels much better.
Family Time
Taking a beat from work has had a huge positive impact on my mental health and overall happiness. I’ve learned a lot about myself over the past few months, and I’m excitedly looking forward to the future. My personal relationships have been strengthening as well, which is absolutely the best part. That said, let’s talk about the gamedev.
Renaissance
One area that piqued my interest is what makes some images invoke certain moods while others fall flat, and why some images are instantly eye-catching while others are so uninteresting as to be invisible. Of course I watched YT videos about visual art theory while shoving late-night snacks in my face, but learning the terminology just isn’t the same as tinkering, so I took time to create an image-decomposition tool. I ran images through to see what kind of visual info I could gather, extracting new grayscale images of saturation, value, luminance, complementary colors, and more. Comparing these together gave some insight on how moods are invoked and how eyes wander through the scene. I use this in the game to direct attention and help balance colors to create mood.
After dabbling with image composition, I learned that torches are way too dangerous to carry around indoors, and that creates a bit of a realism issue with my protagonist waving a torch around a house constructed entirely of flammable materials. So I brushed up on my Blender skills to create and animate a candle that burns out over time. It’s primitive, but so are candles. Setting a few candelabras around the level to light really boosted the mood and created a fun minigame of walking around lighting all the candles. Having an oil lamp would be cool, but that'll have to wait until later. Fascinated with mood and tone-setting, I moved onto music.
Atmosphere
Subtractive synthesis has become another fascinating special interest for me. The signal-processing aspect, while built from relatively simple components, enables extremely complex synergies. I never truly understood the depth that a “simple” note could have, and I’ve barely scratched the surface. I’ve begun to dabble with fundamental waves, oscillators, envelopes, filters, and reverbs. So far, I’ve generated a number of odd sounds and eerie atmosphere, but one I’m proud of is a heartbeat I generated from simple sine waves hooked up to dynamically scale in speed and volume with the character’s fear; the more scared the protagonist, the faster and louder the heart beats. It’s a lot of fun.
The Buildout
Next up, I’m setting my sights on honing the mechanics and grayboxing a proper level. Up to this point, a mansion pack and a cathedral pack that I purchased have been the backbone of my prototype, even serving for the initial project announcement. The packs served their purpose, however, and they don’t fit with the vision, so I’ll be retiring them to start from scratch with level design. What an exciting time!
Now go play the playtest and give me suggestions on what you’d like to see or hear! Reach out through the contact page, comments on itch.io, or my discord server.