April Devlog

Hey everyone! As you guys know, I've been pretty wrapped up in developing Moontide this month, and I've got a lot to share with you guys.

I focused mainly on adding sailing to the game this month, as it's one of the larger mechanics in the game. This was a bit tricky at first, but I eventually got it working similarly to how I initially envisioned it.

Sailing works like a proceduraly generated shoot 'em up, where randomized sets of enemies will spawn in front of the player as they sail. There aren't a lot of enemy types yet, but there's enough to test with for the time being. As the player progresses the plot, harder enemies and more complex obstacles will spawn in the player's way. However, your ship (the Blue Moon) can be upgraded throughout the game to help mitigate this challenge. (There's of course a speed boost upgrade as well, making travel times far quicker.)

Sailing is also the only way to progress time, as it's implied that voyages takes multiple days, rather than simply exploring islands by foot. This is actually recycling a cut shader, that I was originally going to just use on the entire game. However, it didn't look very good when applied as a post-process shader, so I decided to go with alternate tilsets/sprites instead. (To mitigate this, the shader is now only applied to the water and certain other objects while sailing, making use of both a shader and color corrected sprite edits)

In addition to this, the player can walk around the Blue Moon and interact with the crew. You may recognize these characters from the concept art I posted back in January, but for those who don't, here's the lineup:

(From left to right: Syd, Lee, Vira, Jack, and Fox)

These characters each have schedules, and will change where they are depending on the time of day. (Similar to Persona 4) Certain characters also have specific functions. (Though, not all of them are currently implemented) Syd can take the helm and sail for you, acting as a fast travel to locations you've already been. (However, this will cost you.) Lee can heal your wounds, though medicine also isn't free. Vira allows you to buy a set selection of items, as she and Jack work together to barter with passing ships.

In the final game, I hope to implement crew backstories. How you see these backstories will depend on certain requirements, which variate depending on the character. Of course, all of this is entirely optional, just to add some flavor and life to the game.

In other news, at the beginning of the month I met PSIMetronome, and after shooting some emails back and forth he's signed on to help out with the game! He'll be handling the game's Original Soundtrack, as well as creating sound effects. Examples of his work can be found on Bandcamp and YouTube, however I think this video is a good example of his range:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gIqhp8EkVPM

I also have a new Twitter, where I've been posting smaller screencaps/updates on the game and life in general. So if you're interested in keeping in touch, follow me there!

Anyway, thanks for reading and I hope to hear your guys's feedback!