uwusoft

NPCs and Music

Had a hard time working out the taverns different rooms without the npcs in them to better theme the rooms so I've been working on them. Originally they were going to be 3 different types of cats but while working on them I remembered that Morgana the cat from persona had some cool concept art and that made me want to base the npcs on concept art from different games. The first is a goblin based on Midna from Zelda. The second is still a cat but based on Morgana from persona 5 and the last is...

The Bottom of the Barrel

Here it is, The Bottom of the Barrel. Home to the lowest of scallywags. It's on a sand mass floating in space similar to the lobby tower, it may have suffered a similar fate. There's the addition of giant bone jaws in front of the central barrel in the bar. Last minute I've also decided instead of lights or lamps, that light shines through cracks in the planks above adding to atmosphere. I still need about a week to finish up those details, things I messed up, and the rooms inside the bar but...

First Update of 2023

Can you believe it? I haven't made a post this whole year! During the holidays I wanted to take some time for myself and brace for whats to come with Kobold Garden this year, so I haven't got much done during that time to show. But in that time I've been thinking of ways to optimize the tavern so I wanted to chime in with where it's at. 

From the perspective of players that haven't played a sonic game with a chao garden, the tavern may seem like an odd concept at first so I wanted ...

Welcome to The Salty Spitoon

One of the more prominent features of Chao Garden is the chao kindergarten so of course Kobold Garden needs one! A random kindergarten felt kind of off theme wise though so instead I think a seedy tavern would fit nicely. Through one of the the lobby's doors is a rickety bridge leading to a tavern cut out of a huge asteroid. It's built out of shipwrecks and barrels to look as though sea ships have crashed into it, giving it a pirate kind of vibe.

Here you can find all manner ...

Lobby Preview

With the lobby done I wanted to get some animations ready for the knight so we can walk around and show off areas better in the future. When starting up the player character does a small twirl as the game begins. Haven't made a jumping animation yet as I want to work out the jumping system more before I commit so when jumping here the animation defaults to a t-pose.

Lobby Complete!

Took a bit longer than expected but the lobby is finally complete! Hardest part was working out what the elevator/telescope combo would look like, I wanted to make it similar to the chao lobby teleporter but more medieval while looking functional. In the end I went with this kind of dual pulley design which looks ridiculous because it is. It would in no way be practical in real life but what's important is it looks somewhat functional 😉. I doubted myself a lot with how crazy it looks but i...

Stairway To Kobold Garden

Did a few big changes with the lobby here. The lower spiraling stairs lead to a lower garden that is locked off at the beginning of the game. Instead of leading to a locked or closed off door, I'm using a similar effect used in Mario 64 where the stairs seem like they continue to go down endlessly, not being able to reach the end until you unlock the garden. Originally the upper stairs were spiraling on the inside of the lobby completely visible so the effect would not really work, I was fine...

Now in Spaaace

Pretty much got most of the top floor done this time. Not really happy with the pace I've been going so I've been trying to speed things up. I'm using a skybox shader projecting a space cubemap on an object with inverted normals to incase the level. It may be hard to see in screenshots but I also slowly rotate the skybox and main light over time to give the illusion of the level free floating in space. I've also slightly saturated the lighting to give a more in space vibe. 

Through the Ringer

This update I started work on the actual floor and fixing up the stairs a bit. I decided to cut into the 2nd floor for the stairs to come up into it nicer. The bottom floor itself is mostly stone but with a glass strip so you can see through it. Eventually there'll be a space skybox when looking down for a more cosmic vibe. The rings are mostly cosmetic but the ones under the glass will spin around slowly. You may also notice things are different colors as I'm testing out slightly different t...

The Next Floor

Changed a few things here and there with this one. First, I wanted to add a bit more detail to the bookshelfs, they were looking a bit too plain and basic. Rotated the bottom stairs around so it more naturally spirals with the upper stairs but forgot it comes onto the floor at an angle instead of straight on so they look a bit messed up, will get on fixing them up next. Then added a wooden bottom to the upper floor along with railings. Also got rid of the upper floors platformy part that stic...

Lobby Bottom floor

Ironically got to most things on the bottom floor except for the actual floor itself. The colors will be tweaked as more of the lobby comes together but I like how it's coming along so far. The shelves with books all being red and the very uniform textures are mostly for visual reference and will be more randomized and naturally placed later.

Lobby Blockout

Yo, here's a blockout for the lobby. The use for this blockout is to get a sense of scale as I flesh out the rest of the lobby more. The lobby is one of the first main areas and acts as a hub to different levels in the game. The walls will be lined with bookshelves and mystical items with it becoming more of a makeshift observatory as you head up. The middle portion will have portals that lead to the regular kobold garden while the stairs upward lead to a more angelic garden and the lower sta...

New Knight Model

Long time no see!

This model was pretty tough to get though, I originally rushed to get it done but really didn't like the result as you can see in the last pic. I looked at redoing it again or possibly giving the knight a completely new design, but I decided to just stick with the original design and add more detail here and there like the more prominent cowl that now sits above the knights pauldrons instead of under. Something that really helped me with this second attempt was taking ...

Babybold v2

The idea for the babybold was always pretty simple, a smaller kobold. For its new model I wanted to make it cuter and maybe try something different if needed. I decided to go for a googly-eyed salamander on its hind legs and felt it worked pretty well.

When hatched they'll flop onto their bellies and crawl around but will waddle on their hind legs when getting closer to growing up.

What's Next

Thanks to everyone who's been able to check out the kobold directly! With it came the release of Kobold Gardens Steam page which you can visit here:

Kobold Garden on Steam (steampowered.com)

Anyone who supported Kobold Garden before the directly was released will receive your reward of a Steam key for Kobold Garden when the early access verion is released. With it you will have the fi...

Happening

I finally finished that video! The first ever Kobold Directly will be playing live Sunday the 20th over at youtube.

http://youtu.be/ZHboBrg34BA

While it gets pretty silly, I feel the directly marks a new chapter for Kobold Garden going forward and I hope you enjoy. After the directly I'll make a post going over some things presented in it in better detail. Then plans for what'll be going on afterward will be getting v...

that beach scene preview

testing out how it looks, some obvious not finished things like the eyes; gave it a kinda creepy vibe at the end there.

me when the directly is over

A scene where kobold garden and the past are quickly reminisced before we get into what's new. The chairs a refence to sonic's chair from the sonic ova movie, one of my favorites, and kinda a nod to kobold gardens chao roots.

The directlys been progressing really well but the release is looking like it'll go into next week.

quick directly test

Born too late to explore earth. Born too early to explore space. Born just in time to explore Kobold Garden!

A quick test with how I'm handling the main portions of the directly. The kobold newscaster is back but without the gibberish audio and subtitles this time. Using the power of 15.ai, text is converted into audio and lip-synched allowing for kobolds to speak. Motion of my hands and head are mocapped using steamVR inside of unity with the legs and tail procedurally animated based o...

small direct intro preview

Thought I'd share what I have for the directs intro so far! This will be used for this and any future directs I make. Still some small things to brush up like timing and a few errors but I like how it's turning out. I've become accustomed to rendering animations in unity so I did a sort of weird thing with the egg tower where it's rigged directly inside unity, so I can use IK bones and animate it curving in real time as timing that curve in blender back to unity sounded like a pain.

2022-01-18 07:07:29 +0000 UTC View Post

What's going on?

Throughout the lifespan of this patreon I've noticed I've been really bad with deadlines. It's been getting pretty stressful and somewhat embarrassing. I messed up with announcing the direct before working on it and worse, it's still not done.

I've been thinking about this for a while now and feel it's best I change the way I use patreon to be more of like a tip jar. Update releases will be more random and sporadic and there may be less updates overall during some months than others, bu...

Update 17: A Kobold Tale

Sorry for the wait, I've been changing things up with the direct a bit.

The initial plan was for the video to be an apple like product showcase for the new things in kobold garden. While it will still showcase these things as is the purpose of the direct, it's changed to present things in a more movie like way with a non-serious plot line. While I think the apple video would have been neat way to show off things, I feel it's best to take this opportunity to practice on seeing if I can e...

Update 16: The Return

Hello hello! Sorry for the delays again, I've been pretty busy! The kobold model proved to be much more of a challenge. I tried my best to have the model as one solid piece but it fought me the whole way with annoying texture issues everywhere in the end, so I ended up having to split the model into two pieces, the main green body and the yellow plate part, making the texture issues non-issues by hiding them in-between the two pieces. The many kobolds in the pictures are some of my failed exp...

Update 15: New Models

Reason I haven't worked on actual kobolds much yet was planning for new models before getting to them. Because the games gone from a low poly style to what you've seen in the last few updates, I always meant to get around to making new kobold and knight models eventually. The goal for them is higher detail while also staying close to the original design as much as possible. The original low poly models will still be in the game, being able to swap to them if preferred but the new models will ...

Update 14: Ancient Kobold Runes

Kobolds have been living in the garden for a long time, even before you've stumbled into it, and have developed ways to share story's and ideas through ancient kobold runes. Kobolds are very shape oriented so their symbols are usually small pictures of objects and things. These runes contain the deepest kobold lore and are scattered throughout the garden. I show a bunch in an area for demonstration purposes but they will be rarer to come by in game with some only in secret areas.

I've a...

Update 13: Like A New Garden

Had a few unexpected things pop up over the weekend but everything's good!

The gardens main area is now built with the newer stylized assets and I feel better represents the final look of the game. I've done some small things like polishing the visual effects like the gradient effect that compliments the glass ui nicely and you can now enter a first person mode if you zoom into the player all the way.

Things like the layout are still a work in progress as I polish it up and add th...

Update 12.5: Stylized

Apologies for the delays, I've been really indecisive with the ways the walls look. While the old ones look aright from a distance they get pretty messy up close and refuse to look better no matter my efforts. I also blame the new kirby trailer. I always had the idea for modeled 3d moss in the back of my head but thought it wouldn't be worth the effort over 2d moss that's blended into the texture. The new trailer has 3d moss, mostly on buildings and it gave me inspiration to try it out. I als...

Update 12: Blocked-Out

Here's a look at the current larger garden. It mostly looks all like copy and pasted blocks as I try to block and shape out the layout, I hope to add variation and details as the month goes on. I'm really liking how it's turning out though!

Because of the sheer size of the garden, I feel players will usually sit in the main spot near the entrance and rarely explore as there's not really much point too. So I'm thinking of ways to get the player running around and I've come up with two I ...

Update 11: Levels Of Detail

There's not to much to show this week as most of the time was used corralling all the assets. With most things added the game is now almost 4gb uncompressed. Making LODs for everything was a pain but should help with performance with the gardens becoming larger. What LODs do is when you get farther from objects, they switch to lower versions of themselves so everything farther away and not as important isn't in full resolution and taking up resources. I also wanted to include a small portion ...

Update 10: on a new level

I live!

The forest garden in the pics are really only meant to test it's performance and show off the kind of atmosphere I'm trying to go for with it being larger then before. It looks really open and flat right now but the plans to fill it out to be more like a typical level. I've had to change things a ton to where it kind of feels like a new game at times. To a point where I've even updated the version of unity I'm using from 2019 LTS to 2020 LTS. Usually Unity dishes out updates tha...