[DOT] New Shadow System

I've added some additional visual flourishes to DOT Debug

I realised that by tweaking my procedural tiling system, I could easily get the game to add shadows to walls.

Looks quite neat if i don't say so myself.

Early builds of the game I used hand placed tiles, which looked neat, but was such a maintenance nightmare whenever I wanted to modify the level layout. plus it added a lot of overhead for new levels. Moving to a procedural tile system is so much better

Basically, when a level starts, a 2d structure is created, which stores which objects exist at what 32x32 square of the map. That 2D structure is essentially the level. indicating free spaces, walls and error tiles. (since the game is gridbased, this works perfectly).

Then the tiling system goes into place for every point of the level, it decides what to put there. if it's blank space, it puts a floor tile which varies depending on the level. if it's a wall, a black tile is placed. and if it's a error tile a red tile is placed.

if it's a blank space, with a wall above, or to the left, then it places a shadow tile.

Here's some updated screenshots

[DOT] Now available on the Android Play Store - DOT Debug

DOT Debug, my original game is available on the Android Play Store. Check it out, i'd love some feedback.

Go to Play Store

https://i.imgur.com/4hUEQ4n.png

[SPEE] New Screeshots from Chapter 8

New batch of screenshots for the 0.9 Update!

[SPEE] The End is Coming

Hello everyone, hope you had a good new year.

It's a decent way into 2019 now, and well, it's been a long journey. 

It feels like just yesterday when I started SPEE.... it was during my first year university break. Years ago I had worked on a Pokémon fangame called "Pokemon Illusion", and was starting to get the itch to create another one. 

The game went though a lot of early iterations. From being about humans hunting glitchy pokemon, to considering gen4 graphics, then using gen3 graphics, then downgrading to gen2 graphics. 

One thing which set the direction firmly was how I'd always been fascinated by the idea of an Eevee which could switch evolutions, almost like a digimon... 
(Later I found out that the Pokemon Manga had this very concept!)

I managed to implement the eeveelution system, and started tilting the game to be focused around it. the concept started evolving to be more like "remix" of the 2nd gen games (my favourite ones). Breaking the 4th wall was a bit of a revelation to the story, because it allowed me to raise the stakes in a way that the official games couldn't. 

The game started taking same, it actually started becoming fun, I added the first gym, and made a thread on pokecommunity.com, where I released by first demo.

Anyway, that was back in 2010.

Now I've finally added the 8th and final gym. 

Wow, it's been literally 9 years of development so far. It feels surreal. 
I can see the finish line in sight. The only thing remaining is victory road and the final hypervisor battles. That means it's only 1-2 more update to go.

I can't believe I've made it this far. I've super proud of what i've accomplished in this game. It's everything I always wanted it to be. The game has been evolved and iterated a lot.... 

In this time I finished university, I got a software development job, I lost a lot of my free time.... and as much as I like working on the game, it was sometimes tough to stay motivated, especially during the middle years. 

I took breaks. I started other game projects that are in different states of development....
but I never gave up on SPEE because of all the love and effort I poured into it, and because of how much dedicated fans there.

So, thank you, to everybody who has supported the game, and I hope you continue enjoying the journey, and I also hope you continue following my other game projects after SPEE!

Also; here's some new screenshots of the upcoming update.

[SPEE] Tales from the VOID

[SPEE] Battle Zone

Update 0.76 will come with a new feature; The Battle Zone.

Available from the tower north of Portus City,

the Battle Zone is a 12 floor tower that has a random pokemon battle on each floor. 

Battle and obtain "Zone Points" which you can spend in the Prize Zone to get rare items.

Reach the top floor for a bonus prize.

The Prize Zone is also connected to the Arcade Zone,

where you can also obtain Zone Points.

[SPEE] New set of Corrupted Pokemon

SPEE 0.76 will be coming out at some point in the future, here are some new Corrupted Pokemon that you'll be able to fight and catch!

[SPEE] Fracture Islands

Here's a small progress update. Fracture islands, one of the destinations you'll reach on your surfing adventures. 

[SPEE] Litore City

Hope you guys enjoy sun/moon! Here's a preview of a new city :)

[SPEE] Abandoned Labs

Years ago, Silph Co. managed to capture and research corrupted Pokemon in their underground labs. But when they captured a corrupted legendary it became the catalyst for an incident which would cause the labs to be long abandoned. But lurking in it's depths remains rare items, lost research and multiple corrupted pokemon.
Speak to the Silph Co. president in the upcoming release of v0.76 and explore the ruin for yourself!

[SPEE] 0.752 and Left Terminal

New Patch 0.752 is out!
Update it via the Launcher, OR download the full updated game directly
http://dreammodule.com?spee=download

It fixes various bugs reported over the last week, namely the ferry glitch, and drowzee and noctowl trophies, fixes the summon system so it actually works now,
and upgrades the music quality back to where it was in 0.74 (you might've noticed music was accidently downgraded in 0.75)

It also comes with a new launcher, feel free to delete the old one, the new one is way more stable, and has extra features such as automatically installing fonts.

A new Mystery Gift is available too! A pack of 5x Summon Stones, so you can try out that summon command if you havent.

View Full ChangeLog here:
http://pastebin.com/jMhTPu46

0.75 has been downloaded nearly 2000 times over the last week, so I thank everybody for their support

Also, here's a new map, it's in 0.752, left of magnus city, and the new home to voltorb/electrike 

[SPEE] HP Bars in Battle!

So, I've discovered the magic tool called DynRPG that allows me to modify RPG Maker more than I ever would've dreamed of. I'm quite new to it, but so far I've managed to get these changes in.

So, 0.75 will come with some cool battle changes. Firstly, was the increasing of Battle Speed (which i posted about a while ago)

And now, a long requested enhancement. HP Bars in battle!
You'll be able to see Enemy HP and the enemy's speed bar, so you can see when they will attack next.

In addition to that, you can see your Pokémon's HP and PP easily.

Another change you might notice, is the way your pokemon are arranged. 
( before it was like \ now it's / )

[SPEE] Pushing Boulders

I've been playing a lot of Bloodborne, and what's really stood out to me, is the great way it does shortcuts.

So I've added strength boulders for SPEE, but with changed functionality.

Throughout the world of SPEE, you'll now see boulders sticking on ledges. You can push these boulders from the top to open up a permanent path.

[SPEE] Progress and Frig Town

So, long time no update, I'm sorry I hadn't been able to keep to my April deadline :(Small things like coding in wild encounters ended up taking a lot longer than anticipated.
In any case, I have still been working 0.75. The story part of it has been completed. I don't really wanna nail down a date yet, but a beta is incoming.

Anyways, here's a new town which is where 0.75 reaches it's end.

[SPEE] Ignis Volcano

In 0.75, which will be out before the end of the month- you'll enter a dungeon called the "Ignis Volcano"

As it's name suggests, it's a very... firely place. Wild slugma, torkoak and magmars can be battled here.

 In addition to that, you'll fight the first Corrupted Legendary Pokemon: Moltres. But unlike normal corrupted Pokemon, you will not be able to use legendaries on your team.

Instead you summon them into battle to deal massive damage (Final Fantasy style!)

[SPEE] Battle Speed Options

I quite like SPEE's battle system it's very final fantasy inspired and definitely gives the game a unique feeling compared to other Pokemon games. 

BUT, one problem I always had with it is that it would sometimes feel slow if the enemy team were high leveled. A lot of the time you were just waiting for bars to fill up. It was an engine limitation i could not get around. 

But i've recently had a breakthrough in the form of dynaRPG patcher by Cherry. Now because of this, in 0.75 you can change the battle speed!

You can change the speed from the computer in your house, there are 4 options.
 
SLOW- being the current battle speed of 0.74.
NORMAL- being 2x as fast, and the default battle speed for 0.75.
FAST- being 4x as fast as slow.
VERY FAST- being 6x as fast as slow.

The days of slow battles are over!

[SPEE] West Beach

Here is another new area you visit in 0.75; West Beach. (name pending)

This new map is a unique beach-like terrain, on the west side of Ignis Island, where pokemon like Krabby, and Tropius are found.

In addition to that, a special person named the "Surf Master" lives here.

After spending a lot of the last year doing mainly background systems work, it's nice to get back into mapping. Beach locales are a little hard to do, since you want it to appear natural, but you also want there to be tall grass for wild pokemon to be, so I had to look for a bit of balance. I quite like the end result, it feels and looks a lot different than other maps, the mixture of yellow, blue, brown and green is strangely pleasing.

Only downside; no footprints on the sand :O

[SPEE] Route 6 & Conn. Caves Redesign

In addition to designing new areas (more which i'll show soon), i've been working on redesigning some of the old maps.

Route 6/Connecting Caves I've always felt unsatisfied about. It's a route that requires an axe, and has a cave which you need to traverse to pass it. 

This started causing backtracking problems because there's a hypervisor battle right after it. If someone didn't want to face the hypervisor yet, they would have to backtrack through the caves to go back to Arbor City.
In addition to that after you beat the first hypervisor, you get warped back to Arbor City, meaning you're gonna be going through Route 6 again.

Now, the caves are a bunch of interconnected tunnels rather than the isolated tunnels they were before. The cracked rocks will break after you defeat the Corrupted Diglett that is at the end of the tunnel; that allows you take a direct route to the start/end of Route 6, cutting down on a bit of backtracking.

Route 6 has had minor modifications, including removal of ledges which I noticed were confusing players who didn't realise they were going backwards by jumping over them.