Indivisible: Lab Zero's Action-RPG! (General Discussion)

[Cheesedragon]

Don't worry, even if it's not the default design it's practically guaranteed to be an unlockable something something Dragon's Crown weapon system something. Or not. Who knows.

 

[SkullMan]

Those new animations are just so lovely.

 

[Mike_Z]

Don't worry, even if it's not the default design it's practically guaranteed to be an unlockable something something Dragon's Crown weapon system something.

No?
Don't do that.

Vanillaware makes their characters in pieces, meaning they can replace the weapon piece.
We don't, so doing new weapons is redrawing the entire character's animation set.

 

[flio-turbo]

idk y, but I put this in the Palettes thread and I should have put this here too.

Kampan = Cool

 

[North888]

I mean, you could TECHNICALLY make the weapons 3D models and using that to be able to swap them out, but I'm guessing that would require way to much work and limit you guys severely on Ajna's poses so that a weapon swap would be possible, which sounds like a bad trade for your amazing animation we know and love you for.

 

[Mr Peck]

They could TECHNICALLY make the whole game 3D models and then everything could be swapped out and nothing would be hand animated. But like you said, 3D weapons would be a lot of extra work and less animation fidelity for the payoff of...being able to switch in a different looking spear.

 

[Kawalorn]

Vanillaware makes their characters in pieces, meaning they can replace the weapon piece.
We don't, so doing new weapons is redrawing the entire character's animation set.

So if we equip a better weapon will it be a recolor or will there be no difference at all between them?

 

[DukeMagus]

No?
Don't do that.

Vanillaware makes their characters in pieces, meaning they can replace the weapon piece.
We don't, so doing new weapons is redrawing the entire character's animation set.

Ajna is an exception right?

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[Mike_Z]

I mean, you could TECHNICALLY make the weapons 3D models and using that to be able to swap them out, but I'm guessing that would require way to much work and limit you guys severely on Ajna's poses so that a weapon swap would be possible, which sounds like a bad trade for your amazing animation we know and love you for.

Aren't you the person that's trying to be a game developer?

It doesn't matter if the weapon is 3D or 2D. To swap it would be like Beo's chair - every single frame would need to have attach points and (optionally frame numbers) for each of the weapons. In 3D that information is just part of the model, since the transforms for all the bones are figured out per frame. In 2D that information isn't ANYWHERE, and needs to be generated by hand.

Ajna is an exception right?

Nope. She's already getting redrawn 4 times.

So if we equip a better weapon will it be a recolor or will there be no difference at all between them?

Palette effects are easy, and will be used (green bow with gold arrows, red bow with black arrows, etc).

But...I'm not sure how many weapons you think we're doing? This is not going to be a Knife-Dagger-Thief Knife-Assassin Dagger-Chicken Knife-Excalipoor-Gigas Blade, same-animation-new-name-more-damage kind of game. This is a "You got Spinning Blade" / "[Item:] Plasma Beam" kind of game. Damage increases don't come from finding better weapons, which is part of where I think the assumption you have might come from...

Some upgrades may result in different-looking weapons for some things, like how Peacock has a cannon or a shotgun in some animations, but in general you have THE bow and THE spear and THE axe and THE kusarigama. Rather than getting the Better Bow and then the Betterer Bow and then the Betterest Bow, you learn to do new things with The Bow. We are not going to redraw hundreds of frames many times to put tassels on the bow later and then a supercharger after that, nor are we going to do Beowulf's chair multiple times for multiple weapons.

Most of this will be a lot clearer once you know more about her abilities.

 

[North888]

Aren't you the person that's trying to be a game developer?

I am, but there's a lot more for me to learn before I feel I can say I know much if anything I'm talking about.

It doesn't matter if the weapon is 3D or 2D. To swap it would be like Beo's chair - every single frame would need to have attach points and (optionally frame numbers) for each of the weapons. In 3D that information is just part of the model, since the transforms for all the bones are figured out per frame. In 2D that information isn't ANYWHERE, and needs to be generated by hand.

I thought it was something akin to this. I can see how others would be able to run with this and do something, but a lot of extra effort here for minimal changes with the ideas you guys have set forth. Cool. The more you know.

 

[KaboomKid]

in general you have THE bow and THE spear and THE axe and THE kusarigama.

Speaking of that, I realized from last night's stream that there's currently no slot available on the Prototype's equip menu for the kusarigama. I guess that menu was going to be given an intense overhaul anyway, huh? I hope you guys can manage to keep the weapon-swapping nice and quick in the finished version.

 

[Tank]

Since different weapon designs (Not just palette swaps) can't easily be added the animators can use transparent parts of the weapon to make different weapons. So think of it like this. Animate the mega weapon. The mega weapon could have extra spikes or tassels and the level one weapon can just be the mega weapon with transparent spikes and tassels. Start us off with the level one weapon then as we upgrade just make those parts not transparent. That will make it so the animators only have to animate one weapon but you can get multiple weapons out of that one. Plus you can do color swaps with transparency and get a really big number of weapons with no extra animation.

 

[TheMightyBox]

But will I be able to put Ajna in PINK clothes is the question.

 

[Goodbye18000]

But will I be able to put Ajna in PINK clothes is the question.

I don't Lab Zero can spot a deal with Victoria's Secret that easily.

 

[TheMightyBox]

Then what's the point?!

 

[KaboomKid]

Hm, I think we might be forgetting how many great weapon details could be made using just the palettes, like how Beowulf's armhair and Parasoul's glasses are handled in SG. Different palette details on a blade could suggest a rusted metal, or a serrated edge, and subtle shifts in a weapon's color or translucency could make it look like it's glowing or made of crystal. All of that can be done without needing the cleanup artists to draw in any additional composite layers at all.

 

[Tank]

...PINK...

the only PINK clothes that matter are those booty shorts with PINK on the back. Honestly i wasn't even aware they made anything else.

 

[@J-Boogie]

So how come people are throwing out suggestions for how to do multitudes of versions of weapons when Mike just said that's not what they're doing?

Like, I know people are trying to help but I think if it's something they *were* planning to do a bunch of they already know how their palette transparencies work.

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[Tank]

just conversation. it'll pass.

 

[Covenant]

Since different weapon designs (Not just palette swaps) can't easily be added the animators can use transparent parts of the weapon to make different weapons. So think of it like this. Animate the mega weapon. The mega weapon could have extra spikes or tassels and the level one weapon can just be the mega weapon with transparent spikes and tassels. Start us off with the level one weapon then as we upgrade just make those parts not transparent. That will make it so the animators only have to animate one weapon but you can get multiple weapons out of that one. Plus you can do color swaps with transparency and get a really big number of weapons with no extra animation.

The thing about that is complicating the palette. Let's say a "tassel" section overlaps the pole section, but you don't have a weapon with tassles yet. Making the tassles invisible would require a new palette color/section where ever the tassle overlaps a section of the staff. The alternative is having the tassels separate, but then that goes back to attaching stuff by hand.

 

[Goodbye18000]

in lighter news, Mike just uploaded this to Twitter

 

[@J-Boogie]

in lighter news, Mike just uploaded this to Twitter

That should be very easy mode.

Since scribble cat kills everything.

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[Ninja]

welp I'm glad Mike is having fun making the game.

Can't wait for people to start asking "Make Scribble Cat a playable incarnation!" Just like those people who keep on asking for Marie to be put into SG. She had her chance with the DLC character votes, she lost just like Annie and Minette.

Edit: Oh thank god the comments on the video are turned off... sigh...

 

[KaboomKid]

they already know how their palette transparencies work.

I was just mentioning the palettes in regards to other people's thoughts. I don't think anybody here is goofy enough to try to telling Mike what to do.

But y'know, this weapon topic reminded me a lot of the discussions from several months back, when some people felt disappointed about the likelihood of palette-swapped enemies being in the game. Once we got the Prototype though, we saw the palette swaps and sprite scaling on enemies was handled well enough that many players didn't even think twice about it, and I don't think anybody saw things like the Speed Booster coming.

In general, I think the Prototype showed us how well the team can apply simple, practical solutions to seemingly complicated problems, and we should expect they'll apply the same level of ingenuity in the finished game too. Definitely too soon for anyone to have any sort of doubts about this stuff.

 

[missingno]

Is Scribble Cat gonna be the Richter Mode of Indivisible?

 

[Cheesedragon]

Aye, i was gonna say "but mis fourtine hed" but it looks like this has already been discussed to shit.

 

[Kawalorn]

Palette effects are easy, and will be used (green bow with gold arrows, red bow with black arrows, etc).

But...I'm not sure how many weapons you think we're doing? This is not going to be a Knife-Dagger-Thief Knife-Assassin Dagger-Chicken Knife-Excalipoor-Gigas Blade, same-animation-new-name-more-damage kind of game. This is a "You got Spinning Blade" / "[Item:] Plasma Beam" kind of game. Damage increases don't come from finding better weapons, which is part of where I think the assumption you have might come from...

Some upgrades may result in different-looking weapons for some things, like how Peacock has a cannon or a shotgun in some animations, but in general you have THE bow and THE spear and THE axe and THE kusarigama. Rather than getting the Better Bow and then the Betterer Bow and then the Betterest Bow, you learn to do new things with The Bow. We are not going to redraw hundreds of frames many times to put tassels on the bow later and then a supercharger after that, nor are we going to do Beowulf's chair multiple times for multiple weapons.

I was asking cause I was quite sure there was talk, near the beginning of the campaign, about just buying better weapons from shops after we unlock the originals.

 

[Mike_Z]

Speaking of that, I realized from last night's stream that there's currently no slot available on the Prototype's equip menu for the kusarigama. I guess that menu was going to be given an intense overhaul anyway, huh? I hope you guys can manage to keep the weapon-swapping nice and quick in the finished version.

Currently the 5th weapon is Weapon Switch + the All-Block button, which works fine. Switching is still R1 + another button, and will remain as simple as that. We don't have to show the slot for the 5th weapon until you get it, which means by then you'll be used to switching weapons. We tried press-Weapon-Switch-and-release-without-choosing-something to go back to Bare Hands but that sucked.

Since different weapon designs (Not just palette swaps) can't easily be added the animators can use transparent parts of the weapon to make different weapons. So think of it like this. [snip]

Oh, sounds so easy, why didn't we think of that? </sarc>
We did this, for Parasoul's glasses and other things on SG.
You want an explanation of why it is not feasible? No problem, here you go:

If the weapon is in the same art as the character, then you need transparent-weapon-color-on-top-of-character-shirt, so that you can make that color match the shirt color when that part is not present. AND you need transparent-weapon-color-on-top-of-character-pants, transparent-weapon-color-on-top-of-character-skin, transparent-weapon-color-on-top-of-hair, etc, a separate color for EVERY COLOR that SINGLE transparent part can overlap.
And you need DIFFERENT colors for any OTHER transparent parts, so that you can make them different colors from each other when they aren't transparent; so it becomes "transparent parts * character colors" additional colors, which quickly outnumbers the initial palette. It's a nightmare both to draw/clean up and to palettize in-game.
AND, each of those transparent parts must be a flat color, because it cannot be shaded to match the weapon part since the shading has to match the contours of whatever is underneath when that part is transparent. Otherwise you would see the weapon part's shading in her shirt, for example.
Parasoul's glasses are a single flat color when they are present, and just to do that Parasoul's palette includes the following:
Glasses (above background color)
Glasses above hair
Glasses above face
Glasses above eye
Glasses above iris
Glasses above eyeshadow
and it only stops there because her glasses are very small and limited to only overlapping her head. If she were holding them in her hand, she would need an entire duplicate palette that was just glasses-over-every-other-color.

(If the weapon is in a separate layer, that's great because all you need is transparent-weapon-part color...but if the weapon is in a separate layer you can just swap it out anyway...but then you have to position it for every frame as well as drawing it to match specific animations, which is even more work, which is why we aren't doing that either, see below.)

I can see how others would be able to run with this and do something

We ran with it already, for Beowulf's chair. We ran with it already, for Robo-Fortune's headlight. We have done it already for over 3,000 frames. We KNOW how much work it is, and we KNOW whether the tradeoff is worth it. If we were doing puppet-style animation like Vanillaware it would be easy, and we wouldn't think twice about it, but we're not.

Look, I appreciate that people want to chime in with suggestions. I DON'T appreciate when I say, "We already considered this/have done this/know how much work this is compared to what we want for the game," and people continue to chime in with suggestions. I'll back my thang statements up with facts, because we're like that, but I'll get annoyed in the process. (^.^)

I was asking cause I was quite sure there was talk, near the beginning of the campaign, about just buying better weapons from shops after we unlock the originals.

Still not sure about this, since we are actually trying to hella avoid shops; but "better weapons" can be "upgrade the blue spear to the green spear".

 

[Cheesedragon]

Don't be hatin on Nillaware. If by "in pieces" you mean vector graphics, I'm pretty sure Mane6 is doing that too.

 

[Mr Peck]

Don't be hatin on Nillaware. If by "in pieces" you mean vector graphics, I'm pretty sure Mane6 is doing that too.

He means puppet-style animation, also known as paper-doll style animation. It's what Vanillaware does. They save the different pieces of their characters as separate images and animate them by moving, rotating and stretching those pieces separately like old Treasure bosses instead of hand animating each frame. This isn't an insult; old Treasure bosses are cool.

edit: I should mention that Vanillaware usually draws most of their character pieces in a few different poses/angles, especially for things like cloaks, and also that their animations are obviously higher fidelity than old Mega Drive games. Here's a Dragon's Crown walk animation if you wanna try and spot the different pieces/frames that they're using, and a crazy hand-animated walk for comparison (by awesome animator Bahi JD).

 

[fenster]

For a separate topic, I wanted to bring up the topic of difficulty levels again, but here's a slightly different question: would there be any considerations for a "theater mode", or "story mode", something that either trivializes or completely removes the challenge of combat gameplay or the combat gameplay altogether for the sake of the players who aren't good at video games but want to see the story/world? Originally gonna ask this in the gameplay thread but uh, technically it isn't actually about gameplay itself at all.

I know Mike said earlier about difficulty levels in RPGs, but I feel like this is a sort of separate thing. It's not like "Easy mode vs Normal", its more like "Automatic Mode vs not" from Bayonetta/DMC.

I ask because I recently went through this article that was clamoring for different types of games, most especially RPGs that have a worthwhile story, to add in more modes like this. While I very much disagree with the reasoning in the article, the main point is something that I think is worth considering and isn't something I can easily brush off. What about the people who do enjoy going through a world and story and characters but are just too bad at video games, and should there be considerations for them? While it's true that the answer for most years of gaming has been "deal with it" or "get good", it's also true that many many new games in the past 5 years or so have been putting in several things that let players skip past hard parts or put in theater mode esque things.

And note that "just youtube the gameplay" isn't really an answer, since the article specifically brings up in question that there are players who still find joy in discovery and the tactile part of playing games which you don't easily get from watching footage. I dunno how large this subset of thinking really is, but it is something unique.

 

[@J-Boogie]

Don't be hatin on Nillaware. If by "in pieces" you mean vector graphics, I'm pretty sure Mane6 is doing that too.

Everything he said and that's what you took away from it? And all he said was that's how Vanillaware does things and it's not what they're doing.

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[The Dave]

What about the people who do enjoy going through a world and story and characters but are just too bad at video games

As basically one of those people, I just look up spoilers and videos of really good playthroughs. More often than not, I'll play as well as I can play, and I'll look up the stuff I don't want to tackle anymore. That way I can experience gameplay within my abilities and appreciate skill beyond them. No need for a special mode.

 

[Rakurin]

Also seeing what to do helps you get better in general. Because usually when you're stuck at a point in a game it's in your mind that the task is now impossible. So if you look up something, you realize its doable, and you get that extra little boost of "hey, I can do this." I use this method for things all the time, like with the Dark Souls series.

 

[Mike_Z]

For a separate topic, I wanted to bring up the topic of difficulty levels again, but here's a slightly different question: would there be any considerations for a "theater mode", or "story mode", something that either trivializes or completely removes the challenge of combat gameplay or the combat gameplay altogether for the sake of the players who aren't good at video games but want to see the story/world?

That's an interesting idea that nobody's brought up to me yet! Even Wild ARMs 1 had auto-battle, though that was more to remove tedium than to beat bosses.
I would mention that, to me at least, at equivalent "difficulty" levels, RPG combat [is easier than] real-time combat [is easier than] really precise platforming. :^P
I do like this, though it'd be something like "if you choose to do it you won't get any achievements anymore from that playthrough" or something. Which I would imagine that the people who would do it, wouldn't care about?
Please remind me about this in like, a year. :^)

Don't be hatin on Nillaware.

Don't be puttin' words in my mouth. What's with you?!
We LOVE them! ::points to George Kamitani's SG guest art::

Vanillaware makes their characters in pieces, meaning they do puppet animation in-game. This is not some sort of backhanded insult, it's a factual description of their process.
Here's Gwendolyn's "sprite sheet". She doesn't exist as full frames, anywhere. Those pieces are put together and stretched/squashed/rotated/scaled by the game to get the final character. As a result, they have positional data for each piece for each frame, which is what is necessary to replace a part! Replacing a weapon is as simple as replacing the images that make up the parts of her weapon. They can have 300 or 3,000 "frames" of animation but replacing a weapon is still the same amount of work. It's more akin to 3D, but they have to make tradeoffs between the quality/detail of the result and the number of separate pieces to draw - notice how many more heads there are than hips.

If you want to see this clearly, look at the Dragon's Crown opening, which uses the same technique as the game to give motion to those images. It works much better on the Fighter, whose armor pieces we don't expect to change size much, than on the other characters. (Those images are notable because they don't have multiple pieces for each part, just one, so the distortion is way more noticeable there.)

If by "in pieces" you mean vector graphics, I'm pretty sure Mane6 is doing that too.

Firstly, vector graphics just means graphics drawn with vectors - you can do traditional hand animation in Flash without reusing pieces and it is still "vector art". (This is ALSO not an insult.)
Secondly, Mane6 is not doing the same thing as Vanillaware. However they arrive at the art, Mane6 is eventually outputting solid images rather than puppet pieces for the engine.

As a result, if they wanted to modify a weapon they would either have to have multiple versions of a frame - without weapon-part-A, with part A, with part B, with parts A and B - or they would have to do the palette trickery I mentioned above. So while it would be much easier for them to generate multiple versions of each frame (if the weapon is a separate set of images they can replace and just re-render the entire character's move set), they would still be doing much more work than Vanillaware would.

 

[Kit Ballard]

I like the idea of an "easier" mode, while killing Achieves. Let's you enjoy the story elements while letting you learn the game more. Then you can go back and earn the 'chieves. In a way it's like another reason to replay the game XD Plus, I'll admit, I had to "level up" my play style to beat the bosses. Some people prob wouldn't be able to do so or just get frustrated and out right quit. This gives em an edge to continue if need be. Here's hoping we remember to remind you in a year XD
Been playing Etrian Odyssey Untold on "Easy" mode to just enjoy the story. While it is one of my general types of games I love to play, I'm not interested in putting my nose to the grind stone and deal with the random system that I've seen so far. I doubt I'd use the "easy" mode for Indiv, I can see it's use.

 

[North888]

I'm wondering if certain areas will have any sort of 'gimmicks.' Like gravity, color puzzles, etc. You mentioned a hint towards something like that with the bonus dungeon, but I was curious into if you guys had any other area mechanics in mind for the other areas of the game yet, or if some had effects on both platforming and combat (like a time slowing mechanic that slows down enemy and allies within certain zones, or wind updrafts that make it easier to jump high or juggle foes for example)? I know it's a bit early for anything concrete on these, but i love the idea of unique area interactions and thought id ask. :D

 

[fenster]

Well I forgot the other thing that I wanted to ask, which is the complete opposite of what I asked earlier, but I assume there's gonna be some sort of "Skip Cutscene" function as well, right? I tried googling it really quick and all I saw was the discussion earlier in the gameplay thread about skipping certain battle cinematics, but not cutscenes themselves.

 

[KaboomKid]

I do like this, though it'd be something like "if you choose to do it you won't get any achievements anymore from that playthrough" or something.

I'd actually be very interested to see how you guys might integrate Casual-friendly features for this game later on. Since the game always requires the player to make important choices during exploration and combat, I imagine it'd be a tricky task to simplify them both.

Like obviously we know in the Prototype, even if Ajna could one-hit kill everything, it wouldn't really help players that are just struggling to find the axe, or understanding where/how to axe-climb. I figure most Casual players wouldn't mind having to do at least that degree of problem-solving, but you'd probably still have a group of them wanting to argue against the necessity of platforming in general.

I guess a lot of this feedback will really just depend on what type of players the game attracts once its closer to release. Will many people discovering the game for the first time be platforming fans, traditional JRPG fans, or just people that want to watch an interactive cartoon? It'll be an interesting mix for sure.

 

[Not-So-Saint]

I'd actually be very interested to see how you guys might integrate Casual-friendly features for this game later on. Since the game always requires the player to make important choices during exploration and combat, I imagine it'd be a tricky task to simplify them both.

Like obviously we know in the Prototype, even if Ajna could one-hit kill everything, it wouldn't really help players that are just struggling to find the axe, or understanding where/how to axe-climb. I figure most Casual players wouldn't mind having to do at least that degree of problem-solving, but you'd probably still have a group of them wanting to argue against the necessity of platforming in general.

I guess a lot of this feedback will really just depend on what type of players the game attracts once its closer to release. Will many people discovering the game for the first time be platforming fans, traditional JRPG fans, or just people that want to watch an interactive cartoon? It'll be an interesting mix for sure.

That's actually an interesting point. I was thinking about easying/skipping battles (which is I guess a fairly simple problem to solve), but skipping platforming would break the pace and I'm not sure how you can easify it either.

Also this.