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Invocation: An amateur's idea for a game.

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Everything you've got here is really interesting. Here's hoping you can turn it into something unique eventually.
I'm definitely going to keep an eye on this thread. Good luck with your game!
 
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Why have I not seen this yet :O
Pretty kool stuff here.
 
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Thanks. I'm hoping to turn it into something good someday :D

It's all a long ways away, though. We're still early planning, not even pre-alpha XD
Still about 1 millionx times better than where I started. It's humbling reading the early posts and seeing just how much I've learned in such a short time :D
 
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Ok, sorry. Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry! D:

I said I wuld have the OP updated already, but things have gone slow. I have a few more announcements, and this post will therefor be spoilered for size. It's mostly a more indepth look at the mechanics and specifically Helma's move list and her style. I also have something special at the end. However:

Quick Notes:
  • I'd like to spruce up the OP a bit. ATM it looks a little normal and reading through it, despite my efforts to highlight and make things obvious, is still easy to lose interest and skim. So hopefully with the next update I can also work on splitting things up and making it all a bit more approachable. Skullheat has been the place with the most support and active response to my ideas, so I want the posts and OP here to reflect that. PS. If you know any other forum that might be good to show this idea off at, please speak up! I feel the game is not in a state where I can feasibly create any sort of social media or singular site for all its updates and information. It's too early in dev for that!
  • Fluer is still under scrutiny. An idea for a character who would replace his position in the story has come up, and the idea is more appealing. No idea for gameplay yet, however, so that's still on the wall. Fluer's playstyle is also hard to simplify without him coming out, special move wise, as a clone of Rachel Alucard from Blazblue. Granted that was his playstyle's main inspiration, but I obviously don't want to straight up copy or rip stuff off. I'm better than that.
  • Art stuff was supposed to be in this update, even if it was my own very poor and out of date rendition of characters, but rejoice! Our artist, Loki (or one of his million other online names), is close to getting his new art tablet, so that work on actual design process and animation may very well begin.
  • X, our musician, is very busy. Superbly busy. It might come to the point where we need a second musician to contribute some work. Having a second opinion on music would also be helpful, as X is not super familiar with fighting-game music, nor is it always his favorite stuff to listen to. Granted, he's done a great job so far, but if you're a budding musician, or know one, and want to help out, we may have a role for you.
  • I just want to stress that this is STILL a hobby project. Something to get us known for, a passion project. A way to kill some time and create something with which to kill more time. I may have started as a useless idea guy, but I'm quickly evolving into a decent player in the development of my own game!
  • With Helma's design being quite a bit underway, I will be needing a VA for her soon. I do not know anyone personally who would be able to or willing to take the role. Despite being early in development, she is still the first character, and a lot of her design, personality, and lines have already been discussed and worked out. If you know someone who might be interested or available now or a few months down the line, I'm accepting anyone who wants to try out. We're not Skullgirls or anything professional, so this would have to be a volunteer and record the lines yourself. I would still HEAVILY scrutinize them and attempt to give you some sort of vocal direction, however. Gotta be at least a little professional, even if you're an amateur XD
Now for the big stuff!
BURST SYSTEM:
Over time my philosophy for this game has changed. I want to give players as many of their tools right from the start as possible. I want players to have all they need to win right from the get-go. Give them resources to use as they need or see fit, but also give them a choice. The game is becoming more offensive based as I dig into my own mechanics and try to think this out ahead of time. So here's how it is going to work:

Players get a Burst Point for each Round necessary to win a match + 1. So in a 2/3, they get 3 Burst Points. In a 3/5, they get 4 Burst Points. There is no way to recover Burst Points when used, and those Burst Points are all you have for the entirety of the match. When a Burst Point is used up, there is a 10-second lock on using Burst Points again. The period of time use is locked may change depending on development. Starting with a nice number of 10 seconds, however.

Bursting:
Upon inputting the buttons, the user bursts, hopefully blasting the opponent away from them to create breathing room. Bursting has a few weaknesses, however, that make it punishable. Listed below are the parameters of Invocation's Bursts. Yes, even some obvious stuff:
  • You are lifted into the air if used on the ground. If in the air, you will burst where you are.
  • After bursting, there is a few moments of recovery. Few enough to create breathing room on hit, but enough that if you miss with a burst, you're very easy to punish.
  • Obviously, bursts can be blocked, opening you wide up.
  • Armor and Grabs/command Grabs beat out Bursts. So if you're going to burst and get grabbed or they use an armored move, it isn't going to end well.
  • When bursting, you are unable to attack or control your air momentum for a brief period of time before either touching the ground, or getting attacked. You can still block in the air after bursting (after the recovery), but you can't retaliate.
  • Bursting uses up one Burst Point.
  • You can burst at any time except during grabs or supers.
  • IMPORTANT: IF YOU ARE OUT OF BURST POINTS, YOU MAY STILL BURST, BUT AT THE COST OF 50% METER!
Now for something new:
Burst Cancel:
In the vein of GG's Roman Cancels and UNIEL's own similar mechanic, Invocation allows you to cancel whatever action you're in and return to neutral. This obviously allows chaining certain moves that normally wouldn't be possible, or extending combos near their normal end. However, there is a catch. It will ALSO cost a BURST POINT and put your stock of Burst Points in the 10-second lockdown. Here are the parameters of Burst Canceling:
  • UNLIKE NORMAL BURSTS, YOU CANNOT BURST CANCEL IF YOU HAVE NO MORE BURST POINTS
  • Has a different, yet undetermined input
  • YOU CAN ONLY BURST CANCEL FROM ATTACKS! AFTER HITTING THE OPPONENT OR THROWING A PROJECTILE OR WHIFFING OR ETC, YOU CAN SPEND A BURST POINT TO BURST CANCEL, RETURNING YOU TO NEUTRAL AND PAUSING TIME AROUND YOU FOR JUST A BRIEF MOMENT.
  • You cannot Burst Cancel into a super or Burst Cancel off a super. You MAY, however, Burst Cancel into another move AND THEN use a Super.
  • Does not reset damage scaling (duh)
  • Assuming it is even possible depending on development (which it shouldn't be), you may only Burst Cancel ONCE per combo. If 10-second combos are a thing, however, I will personally shoot myself in the foot and then balancing those out. I'm going for shorter combos of maybe up to 10-12 inputs on the longer ones.
It's fairly self explanitory. It's a lot more limited version of something like Roman Cancels, that allow you make your actions safe or chain into things normal impossible. I want this multitude of choice in one simple mechanic: defense NOW, defense LATER? Saving this point for use to get extra damage NOW and take the lead? Or save it for possible screwups or to catch up in case I start losing? That's what I want. That choice of whether to save or to use, and how it affects the game since both this multipurpose tool and high defense tool are tied to a fairly limited resource. Most people would prefer to use the Points for Burst Canceling, since you can still burst at the cost of massive meter which could go towards supers instead. It's that interconnected choice I want! I would like to take a similar philosophy to my characters, too. Hopefully Helma will exemplify that.

RED HEALTH:
This is much harder to quantify since I have yet to actually implement it. The idea is one seen many times in the past. Essentially, when hit, your HP goes down. Duh. But, you also retain 1/5 of that dealt damage as RED HEALTH. In a combo, the RED HEALTH is comprised of 1/5 of the TOTAL damage at the end of the combo. So how do you use RED HEALTH? Unlike a lot of games, its kinda different. When you hit the opponent, even if they block, you recover a tiny bit of RED HEALTH. You get less when the opponent blocks, but you still get some back. Now, 1/5 may sound like a lot of RED HEALTH, but how much you gain back on hits doesn't really give much. If you're playing offensively you can gain back a small portion of your health. MAYBE up to the 1/5 if you get a miracle, but get hit again, and all that RED HEALTH goes away, leaving only the 1/5 of whatever damage you took from the most recent hit. This doesn't apply on block atm due to planned rules for how chip damage works, but my plans for chip damage may change depending on how these mechanics work. Speaking of chip:

CHIP DAMAGE:
Just because you're blocking doesn't mean you're safe, pal. Heavy normals, Special attacks, and Super attacks still deal chip damage. ATM its not quantifiable (don't even have a completed char that works :/), but chip damage would be quite small. This is all pretty basic stuff. If hit with chip damage that would kill, you are reduced to 1 pixel of HP first. Another hit of chip damage WILL kill, however. Just remember that light and medium normals don't deal any chip.

MISC:
  • Air Dashes and Double Jumps exist. How they work from character to character and who has them is not universal. Some characters also have either a dash or a run for double tapping towards the opponent. Away, however, all characters do a short distance backdash. It is quick, short distance, but not invincible. It will be detailed on the front page under the character's GAMEPLAY portion.
  • Meter Scaling is still set to be fairly high. In general, meter gain is going to be a lot harder than in other fighters. This is to make meter more of an actively growing resource than a crutch with which to use a wakeup super or add small amounts of extra damage on at the end. It also helps the choice of spending meter to use a Burst at the end of a match, or to save it, eat the damage, be put in a disadvantageous position, but possibly return the favor and add that extra damage to your next attack.
  • Characters will, for the most part, have 2 supers. There are few characters with 100% supers. Tyrus and Tiganizo, and Sarria, of the original cast, break this rule, but Tyrus' feeds into his changed mechanic (DETAILS TO FOLLOW ON OR PRIOR TO NEXT OP UPDATE!) with a third super at 100%, Tiganizo has an attack super that uses 100% in addition to his 50% super, and Sarria has 3 50% supers tied to her projectiles.
  • The two chars that we're working on for this "demo" or whatever you wish to call it, are Helma and Tyrus. They're two more defined characters with mechanics and move sets that are fairly easy to explain. Helma, being essentially the game's poster girl similarly to Filia, is obviously the main focus for now. As said, deep details on her below.
  • There was an idea for a counter mechanic utilizing 25% meter instead of the Burst Cancel mechanic change. However, I felt the current setup appealed more and created more of a meta and choice than some disconnected counter Blitz Shield-esque mechanic.
  • EVERYTHING IS STILL PRE ALPHA! I have a lot of ideas and my artist is planning his own fighter (which I may or may not have to work on after this XD) and often has plenty to contribute. However, neither of us are professionals, nor do we 100% understand all the mechanics. I'm trying to learn, digging into mechanics and the workings of characters as I go, but I'm still a ways away from understanding anything. It'd be nice if I could find someone who could contribute that knew a thing or two more than me about fighters XD
  • The game uses a chain system with the 4 button layout as mentioned previously. Until the OP is updated, you may have to go back to check previous updates I've posted to understand what is said here and how it relates to the game and how it will play.
  • Game has OTGs. You can use ONE OTG to extend your combo. After that, if they touch the ground, they are invinscible and can tech and all that. Obviously, this is 1 OTG less than SG, which gives you 2 OTGs. It feeds into how I want to naturally reduce combo length and how I want damage structured.
  • You can tech from ground forward or backwards, or simply ukemi and tech back to your current position while still getting the same period of invincibility teching grants. You decide teching direction by holding the direction you wish to tech and hitting any two attack buttons. Bursting and Burst Canceling both require 3-button inputs, so you shouldn't do those on accident. You can also tech by hitting the direction you wish to tech in twice like a dash. You would hit up or down twice to ukemi. You can tech BACKWARDS ONLY in the air. It doesn't really grant much any extra aerial time, nor does it really grant any openings, just allows you to get out while in the air.
  • In the ideal situation, which means how I plan on balancing everything, it will take probably about 3 well optomized combos using Supers and/or Burst Cancels to kill. Meaning about 5-6 standard optimized combos. This is subject to change, depending on how it effects everything. Might try to go for 4-5 standard combos and 2-3 well optimized using Supers/Burst Cancels. Either way, that's about what I'm hoping to balance it as. So that damage from footsies and basic hits still amount for something, but combos don't end the match super quickly. Hoping to do this all while making matches less than 45 seconds. I'd like to shoot for less than 30 on average, but if I can balance things so the match is still entertaining and keeps people invested while being a bit higher than 30 seconds, I think I'll be happy with it.

Here's a lot of info about Helma being thrown at you! This isn't anything backstory-wise, just pure gameplay for the moment!

  • As stated, Helma uses a Follow-up mechanic. Kind of like Rekka. Kind of. After many of her moves, both specials and normals, she can use the D button to followup said attack with a different attack. You can press and hold D to delay the release of the followup attack, similarly to Beowulf's Pipe Bomb. Her Move list most stayed unchanged from what it was previously stated to be, and I'm going to be going over all her specials and some normals.

  • First off. Helma has BOTH an air dash and double jump. However, she can only do one on any jump. She can also super jump, which gives her the height of approximately 2 normal jumps and more momentum/distance to her jump arc, but she can't air dash/double jump. Her Double Jump is unique in that she uses her Flamethrowers on her feet to generate a quick burst of fire. This gives her an extra jump by simply pressing up again. However, it cancels her current momentum, holding up and back or forward is important. Lastly, her second jump is more like a hop. It gives about 1/2 the height of a normal jump, and far less momentum, meaning it allows her to cover less distance, but also allows her immediately reverse her jump path should that be necessary.

  • Helma's dash is a quick run.

NORMALS:
Helma follows the other universal normals, of course. Her normals are pretty average, and she lacks any extra Command Normals, due to her Follow-Up mechanic giving her more versatility. She also is the only character lacking a launcher in her set up normals.
Normal specifics:
  • Her s.C is a heavy punch that knocks the foe over and sends them a bit backwards. Punishable and has a bit of wind up to it. Similar, in the way it works, to Big Band's c.HP for example. Though it isn't as a good for chaining or hold the opponent in the air a moment.
  • Her c.C is a sweep where she stomps forward and blasts with the flamethrower at the bottom of her foot. You can get an OTG off of this as well. Has fairly short range, however. The attack is two hits, and the stomp part has to hit for Helma to do the blast. The blast is NOT a followup attack.
  • her s.B, as stated previously, is a quick, forward thrust of her knee. Hitting D during this time makes her unleash a blast of fire from her knee. This acts like a launcher and sends the target upwards at a fairly high altitude with some backwards momentum. You can air combo off of this, but its more limited due to that backwards velocity it gives.
  • s.A and c.A are both quick jabs. You can quick chain s.A twice for hit confirming. Mike's stance on jab confirms, after seeing it in action in Skullgirls, I realized its a smart thing instead of just making the jab 3 hits or something silly. c.A is slower and has Helma flick a flame from the lighter on her hand at the opponent. It's short range, but still an effective confirm, similar to PW/Double's c.LK.
  • c.B is a quick thrust of her leg forward along the ground.
  • I cannot talk quite yet of her air normals. They are primarily for combos and I shall attempt to set them up as such, but I don't have much set up for them yet, unfortunately.
SPECIALS:
Her special moves are largely unchanged from the previous update, and will quote them as such. However, her DP, the fire flip kick, has been drastically revised. I will quote the other two specials in their exactness below. Sorry if they still read a bit cluttered. Here's her previous specials:
  • :QCF:+ABC (In air-OK): She has a Hit-Grab special. She launches herself at a low angle a decent amount forwards and on hit grabs the opponent and blasts off of them, throwing them back at a low altitude (can get wall bounce). Pressing the special with A, B, or C will alter the distance and angle. A launchers her low the farthest distance and has noticeable startup. A also gives her some projectile invincibility, similar to Zangief's Lariat (to an extent), B has less startup than A but lacks as much distance or the invincibilty. B and C come out very quickly. C launches at a higher angle but has the shortest distance. It's very similar to I-No's AA read with the String. And if you get caught and commit to it too early or want to cancel the launch on hit, you can press D to cancel the move at any point up to a frame or two after hit to have Helma switch into doing an axe kick and putting the opponent on the ground in front of you. Alternatively, you can use it to cancel the move before you commit to it and get punished, though the move still does have obvious recovery and is, on whiff, more punishable due to recoery than the Hit-Grab is on block due to Hit-Grabs slight upward velocity and counting as Helma being in air. Additionally, you can use this in the air and Helma will do the move as a Divekick. It doesn't have any altering trajectories between ABC, but it still has the hit-grab and you can cancel most of her air normals into it as well. The Axe Kick followup with the Dive Kick version causes Helma to be put in a state similar to Bursting in the air; Helma cannot guard or attack, causing players to need to commit behind either the Dive or Follow up.
  • :QCB:+ABC: A quick kick with large stun behind it. Doesn't have varying versions between ABC, but unlike her normals, it can cause an extended stun state and has good priority. Can be followed up as well, causing a quick flame blast with some kick to it. Doesn't knock down, though. It exists to serve more as a reset point, since you can delay followup attacks by holding D and then releasing. You can chain the followup to this into her D normals if you haven't used them in the combo yet. This is again to further emphasis early use of it or as a reset point in a similar way to Beowulf's Pipebomb in that you can delay it to get a second hit or reset.
Her Flip Kick has been changed heavily. I will, when I post her move list to the OP, update her other two specials to match this format:

PHEONIX WHEEL: :DP:+A/B/C: Variation Yes. Helma does a flip, loosing fire from both her knee and feet Flamethrowers to create a circular trail of fire in the air. All 3 variants have disjointed hitboxes. A is simple, while B and C's flames nullify projectiles, and have a Follow-Up.
  • :DP:+A: Helma does a flip in place. The disjointed hitboxes are there, but mostly in front of her. On hit, it launches targets at a lower altitude and with no extra momentum. Serves as a basic launcher where her Normals lack one.
  • :DP:+B: Helma does a higher altitude flip. Creates large disjointed hitboxes of fire directly in front of, above, and partially below. Helma counts as airborn and most of the move will whiff on grounded opponents. Targets hit by the attack will fall straight down to the ground. Disjointed fire lingers a moment after the fire comes out. Has a larger recovery and is difficult to chain out of. Best used for OTG with a Burst Cancel, but serves as a good tool against zoners.
  • :DP:+C: Helma does more of a flip kick, giving her forward momentum and makes the attack more of a traveling uppercut. Similar in most ways to K's :DP:+P2 move. On hit, it carries targets with Helma a bit. Can't really get much off of it, but planning on making OTG fairly easy off of the followup.
  • FOLLOW-UP: D: Helma lays down a kick that sends the opponent down and away from her, hitting and bouncing hard off the ground. Makes it easy to OTG off of. Current plan is to make it possible to follow the ground bounce with either air normal and continue into ground combo, or make the kick push Helma towards the ground as well.
Only one of her two Supers are planned. First is simply that Helma dashes across the screen, charring anyone she passes through, but can't really combo off of it. One hit for high damage and it puts you on the other end of the screen whether it hits of blocks.

Preview Pic.png
Yes, that's right folks, you can plainly see before you, part of my progress on creating Helma's prototype! It's obviously nowhere near complete. I'm still compiling the sprites and placing the anchor correctly, but PROGRESS! Most of you have probably noticed this is not a character you don't really recognize. In fact, its not even a girl! It doesn't even have prosthetic limbs! WAIT A MOMENT! Isn't that K' from the KoF series? Yes text, it is. I'm using K' here as an anolog for Helma during development until we can replace the sprites with Helma's. I want to make some tangible progress, so here you go!

This should hopefully be the last monumental update to read before I update the OP with it all. Depending on how development over Tyrus and Fleur go, however, there may be one more, but it hopefully won't prevent me from updating the OP. I can't say when the update to the OP will be, but I'm hoping to bring a finished movelist to the table, and maybe, just maybe....A video? No guarantees guys, however. I want to update the OP, but want it to be lasting info so I don't have to change everything a week later just cause one thing altered in the course of development. With that, then, the update WILL come, but be patient. I'll try to tide you over with art and screenshots of progress till it comes :D
 
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Progress on everything in general has been slower than expected. Probably going to go without an update for awhile until I can get some issues with the team sorted out. Since Helma is getting farther into completion and we basically have the "story" of the game worked out and personalities of hte characters done, I may release some example scripts for character lines if anyone is interested. At this point its all up in the air due to a number of unfortunate, personal circumstances.
 
*nervously raises hand* I will admit to having a terrible college situation which is currently eating most to all of my time....along with the fact that I no longer have any access to the computer I used to make my music. So...if anyone wants to assist North in making music, I won't hold any grudge. This bloke wants to get stuff done, and heck, I'm not liking the fact that I'm not exactly helping his cause. So...yeah. D=
 
North888 said:
At this point its all up in the air due to a number of unfortunate, personal circumstances.
I hope things get better c:

I've only read that june 21 thing now, but everything seems pretty good.
I had an issue or two with how bursting works then I realised this isn't ips and I don't know much about blazblue and guilty gear style burst systems...
I also like the heavy meter scaling, I feel like that encourages more resets; but what do I know :v
 
The burst system is to give players a choice. You will also get about 10% meter on a successful burst hit. But you still lose a stock/50% meter just using it, so that 10% isn't going to mean much outside of maybe building a super. Since meter scaling is going to be higher, that means that if you run out of stocks, you'll be choosing between either getting extra damage a super, or saving yourself with an extra burst. Again, i want to give players that choice of either saving to keep themselves alive, or using stocks and meter towards extra damage to win the match earlier. I like that dichotemy of choice, and it makes screw ups and wastes of bursts/supers/stocks on the player for making a bad call or not making sure they're keeping their emergency defense in mind when playing offense.

It also does encourage resets, which will help build greater meter. With how combos are scaled, resets will be best to get good damage and meter. But if you want the best results, you can use an optimized full length combo into a Burst Cancel into either a super or a reset. The game encourages both combos and resets. If you want the best damage, full combos are best, but resets are best if you want the extra meter and make more out of the resources you're given.

As far as BB and GG go, bursts were a resource you had. You used them at any point aside from supers and then had to wait on a cooldown before doing it again. The cooldowns were quite long however. Some of the games had things that rewarded smart or stupid bursting, like Gold bursts from BB which game you full meter for hitting the opponent with a burst in neutral. My system here is basically trying to keep that limited defense while also giving more opportunites like SG does. It's kind of a mashup of the two ideas...kinda...not really.


On a side note, I could have done a better job keeping up with my team. I have a large number of things that've changed that I have yet to fully explain to the team. A lot of things have come up that have slowed me down and such. So I'm changing plans to just update this whenever I can with the current information and how Helma has been altered and go over a more in-depth guide to Tyrus. Helma's also gotten a move list change. One of her specials have been replaced and I plan on explaining that and how her moves and moves in general chain and cancel and such later.

Also, one important thing to note is that we have removed Fleur. He will be replaced with a different plant-based villain. She's heavily tied to Ninetails and how Ninetails became as deluded as she is. I'm hoping to keep Fleur in as a side character maybe, but as far as story relevance, he will be updated to reflect that he is no longer an important character, much the same as someone like Zamani or Q-W1X.

tl;dr: Lots of issues on everything. I need to keep up with my team better, and Helma has changes and Fleur has been made a side character.
 
Little Double Post Bumb while I work on things. Given that my composer, X, is in a situation where he most likely wont be able to return to his position for a good period of time, I would like to post direct links to the songs we started or finished on his Soundcloud. These are the most up to date versions of the 3 themes we had in progress. If anyone wants to post opinions of them or finish them or whatever, fine. I'm just putting them out there at this point. Until I can find a new musician they're all we really got...

FINISHED:
Infiltration

WIP:
Cold Steel Warm Eyes
Q-W1X47's theme. I was going for an Arabian theme when me and X were doing this. It's a bit slow paced now, but a bit of a speed up and some tuning coulda turned it into a great piece.

Afternoon of Adventure
Helma's theme. We were going for something along the lines of Taokaka's theme, maybe with something along the lines of May's Blue Water Blue Skies theme. It was turning out well. It's still a bit slow and not necessarily pumping you up, but I like it and feel it could be great with a few tweaks,
 
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Lookin good.

You're still using Mugen right? If so, don't forget The Mugen Fighting Guild is a pretty big forum for the engine (last I checked) if you need help/advice/feedback. No shame in seeking help, I do it all the time with more experienced friends, though I try to always be prepared for the big question.
 
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I'll look into them. The big thing right now is to get some sort of model to show what I have in mind as far as mechanics. I'll check them out cause I hear about them from a few ppl. Might be able to get some good tips and some help with creating the analogs.

As far as this bump is concerned, just updating to say that scripts are on their way, and this time it should be on time! I'm gonna be posting the full list of scripts here for anyone interested and possibly finally updating the OP as necessary! I should STRESS that the scripts mostly contain dialogue, intros, a few story-related lines, etc. The big thing about them is that they also feature the WIP move lists and official current bios.

ALSO, as part of this I will be revealing some world updates and maybe finally finish the list of Deities. I don't know what all will be in the exact update at this time, but I'm pretty much shooting for everything. If I don't have anything physical worthy of being shown, I'm damn well gonna keep you all in the loop as best I can!
 
Amazing work X! I've shown it to a few others outside of the group as well. It's earned nothing but praise! :D

Did I forget to mention the team's all college students? :3
 
Ok, so we have some problems. The files I was working in to create these bios and create the general update to just C+P over the current first post got corrupted after my comp got a virus. I managed to restore a number of the files and things are back on track, but the reason this has been so silent is due to that and general laziness. With school starting soon, a lot of us working on this game have had other things. Additionally, problems at my job have been taking a lot out of me and reduced my energy and will to work on this a ton. As it stands, I hate to say it, but an update is probably still far away.

You guys...you guys don't realize how horrible it feels to keep saying you'll get stuff out and then things to go wrong. I can't even make promises about anything anymore cause it'll just kinda poof up in smoke. Stuff is coming, it's just slow and I can't do anything about that, I'm a naturally slow worker. Soon as there is anything to show, I'll be updating this here again. Thanks for reading and such.
 
Thanks for letting us know. Maybe keep more backups around in the future? And don't beat yourself up too much about life getting in the way, man, it happens, just do what you can.
 
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It's just that I'd like to actually have some form of a schedule. But as it stands we really have no schedule. We kinda get what we can done when we can. As such, I'll probably only put up info when we actually have it instead of saying what we're working on from now on :P
 
Programming life will teach you to always have back ups. and back ups for your back ups. Especially if you end up working for the government. Or any IT company really.
Anyways, you're only one guy. Shit happens. Just do what you can. No one's pressing you for a deadline.
 
I've been backing up a lot of my stuff. This corruption hit my computer that I was doing a lot of the updates on. I hadn't backed up the files recently as I was sending them out for feedback to a few friends who are close to the project when the bug hit. I managed to save most of it, but still lost enough to throw me back awhile.

Thanks for understanding and being patient, I really appreciate it. I just want to be able to say something and actually meet a deadline I set for myself for once.
 
So is this thread just your dev blog?

Why not have an actual dev blog that isn't in a forum?

Not that I'm against you posting your progress here, I just figure you'd benefit more with a Tumblr or Blogspot or whatever kids are using these days. Y'know, something a little more public.
 
Verdant Brave said:
So is this thread just your dev blog?

Why not have an actual dev blog that isn't in a forum?

Not that I'm against you posting your progress here, I just figure you'd benefit more with a Tumblr or Blogspot or whatever kids are using these days. Y'know, something a little more public.
I......y'know that's a good idea.

This thread started as my being stupid, but since I decided to stick it out, it's become more of a dev blog. I should definately move it to a tumblr or such though. I'll definately set something like that up.
 
Working on a lot of things. School takes a lot of time as many of you know. Have a lot of plans and ideas, but at this point nothing to update with. I'll probably be creating a Tumblr or Facebook group or something for the project later, but for now, until we get a little more material to talk about, it isn't necessarily ready to go up.

Also I plan on spewing a lot of info about the battle system and how it works. Lots of thought has gone into it and I want to run it by everyone in pretty specific detail, but I'll do that later. Just posting this to basically say we're not dead and we're making progress. XD

OOOH, ok, names!

NEW CHAR: Amanita. A villain character that serves as a driving force for Ninetails. Based on the term for Death Caps and is inspired, in design, by Touhou. Serves as a more basic zoner compared to Sarria.

NEW CHAR: Zed Rajnash. The villain/rival char for Murasame. A leader of the local worshippers working under Kuro and Ninetails' cult. It was through his machinations that started Murasame's journey of revenge. Based on generic dark mage designs, particularly from games like the Fire Emblem series, the pre-Awakening designs. He'd be a slow, combo-oriented character. Possibly a mid-range zoner meant to pull enemies closer to him and keep them in his range.

Sarria's move list is getting a bit of a rework, I couldn't figure out how to make her dragon projectiles really work out in the system without it breaking a large number of the other character's tools and forcing players to burst to get them off.

Murasame is now getting a rework alongside Fleur. It's not as extensive, only really reworking her appearance and lore. Wanted to change her inspirations from Japanese theming, but I'll keep silent about the rest until I have more to say.

That's about it for now. I want to spill some beans on lore updates and go in great detail over a ton of things, but that can all wait for the official social media place where I'll make sure to actually keep it up-to-date.
 
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*waves frantically* Oy! Hello Internet! Quick question! *slaps up music link*
https://soundcloud.com/xscalibur64/cold-steel-warm-eyes-v4
Rumor has it that the panning on this sucker (that I made) can drive one mad.
......Not really, but I have a vote that the panning I did is rather annoying, but since I've listened to this for the entire time that I made it, I want to hear/see everyone's opinion on it to see if I need to make that one last balancing adjustment before I can say I've completed this one for good. Thanks in advance! =D

Edit: Sorry. Forgot I changed the url slightly. But yeah, that's the one. Thanks North!
 
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Hey uh... the link you gave doesn't work?
 
The panning is annoying but it isn't too bad IMO. Good work anyways, though!
 
It's real good, but I can see this giving me light headaches after prolonged periods of time...
 
Alright. Fair enough. Even so, light headaches aren't desired, so I'll lighten the panning a bit. Lemme just fix that, and.....
https://soundcloud.com/xscalibur64/cold-steel-warm-eyes-v41
Alrighty. If anyone cares about numbers, I cut the panning down so it's about 30% in each direction, and not full blast in one ear or the other like it was before. xD

Edit: Also, I like to delete older renditions of a song off of Soundcloud, so if you wanna listen to something that badly, either download it (don't steal, tho ;~;) or ask me, and if enough people want it, I'll put it back up and leave it up. =D
 
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Much better, great.
 
yeah what Meow Professor said.

On the other hand, is this supposed to be a track for a stage or a menu? Cuz idk if I can see myself fighting to it.
 
This is supposed to be a theme for the robot character, Q-W1X. I can get how some may feel its not really a fighting theme, but I think it works fine and fits the robot ninja with his Arabian theming. We have stuff like Return to Normalcy in SG as a stage theme, which I never really felt was much of a fighting game track, but I feel this has more punch to it and will work just fine when integrated.
 
You'd have to bring that up with North. I just make the music, and he decides what happens to it. x"D
But from what I know, it'll be a character's main theme, but not necessarily the fighting theme, per say. At least I think so. 0_o;

Edit: Got ninja'd. xD
 
Well, with how things are progressing, it hasn't been decided or worked in yet if the themes will be used based on stage or characters. Probably gonna be based on stage with some stages have multiple possible themes to make up for the number of chars we'll most likely have compared to the number of stages, but we're really just covering all our bases by giving each character we'd really like to have in a theme. Though Xscalibur got a bit ahead of himself and made what would become Q-W1X's theme in a fit of inspiration, not because we actually planned to do his theme next XD.


EDIT: I've made an official OST for Invocation on Soundcloud. You can find it here: https://soundcloud.com/finalfantsia/sets/invocation-official-ost

The original version of Cold Steel, Warm Eyes will most likely remain on there just for how different it is and we might be able to reuse it still for other things XD. Anyways, enjoy.
 
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Lemmee just say that Infiltration is easily one of my favorite tracks so far. Not something I could fight to after that initial guitar riff, but it's still great.

I personally feel it'd be best suited to a cutscene or story dialogue. Perhaps a story-relevant match could play this?
 
I think they would be fine to fight to personally. Look at Skullgirls, a lot of tracks aren't really intense fighting themes but they still work well.
 
Personally, Afternoon of Adventuring is my favorite of all our tracks XD

but yeh I get some of the comments saying they don't really sound like a fighting game track. We're working on it for future ones, dun worry. A few laid back tracks to fight isn't so bad.

Also thanks to everyone for the feedback. While progress on everything else is going to slowly, the music is one area we can show some progress, so its great to see the reception to that.
 
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To be fair, music helps in games just help set the tone and theme of things. The tracks given help establish the futuristic setting of it all, but as far as visual representation to apply the setting goes, we're lacking on details. Not anyone's fault really. We're basically trying to grab as much speculation without having to read the world and character bios cuz human laziness is a wonderful thing.

In other words, just think about hearing this track without knowing anything about Vsav's Fetus of God stage.

....yeah that's pretty much where we're at right now.
 
Understandable. We've got ideas for stages and everything. The big problem is that with the start of school again, our only artist hasn't had time to do any of it just yet. XD
 
It's been a long time since I last posted to this thread. I'd like to request it be locked until I am able to get back to this project. For now I'm unable to do any work on Invocation, but I'm not about to just let it die, just sleep awhile.
 
Oh good I was legit worried you were updating this thread to announce you'd cancelled the project D:

Mine's in a similar state atm. Ah well.
 
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