DevBlog #19
[h2]FTessaro - Lead Programmer[/h2]
Hey everyone, it’s been a month of adjustments, fixes and preparations for what comes next. I’ve been particularly occupied with corrections of old and new mechanics this month to ensure that we have a clean path for the next updates, including humans as well.
One important fix was related to “Lag Compensation” which is utilized by a few abilities such as the Utah’s pounce and the Pachy’s ram, the system was causing a noticeable stutter and lacked the necessary accuracy in relation to server and client sync of events. The “Lag Compensation” is a generic term to help against the biggest issue in online games, the latency, or lag, which is the time certain things take to go from the client to server and/or from server to client. This system helps to reduce that latency the moment an ability is activated, which makes the entire ability chain significantly more reliable, accurate and ping tolerant. The problem is that such a system is sensitive to any code mistake, which obviously can break the various abilities, but it is important for the future. However, I’ve resolved the issues and with more tests/time we will finalize this mechanic so it can be implemented in other abilities and even expanded.
Besides that, I have also been working on humans (yes, officially) organizing animations, folders, classes, etc. Something important to note is that the initial implementation of humans will be basic and significantly expanded upon throughout development.
[h2]Amar0k - Programmer[/h2]
Hey all, this last year has gone by in a flash and I hope that you’re all looking forward to the holidays. This past month for me has been spent developing some of our server side tools, which will eliminate the issue of the servers not restarting properly, as well as making them significantly easier to manage on our end.
Based on feedback, the team and I are also reimagining our approach for the implementation of AI and the roles that they will fill within the ecosystem; we'll be able to share more specific details on that in future. I’ve also been working on the ambient animals, continuing to make their behaviour more dynamic and interesting to interact with alongside improvements to the fish. Other than that it has just been a plethora of bug fixes and performance testing as usual. That’s it for me this month!
[h2]dmIV - Programmer[/h2]
I updated the stagger mechanic to have actual movement instead of just playing the animation in place. It’s just a little push, but the animations play out much better now that the feet are not sliding around. I had to set up a little “studio” in the engine to measure the movement speeds and durations for each direction of each animal but it will come handy for the new additions.
I made some changes to the tracking system as well. It’s mostly just balancing it at this point but there were some visual updates too. You can now see the cone and the footprints through foliage which was a much needed improvement in places with dense vegetation.
I also moved the scent icons back to the compass. When I first set up the system it was primarily for testing so now I went back and made some updates to support fading in and out. Finally I got around to moving the pack scent there as well.
[h2]hypno - QA Lead[/h2]
This month QA has been busy assisting with rounding out Update #4. We’ve been spending the majority of our time bug testing and confirming the fixes for the programmers with each internal build of the game. We’ve noticed lately that the game has been suffering with a lot of crashes and input lockups (we hear you Stego players), so the majority of our focus has been spent on narrowing those down. These issues can arise from all sorts of unexpected places - one of the latest crashes was related simply to fracture sounds not playing properly, instead of the headbutt ability itself.
Besides bug testing, we’ve been following the mechanic test and balance feedback channels on the Discord closely, fine tuning the statistics for the characters across the board and the values for the diet system. A large focus during this time was spent looking at the Pachycephalosaurus and the accompanying fracture system, more specifically how well the character contends with the other species on the island. We knew that the Carnotaurus was going to be a huge threat for the Pachy and started by ensuring that this animal had the toolkit to deal with it effectively. The goal we’re currently pursuing is for the Pachy to be able to break its leg and be able to run away, instead of outright killing it; please let us know in the balance feedback Discord channel how it feels so far so we know how it’s performing.
Another focus we’ve had is the new scent tracking system that was mentioned above. We’re really excited to see this feature come into the game and think it’s going to push carnivore tracking into a whole new direction that the game hasn’t seen before. As mentioned in dmIV’s post, it’s mostly down to balance testing at the moment and we’re looking forward to seeing what you guys think about it!
[h2]VisualTech48 - 3D Artist[/h2]
This month has been all about the Dockyard and getting shaders ready for the new system.
Dockyard items have been progressing as expected with various buildings pretty much done. Just need to be put in a blueprint, optimize the distances and voila, we have at least 4 versatile buildings.
Others are on the way of course, with a large collection of props and interior changes, both in the decal department, and set dressing. These new items are a collection that we are pushing to make all aspects of human buildings feel unique and with a purpose, especially with coloring, which highlights the importance of each building, and what can be pretty much found there.
Alongside these, I’ve been making semi modular props for storage, to bring more life into these storage places.
That is so far regarding highly detailed items for the humans, and the new dockyard. I wish you all the best with the new year and holidays!
[h2]Fred - 2D Artist[/h2]
The art department has been keeping me busy a great deal. At the beginning of the month I’ve been working on finishing the Underwater Concept for our Rivers. Because rivers are thinner and longer in shape than lakes, I had to stretch out the concept art horizontally quite a bit to fit as much as I could. I’m hoping we can be quite creative with how the river bends, forms, deepens, and shapes. Default skins for all the animals have been completed and work on secondary skins has begun. We’re going to try and not be super drastic between patterns and keep them looking similar with their own flair. Think of them like different variations of the same skin, like different morphs in some reptiles. Hopefully they’ll break up the monotony of having the same patterns on every individual.
[h2]Seiza - Video Editor[/h2]
The release trailer for the 4th update had to be revised heavily in the last few months, as the content of the 4th update changed a lot over the course of its creation and thus many scenes of the trailer had to be re-filmed.
Especially the changes to the fractures took a lot of time, because now only the pachy can use fractures. So (besides small specials like the Halloween video) I spent the last weeks updating the release trailer.
Also during the last two weeks, I've been working on the audio effects for the trailer. When I film a scene in the game engine it is entirely without sound. I add the individual sound effects, each call, each step and each idle snort manually in the video editor, as it’s easier to adjust and edit the effects there.
When designing the sound of the trailer I make sure that the effects harmonize with the soundtracks. I often test many different variations until I'm satisfied with how the sounds fit. In the end there are often more than 10 audio tracks (uncompressed). Here is a little view behind the scenes of the audio tracks:
[h2]Wedge - Sound Designer[/h2]
This month I continued the design of the Beipiaosaurus calls, which consist of a variety of unique bird sounds giving it a colourful sound palette. However, these sources are blended with more unusual sounds such as wood and plastic bowed with a cello bow, contrasting the delicate bird-like qualities with a harsher and raspier honking quality, which carries across the Beipi’s larger biology over modern birds, whilst maintaining the organic feel. The juvenile and hatchling calls follow the same gesture as the adult calls, but are created using a selection of the adult sounds pitched up combined with sounds from large birds in their infancy and in-organic elements such as glass squeaks.
I have also been continuing on the combat feedback sounds, the stab and claw attack sounds are complete with sufficient impact and gore, however the bite sound is still in development. As this sound will be heard very frequently a lot of attention is being put towards it in particular to ensure the sound is impactful, but also realistic, as we want the player to really feel these sounds as a clear indication of when they have been bitten. Additionally, I need to create enough iterations to the point at which repeat plays of the same sound do not occur so as not to break that immersion. This has to be achieved for all size categories so entails creating a large quantity of these sounds and making sure they hit the mark in both aesthetic and feeling.
[h2]Bryan - Animator[/h2]
Most of what I've been doing lately is updating rigs in preparation for future updates, for the rest you'll just have to wait and see when the proper time comes. Troodon, Beipiaosaurus and Ceratosaurus all got some modern upgrades in the puppeteering department along with some associated animation work with more to follow in the coming weeks.
[h2]KissenKitten - Producer[/h2]
With November having come and gone, we have gathered all the information we feel we need in regards to diets, fractures and the pachy. We have a few more things we want to polish and solidify before we fully release Update 4 but we are quite satisfied with the initial results. Which has led us to expanding on diets even more. The diet system has a lot more depth than we initially released it with as we wanted to take our time and carefully assess its impacts on the ecosystem first. We didn’t want to bloat the system with too many factors that may have led to a false assessment of how well the feature as a whole was performing. With diets being such a cornerstone feature, we really wanted to have a solid base to work from before adding too much complexity. But we are satisfied with the results and can begin working on the deeper gameplay we want to deliver. Some of the changes to come, in a later update, will center around mixing dietary elements that have effects that can then be tailored to your individual playstyle. We will be maintaining that one of each element will still be required for a dietary growth boost but we will be introducing combinations of diet elements that can result in substantial changes to movespeed, stamina, regen, damage etc depending on what exactly you are eating. If you like going fast, there's a dietary combination for that. Want to maximize your strength? There’s a combination for that too. We really want you to be able to choose how you play within the confines of the island's harshness. Naturally we will have to keep a very close eye on balance and will likely only include one active buff through diets at a time but we are excited to offer you much more complexity. More information to come as we are closer to the release of these new changes. Which will not be accompanying the release of Update 4.
With Update 4 coming to a close, I can reveal some elements of Update 5. Which is largely restructuring how nesting occurs in The Isle. While some of the basic elements you have come to know will still be present, we are adding more engagement to the experience. Players will have to engage in courtship displays, form a bond and then create the nest together, varying by species. There will be different requirements for the type of nest your animal creates and different incentives to nest in certain areas as well. We aim to deliver an in-depth parental experience so you can really bond with players you create nests with and invite to your nests. Which will make the stress all the more dire when your nest and offspring are inevitably threatened with brutality by outside forces.
The skin system is also underway with changes to patterns and colors and a means for unlocking different skins and patterns through gameplay. Maintaining an exploratory commitment to allowing server owners to decide how they want a species visually represented on their server. Before we go... I'll leave you all with a little preview of Utahraptor's courting animations. More information on Update 5 as we progress, in the meantime be kind to one another and we’ll see you in December!
[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]
Hey everyone, it’s been a month of adjustments, fixes and preparations for what comes next. I’ve been particularly occupied with corrections of old and new mechanics this month to ensure that we have a clean path for the next updates, including humans as well.
One important fix was related to “Lag Compensation” which is utilized by a few abilities such as the Utah’s pounce and the Pachy’s ram, the system was causing a noticeable stutter and lacked the necessary accuracy in relation to server and client sync of events. The “Lag Compensation” is a generic term to help against the biggest issue in online games, the latency, or lag, which is the time certain things take to go from the client to server and/or from server to client. This system helps to reduce that latency the moment an ability is activated, which makes the entire ability chain significantly more reliable, accurate and ping tolerant. The problem is that such a system is sensitive to any code mistake, which obviously can break the various abilities, but it is important for the future. However, I’ve resolved the issues and with more tests/time we will finalize this mechanic so it can be implemented in other abilities and even expanded.
Besides that, I have also been working on humans (yes, officially) organizing animations, folders, classes, etc. Something important to note is that the initial implementation of humans will be basic and significantly expanded upon throughout development.
[h2]Amar0k - Programmer[/h2]
Hey all, this last year has gone by in a flash and I hope that you’re all looking forward to the holidays. This past month for me has been spent developing some of our server side tools, which will eliminate the issue of the servers not restarting properly, as well as making them significantly easier to manage on our end.
Based on feedback, the team and I are also reimagining our approach for the implementation of AI and the roles that they will fill within the ecosystem; we'll be able to share more specific details on that in future. I’ve also been working on the ambient animals, continuing to make their behaviour more dynamic and interesting to interact with alongside improvements to the fish. Other than that it has just been a plethora of bug fixes and performance testing as usual. That’s it for me this month!
[h2]dmIV - Programmer[/h2]
I updated the stagger mechanic to have actual movement instead of just playing the animation in place. It’s just a little push, but the animations play out much better now that the feet are not sliding around. I had to set up a little “studio” in the engine to measure the movement speeds and durations for each direction of each animal but it will come handy for the new additions.
I made some changes to the tracking system as well. It’s mostly just balancing it at this point but there were some visual updates too. You can now see the cone and the footprints through foliage which was a much needed improvement in places with dense vegetation.
I also moved the scent icons back to the compass. When I first set up the system it was primarily for testing so now I went back and made some updates to support fading in and out. Finally I got around to moving the pack scent there as well.
[h2]hypno - QA Lead[/h2]
This month QA has been busy assisting with rounding out Update #4. We’ve been spending the majority of our time bug testing and confirming the fixes for the programmers with each internal build of the game. We’ve noticed lately that the game has been suffering with a lot of crashes and input lockups (we hear you Stego players), so the majority of our focus has been spent on narrowing those down. These issues can arise from all sorts of unexpected places - one of the latest crashes was related simply to fracture sounds not playing properly, instead of the headbutt ability itself.
Besides bug testing, we’ve been following the mechanic test and balance feedback channels on the Discord closely, fine tuning the statistics for the characters across the board and the values for the diet system. A large focus during this time was spent looking at the Pachycephalosaurus and the accompanying fracture system, more specifically how well the character contends with the other species on the island. We knew that the Carnotaurus was going to be a huge threat for the Pachy and started by ensuring that this animal had the toolkit to deal with it effectively. The goal we’re currently pursuing is for the Pachy to be able to break its leg and be able to run away, instead of outright killing it; please let us know in the balance feedback Discord channel how it feels so far so we know how it’s performing.
Another focus we’ve had is the new scent tracking system that was mentioned above. We’re really excited to see this feature come into the game and think it’s going to push carnivore tracking into a whole new direction that the game hasn’t seen before. As mentioned in dmIV’s post, it’s mostly down to balance testing at the moment and we’re looking forward to seeing what you guys think about it!
[h2]VisualTech48 - 3D Artist[/h2]
This month has been all about the Dockyard and getting shaders ready for the new system.
Dockyard items have been progressing as expected with various buildings pretty much done. Just need to be put in a blueprint, optimize the distances and voila, we have at least 4 versatile buildings.
Others are on the way of course, with a large collection of props and interior changes, both in the decal department, and set dressing. These new items are a collection that we are pushing to make all aspects of human buildings feel unique and with a purpose, especially with coloring, which highlights the importance of each building, and what can be pretty much found there.
Alongside these, I’ve been making semi modular props for storage, to bring more life into these storage places.
That is so far regarding highly detailed items for the humans, and the new dockyard. I wish you all the best with the new year and holidays!
[h2]Fred - 2D Artist[/h2]
The art department has been keeping me busy a great deal. At the beginning of the month I’ve been working on finishing the Underwater Concept for our Rivers. Because rivers are thinner and longer in shape than lakes, I had to stretch out the concept art horizontally quite a bit to fit as much as I could. I’m hoping we can be quite creative with how the river bends, forms, deepens, and shapes. Default skins for all the animals have been completed and work on secondary skins has begun. We’re going to try and not be super drastic between patterns and keep them looking similar with their own flair. Think of them like different variations of the same skin, like different morphs in some reptiles. Hopefully they’ll break up the monotony of having the same patterns on every individual.
[h2]Seiza - Video Editor[/h2]
The release trailer for the 4th update had to be revised heavily in the last few months, as the content of the 4th update changed a lot over the course of its creation and thus many scenes of the trailer had to be re-filmed.
Especially the changes to the fractures took a lot of time, because now only the pachy can use fractures. So (besides small specials like the Halloween video) I spent the last weeks updating the release trailer.
Also during the last two weeks, I've been working on the audio effects for the trailer. When I film a scene in the game engine it is entirely without sound. I add the individual sound effects, each call, each step and each idle snort manually in the video editor, as it’s easier to adjust and edit the effects there.
When designing the sound of the trailer I make sure that the effects harmonize with the soundtracks. I often test many different variations until I'm satisfied with how the sounds fit. In the end there are often more than 10 audio tracks (uncompressed). Here is a little view behind the scenes of the audio tracks:
[h2]Wedge - Sound Designer[/h2]
This month I continued the design of the Beipiaosaurus calls, which consist of a variety of unique bird sounds giving it a colourful sound palette. However, these sources are blended with more unusual sounds such as wood and plastic bowed with a cello bow, contrasting the delicate bird-like qualities with a harsher and raspier honking quality, which carries across the Beipi’s larger biology over modern birds, whilst maintaining the organic feel. The juvenile and hatchling calls follow the same gesture as the adult calls, but are created using a selection of the adult sounds pitched up combined with sounds from large birds in their infancy and in-organic elements such as glass squeaks.
I have also been continuing on the combat feedback sounds, the stab and claw attack sounds are complete with sufficient impact and gore, however the bite sound is still in development. As this sound will be heard very frequently a lot of attention is being put towards it in particular to ensure the sound is impactful, but also realistic, as we want the player to really feel these sounds as a clear indication of when they have been bitten. Additionally, I need to create enough iterations to the point at which repeat plays of the same sound do not occur so as not to break that immersion. This has to be achieved for all size categories so entails creating a large quantity of these sounds and making sure they hit the mark in both aesthetic and feeling.
[h2]Bryan - Animator[/h2]
Most of what I've been doing lately is updating rigs in preparation for future updates, for the rest you'll just have to wait and see when the proper time comes. Troodon, Beipiaosaurus and Ceratosaurus all got some modern upgrades in the puppeteering department along with some associated animation work with more to follow in the coming weeks.
[h2]KissenKitten - Producer[/h2]
With November having come and gone, we have gathered all the information we feel we need in regards to diets, fractures and the pachy. We have a few more things we want to polish and solidify before we fully release Update 4 but we are quite satisfied with the initial results. Which has led us to expanding on diets even more. The diet system has a lot more depth than we initially released it with as we wanted to take our time and carefully assess its impacts on the ecosystem first. We didn’t want to bloat the system with too many factors that may have led to a false assessment of how well the feature as a whole was performing. With diets being such a cornerstone feature, we really wanted to have a solid base to work from before adding too much complexity. But we are satisfied with the results and can begin working on the deeper gameplay we want to deliver. Some of the changes to come, in a later update, will center around mixing dietary elements that have effects that can then be tailored to your individual playstyle. We will be maintaining that one of each element will still be required for a dietary growth boost but we will be introducing combinations of diet elements that can result in substantial changes to movespeed, stamina, regen, damage etc depending on what exactly you are eating. If you like going fast, there's a dietary combination for that. Want to maximize your strength? There’s a combination for that too. We really want you to be able to choose how you play within the confines of the island's harshness. Naturally we will have to keep a very close eye on balance and will likely only include one active buff through diets at a time but we are excited to offer you much more complexity. More information to come as we are closer to the release of these new changes. Which will not be accompanying the release of Update 4.
With Update 4 coming to a close, I can reveal some elements of Update 5. Which is largely restructuring how nesting occurs in The Isle. While some of the basic elements you have come to know will still be present, we are adding more engagement to the experience. Players will have to engage in courtship displays, form a bond and then create the nest together, varying by species. There will be different requirements for the type of nest your animal creates and different incentives to nest in certain areas as well. We aim to deliver an in-depth parental experience so you can really bond with players you create nests with and invite to your nests. Which will make the stress all the more dire when your nest and offspring are inevitably threatened with brutality by outside forces.
The skin system is also underway with changes to patterns and colors and a means for unlocking different skins and patterns through gameplay. Maintaining an exploratory commitment to allowing server owners to decide how they want a species visually represented on their server. Before we go... I'll leave you all with a little preview of Utahraptor's courting animations. More information on Update 5 as we progress, in the meantime be kind to one another and we’ll see you in December!
[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]