Touhou SRPG - Story of a Lost Sky [Update 1/22/11 - Version 0.6.0] (Thread 3)

[warpshadow]

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "srpg.py", line 49, in <module>
  File "core_system\engine.pyc", line 36, in __init__
pygame.error: Couldn't open images\splash_fmp.jpg
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "srpg.py", line 102, in <module>
  File "core_system\engine.pyc", line 1574, in title_screen
  File "core_system\engine.pyc", line 1607, in launch_wm
  File "worldmap_system\worldmap.pyc", line 449, in navigate_loop
  File "worldmap_system\worldmap.pyc", line 401, in user_input
  File "worldmap_system\worldmap.pyc", line 1246, in navigate_loop
  File "worldmap_system\worldmap.pyc", line 1203, in user_input
  File "worldmap_system\worldmap.pyc", line 1422, in menu_loop
  File "worldmap_system\worldmap.pyc", line 1695, in execute
  File "battle_system\mapobj.pyc", line 1772, in turn_loop
  File "battle_system\mapobj.pyc", line 1593, in ai_turn
AttributeError: 'Unit' object has no attribute 'ai'
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "srpg.py", line 102, in <module>
  File "core_system\engine.pyc", line 1574, in title_screen
  File "core_system\engine.pyc", line 1607, in launch_wm
  File "worldmap_system\worldmap.pyc", line 449, in navigate_loop
  File "worldmap_system\worldmap.pyc", line 401, in user_input
  File "worldmap_system\worldmap.pyc", line 1246, in navigate_loop
  File "worldmap_system\worldmap.pyc", line 1203, in user_input
  File "worldmap_system\worldmap.pyc", line 1422, in menu_loop
  File "worldmap_system\worldmap.pyc", line 1695, in execute
  File "battle_system\mapobj.pyc", line 1772, in turn_loop
  File "battle_system\mapobj.pyc", line 1593, in ai_turn
AttributeError: 'Unit' object has no attribute 'ai'
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "srpg.py", line 102, in <module>
  File "core_system\engine.pyc", line 1574, in title_screen
  File "core_system\engine.pyc", line 1607, in launch_wm
  File "worldmap_system\worldmap.pyc", line 449, in navigate_loop
  File "worldmap_system\worldmap.pyc", line 401, in user_input
  File "worldmap_system\worldmap.pyc", line 1246, in navigate_loop
  File "worldmap_system\worldmap.pyc", line 1203, in user_input
  File "worldmap_system\worldmap.pyc", line 1422, in menu_loop
  File "worldmap_system\worldmap.pyc", line 1695, in execute
  File "battle_system\mapobj.pyc", line 1772, in turn_loop
  File "battle_system\mapobj.pyc", line 1593, in ai_turn
AttributeError: 'Unit' object has no attribute 'ai'
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "srpg.py", line 102, in <module>
  File "core_system\engine.pyc", line 1574, in title_screen
  File "core_system\engine.pyc", line 1607, in launch_wm
  File "worldmap_system\worldmap.pyc", line 449, in navigate_loop
  File "worldmap_system\worldmap.pyc", line 401, in user_input
  File "worldmap_system\worldmap.pyc", line 1246, in navigate_loop
  File "worldmap_system\worldmap.pyc", line 1203, in user_input
  File "worldmap_system\worldmap.pyc", line 1422, in menu_loop
  File "worldmap_system\worldmap.pyc", line 1695, in execute
  File "battle_system\mapobj.pyc", line 1772, in turn_loop
  File "battle_system\mapobj.pyc", line 1593, in ai_turn
AttributeError: 'Unit' object has no attribute 'ai'
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "srpg.py", line 102, in <module>
  File "core_system\engine.pyc", line 1574, in title_screen
  File "core_system\engine.pyc", line 1607, in launch_wm
  File "worldmap_system\worldmap.pyc", line 449, in navigate_loop
  File "worldmap_system\worldmap.pyc", line 401, in user_input
  File "worldmap_system\worldmap.pyc", line 1246, in navigate_loop
  File "worldmap_system\worldmap.pyc", line 1203, in user_input
  File "worldmap_system\worldmap.pyc", line 1422, in menu_loop
  File "worldmap_system\worldmap.pyc", line 1695, in execute
  File "battle_system\mapobj.pyc", line 1772, in turn_loop
  File "battle_system\mapobj.pyc", line 1621, in ai_turn
  File "battle_system\ai_fsm.pyc", line 49, in execute_turn
  File "battle_system\ai_fsm.pyc", line 464, in act
  File "battle_system\spells.pyc", line 210, in action
  File "core_system\char.pyc", line 2105, in battle_event
  File "core_system\char.pyc", line 1883, in can_counterattack
AttributeError: 'str' object has no attribute 'validattacks'
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "srpg.py", line 102, in <module>
  File "core_system\engine.pyc", line 1574, in title_screen
  File "core_system\engine.pyc", line 1607, in launch_wm
  File "worldmap_system\worldmap.pyc", line 449, in navigate_loop
  File "worldmap_system\worldmap.pyc", line 401, in user_input
  File "worldmap_system\worldmap.pyc", line 1246, in navigate_loop
  File "worldmap_system\worldmap.pyc", line 1203, in user_input
  File "worldmap_system\worldmap.pyc", line 1422, in menu_loop
  File "worldmap_system\worldmap.pyc", line 1695, in execute
  File "battle_system\mapobj.pyc", line 1772, in turn_loop
  File "battle_system\mapobj.pyc", line 1593, in ai_turn
AttributeError: 'Unit' object has no attribute 'ai'
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "srpg.py", line 102, in <module>
  File "core_system\engine.pyc", line 1574, in title_screen
  File "core_system\engine.pyc", line 1607, in launch_wm
  File "worldmap_system\worldmap.pyc", line 449, in navigate_loop
  File "worldmap_system\worldmap.pyc", line 401, in user_input
  File "worldmap_system\worldmap.pyc", line 1246, in navigate_loop
  File "worldmap_system\worldmap.pyc", line 1203, in user_input
  File "worldmap_system\worldmap.pyc", line 1422, in menu_loop
  File "worldmap_system\worldmap.pyc", line 1695, in execute
  File "battle_system\mapobj.pyc", line 1772, in turn_loop
  File "battle_system\mapobj.pyc", line 1593, in ai_turn
AttributeError: 'Unit' object has no attribute 'ai'

[RuneDevros]

Ah. Yes, that would be exactly as I suspected. Those units don't have an AI assigned to them since we changed the way AI got set up and I never updated the old test missions. Eh... since those missions aren't going to be used in the future, just ignore them for now. The Lord Fuzzy mission got incorporated into CH2ST5 and I think Alice is getting her own mission later on. Thanks for the update!

Edit: Bug has been fixed. Those links to the alpha have been updated with the patched missions.

[Psieye]

Found some free time earlier than I thought, I started a campaign from the start in v0.5.0. I skipped most of the dialogue as those can be edited easily and it's gonna get long if I give feedback on that now.

CH1ST2, I killed everything there without using a single heal item. Everyone was darn close to dying, but none of my units actually died. Definitely not something most players would pull off though, as my starting move was "send Youmu to solo all the trees East, send everyone else to walk into the forest West". The game was expecting me to go immediately North to spring the trap, so when I walked through the West forest, the fairies didn't come all at once.

Whether this kind of accomplishment is acceptable or not is up to you. I'll just be giving a play review without nitpicking on the few things I'm noticing.

[RuneDevros]

I don't expect the suggested strategy to be the only one. I'd be perfectly happy if players come up with another strategy as long as there isn't a single dominant strategy that makes a level trivial to play. Your strategy doesn't seem to be something that a lot of people would come up with.

[Psieye]

CH1ST3, Chen became a healbot so that Youmu could have 2 spells for alignment mixup. Marisa is my backup tank. Ran is mostly useless except for picking up items and pulling mobs one at a time. Mind, she dodged on a 20% chance when I needed her to weaken Wriggle just that little bit more. I expected her to die from that task - and it shows I'm abusing the "no penalties for if your units get KO'd" feature that I'd even consider such an attack. Used 1 too many heal items on Youmu, she'd haev been fine at 3 HP at the end of the map but I didn't calculate Wriggle's damage properly. Again, every enemy mob was killed before I finished the map.

as long as there isn't a single dominant strategy that makes a level trivial to play

Some of those dominant strategies are going to open up around mid-game when a diligent player who has sacrificed whole stages to their one Chosen Unit starts to reap their reward. I'll seeif I can hit that by the end of chapter 2, as I'm not giving any kills to Ran or Chen.

[RuneDevros]

There's been some feedback on the wave regarding that our characters aren't really distinct enough. Ran and Chen don't really have well defined roles. I think that we could assign them some specialized spells that could be put to good use. For instance we could replace Ran's spell card with something that'll give a unit temporary evasion bonus since her class is an illusionist. We don't have any support spells at the moment but I would like to see some. We also need to create more class and character specific traits. I use Chen a lot more than you do Psieye, but I don't know how useful she is to other people. She can take hits a lot better than most characters since she has fairly good defense if you bring her up to level. At this point, the engine is stable enough that we can push on to content development in earnest.

Here are the latest builds:
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/149048/lostsky_0.5.0alpha2_source.zip
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/149048/lostsky_0.5.0alpha2_win.zip

# 2/27/10 - Bugfixes to spell synth and battle system, mission story tweaks
- Added a treasure to CH2ST3's right side
- Tweaked the intro story event to add a startle emphasize which Fuzzball is talking
- Added terrain data display to "View Map" mode on deploy unit menu
- Changed Mokou's death line to something more intimidating
- [Bugfix] Unlock Youkai Mountain set to after CH2ST5
- [Bugfix] Fixed spell synthesis ingredient information not updating after a spell is created
- [Bugfix] Fixed a crash in checking if a unit has a valid counterattack when one side has no spell equipped

# 2/26/10 - Battle Map Gameplay Optimization
- Minor optimization to unit.get_moves_path and unit.get_prohibited
- Removed unnecessary blits when backing out of a menu from sc_loop_a-c, move_loop, menu_loop
- [Bugfix : Targetted at Issue #49] Removed an extra call to map.get_all_moves in unit.menu_loop
- [Bugfix] Fixed uncontrolled blitting causing 100% CPU usage in Traits Loop
- [Bugfix] Gave a mission name to Ch2ST3 which did not have one

# 2/24/10 - Extra Missions Bugfix
- [Bugfix] Fixed a bug in CH0ST2 and CH0ST4 due to ai not having been assigned.

[Psieye]

I use Chen a lot more than you do Psieye, but I don't know how useful she is to other people. She can take hits a lot better than most characters since she has fairly good defense if you bring her up to level.

Oh yes, I'm quite aware Chen isn't useless. Just that for this campaign run, I decided I'd concentrate all my Player Love on Youmu and Marisa. Thing about Chen is, she needs to be fed kills to level efficiently and moves slowly. Nothing wrong with that, I've built up such units before. But for this particular run, I chose not to use her. Especially in the earlygame when we're very limited in spell variety.

On that note, I'll have to see what you've got later on, but right now in CH1ST3 it feels extremely limited in what spells I have available for use. Of the basic attack spell given for each alignment, only Force (dagger throw) is "check against DEF" and everything else is "check against MDEF". Ideally there should be 4 basic attack spells for each alignment, so the player can optimise for "uses STR/MGC" and "check against DEF/MDEF" without being bound to which alignment they're using.

[RuneDevros]

You make a good point about the lack of spell variety at this stage. As I previously alluded to, I didn't want to make a lot of spells because of the engine instabilities up to this point and that we were going to eventually replace the spell animation system.

Our spell crafting system has a few holes to fill: Spreadsheet. I haven't updated this in a while so I'd like to sit down and put in some ideas. I'll also start a wave for the discussion.

I am targeting the final version of 0.5.0 this weekend so I'm considering what we have in the repository feature complete.

[Psieye]

Your spell list needs to satisfy 2 criteria: a satisfying set of relationships for how they get synthesised and a distribution of properties to fill in all the needs of the player (P vs M in Att/Def). You need to build a 2nd table to investigate whether you're satisfying this 2nd criteria, just as you've investigated for the 1st criteria.

[RuneDevros]

0.5.0 is here!

http://bitbucket.org/featheredmelody/lost-sky-project-public/downloads/

Thanks to everyone who contributed or did testing and gave feedback/bug reports. Couldn't have done it without you all.

Screenshots:


What are the major changes in the latest version?
-Spirit Charge Cost for spell cards
-Recipe based Spell Synthesis System
-New Predictor Panel
-New Content:
--Additional scene added to prologue
--Missions: CH2ST3 to CH2ST5
--Mokou playable
--Shop/Spell Synthesis Theme Music

Here's the changelog:

# 3/6/10 - 0.5.0 Final
- Removed test trades from item trading system
- Set debug flags (splash), WM tutorial to true

# 3/5/10 - Aya Stories Added
- Added 2 more Aya articles to be triggered after CH2ST2 and CH2ST4.

# 2/28/10 - Reduced shield for Healing Drop to 1 - 0.5.0 Beta

# 2/27/10 - Bugfixes to spell synth and battle system, mission story tweaks
- Added a treasure to CH2ST3's right side
- Tweaked the intro story event to add a startle emphasize which Fuzzball is talking
- Added terrain data display to "View Map" mode on deploy unit menu
- Changed Mokou's death line to something more intimidating
- [Bugfix] Unlock Youkai Mountain set to after CH2ST5
- [Bugfix] Fixed spell synthesis ingredient information not updating after a spell is created
- [Bugfix] Fixed a crash in checking if a unit has a valid counterattack when one side has no spell equipped

# 2/26/10 - Battle Map Gameplay Optimization
- Minor optimization to unit.get_moves_path and unit.get_prohibited
- Removed unnecessary blits when backing out of a menu from sc_loop_a-c, move_loop, menu_loop
- [Bugfix : Targetted at Issue #49] Removed an extra call to map.get_all_moves in unit.menu_loop
- [Bugfix] Fixed uncontrolled blitting causing 100% CPU usage in Traits Loop
- [Bugfix] Gave a mission name to Ch2ST3 which did not have one

# 2/24/10 - Extra Missions Bugfix
- [Bugfix] Fixed a bug in CH0ST2 and CH0ST4 due to ai not having been assigned.

# 2/21/10 - 0.5.0 Alpha
- Set debug flags to alpha readyness settings
- Typo fix in prologue
- Set version number to 0.5.0

# 2/20/10 - CH2ST5 Revision 4
- Moved the bridge and the shrine item closer to map center.
- Added Ibis Tapestry, Cell Phone, and Magic Lamp as treasures
- Added CH2ST5 Prologue Event, Treasure Event, Ending Event
- [Bugfix] - Set all units to regular color (turn not ended) at the end of the mission

# 2/14/10 - CH2ST5 Revision 3
- Decreased map size of CH2ST5 to 25x20
- Added three wind weasels guarding a shrine to SW corner
- Stripped down all the story part for now.
- [Bugfix] Target spell incorrectly displays as None on predictor if unit is equipped with a different spell slot.
(Cause was the target unit's spell lookup using the caster's spell index)

# 2/13/10 - Various Bugfixes: Objectives display, Item trading, CH1ST2, Ch1ST3
- Changed "Enemy Objectives" to "Mission Failure Conditions" and wording of objectives to match
- [Fixes issue 48] Set end turn after all units move to on by default
- [Bugfix] Unwrapped description text in item trading menu for treasures
- [Bugfix] Fixed a bug in Ch1St3 where Marisa instead of game narration said "Marisa's SC is maxed out"
- [Bugfix] [Fixes issue 45] Closes up the gaps in the CH1ST2 Kodama reaction

# 1/30/10 - More work on CH2ST5
- Continued work on CH2ST5 - Added a pre-mission sequence, adjusted stats.
- Separated out check if a unit can counterattack into its own method
- Stardust has a 80% chance to stun.
- [Bugfix] Stun status effect blocks counterattack actions.

# 1/29/10 - Started working on CH2ST5
- Started working on CH2ST5: Created Mission Map and basic battle setup
- Added Lord Fuzzy sprite
- Added Stardust Spell (Stun Status Effect)
- Corrected description of Poison Dust's effectiveness. (30% -> 60%)

# 1/24/10 - CH2ST4 completed, Fix to player state leak between save data loads.
- Draft of Ch2ST4 Finished.
- [Bugfix][Issue #46, Issue #47]
-- Problem: Player state was leaking through between save data loads.
-- Created a reset state method for units to restart them.
-- Reset all units to starting state between loads
-- Reset list of units in party between loads

# 1/23/10 - CH2ST4 Groundwork
- About 75% through a rough draft version of CH2ST4

# 1/22/10 - Emotion bubbles added
- Added emotion bubble actions to prologue and CH2ST3
- Added emotion bubbles from Team Pockethouse

# 1/21/10 - Minor typo fix
- Fixed incorrect spellings of Lantern in the game.

# 1/20/10 - Prologue Expanded
- Added Yuyuko and Yukari scenes to the prologue

# 1/19/10 - Fleshing out CH2ST3
- Added a conclusion part to the mission
- Added some in-battle conversations to CH2ST3
- Gave Mokou a rice cake
- MAE execution check added before player's turn begins.
- [Bugfix] Dotdotdot emote frameheight
- [Bugfix] Number of frames in an emote incorrectly calculated
- [Bugfix] Support for triggers turn number, unit alive included in mission2wiki.

# 1/17/10 - Shop Theme Added
- Added a shop theme to Spell Synthesis, Item Creation, Treasure menus

# 1/16/10 - CH2ST3 Story Revision
- Revised story intro of CH2ST3
- Added names to Kodama Lords: Kotone, Ayaka, Haruna, and Miu
- [Issue #32] Added display of current turn number next to terrain display

# 1/14/10 - CH2ST3 Gameplay Revision
- Added the following triggers: unit_alive, turn_number
- CH2ST3 gameplay side drafted
- Added more enemies and changed the way they were distributed
- [Bugfix] Crash when unit's ai acts and unit has no spells available

# 1/13/10 - CH2ST3 Revision Groundwork
- New map for CH2ST3
- Started revision to convert Ch2ST3 into an escape in 15 turns map.
- Enemies moved around: E and W groups moved to NE, NW. Fireflies moved to central island
- Added escape objective
- [Bugfix] Crash when unit recovers from status effect

# 1/12/10 - Deployed Units
- Added deploy units sub action
- Added ability to set a unit as reserved to be place on the map later via map actions
- [Bugfix] - Assigning of multiple traits/ spells supported at map initialization to enemies

# 1/9/10 - More clear presentation of unit advantages at predictor
- Reworked the way the predictor is displayed
-- Predictor now is called as a single method from user.plot_predictor(target)
-- Display of traits at this predictor is dropped
-- Use arrows to show strengths and weaknesses
- Added arrow icons for displaying strength and weakness

# 1/6/10 - Status Effect fixes and displays
- Increased basic spell uses from 30 to 45
- Added display for when status effect has ended.
- Added display when HP/SC changes due to a status effect
- Output damage from poison to console
- [Bugfix][Issue #31 ] Crash due to death from status effect

# 1/5/10 - CH2ST3 update
- Enemy Movement Range changes: Fairy (7 -> 5), Firefly (5->6), Kodama Lord (7->4)
- More enemies to CH2ST3
- Added a healer fairy introduction scene in CH2ST3
- Added healer fairy portrait
- Added Show Animations sub action support to mission2wiki exporter script

# 1/4/10 - First Draft CH2ST3
- Removed a debug print in mapobj.py
- About halfway done with the enemies but mission is playable.
- Survive objective counts a victory if you defeat all enemies.
- Added a spell for Mokou
- Added Yukari portrait / sprite
- [Bugfix] Crash when all enemies defeated in survive objective.
- [Bugfix] Crash on launching mission2wiki due to add recipe map action

# 1/2/10 - More progress on CH2ST3
- Added more enemy units and dialog to CH2ST3
- Set up CH2ST3 deploy locations
- [Bugfix] Crash when attempting to remove a unit in deploy mode on an unoccupied tile.

# 1/1/10 - Mokou sets things on fire
- Added Mokou portrait image
- Added Fire Spell image
- Moved emote animations to images/anim/effects
- Emote effects loaded from xml file instead of hard coded into engine
- Added support for effect animations on the map

# 12/31/09
- Added CH2ST3 map and started working on mission.
- Added a gravestone location to the landmarks file. Replaced statue.

# 12/30/09 - Marisa AGL fix
- Flight has +30% AGL
- Marisa has AGL base growth of 9 instead of 7

# 12/28/09 - CH1ST3 Map Redo / Outlined map text
-Added outlined text to map healing and no battle animation mode
-Set the display of numbers in no-battle mode to be consistent with healing items / regen
-CH1ST3 is resized to a 25x25 map from a 40x40 map.
-[Bugfix] Victory banner properly set to come before post mission events

# 12/27/09 - Minor Balance Tweak
- Marisa starts at level 4
- Fried Tofu recovers 40% HP instead of 25% to improve usefulness at start of game.

# 12/26/09 - Sorting Units
- Added ability to sort units by Name, Class, Level and any stats
- Added directions to party menu
- Removed sort option from individual character menu in party menu
- [Bugfix] First unit in the party list placed 10 pixels too high in the deply screen unit selection screen.

# 12/24/09 - AI Turn Prioritization
- AI prioritizes units in the following order: Retreating Units, Healers, Everyone else
- Refactored the Turn Loop method to split it up into separate function in the battle map object
- Minor fix to realign "empty" word in Treasure menu
- AI update state happens before unit turn prioritization instead of during the unit's turn.
- [Bugfix] AI not properly changing states

# 12/23/09 - Treasure Icons
- Added Treasure Icon attribute to Treasures object and XML reader
- Added Treasure icons to Treasure menu and Spell Synth

# 12/22/09 - Death quotes + Traits tutorial expansion
- Added support for showing a randomly selected line after a unit dies by both status effect / spell attack
- Expanded the Traits tutorial in CH1ST2 to provide more details on the Trait Learning System
- [Bugfix] Crash on use of a regen trait from SC cost display on results

# 12/19/09 - Spell Synthesis Tutorials
- Added a line to CH1ST4 directing players to tutorial
- Added basic spell synthesis tutorial
- Added some crystal and spellcard icons

# 12/18/09 - SC Cost System Results Display
- Added a display of SC cost to the battle results menu
- [Bugfix] SC Cost not loading into healing spells

# 12/16/09 - SC system tweaks, AI spell range fix, Marisa MS Fixes
- Automatically centers back on unit if cancelling either movement selection or spell target selection. Prevents cursor from being stuck off screen.
- Changed SC for hit to 15, miss to -10, critical to 40
- Added recipe unlock for basic spells to CH1ST4
- Attack AI now searches after moving if there's a target in range that it can hit if primary target is out of range.
- Marisa gets 900 SC after arriving at her house. Let's her unleash it on enemies to finish the mission.
- [Bugfix] Just set Marisa's MS uses remaining to 2 in CH1ST2 and have it recharge fully between battles.
Solution from 11/03/09 was causing a bug where she could receive a number of MS spells if you restarted the mission..

# 12/04/09 - Foundations for Spell Synthesis 2.0
- Reorganized spell synthesis system
-- Free Create Deprecated
-- Added elemental alchemy
-- Added recipe learning subaction to xml, mapaction
-- Added descriptions to spell synthesis interface
-- Added a summary screen to recipe synthesis

# 11/27/09 - SC Cost System ctd
- Added SC cost data to stats pages.
- Added SC cost data to spell swap, item creation, trading system displays

# 11/26/09 - SC Cost System / Spell Card Used Up Alert
- [Save Data Change!] Added SC Cost to spell actions.
- Implemented SC cost system on all spellcards.
- Rearranged spell display in SC Loop A to show SC cost
- Changed SC reward for successful attack from 5 to 20
- Expanded the glowy box in the battle menu panel to allow us to fit more stuff
- Alerts player to when a spell action has run out of uses
- Updated version number to 0.4.2
- [Bugfix] Spell cards no longer can be allowed to keep being used for counterattack after being depleted.

# 11/25/09 - Fixing SML
- You can now specify the setup for Youmu/Ran/Chen in the mission launcher.
- [Bugfix] Launching of missions not unlocked at start of game would crash mission launcher since they
were not recognized yet.

# 11/21/09 - Single Mission Launcher
- Added single mission launcher script. Run mission_launcher.py after configuring
mission / characters inside mission_launcher.py file

# 11/14/09 - Emotion Bubbles
- Added emotion bubbles to XML reader, map action, character, mission2wiki
- Added "end unit turn" to mission2wiki that hadn't been added yet
- Added the dotdotdot emotion bubble
- Changed Youmu and Ran's Emotion Bubbles in CH1ST2 to emotion bubble animations
- Fixed typo in CH1ST2 Youmu: "... they're behind this" to "... we're behind this."

# 11/13/09 - Map Background Rendering Update
- Map background rendering algorithm change. Faster and more efficient since map
image doesn't need to be generated on the fly every frame.
-- map.setup_background() : Render background once at map generation and save it
-- map.render_background() : Draws a slice from the pre-rendered background

[RuneDevros]

@Psieye - Started a compilation of all the spells in the game. Looking at this I already don't like the way we do our stat modifications. A lot of the spells seem to have had their stat mods chosen arbitrarily.

http://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?key=0AiT_qFotTXj-dC16b040bjRxY2s5eWZ4cGRsa1ZRN1E&hl=en

A lot of people in the survey have expressed an interest in access to the work in progress builds of our project. I'd like to open our internal repository to the public and make it clear that it is a work in progress build where things can easily break.

[Elcura]

Finally got my PC back up.  Well, that's a lie, it's a totally new PC, but still!  But, uhh, FFXIII has taken me by the balls, will be a will before I get done with it.  But I'll still comment on things up on the wave.

[RuneDevros]

Gotcha. That's great to hear! Looking forward to seeing new stuff from you.

[RuneDevros]

Not really many screenshot worthy things to show since most of the stuff is under the hood fixes.

I'm currently working on restructuring some of the old unreliable code that's been patched around since the firstt days of the project. I made some really bad decisions about how to store traits and spells back in my first few months on the project when I wasn't as adept at programming Python as I am now. These are deeply ingrained design flaws and I'm going to fix them now before they make updates to the engine unbearable.

The fix to the spell system has been committed. I think I've fixed almost all the problems that have arisen over storing the spells in a list rather than a dict.

[Water_and_Wind]

Hey Fawkes,

Sorry for dropping out of this project without notice, I know this is inexcusable behaviour.  If you'll still have me, I can continue spriting where I left off.  I finally got working on Wriggle, and her physical animation is complete:


Again, sorry for letting the team down.  :ohdear:

[RuneDevros]

Welcome back! We really missed you, so it is really good to see you back. How have you been doing? Don't hesitate to let us know that you're busy. ^^;

Wriggle is very nicely done. I'll wrap her into the game soon. Elcura's been working on Youmu right now.

I'd like to get you caught up with what has been going on as soon as possible. Most of the planning is split between here and the Google Wave conversations, so if you could send me an email address, I can get you an invite into our conversations. We've also been discussing that we need new map tiles for the upcoming levels since we'll be moving into the Youkai mountain region soon.

[Water_and_Wind]

Thanks.  I've just sent you my email.  Also, I do remember you talking about needing mountain tiles before I left, those will be tricky to implement and probably needs some discussion as to the scale of the mountains (after all, how many mountains does Gensokyo have?).

Riguru's magical attack.


A house, a torii and a shrine.

[mew77]

Is there anything I'd need to do to help by this point in development?

[RuneDevros]

@WnW - Wriggle animations look great. Will hopefully try to add them to the game this week if I'm not too busy. Also thanks for the buildings. My generic thatched roof cottages aren't as good and now we have a proper Torii .

Regarding the mountain tiles. This got posted in the Wave, but I'll repost it here. Gensokyo only has 1 mountain so it doesn't make sense to have one tile equal one mountain. What I had suggested was a "cliffside" terrain similar to what these guys did with their RPG maker project. That way we can give the sense that the players are climbing up the mountain.



@Mew77 - I just wrapped up some heavy modifications of the internal engine that affect the trait and the spell system. Could you do a quick run through the game and see if there are any crashes? I also tweaked the traits swapping display to make it more clear which traits go where:

[Achii]

I recommend looking over this for pretty reference for maps :3
http://rpgmaker.net/games/471/ That XP one isn't really that impressive unfortunately.

[RuneDevros]

Ah those maps look nice. I'll have a more detailed look when I get the chance. Thanks!

So let's get everyone up to speed on what's been going on.  Because of some of the new things that WnW wants to do, there's going to be an overhaul of the map data format in the future which will make it unbearably difficult to do things the way we've used to do*. So, I've been working on a map editor:



It's still very much a work in progress and the features are a little limited, but it's at a stage where we can safely ditch the old way of making maps very soon.

* Create a terrain map as an image (.png) and run a script to export it to a data file.

[Achii]

Oooh and another would be this one: http://rpgmaker.net/games/8/
Hopefully they can be some inspiration for your future maps

[Elcura]

Really glad to see you again WnW, I was dreading doing all those sprites alone.  I'll stop being lazy soon and get to work, lol.

[RuneDevros]

Updates from tonight.

First off, this week I made the WIP repository open to the public to read (but not write to). Our development repository can be found here. Be warned that this repository is highly unstable and prone to being very buggy since it is the development version. We don't do executable builds until stable release versions.

http://bitbucket.org/featheredmelody/lost-sky-project

Secondly, there have been some major changes to the terrain data. It's loaded from XML data rather than being hard-coded into the game. This will make things easier to implement new terrain types. Moreover, since the editor now uses the same data as the game, updates to the terrain data will be reflected in both programs. Here is an example of WnW's new terrain that was added tonight.

[Elcura]

I know I'm gay and all, but I can't help but want to do these sprites better.  I pick a style, I like it for a while then I want to do better.  Such a self-destructive workflow I got, but I like this new style.  And with more experience in drawing and animating, lets see where this takes us.



Note to self:  Stop being a gay and stick to a style, lol.  This is it! 

[RuneDevros]

I actually like the new style more than the last iteration. Let's get a working set of animations for Youmu and then we can work on others. I'd prefer if we cover as many characters as we can first.

[Water_and_Wind]

This new style is cute, I like it.  It might actually be better in the long run to go for this style because its smaller which can make spriting a little faster (less AA, at least).

[Elcura]

Did a few more, just need block and attack and Youmu is basically done.  Keeping shit relatively simple, only thing that probably needs more work is the hit frame, but I imagine with some hit graphics (i'll impose one from IaMP/SWR) and some frame shaking it'll look fine.  The magic animation has the repeatable frames for whatever graphics overlay and signify spell casting.  Oh, I guess I could put a quick spell card animation on top?

[RuneDevros]

Stance 1 looks good. Which ones do the 2nd and 3rd ones correspond to? With the second and third one, it seems Youmu's movements are unnatural since she seems to move just her arms and head without moving her body or legs at all. Does anyone else see this? Otherwise, they look great.

Updates to the terrain system are mostly complete at this stage. We now support a second layer for the use in cliff tiles:

[Elcura]

2nd and 3rd are magic and hit.  Just keeping it quick and simple for now, I didn't want to spend too long on a character because well... new styles come lol.  After I'm done with attack and block, I'll revisit those animations and see what they'll look like post effects.  If it still looks weird to you I'll add some more frames and motions.