Thanks guys keep that c+c coming.
I keep losing focus when looking at ref paintings and forget to simplify.

@Jeremy, I am trying to stay to the 86 color original palette but some colors have snuck in from original 120 palette as I've lost some control on the colors :/ Thanks for the edit.

•Leo: New cranium and beard. 2 versions light and dark.
•Gypsy: This portrait is only inside the wagon and its a dark and busy scene so this is why she's somewhat simple.
•Monk: new ear and purples removed although it was purple because this goes in the library interior which is very purple.
•Dude, Cardinal, Mona and Guard: Approved by the masses \o/
•Ship's Captain, the waitress and the Twins: New. Twins are very pink to suit shop interiors. Twins cuz the shops are pretty much the same. Captain dark skinned (sunburned)on purpose. Waitress bright to suit Last Supper interior.
•Lorenzo: Only one that will have multiple portraits. I never fully understood about the mouth when making the mockup and still don't. This show original and new bad look with mouth downturned.

Wow, nice new portraits! I'll do a more detailed c+c in the coming days. Just say I like specially the ship captain (is he a "conquistador"? ; )

For now, just to say a fast thing. We agree that at the beginning, the first thing to do would be seeing Lorenzo?

All the characters would have a dialog line in which you can ask "Where is Lorenzo Medici's castle?" and they point you "north from here/east from here", etc..

For seeing and talking Lorenzo we may give the player, say 100 exp points?

I'll try to implement this on the next update, and to make working the puzzle for opening the gates at level 2 (medici's castle).

Update 9 Prevue

*** THIS IS NOT UPLOADED YET, ONLY SCREENSHOTS

I couldn't resist to show you how this is looking right now (still haven't uploaded yet).




























I switched the quality of the flash player from high to "best", but sometimes it lags, I'm concerned about this. Can you test www.jaumealcazo.com (the old update, none of this screenshots is uploaded yet) to see how it performs?

Chris

Thanks for the bug reporting! I'll fix that : ) The exp points would be for levelling up, and if we do more rpg things we could use the level or the various abilitys of the player to determine if the player can do certain things.

For example, if we ever include a lockpicking ability, then if you have more experience and more level, would be easier to open certain chests, or doors...

*** THIS IS NOT UPLOADED YET, ONLY SCREENSHOTS

Edited by JaumeAlcazo - 15 January 2011 at 8:21am

a stock ipod cant play swf files i dont thinkl, the droid can play flash though, although I have a "droid" it might be too slow to play it

If that's cleavage on the waitress, I think it's quite a bit off. Maybe if her arms were at her sides, but it seems that her right arm would be crossed with her left, pushing her right breast to her left much more than it is now. Also, if this be the case, I think that her cleavage line would need to be a bit darker.

Lovely stuff guys, keep it up!

Jal, why are you so awesome?

@ChrisButton,
@Jeremy, Iron seems to be more greys... I did retouch them tho. I've been choosing Item colors on what I need for the game sprite so some colors are not quite as they should be. Thanks for gear edit...
@lucas, if I were awesome your new PAs would be on front page for one whole week :p

@Jaume, This whole invention is a Ninja Crow credit, he should be added to game credits. Jeremy too.
Sprite and portrait for Josquin des Prez to come.


The ivory is supposed to be a tusk.
This is a puzzle of sorts. Medici hates it until player figures out it needs 'ebony' (a very rare item).



Edited by jalonso - 17 January 2011 at 11:42am

•Ship's captain is hopefully not looking to much like a Conquistador now. I do want him to look foreign tho.
•New harpsichord guy, based on real portrait but doesn't look like him >.< Wierd colors look fine in castle interior.
•One twin lost an eye.
• Waitress chest cleaned up.
• Evil guard that eventually is a good guard as all RPGs do. Mask is meant to look like Italian carnival mask.
• David is a quest (and a joke as Michelangelo and Leo hated each other). He's in the forest hiding as some gypsy stole his clothes. He is already late for an appointment with 'some' sculptor. Leo must find and bring his clothes back to him. When he does he gets the 'Anatomy Journal' as thank you... or something like that.
He's colored to go with the forest colors but I kinda wanted him to look marble-ish too.
Something is wrong with his face looks really round :/






Edited by jalonso - 17 January 2011 at 11:21pm

Thanks all for the support and kind words : D

Thanks to bannana and Jeremy for the text corrections, and Chris for the bug pointed, I'll fix that :) And Chris, do you have any clue of what you are doing? I'm intrigued..

Bannana (or anyone), don't be shy to post more text corrections/proposals, because however I can communicate with the people in english and they understand me more or less, sometimes is hard for me to write proper english, and is even harder for a spaniard to trying to imitate in english the italian accent XD lol.. Thanks, you are welcomed :)

Hi all! jal, I sent you a more extense mail!

This game is beginning to be something memorable my friends!

All the new art is absolutely great, it is looking very very good.

The idea for David quest is very funny and cool : ) I like more the cheekbones that Jeremy did, but I like both yellow and green hair. Maybe a mix of the two hairs could be done, as the blonde hair very shines on the green hair? Only a idea. Your original David was more shiny in general, but defenitely the cheekbones should be there.

My part

As for me, the update 9 is progressing good, but there is still some hard work to do, I need a couple or 3 weeks I think. Maybe less, maybe more.. I don't know. I'll keep all of you informed : )

Iphone:

I obtained a couple of books about iphone game programming, and I registered as an apple developer, and I'm downloading the sdk (with a simulator of an iphone), to work with.

In my (little) free time, I'm studing a bit of iphone programming and objective c, as I master c and c++ it should be pretty straightforward, althought iphone seems challenging, it will be fun to learn that for possible future projects!!



No problem about that : )

A bit of c+c on the portraits:

Lorenzo Medici:

The one I am less sure about is Medici. As for Medici, the new "good invention" is looking weird for me, it was better the old "good invention", because his eyes he seems a little mad (from madness, not from anger), I like more the old "good invention".

Medici plain is looking too expressionless for me. He is not happy, not angry.. I liked more the original idea (maybe is only as I read it) that he was very arrogant, and haughty. This makes the player hate him, and makes the player want to disappoint him, by doing right the things. I like thinking Medici always thinks that Leonardo will not end well his invention, and makes fun of him, but Leonardo/the player is not discouraged, and does the invention work, only to see the disappointed face of Medici. Medici says "ok, well, well, you did it, great!", he is congratulating Leonardo, but his face tells us "Grrr, I hate you, you will fail, soon or later..".

In general the mouth of Medici seems to be pointing down in all his frames, I'm not sure about this, I still like more the one in the original mockup.

Ship captain:

I did not mean him looking as a conquistador as something bad, actually is cool for me that he is looking a bit spanish ; ) But I do not see apparent changes from the two versions of the ship captain. What has changed?

Where do you want him to be? I thought he could be next to the throne of Medici, only the first time you visit Medici. Medici would be sourrounded by guards, all in line, and the first time Leo sees Medici, he spots a bit of a conversions beetween the Ship captain and Medici (maybe a CONSPIRACY beetween the two!??!)

When Leo enters the hall, the captain excuses and leaves out, leaving Leo face to face with Medici and the guards, and then Medici begins commanding Leo the inventions, after some chat about the old times and all the things that have been since Leo has been out of town (Medici has gained many power since Leo is out).

What do you think about that?

Bad guard:

Is cool, but the thing in his forehead I don't know if it's hair or some part of the helmet.

Gypsy:

I'm still not sure about her hat/hair..

The rest: Is looking really good for me. Maybe Josquin nose is a bit too large, or there is something in his face (I don't know what) that could be slightly adjusted to resemble more the portraits.



Edited by JaumeAlcazo - 18 January 2011 at 12:26pm

Oh my... how did I miss this thread all this time? It's amazing to see a 4 page thread showing a fabulous game developing step by step. Thanks to both of you guys for sharing the whole thing with us. Everything's amazing upto now to be honest. I love the environment and the portraits are unique, since they look both renaissaince-esque and caricaturistic. The sprites are not really my style but guess it's the way to go for Zelda type games. Also thoroughly explored the map, the programming works quite well. Invention-puzzles seem fabulous too.

Now I'm sure many PJ members would like to donate some stuff to this project, (because of pure jelaousy in my case) in case you're accepting such things, but I doubt many are in control of the project as much as Jal, nor as fast and dedicated.

Still to be able to think about some stuff, gonna ask a few questions;
-Is the game completely based on puzzles/dialogues as in an adventure game or will there be a combat system? (If so you guys will have creature sprites and stuff within the game).
-Do you guys need suggestions for puzzles?
-Will there be non-invention inventory use? Such as using a rope on a balcony in order to climb up?
-Do you guys need even more character sprites/portraits?

A few suggestions about the gameplay:
-You should really put a map that opens up with M showing the names of the places. It's really easy to get lost or leave places unexplored. At least road signs would be cool.
-On my computer direction keys sometimes stick and Leo runs towards some place unintendedly. Is it only my problem?
-You should exchange I key with C. On most games I stands for Inventory and C for Credits.
-The maps are so huge that you should really put interactive objects and pickable items everywhere. Otherwise many rooms will go unexplored.

Anyways I'll be watching this thread from now on but good luck. It rocks to see this happening mainly with 2 guys only, even better is many people trying to contribute.


Edited by Gecimen - 19 January 2011 at 7:06pm

I am not in control other than I've been making stuff and have suggested ideas. EVERYONE is welcome to contribute in any way they like, including editing my stuff...if its good it will be used :)


Nothing is set, some combat is cool as long as it fits in. Yes! coming up with puzzle ideas is awesome.
I would love to see as many old paintings as possible in the game. Here's an example of one:


Made and updated some sprites for the portraits. Gypsy now has hair and the piano player is new. Most of the sprites are placeholders until we know what actions they need.

Another amazing idea Jal...

Ok then just a try, took 20 mins :S

The vitruvian man as an NPC :P




Edit: Oh btw there's this dragon drawing of Leonardo. You have to use it!



Edited by Gecimen - 21 January 2011 at 3:41am

@ Gecimen, the quality is great but please stay away from anything directly Davinci as I need those. Vetruvian man is a carnival performer in the town square. he spins in a wheel while another guys throws knives and Leo gets an idea there.

If you wish to get involved here is a simple and a more complicated project.
The gypsy guitar player and dancer is simple. If you'd like to try that animation for the sprites then ignore my sprites and make your own gypsys so its 100% you. I can always use those elsewhere.

A bigger project is the whole Boticelli quest thing. The location is already picked. The idea is Boticelli is painting and the models are there waiting around in their costumes hanging out. Venus is not naked, shes wearing a robe. He can't proceed because he needs a pearl for the shell which he asks Leo to get for him. Once Leo gives him the pearl (he gets a present) and the painting is recreated for the rest of the game. This doesn't need a lot of animation. Just some head turning and painting hand moving and stuff, simple movements. You can make new items too beyond all I currently have.
Boticelli may be a portrait NPC, but not that important.





Edited by jalonso - 21 January 2011 at 12:46pm

Editing one of Jal's sprites feels like some sort of deadly sin I'll be greatly punished for, but I can't help but to think that David should still be blonde, just a different shade.


Gotta agree with Stratto as well.

An interesting edit Lucas, but if you really wanted to make him look more like his portrait you should have played with the colours a little because

What I was trying to do is make the portrait more like the overworld sprite, not the other way around, and I did change the portrait's colours


I think what Stratto meant is that the small sprite looks like Gandalf, and Jal's portrait looks old and weak, which's what I tried to change.

But even if he WAS meant to look old and weak, I believe its still worth considering revising his nose, since in jal's sprite it was a different type of nose than it is here. It's rounder, shorter and wider.

You guys are silly. The forum is for c+c, edits and discussion.
Editing or commenting on my stuff should be no different than anyone else's work 

I totally like lucas' nose better than mine.
The player sprite is an early version that I never touched after making the portrait to match it. So all are correct:p
I have redrawn the nose and the whole beard on the portrait. I can see what lucas means but I think Leo needs to be as cute as possible. An old game hero is kinda weird :/
I remade 2px taller  all the player sprites.
I touched up David's hair a little and should be a bit blonder but still matching his general forest BG color.



Edited by jalonso - 22 January 2011 at 12:58pm

@Lucas, 

Edited by ChrisButton - 23 January 2011 at 7:30pm

Servant girl walks around. Sometimes she stops and kneels before the lady...it makes The Annunciation painting :)


Making these mini painting scenes is way fun. Maybe the Cardinal asks Leo for painting ideas. Game has...say 20. For every 5 he brings to the Cardinal Leo gets a prize. This way I have a way of adding Leo drawings and paintings that aren't invention things...a side quest???

It's so funny that she seems to have wings when in front  of a statue.. :)

Btw still working on birth of venus.

LOL love the angel thing.

@Jal, still continuing. Just finished Boticelli sprites and started the scene. I must say to minimize a whole painting into a few pixels, is great fun. More people should try :)

Edit: this is the painting one. There are ofc without the brush and the palette.

The right one is looking at you when you talk to him.


Edited by Gecimen - 28 January 2011 at 9:43am

Hey Jal, you might be interested in using Leo's robot as a character
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leonardo%27s_robot

it could lead to some interesting ideas in the game.

How many mini paintings are you going to do? the ones you have look really cool. maybe you could even add other paintings from the era, but just as 'easter eggs'

@zi, the fountain is horizontal because that way it can be used for all fountains no matter what shape. May I use your circular edit version for that fountain? Its good :)

@Stratto, thanks, the robot is in. Maybe in the Bell Tower. Easter Egg painting from people not daVini are already being used. The Wedding pic a few posts up, David, and Birth of Venus, so far.

Thanks to zi for allowing his fountain water animation to be used :)

Before working on the water reflections and highlights does the water tile base work? Is it too busy? 8 frames so not a lot can happen and I like calm waters but less than this was just a waste as it didn't even show up much until I added the 2 brightest colors...This is the biggest body of solid water anywhere.