Calis Projects Forum

This thread will fill you in on what we are working on and developing behind the scenes for the game.
I'll update this thread regularly.
I'll update the first post with links to future posts in the thread and the date it was added so you can keep track.

So...
What are we working on behind the scenes?

May 19th 2012

Revamped the entire map data handler, added flower animations, and launched a clothing store online.
Read about it!
http://www.calisprojects.com/forum/showt...973#pid973


May 7th 2012
In this update, a short gameplay video is posted from an early event in the game. Also a really cool screenshot of the player getting to pick the first Newborn ZENFORM. Be sure to have a read:
http://www.calisprojects.com/forum/showt...906#pid906

13th of April 2012
Thinking of going more weekly with the updates. This update shows off some really cool screenshots from the early parts of the game in the hometown. The shadow graphics have been changed to straight black to help give the game more vibrancy. Also teased a feature.
Check it out: http://www.calisprojects.com/forum/showt...725#pid725

6th of April 2012
Showing off the Cafe map from the Duvlynn South City map. Very pretty tiles made by Will. Check it out.
http://www.calisprojects.com/forum/showt...627#pid627

20th of March 2012
A small update this time. Shows off the changes in skin-tone colors and a tab from the Journal App on the PCom.
http://www.calisprojects.com/forum/showt...515#pid515

9th of March 2012
Great update this week. Thanks to all of your comments, I got my passion back for coding and put my head down to get working.
This update details the changes made to the ZENFORM attacks and shows a PCom app.
http://www.calisprojects.com/forum/showt...435#pid435

3rd of March 2012
So, it's march. The release window. Read about what's going on here.
http://www.calisprojects.com/forum/showt...403#pid403

18th of February 2012
Update in the 9th post.
An update on the battle system code!
Read here:
http://www.calisprojects.com/forum/showt...344#pid344

20th of January 2012
Update here in the 7th post.
Details this time cover the missed release date to details on working on the revamping of the battle system.
Read here:
http://www.calisprojects.com/forum/showt...205#pid205

10th of January 2012
Update here in the 6th post.
Contains the first official screenshots of both the storyline and choice system.
Be sure to check it out:
http://www.calisprojects.com/forum/showt...121#pid121

4th of January 2012
New Post - 3rd post.
Details the update to the bag, only 1 more outdoor map needed for Version 1.0 release and a recoding of the OW (overworld) "people" handling of the ZENGarden (the engine for ZENFORMS).

15th of December 2011
New update posted just below in post 2. Update includes the save/load game scene and a new day/night cycle.

2nd of December 2011
For the last 2 weeks, Spaceemotion and I have been focusing on finishing a map needed for the school. We also have been planning and doing early code work on the item system. We want to have a cool "sub-feature" to the item system and it has been time consuming planning and adding it. I want to make sure we plan it right before I started coding it. The last week was spent making sure we knew what we wanted out of the system. Only 2 days ago I began coding the Item Database into the game engine. Laying in the variables for items to use (item name, effects and so on). Everything went smoothly.
The school map mentioned above was also just finished (I say finished, but we just need to make 2 or 3 little edits for it to be fully done). That was added into the game. Each map takes about 50 or so lines of code just so the engine won't crash. Again, it takes time to do this, but it's not "hard" work.

Spaceemotion is going to begin coding the UI for the item menu.
Hopefully it goes good for him.

While he is doing that, I'm going to edit our Save/Load Game Menu.
This is currently it:

(Testing, ignore the "null" text label. That will be the player name. No name was set when testing - hence a null value lol).

You can swipe left and right to view your saved/load games. I'll keep that. It shows the player and what the player looks like from the save file, and the ZENFORM team (names and star rank). But it's very blank and doesn't provide the information I really want.

The edits I'm going to add is:
The map image the player is on will change based on the map the player is on. The name of the map might be displayed (if it looks good).
A new label showing how many quests the player has taken will be added.
A new label for player reputation/moral will be added too. This will show more information related to the story that is vital information to show the player on a load screen.
Another possible addition for the scene might also be a money icon showing how much money you have. Again this will just help you know what your save file is.


- - - - - - - - -

That's what is going on behind the scenes of development. Any questions, suggestions or comments, please leave some

The Save/Load game scene is pretty much finished.
The scene now shows the map the player is on behind the player, the time and day, the quest count (I done 999 quests XD) and the money count (I'm broke ).
Still works the same, swipe left to view saved data which you can load (if there is any) and swipe right to view your current data (which you can then save).
From the previous version, it still shows what the player looks like, and the ZENFORMS on the team with their star rank beside the name.


Name is Null because I never gave myself a name when testing - that will display your name).


So much work going on. Spaceemotion and I have never been as focused on development as we are now.
We are working great together and very fast at the moment.

Personally, I'm on a real coding "buzz" - I'm loving doing the code at the moment. A lot of the stuff I'm working on is very visual, so 5 lines of coding is having an impact on the visual look of the game. It's great for getting feedback and is by far the most fun part of game development in general (seeing work in action).

We are almost ready to increase the development build of the app by 0.1 of a version (I'm not telling you what version we are behind the scenes lol) - meaning we are closer to 1.0 (release of the app) then before.

Another feature we decided to do is "in-game" time.
Originally we planned to use the device's time (real world time) and have time based events happen throughout the game. During testing of the game, I noticed it sucked. It took too long to wait for these events. Not what I want in ZENFORMS. I drew inspiration from Minecraft (and actually my older Pokemon Games- such as Digital Network) to make "game time". Game Time would be faster then real time. Currently 3 seconds real world time is 1 minute game time (this may change throughout development).
I took ideas from my old RPG Maker 2003 days and got to work on tinting the screen to get the effect of day and night. It is broken up into stages, with each tint effect changing based on the hour of the day (such as 6pm, the sun sets, 7pm it starts to get darker but still redish tint from the setting sun, 8pm it starts to get a lot darker, and 9pm is pretty much night time). The day in-game is no longer the real world day, but set in game.

What does this mean for the game? It will make the story feel a lot better in the game world- since the player goes to school, time can be skipped ahead so by the time all the school stuff is finished, it's 4pm in the day. Of course there will be lots of other time based events. Shops will have sales on specific days, different ZENFORMS will be in different wild spots based on the time, different people will be out and about and say different things at different times. We can get a lot more creative then using real world time since it can be edited in code, rather then make sure the player plays the game at a certain time.

We are adding several light effects such as lamps, traffic lights and windows from houses. It will make the night feel really special.
I hope you like this screenshot, I love it. I can tell you it looks amazing on the device.

I hope everyone had a great christmas and new years.
I know a lot of indy developers tend to do a lot more work on their projects over the holidays and ZENFORMS is no exception.
So much has gone on. Over 15,000 new lines of code have been added to various parts of the project.

If you have been watching the livestreams, you will have seen the work we are doing right now is very broad for the project. We have done mapping, updated (RE: revamped) the overworld "people" handling, and of course we have created the item database.

For the mapping, only 1 more outdoor map is needed for Version 1.0 release. The plan is to have it done by the end of this week. I'm pretty sure that when I do work on that map, it will be part of the live stream.
I'm just waiting on getting some more tiles and when I do I'll create the map.



Gif is pretty laggy- sorry for night time shot, that was my save file lol.
Screenshot Gif is taken from simulator footage that is why you see the mouse cursor.

The updated/revamped overworld "people" handling is the biggest change. While the bag system and item database was 9,000 lines of codes (and bigger in that sense), this was a complete recode of the ZenGarden (the name of the ZENFORM engine) with regards to handling data of the overworld people in the game.
This goes for storing the data of people on the maps, drawing the person on the map and handling actions for the people.
In the above gif you can see the people all laughing at the same time. This was not possible with the older code. Only 1 type of action (such as laughing or talking) could be applied at once. Now the actions can be applied to any person on the map at any time with simple "calling" of the code to the actions. This new code - while a lot - actually saved lines in the long run and reduced the amount of lines needed from the older code.

The bag system and item database is very cool. Thanks to Spaceemotion it looks awesome!
The code is very clever and doesn't need editing as new items are added to the item database. The current code can load the variables needed for any item and apply the correct effects.
If you haven't seen the stream of the bag update (only a few minutes long so check it out here: http://www.ustream.tv/recorded/19469431 ), be sure to check it out and tell us what you think.

Speaking of the live streams, the daily streams (starts generally 5 or 6PM GMT) should be back to normal this week.
The audio will be better (new mic, not using my built in mic as I did in previous streams). Video is still not great.
Check the CP Twitter feed as I update that with the time of when we will start and when we do with the link if needed. http://www.twitter.com/calisprojects

Thanks for reading all this.
Feedback would be great.
As always, I'll keep you informed of development.

"We are almost ready to increase the development build of the app by 0.1 of a version (I'm not telling you what version we are behind the scenes lol)" thats one more 0.1 we didnt have :3 keep up the great work :3

I recently joined this website, and i must say i am very excited about this project you are working on keep up the good work neo! By the looks of it, this will be one of the best rpg apps out there no doubt!

I posted a bunch of screenshots around the internet and not here.
I wanted to explain some elements of the screenshot and keep in topic - what are we working on lol.

The most obvious addition to the latest screenshots is the storyline events.


I'm not going to lie to you. Any screenshots released BEFORE these with text between 2 (or more) character sprites - it was all placeholders. That intro in the alpha build was not the actual intro you will experience. What you are seeing now is. A lot of engine improvements needed to be made to make this possible. Loading the camera on a position of the map (before the camera defaulted on the player), making sure the events started up when they should, such a loading of the map had to be coded. Even just moving the people that were not the player.
In the above screenshot, the player and his best friend Keith (the one in the hat) are talking about becoming Protector students.
You will also notice I fixed the shadows for the people to match the shadows of the tiles (which change strength/opacity based on the time of the game world).



The above shots are the first that show of the ability for you to make choices in the game. Choices will have consequences and the more important the choice, the bigger the impact. Right here, this choice isn't important, it's just to introduce you - the player - to the system.
Choices can effect you fame and your moral (if your good or bad). Choose wisely as this is one of the reasons why I designed only 1 save file.
The second screenshot in that section doesn't mean they are in love. They are talking about being in love with become Protectors.


We are currently working on building the storyline, improving the engine to handle the storyline and finishing up maps needed for release!
We are working very hard but we should have a new video to show you this week!

Hey everyone.
I wanted to fill you in on what we are currently working on.
It's been 10 days since I last filled you in on what we were doing behind the development curtain.

As most of you know, we decided to add new ZENFORMS to the game. We are nearly done. Thanks to everyone who donated. All the money donated went to the commission art for work on the new ZENFORMS sprites.
I also had a close friend design the ZENFORMS themselves. Work was very quick.
The new ZENFORMS look great. It was because of you guys we added them. We listen to all feedback we got on you all wanting more and made changes accordingly ;-)
Go here if you want to see them and the debate we had about adding them if you haven't seen it.
http://www.calisprojects.com/forum/showt...php?tid=24

Internally, the build version of the game increased by 0.1. I won't say what version we are on now, but when we get to version 1.0 - that will be the build we release. We have been play testing the game as a whole. Making note of the bugs. We have been squashing those bugs. It's also great to play ZENFORMS in the stage it's at. It's very enjoyable. I can't wait to let others play it! Soon! Release date for this month is not going to be met. The game is pushed back to "sometime in February or March". I need to be clear that the game is programmed by me and me alone. It takes time to do a game on this scale. A lot of pet style games don't have a world where you can create your character or even have maps you can walk around on and if it does (like Pokemon), it generally has a big team working 9 to 5 every weekday on it. Spaceemotion is the only other dedicated team member working on this game. What makes it even harder for us is we don't live in the same country. We communicate solely over Skype and not in a cool office. So please forgive us on slipping the release date a month or two. It will be worth of it. We are so proud of the game!
We will keep you informed on the release and be showing off more and more as we get closer!

Why no live-streams this week and WHERE IS THE BATTLE SYSTEM STUFF???
(That is what I am guessing your wondering)
Well, the no live streams is because we are revamping the battle system.... Yup, revamping it.
Both the code and the artwork is getting an upgrade.
It will still look a lot like what we have shown off in screenshots like this older shot.

REPEAT: OLD SCREENSHOT
It will still have the "fake" 3D style battleground that you'll be able to move with your finger.
(The 3D effect is shown off at about 14 seconds into this OLD video since the title screen uses the battle ground.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jejfoK2xPlI )
ZENFORMS still have a status bar and when you touch a ZENFORM it will slide open and reveal more information like how you see in this OLD screenshot

REPEAT: OLD SCREENSHOT

It will look a lot cooler. Spaceemotion, the lead artist for the game, has grown a lot as an artist since he did that older user interface. The new stuff fits a lot better with some of the newer UI throughout the game.

Code wise, the battle system wil feel a lot better then an older build we had. It will be faster too. The battle system has A LOT of features and mechanics we haven't talked about. We really cannot wait to tell you, but we must wait. We want to wait until it is done before we show it off. But when we do reveal it, there will be screenshots and a video with commentary explaining it all.

Stay tuned!

Just a small update on what I said last night.
This is more of a teaser.

As I mentioned above, the title screen uses the same code for the battle ground.
This image is a teaser of what to expect from the battle system.
New battle ground and new UI (in battle, it's so much cooler!).
The clouds and leafs blow by in the wind.


Edit: if you are still seeing the old title screen - your browser most likely "cached" it. Just click refresh.

I'm still working hard on the battle system
Finally after about a month, I'm starting to wrap up on the basics of the battle system.
Most of the functions are coded. I still haven't got a fully playable battle system. I'm waiting until I get to that stage before I release a video of it. I can't wait to show it off, but it's still not ready to be judged.

So what needs to be done?
The stuff that will "layer" on the battle system. By that I mean things like creating more attacks for the ZENFORMS move pool (I say layered since this also affects the ZENFORMS menu and so on).

Each ZENFORM will have several move pools. This will mean the ZENFORM you get in one area will have a different movepool then one caught in another area. This will make wild ZENFORMS different and can really change up the moves of the ZENFORM as it evolves.
I really want to nail this too. I think this will be great and it's a feature that would get me hooked into finding the right ZENFORM.

Speaking of attacks, here is the ATTACK User Interface.
Each ZENFORM has 5 attack slots.
(SCREENSHOT IS ALL TEST ATTACKS WHEN I WAS DEBUGGING)

The "1 Effects" typo has been fixed since this screenshot was taken

The attack name, the element if it has one (one of the attacks is a Wind element in that screenshot),the cost of FP (Focus Points) for using the attack, it's speed priority (it it will attack first even if the players speed is lower then the enemies' speed stat), it's percentage of landing a successful attack, and how many effects the attack has (some attacks have 2 effects).

You can also see 3 buttons. "S" "G" and "i".
S is for Standard.
G is for Gamble.
And i is for Information.
More details on that will be mentioned when the battle system is fully revealed


Spaceemotion is working on revamping our game's map and also completely recoding the website. So look forward to seeing that really soon!

Not long left before RELEASE!

That title screen seems too bare to me. Maybe add flying zenforms in the background, and have the starter ones walk around? Of course that would require animations for a few of them, I think the subtleness of animation could totally pay off!