It's been so fun to watch this game grow, and congrats on finally getting that demo out there and entering the festival. That's no small achievement! I'm loving the rise in popularity of 2.5D games and this is definitely one of the better looking ones I've seen. You're right though, handling camera systems is tough in this style of game... I feel your pain. 😅 I sent you an email back in April of last year inquiring about your plans for music, since this genre is my favorite to compose for, but I'm assuming you've already worked something out. Can't wait to try this out later either way! :)
great work on the new camera! i feel like camera systems are kinda like sound effects; if they're bad they really stands out, but if they're good you don't really notice them
This is the first video I’ve viewed of yours. The game looks great! I find myself thinking more about cameras recently, just to help guide the player without it being too obvious.
Aye just started watching the video, I thought the video was gonna be kinda boring bc of the title though ya camera system is essential, but when I heard you say that you released your first playtest and you realized that you almost set yourself up for failure I think that kind of thing alot of ppl could relate with, maybe you change the title for that and the video could reach alot of people and help encourage them too but ya i only clicked on this video bc i seen your previous dev logs b4 and its progress and your story with it was interesting but ya i hope you can figure everything out and be good ❤
Commented on your first video when you first posted it and this here popped up, been quite a while! Gotta say... Amazing bump in the quality & variety of environments & enemies. I have 2 humble suggestions if you get the time, purely cause I really believe they'd only add to the experience: 1) Add the option to toggle post fx like Bloom & DoF off or at least tone it down. I understand why they feel ok to be included, but you've got to make the decision on if you want your art to feel homogenous or not. Currently these PP FX are clashing harshly with what I'd initially expect to be minimalist art. Would be more ideal to boost your visuals by focusing on sounds as DoF & Bloom give it a realistic side that could do more damage than good. 2) If your character & fx sprites are rendered on a separate layer from your 3D environments, it would be a fun idea to add a pixelation effect over your 3D and see if they look better in tandem with your sprites. Solution would be to either render them in-engine at say, 270p (if in 16:9) and upscale in nearest neighbor OR fake this with a filter that behaves like Reshade's Virtual Resolution (essentially the same thing just applied as post fx). You've put so much work on this, I'll be following to see how it turns out! Huge props!
Yeah, I'm glad people are finally commenting on the PP, as I really just got it in one day and never looked back. Hearing feedback like this is super helpful. For your second point on lo-res environments, I honestly love that! I tried to mess around with that concept a while back but kept running into roadblocks. I'll take a look at the Reshade solution though. Thanks!
@@reboundstudios8 Oh that's so good to hear! I have in fact tested that Reshade effect and made a guide on how to use it exactly for this sort of thing. Did this for Hyper Light Breaker which released in Early Access just about a week ago: steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3411510911 It would theoretically be more optimal to apply a similar technique natively like I said, let me know if you want my Discord to discuss anything else in case you need any help! Good luck!
I never played Digimon World, but one of my favorite things to do is play random games I've never engaged with before. I'll probably check it out and see what I can parse from their camera.
Nice, cinemachine is pretty damn good. Just played the demo, is it possible to tone down the bloom, DoF, and chromatic-aberration a bit? Feels like visibility/clarity is somewhat lost.
Thanks for playing the demo! And thanks for the feedback! You're actually the first person to comment on any of the post processing effects, so it was all pretty much first pass. I agree it's about time to make some adjustments.
Now that you're focusing on the camera, please, please move the target ahead of the character. It has felt like it's been dragging behind, since the beginning really. In cinematic composition theory, one generally leaves breathing room in front of a character, unless intentionally going for a feeling of claustrophobia. And in a game, I am much more interested in what is ahead. I don't need a hi def look at enemies I've already killed or gaps I've already jumped. I need to see ahead. There are times watching these clips that I'm very aware that the person playing seems to know the terrain very intimately already. I've sometimes wondered if a new player would feel frustrated walking off a cliff or into an enemy they couldn't see. And the real trick to this: the faster you move, the further out ahead the camera target should be. This is the exact opposite dynamic from the typical dragging behind type camera smoothing, as it is much more difficult to implement. But it's so, so worth it. Your game will be much more of an enjoyable experience.
I totally agree with you. Cinemachine has built in tracking that predicts the position of the target that the camera is aiming at, and it works really well, but I'm not using that since the camera doesn't turn. In the near future I'll likely implement a new follow target that does exactly what you described though. It definitely bugs me when the camera lags behind a bit.
Haha! I still had to download the package and then import some custom functions into Playmaker to be able to access everything that it has to offer, but yeah it's very similar to Bolt in that they really push for the end user to take advantage of it. I figured it was worth mentioning though because some of the "free" tools that some major software solutions offer aren't always fully integrated off of a fresh install, as was my own experience here! Most of my game was simply built on what I taught myself or tutorials from a few years back.
![Seungmin "그렇게, 천천히, 우리(As we are)" | [Stray Kids : SKZ-PLAYER]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/kAzmhLHePqU/mqdefault.jpg)
Looking forward to what's next!
Ngl im always surprised by how important the camera is, even though it's so easy to notice a bad camera. Nice one :)
It's been so fun to watch this game grow, and congrats on finally getting that demo out there and entering the festival. That's no small achievement! I'm loving the rise in popularity of 2.5D games and this is definitely one of the better looking ones I've seen. You're right though, handling camera systems is tough in this style of game... I feel your pain. 😅 I sent you an email back in April of last year inquiring about your plans for music, since this genre is my favorite to compose for, but I'm assuming you've already worked something out. Can't wait to try this out later either way! :)
it looks really nice!
great work on the new camera! i feel like camera systems are kinda like sound effects; if they're bad they really stands out, but if they're good you don't really notice them
I totally agree. That and UXUI. If the HUD is really great, then you may not even notice it at all...
nice touch. much more appealing art style. keep it up bro.
This is the first video I’ve viewed of yours. The game looks great! I find myself thinking more about cameras recently, just to help guide the player without it being too obvious.
amazing as always
Aye just started watching the video, I thought the video was gonna be kinda boring bc of the title though ya camera system is essential, but when I heard you say that you released your first playtest and you realized that you almost set yourself up for failure I think that kind of thing alot of ppl could relate with, maybe you change the title for that and the video could reach alot of people and help encourage them too
but ya i only clicked on this video bc i seen your previous dev logs b4 and its progress and your story with it was interesting
but ya i hope you can figure everything out and be good ❤
Commented on your first video when you first posted it and this here popped up, been quite a while! Gotta say... Amazing bump in the quality & variety of environments & enemies.
I have 2 humble suggestions if you get the time, purely cause I really believe they'd only add to the experience:
1) Add the option to toggle post fx like Bloom & DoF off or at least tone it down. I understand why they feel ok to be included, but you've got to make the decision on if you want your art to feel homogenous or not. Currently these PP FX are clashing harshly with what I'd initially expect to be minimalist art. Would be more ideal to boost your visuals by focusing on sounds as DoF & Bloom give it a realistic side that could do more damage than good.
2) If your character & fx sprites are rendered on a separate layer from your 3D environments, it would be a fun idea to add a pixelation effect over your 3D and see if they look better in tandem with your sprites. Solution would be to either render them in-engine at say, 270p (if in 16:9) and upscale in nearest neighbor OR fake this with a filter that behaves like Reshade's Virtual Resolution (essentially the same thing just applied as post fx).
You've put so much work on this, I'll be following to see how it turns out! Huge props!
Yeah, I'm glad people are finally commenting on the PP, as I really just got it in one day and never looked back. Hearing feedback like this is super helpful.
For your second point on lo-res environments, I honestly love that! I tried to mess around with that concept a while back but kept running into roadblocks. I'll take a look at the Reshade solution though. Thanks!
@@reboundstudios8 Oh that's so good to hear! I have in fact tested that Reshade effect and made a guide on how to use it exactly for this sort of thing. Did this for Hyper Light Breaker which released in Early Access just about a week ago:
steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3411510911
It would theoretically be more optimal to apply a similar technique natively like I said, let me know if you want my Discord to discuss anything else in case you need any help! Good luck!
Looks like Hyper Light Drifter 1.5. Wishlished.
Reminds me of Digimon World’s fixed camera angle that changed per map
I never played Digimon World, but one of my favorite things to do is play random games I've never engaged with before. I'll probably check it out and see what I can parse from their camera.
@ I suggest the OG ps1 version!
Nice, cinemachine is pretty damn good. Just played the demo, is it possible to tone down the bloom, DoF, and chromatic-aberration a bit? Feels like visibility/clarity is somewhat lost.
Thanks for playing the demo! And thanks for the feedback!
You're actually the first person to comment on any of the post processing effects, so it was all pretty much first pass. I agree it's about time to make some adjustments.
Now that you're focusing on the camera, please, please move the target ahead of the character. It has felt like it's been dragging behind, since the beginning really.
In cinematic composition theory, one generally leaves breathing room in front of a character, unless intentionally going for a feeling of claustrophobia.
And in a game, I am much more interested in what is ahead. I don't need a hi def look at enemies I've already killed or gaps I've already jumped. I need to see ahead.
There are times watching these clips that I'm very aware that the person playing seems to know the terrain very intimately already. I've sometimes wondered if a new player would feel frustrated walking off a cliff or into an enemy they couldn't see.
And the real trick to this: the faster you move, the further out ahead the camera target should be. This is the exact opposite dynamic from the typical dragging behind type camera smoothing, as it is much more difficult to implement. But it's so, so worth it. Your game will be much more of an enjoyable experience.
I totally agree with you. Cinemachine has built in tracking that predicts the position of the target that the camera is aiming at, and it works really well, but I'm not using that since the camera doesn't turn.
In the near future I'll likely implement a new follow target that does exactly what you described though. It definitely bugs me when the camera lags behind a bit.
"After doing a lot of research I found Cinemachine" Isnt cinemachine prepacked with Unity and advertised everywhere as the go-to solution? :D
Haha! I still had to download the package and then import some custom functions into Playmaker to be able to access everything that it has to offer, but yeah it's very similar to Bolt in that they really push for the end user to take advantage of it.
I figured it was worth mentioning though because some of the "free" tools that some major software solutions offer aren't always fully integrated off of a fresh install, as was my own experience here! Most of my game was simply built on what I taught myself or tutorials from a few years back.