August 9th - The pace of a snail, the speed of a turtle news

I blame...

A lot of credit has to go out to the folks who help with this project daily. You have John who's committed to the bone to help out with music. Tiji who's dedicated to executing A+ code on a moments notice. Noobina who reminds me how utterly ludicrous and unorganized I can be at times. Muff with his great enthusiasm and willingness to help out with the audio; etc., etc..

Even when you have everyone working in sequence, tightly bunched together to get things done, you'll always run into "downtime". You guys know what I mean. The time during development where the gravy train starts to slow down a notch and not exactly produce any significant work that's mind-blowing. Such is the case now. Considering the fact that everyone has their own social lives to maintain (indie/mod game development being something constantly limited by this), the pace isn't as insane as it once was, say like 3 months ago. =P

"OMG, VHEL isn't going to be made! It had so much potential. D=" No, I'm not really saying that if that's what your getting from the previous paragraphs. In fact, since the last update -- if I can honestly say this with a straight face -- a lot has been achieved. Here's a list of said achievements:

• Paperback design to the gameplay is finished! Now comes the hard part with making, testing, and balancing the mechanics recently invented.
• Team size is now 7 strong. We even have a new artist -- Blodia.
• Master storyline script is now 78% complete. I'm far from done, but at least now people are looking at it and giving their input.
• New code is in production that will hopefully reduce the amount of memory used in-game (loading, buffing, dumping, etc.), maximize the value to the character sprites, and make animations a bit more dynamic.
• Master walk through for the entire game is now 80% done. I'll be honest with you, the beginning of the game is a bit shallow even though the middle is very strong and varied, but like the beginning, the ending is lacking that special touch. These issues will be addressed once we can stabilize a locked build of the game content.
• That gameplay demonstration I promised a few weeks back isn't happening -- sorry guys. Too much has been in the way of development for me to even get to it. When and if I can in the future, I will...you know, unless real-time video of the game is shown. ;D
• Several new characters have been drawn up, but I won't talk about who or what they are. This you'll have to see later.
• A lot of UI art was worked on. So much in fact, that I'm too lazy to mention what I all did. =P

These things are all fine and dandy to accomplish in a month, but this isn't really the good stuff you all want to see, clearly (it's not even a lot by my standards, honestly). You want screenshots, video; hell, you people want to play the game itself! That will come once the planning and execution is accomplished. We're still in pre-alpha, so give it some time.

Looking for someone who likes reading -- reading VHEL's storyline script, I mean. ;D

Art, game design, and literature are things I'm extremely passionate about. Since VHEL is very intense about being story driven, it helps when I can bounce ideas and whole scenarios off of people. This isn't an open viewing into the world I slaved over, so don't get that impression. However, this is a cry out to the folks who like what this game/universe can become, and want to have a say in it's direction. Not many teams let the audience dictate their game storyline, so this is a pretty solid opportunity. I won't get into the specifics here, but if your interested in helping out and making some magic, just leave a comment. You don't need any special qualifications outside of a lot of time to kill and a willingness to use your imagination a bit.

Done and done

I'm terribly sorry to raise people's hopes up a month ago and not deliver the simple demonstration reel. Yes, I am to blame. I am to blame for wanting to have a life. No worries though, I'm already hard at work to make up for this simple delay and will make sure that your time is well spent spectating. =D

Ciao!