I lost a weak being sick like crazy

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I don't want to go in any detail as it was gruesome. I'll just say, nothing Covid related! Anyway I was literally stuck in bed for a whole weak. I still tried to work but I couldn't go as far as I wanted. Didn't open the project. Just added the new team member to the project and shared all my work file with them. But that was it.

Still I did a lot of thinking, especially since I had someone to talk to and dive deep inside my project and there were some unanswered question I had to deal with. And I answered the most important one of them all.

New document - Visual

First thing I did is I created a visual research document. I already had all that in mind but in order to convey an idea about what the game is going to be, I have to make clear and precise examples. I love video game above else but I also love cinema, especially animation. Luckily I have now a beta account to SHOTDECK which allows me to take good screenshots of movie shots to convey my visual ideas for the game.
You also can check my visual document here as it gets updated and I'll share a few screens if you don't have the patience.

Here you can see that direct movie comparaison can shine what Paris looks like compared to, even if retro, a US city

Here you can see a direct comparaison of urban poly games that have a good look but not specifically suited for my game. A good balance would be an in-between those two pictures as a game style.

So as you can see. Even in my state, work has been done but it's not super impressive if I may say so hahaha. Still I'm glad I was able to do something at least.

I figured out the combat

For a long time, I knew the game was going to be about someone that fights, and struggle. And I had to have game mechanics around that but I didn't want them to be secondary to the story. It's a game. Gameplay should be a center part to the narrative and the narrative a center part to the gameplay. Not two separated entities.
I know the main character first choice is non lethal combat. And I loved some ways of fighting in some games that seemed powerful while not killing the enemy. Its then I realized unique games that were openworld or somewhat openworld where I loved the feel and gameplay behind fighting.

For the feel, someone that I know a lot of people love deerly.

Tifa Lockhart

Tifa feels very powerful with just fist and kicks. She can kill with them, but she can also powerfully knock out enemies with that. And I want the player to feel as powerful as Tifa when playing my game.

If you didn't know, Dead Island has a unique combat control system that has a very heavy impact in the gameplay. The analogue mode allow you to lock on an enemy and swing your right joystick in any direction in order to aim at limbs or push an enemy towards a certain direction.
ITS AMAZING.
You can break specific arms in order to prevent them from fighting and in this video we can see the player just launching zombies overboard by specifically swimming from right to left.
It's unique, it uses dynamically the environment as well as interact a lot with a simple zombie enemy, it brings a lot of variety and I want that to be center in my game. Top down will allow to project on top of the verticality our enemies in a number of ways. And believe me, I'll make that awesome.

Dark Messiah of Might and Magic - Arkane Studios

Finally, a game that uses a lot of melee fighting, and in first person, is an early Arkane title (that is amazing, play it if you didn't) that is called Dark Messiah of Might and Magic. Arkane used the source engine, that was made by valve and used in every game they made, because of its heavy physic oriented design. They used the engine not only for puzzle but in fights as well.
The fighting is still pretty simple but the level design makes up for that. It even makes it super good with traps, empty space and all that kind of juicy things to use during enemy encounter to use the environment as a weapon.
If I can mix all that in my top down that uses verticality... I will be able to make a game with unique fighting style that will allow for very good gameplay on top of a game with, I hope, a good narrative.

I also want to use these logs for something else

I never talked about it, but I also wanted these logs to share more than just me working on a project. I wanted to share a little bit of myself. So if I get the time and I heal, I will also sometimes post about two things I really want to express.
The thing is, right now it feels a bit pointless as (it's not bad in any way) these logs don't have a big audience and so my thoughts will be for myself only. And what I'd really want when sharing an opinion is to have someone with a different opinion. So we can share arguments about why and elevate both our opinions and construct them better, improve them.

​Anyway. I have always some insight that needs someone to contradict them, especially towards gaming and game experiences. Recently I've played a bunch of ps4 exclusives that happens to be HUGE OPEN WORLDS WITH PLAY TIME SUPER LONG, and while I have nothing against the gendra, I have some criticism that I'd like to state. Like why most of them can't handle an ending that feels complete narrative and gameplay wise? It has to have something to do with how much you stretch both of them for such a long experience but some studios like Rockstar manage to make their ending super good so...

Anyway I'd like to do entire articles about that. Also I'd like to share stuff I love, like movies or taking screenshots of games.