Devlog #4- Saving Space

October 22nd, 2019

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• For more about Yami: Our Game: Yami

Weekly Updates Week 4: Discover the world of Raum

The game of Yami takes place within the planet Raum, known for its harsh climates and immense gravity upon its surface. Raum has four moons, and orbits two suns at the center of its solar system. Below is a brief description of each of the heavenly bodies players will spot in the sky during their gameplay, as well as concept art produced by Tumultuous Productions’ talented artists!

Moons:

Shattered Twins: Two smaller moons within the Raum sky, encircle one another in their own gravitational pull. Debris and rocky dust swirl around both moons as they rotate around one another. Some of the smaller dust and debris have begun to form a faint ring around the moons. 

The Eye of Rage: The surface of this larger moon is covered completely with oxidized iron, giving it a reddened appearance to the inhabitants of Raum. This moon has an asynchronous cycle with the Eye of Mourning, with one day a year the two ‘Eyes are Open’ and one day a year when the two ‘Eyes are Closed.’ These two days were considered sacred to the ancients, and signified important events. When the Eye of Rage is full in the sky, it is considered an omen for danger or violence.

The Eye of Mourning: The surface of this moon is covered with vast oceans and two polar ice caps, giving it an impression of a teary eye in the sky. This moon has an asynchronous cycle with the Eye of Rage, as aforementioned. When this moon is full in the night sky, it is considered an omen for great sadness or loss. 

Suns: 

The two suns of this planet are part of a binary star system, where the two orbit around one another due to their intense gravitational pull. There is a ‘thread’ between the two in the sky, as one star is slowly absorbing energy from the other. 

Dorhen: The larger of the two suns, a Class O Blue Giant Star, giving it a large and blue appearance in the day sky. 

Ettas: The smaller of the two suns, a White Dwarf star, which has a luminous white light in the sky, but provides little heat to the surface of Raum. 

(Concept art of the celestial bodies within the world of Yami)

Saving and Loading your game in Yami

Within the game of Yami, there will be various locations where the player will be able to save their game. When returning to your journey, you will be able to load your game from multiple save slots. Below are our concept designs for loading screens and save files. 

(Save/Load Concept)

Weekly Member Spotlight: Seik Lucid

For this week, I asked one of our hard-working and incredibly talented coders, ‘SeikLuceid’, a few questions about how they got into coding, and what their creative process looks like.  

Q: What is the process for coding a video game?

A: “I could go on for days on this subject, game engines, and psuedo-code, both of which are good tips: but what it all comes down to?  Breaking your goals up into their smallest parts, smaller than you might be able to consider them as even a 'part' of the goal if possible, then figuring out how to make those pieces work towards your end goal.  Psuedo-code is a great tool, Adaptability is important, but functionality is your main goal, especially starting out. If it works, it can be refined. Personally, I use Pseudocode, then I use in-game prompts or debug lines, then I fill them in one at a time, piece by piece, until I get the functionality I need.  Afterwards: I begin worrying about cleaning it up, optimizing it, and refactoring it into adaptable, and readable code.  

Q: What made you interested in making a video game?

A: “As with most game enthusiasts, playing games as a child.  I spent a lot of time playing games, indulging in the stories and enthusiasm that surrounded games.  Unlike the modern days, games were a secret hobby you did by yourself, when no one was around when I was young.   Games didn't even really have a multiplayer. Arcades were still a thing, if that helps to place it for you. By the time it became socially acceptable to play games, was about the time I got my first computer, and really started exploring the wide world of gaming. Sharing stories with a vast audience, and entertaining children who perhaps spend much of their time alone, within their own head, as I did.  That's ultimately what my game development is fueled by.”

Q: What do you like best about the Yami team?

A: “The Yami team really stands out to me solely based upon the fact that there is such a constant flow of communication.  I've worked on a few teams before, even been part of the problem in them, in which you inevitably had to talk through a chain sequence of people to get clarification or instruction.  Personally, I'm glad to be a part of a decent environment, where I feel as if forward progress is being made. You'd think with more people that would be evident, but it's really not.”

Q: Tell us briefly about yourself!

A: “I'm really not an about me type of person, honestly, ask anyone who knows me, they learned 'about me' by being around me for years, and still learn the most basic things sometimes years down the road.  In terms of game development though, I've worked on five separate projects, have two ongoing, participated in one game jam, am participating in a second currently, and have been pursuing this field off and on for years. I have a wall of sticky notes with game design notes on them from my many projects, I can't throw them away because I'm never sure if they'll come up again later.  I have a whiteboard, but I never erase it, so it's basically one big sticky note now itself. I love RPGs, I have fancied myself a writer, to about the same degree of success as a game developer, which means none so far! I am horrible at art, practicing, but it's nigh fruitless thus far, hopefully that changes over time! That's about all there is to know about me, at least that I am able to think of!”

Q: What is something about coding that most people don’t know or understand?

A: “Programming is not a difficult skill.  It 'seems' difficult because of the syntax, because of higher level programmers min-maxing their code to be as efficient or as minimal as possible, but code can be as large as it takes to accomplish what you need.  The act of programming is not hard, but it is a skill that you gradually improve at. I'm still a novice, my code is probably ugly and unclear as it gets, when it's just for me especially, but it'll function as I intended.  There are certainly better ways to accomplish what I have, there are likely more 'adaptable' ways to do it as well, but it's functional. That's where programming begins. Once you can accomplish everything you can think to do in code, then you can expand upon those ideas, try fitting them in similar but not the same situations, update the code to see how you can morph it to work differently, but without destroying how it worked before.  Clean it up, make it easy to read, make it easy to follow along with. Many bugs will make you just read through your code, following the logical path, trying to figure out where the issue could be: So if you are having trouble doing that, your code could use some maintenance!”
 

~Stay tuned for our next DevLog issue where we learn about another NPC in Yami as well as concept art of our game’s first boss! We also will be showing some neat animations soon! Will be pushing out screenshots of game play as well in a couple weeks!

Remember to:

Connect with us on Social Media:

• Facebook: www.facebook.com/TumultuousProductions
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/TumultuousGame
• Join our Discord Server: Join the Yami Discord
• Want to Join the Project? Fill out our google forms Online Application 
• For more about the Studio : About Us Tumultuous Productions
• Check out our website for Yami! https://tumultuousproductions.site/index2.html
• For more about Yami: Our Game: Yami