Dreamscape Update!

We're in July already and my Dreamscape weekly challenge is going well!

29 pictures done and counting 😄

Here's a sample:

And line art:

 

Arranging a room in the house of Pingouin & Raptor

While I'm working on new levels for Pingouin & Raptor: hidden object, let's review how I'm making those with the Hallway level as an example! 😀 

Background

First of all I gather a lot of references, here's a sample:

I choose one, or plus, main reference that I use for the lay-out of the level. Here, I liked the corner and the big window, and the set-up of the chair with its footstool:

Then I create the perspective grid that will help me to design other elements and furniture.
I draw a quick rough of everything...

...before drawing a clear line art:

For colors, I also have different references which help to create the right atmosphere. In this case, I went with a marine theme, and I really liked the contrast of the orange elements with the main blue colors in some of the pictures.

Objects and Level Design

The background's ready! It's time to design objects:

That's probably the longer task of my process. I usually need one full day of work to rough every object. Ideas don't always come easily, I need to be inspired!
There are 30 to 40 different objects in a level, they need to be different enough that the player cannot confuse them with one another, and when possible, a bit tricky to find 😁. Also, to make the game color-blind user friendly, I cannot use colors in the description of an object.

Final version of the objects takes another couple of days, then I have to integrate everything in Unity, and send the texts to the translators. And then a new level is finally ready!

The whole process takes 6-7 days that I usually spread over two weeks or more if I have client work.

I aim to craft each level carefully without rushing, to make them all special and as polished as I can.

I hope players can feel the time, dedication and love that went into this game! 😊

Dreamscape

This year I created my own weekly challenge to get a few images out of my head!
Every week I will post a new picture in a simple style, line + color, and sometimes I animate them!

Here's what I made so far:

Animated

Animated

This will also help me for my next game project! While I'm still working on Pingouin & Raptor Summer update, I'm starting to define the world where the next game will take place, and its game design, and gameplay.

I hope I'll be able to create all 52 pictures and post one every week 😀 I don't know what this will bring me, will I learn and make some progress? This far it's been really fun and inspiring!

Pingouin & Raptor: what's new?!

Happy New Year from Pingouin & Raptor!

What happened lately? Well I finally launched the first (paying) package of levels in December. 😄

I had no idea it would take 6 months to complete this update, including one whole month for publishing. 😱

But everything is now in place for more levels and hopefully the Summer 2021 update will be smoother!

I started to work on the cute little shops from the Village nearby Pingouin's mansion. 

So here's my roadmap:

    Spring: maybe new languages
    June/July: new levels

    After: ???

Last news: Pingouin & Raptor passed 5000 downloads 😎🎉
Not bad for a game I made by myself 😅

2 years of AFK Arena Fanarts!

I finally completed this series of fanarts! 64 characters from AFK Arena:

 
I started playing AFK Arena about 2 years ago and I love that game and its art direction so much I made those fanarts for fun and training my skills!

I use the app Pixaki on an iPad pro with an Apple Pencil, and sometimes I finalize my work on Photoshop. 100x100px for each character (but some needed more space for their weapons!).

With time, my style changed a little and I redid some of them. 

I still find some too small or too big, but it's okay, it shows an evolution!

Half way through this series, I made bigger fanarts based on their amazing concept art:

I also tried digital painting sometimes, while learning to use Procreate and Photoshop apps:

I had a lot of fun, and I learnt a lot!!! I don't know if I will make more AFK Arena fanarts in the future, anything is possible! But I will focus on my own work for a while.

Thanks for following this journey, and thanks to Lilith Games for this game and all the inspiration it brought me!

See ya!

Pingouin & Raptor: Hidden Object is finally out!

Great news, Pingouin & Raptor: Hidden Object is now available on Google Play:
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.tuesdayquest.HiddenObject

It's been a long and crazy journey! 3 years ago I was studying programming and I was attending GameCodeur's game jams each month, where I made prototypes -mostly- alone. 😆
(Some are still playable on itch.io!)

In December 2017 a friend from work challenged me to complete and publish one game. And now I can say: I DID IT! 🌟

Tuesday Quest published my game under their new banner: Tuesday Camp. They'd like to help other solo developers like me get published on mobile stores.

About the future:

New languages will be added this Summer: Spanish, German and Italian (English and French are already available). 

The iOS version is in production.

I'm working on new levels that will be added to the game this Autumn!

What I learnt with this project:
Some programming (obviously) 
Making a game alone takes way more time than I thought or wished 😅

I'm not good at promoting myself or my game, I seriously need to get better at this or pay someone else to do it! 😅😅

Anyways, I finally took some time to rest and soon I will be back to work fully recharged!

Former posts about the game:
The beginning: part 1 - part 2 - part 3

Production: part 1 - part 2 - part 3

Events: Epinay Games - Japan Tours Festival

VF : 

Ca y est Pingouin & Raptor: Hidden Object est enfin disponible sur Google Play : 

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.tuesdayquest.HiddenObject

Ce fut long et périlleux... 😆

En 2017 j'ai commencé à apprendre à programmer avec GameCodeur, et chaque mois je réalisais un petit prototype pour participer aux gamejams de l'école (Certains sont encore disponibles sur itch.io).

En décembre la même année, un ami me lançait le défi de terminer et publier un jeu "pour voir", et je peux maintenant dire : C'EST FAIT !

Tuesday Quest a publié mon jeu sous leur nouveau label : Tuesday Camp, grâce auquel ils souhaitent aider d'autres petits créateurs à publier leurs jeux sur Android et iOS.

Et ensuite :
De nouvelles langues seront ajoutée dans le jeu cet été : l'espagnol, l'allemand et l'italien (l'anglais et le français sont déjà disponibles).
La version iOS est en cours de préparation.
Je travaille maintenant sur de nouveaux niveaux qui, si tout se passe bien, devraient être ajoutés dans le jeu cet automne !

Ce que j'ai appris avec ce projet :

Programmer des trucs (forcément) 

Faire un jeu tout seul ça prend biiiiiiien plus de temps que ce que j'aurais voulu ou imaginé. 😅
Je suis nulle pour faire la promo de mon travail. Il faut vraiment que je m'améliore ou que je paie quelqu'un pour le faire à ma place ! 😅😅

Finalement, j'ai pu prendre un peu de temps pour me reposer et recharger mes batteries !

Stay tuned!

Hey Pingouin, what's up?!

Since we attended the Japan Tours Festival late February, things have been a little bit chaotic, as you can imagine!

I'm lucky though, the video game industry is not too much affected by the world current situation, and I'm used to work from home. 

The Tuesday Quest team have regular meetings online, Hungry Cat Picross is doing okay, my other clients are fantastic, and I can now officially announced that Pingouin & Raptor: hidden object will be the first game published by Tuesday Camp (from Tuesday Quest)!

We made great progress before the lock down here in France, and I've almost completed the 15 levels of the game! One more room to design, a lot of polishing, bugs to fix, translations to add and we may publish the game before Summer (I'm such an optimist 😄).

15 rooms

VF :

Comme vous pouvez l'imaginer, depuis le Japan Tours Festival fin février, les choses ont été plutôt compliquées !

Mais j'ai de la chance, l'industrie du jeu vidéo n'est pas la plus touchée par la situation mondiale actuelle, et j'ai l'habitude de travailler chez moi.

On se réunit en ligne régulièrement avec l'équipe de Tuesday Quest, tout se passe bien pour Hungry Cat Picross, mes autres clients sont vraiment cools, et je peux maintenant annoncer officiellement que Pingouin & Raptor: hidden object sera le tout premier jeu édité par le Tuesday Camp de Tuesday Quest !

Le développement du jeu a beaucoup progressé avant le confinement, et j'aurai bientôt terminé les 15 pièces du jeu ! Il me reste une pièce à créer, beaucoup de finitions, quelques bugs à corriger, les textes et traductions à ajouter et il est encore possible que le jeu sorte avant l'été (je reste optimiste 😄).