So one thing I’ve been putting off on Arashi’s final animations are the apparently infamous walking cycles.\u00a0 I’ve had no training or schooling in animation so this has been kind of a kick in the face out of nowhere; apparently drawing a walk cycle is much more difficult than other, more exaggerated actions.<\/p>\n
It’s pretty amazing actually, when I started the game I was not sure I could do more than 3 frames for ANY animation, just to keep things timely.\u00a0 As I get better at drawing Arashi in various poses and actions, I realize I want to do things right<\/em>.\u00a0 So now, somehow I have an 8 frame walk cycle animation in 4 directions.\u00a0 32 frames just for walking…\u00a0when most people will be running (which takes a few less frames per direction).\u00a0 If anything, it may demonstrate the level of detail I’m willing to give to this game world.<\/p>\n Another thing that has changed over the course of developing the game is the core combat sequence.\u00a0 Originally Arashi wasn’t going to have access to\u00a0the skillset her\u00a0Shadowdawn<\/em>-future self would have, but there’s actually going to be a decent (let alone logical)\u00a0explanation for why any of her skills she learns in this game won’t necessarily carry over to the game set later, so I’ve been expanding her “Mirage Blade” (aka shinkirouken<\/em>) abilities to be a core part of her levelling-up system – which in turn became fully integrated into the combat design.\u00a0 This helps both offense and especially defense, something I’ve been most worried about is that people won’t realize how powerful defensive abilities are in this game versus simple brute force which most action RPGs devolve into.\u00a0 Maybe I’ve learned something from Demon’s Souls… I can’t be afraid to make a game challenging as long as there’s a solution to be found \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n I’ll try to get some video recorded of Arashi doing stuff other than standing around once I finish cleaning up the frames for walking and running, so everyone can have something visual (just showing a screenshot of one frame isn’t very exciting I guess)<\/p>\n