"Horde mode" up for download!

Howdy folks! We've uploaded the Horde mode stand-alone demo for you to try out. The game is still unfinished of course, and there are some character animations missing. You can grab the demo at either GameJolt or IndieDB. Happy hunting!

Updating the user interface

Hello there, readers!

We're now in the progress of going through the assets, and giving them the polished look that they need. One of the first things we're going to update, is the dialogue screen.

From the above you can see the new design on its graphics. We've beefed up the size on the dialogue, and given the portraits these little animations. Now the characters blink, move their head, or do some little movement like that.

It's weird and exciting to see the new dialogue screen in-game, as you've watched the previous version for so long. Every day of gamedev requires constant testing, running the game with different fixes and seeing what's fixed. The former iteration of  the dialogue screen just seemed like an alpha version of the design, and not something that belongs in the full game.

One of the major things that we're updating is the main menu. We're not only giving it a graphical re-haul, but adding some features like the Horde mode, Art gallery and Encyclopedia. The horde mode will be an extra survival-type game mode, where you can visit a couple of the environments from the actual game in a different, alternate timeline. 

In this timeline the corruptive forces have spread much further, and all the locations are crawling with enemies. The environments will have a different look in this playmode, and will be redesigned to fit the mood. In horde mode, you will collect powerups and top your high score, as you survive further against the enemy onslaught. 

Our inventory screen is also going through a new iteration, along with the objectives and map screen. The old version was never meant to be shipped as a part of the finished product, and was made only to display all the important information. We're trying to enhance up the UI elements, but also trying to keep the simplicity of it. The hud should represent the theme and evoke the right kind of feeling about the gameworld. 

The paper doll graphics of Bob also needed to be redone. The previous one was intended as a placeholder from the start, and was waiting to get replaced. As our character designer Vesa-Pekka is currently busy with the last animations of Bob, I had to take on the task of creating these little images. 

We might do another iteration of the Bob picture seen above. It really depends on how much time we'll have late in development. We have this principle that we'll focus on the assets which are most regularly seen during gameplay, and give those a facelift. We will also go through the scenes, write some new stuff for them, and add some new interactive objects.

There's still no set release date, but we'll deliver the finished game by the end of this year. After that, we'll see if there's still something that needs fixing and patch it. We can't wait to get the game to players and hear their feedback. Although we've had internal testing and QA on the game, it's impossible to predict how the game will work with a larger audience. 

Friday diaries: Main quest completed

Hello there, readers! Folks, we've finally got to the point in our development where you can actually complete the main quest! The ending is still placeholder at the moment, as we haven't created the final artwork for it yet. Second piece of news: on November 15, 2014 we conceived the first concept for Kalaban. So we're officially two years into development, yay!

Bob takes a hit from a canine mutant.

We're going for this comic book (or rather motion comic) style cinematic, instead of a fully animated movie. We have received a lot of feedback from the silly cinematic that we did for our Steam Greenlight trailer a while back, and we won't be making a prerendered cinematic for the ending. The trailer really split viewers, and people have clearly expressed that they want to see something less cheesy, and more polished, so we'll respond to that demand.

We might do a small treat for those of you who actually enjoyed the prerendered cinematic. But more on that later. Right now we're focusing on the core game, and putting all our time and effort into that.

Attempting to sneak past the enemy. Unsuccessfully.

So, all the key NPCs are now fully implemented in the game, and you can interact with them. We haven't added the feature to kill any NPCs yet, because that would give us a ton of headache right now.

Making the NPCs die, and stay that way, is easy of course, but we're constantly testing the game and playing with it while developing the other features. So, you would have to mess with the save games, and restore earlier state every time you've killed one off. So, NPC killing will be one of the very last things to be added into the game, just a heads up if you're one of our Early Access testers.

Mini-puzzle: Discovering the key and unlocking the house.

On that matter, we've decided to move out of Early Access at the end of November, and focus fully on the development of the final game. Those who have bought the Early Access version will still be able to play it, and will receive the Steam key for the finished game, once it's in the store.

We just want to give our 100% for the final parts of the development, and prepare a really kick-ass experience for all of you to enjoy. Right now we're implementing a bunch of beauty fixes, and stuff that we haven't got time to implement before. We wanted to have all the scenes finished, before we got into the fine detail and adding those finishing touches.

 We recently revised the drag & drop system in the inventory.

A few things in the UI will get revised, and we will look at the writing in the game. We will also go through all the scenes and add story flavor, items and bunch of visual stuff, that isn't there yet.

Our estimated release date is December 20th, and that's what we're still aiming for. We've been reluctant to give out a confirmed date, because as you know, software development is quite tricky and full of surprises. But we'll let you guys know the date, as soon as it's confirmed.

Bob exploring and discovering clues at the junkyard.

 

So, if you haven't tested out our Early Access and want to do so, head over to GameJolt and get yourself a copy. It costs 6 dollars at the moment, which is around 30% less than the price on the finished game. After the end of this month, you will have to wait for the finished game to pop up on the Steam store page with the actual retail price.

That's it for this week, thanks for reading everybody!

Friday diaries: Quality control

Hello there!

A big part of game development is refining stuff that you've already created, be it code, sound effects or graphics. Sometimes it's also taking stuff out permanently, bits and pieces which don't fit the narrative or overall story.

This week we'll take a peek into what's been left on the cutting room floor, and what features or assets have been altered during the process. Of course we'll be talking about the highlights, not every single thing that has changed during development. 

Background art

The home road scene from one of the first builds, circa February 2015.

Comparison shot from one of the background assets.

Especially the early scenes, which have been there from the start, have gone through many iterations. The graphical style has been re-hauled a couple of times, and that has required  some drastic changes. At first, we created the environments in this very fantasy-like fashion, with crazy lights and mostly prerendered stuff. 

During the spring of 2015 we moved to a more serious tone with the background art, and revised the areas to look more realistic. Trees looked like they could belong in the real world, and ground looked more realistic. Of course there's still this comic-book style flavor to the assets, but now they at least  represent actual real-life scenes, instead of this very abstract and game-like environment. 

The third version of the background art came when we decided to set the game permanently at night, or at the hours of dusk. All the lights would be pre-set in the locations, and the sun would never come up. An eerie fog rolls over the scenes, and there is an ominous glow to some areas. Most of the areas look very different, than they looked during daylight. 

Art style 

Original design of the big house on the left, and current version on the right.

Screenshot from the current version of the game; the abandoned gas station.

This is partially related to the earlier point, but this one is about the big picture. In the very first draft our game was designed to feature a fully top-down view. Then, we tried to create a sidescrolling concept, but that lacked all the fun and engaging gameplay that we wanted to achieve. After that we settled on this slightly slanted bird's eye vision. It was supposed to function like a top-down game in the code, and reveal a bit more about characters and environment, but it soon transformed into this isometric type of deal. Now we have to deal with things being behind other things, walls to become transparent once you're inside the building, and avoid player overlapping things.

When we finally got past the initial birth pain, I took some time to sketch stuff out, and think about how I wanted the whole game to look and feel. In the spring of 2015 I had recently watched the Nirvana documentary Cobain: Montage of Heck, which featured these beautiful hand-animated sequences. Those became one of my main inspirations in creating the look for this little mid-nineties Finnish town. 

Another key inspiration at that time was the wonderful artwork done by Simon Stålenhag. He has created some really unique vistas, which perfectly capture the bleak and beautiful nordic atmosphere. 

Enemy design

The old enemy design in motion. This build is from the summer of 2015.

The evolution of the Bruiser design.

One character asset, which has gone through most iterations, is the 'Bruiser' monster, also known as 'The werewolf monster'. The very first version was this demon-like hairy blob of flesh, which was inspired by Warhammer chaos miniatures. Then, we took the design to a more standard humanoid / werewolf form, which is more streamlined and clear visually. 

The writing 

One of the more grislier bits of Kalaban, seen in the current version of the game.

Oh yes, even the core of our storytelling has changed quite a bit. Kalaban was originally set during the winter, in some generic American little town. The town was overrun by demons and monsters, but we then decided to make the story and setting more personal. The date was set to be in 1995 in early development, and frankly it could've been set in -94 or -96 as well during that time. Somehow just setting it in the smack center resonated with us, especially with the cultural transition happening during that time. For example, the album Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness by The Smashing Pumpkins, and films like Se7en coming out that year.

All the dialogue and interactions in the game are written by either Tuukka or me. We've discussed about the tone and the themes endlessly. If something needed to go, it was axed. If something had to be added, we worked it into the game. Earlier this year we did a huge re-haul to the story, and decided to add the NPCs into the game, with their own little side quests. Now, it would be impossible to think about the game without those characters. They are an integral part of the experience. 

User interface

Original UI from early 2015, where inventory bar was always visible and in real-time.

Comparison between the old icons, and the new.

The UI in Kalaban has been through a lot of changes. Originally, we started the game as a purely horror-themed adventure game, and then moved more towards action adventure genre. We needed to add the inventory screen to the game, so that players could manage their hotbar and the items they're carrying, all without interruptions. 

This gave the game more action RPG type of flavor. The changes and reworks took a long time to refine. We started planning the new inventory in October 2015, and at first it was going to be a drop-down menu like in the early Fallout games. We then opted for a more standard grid-based view, but that meant scrapping the previous system entirely. 

Not only have we redesigned the interface over and over, but we've also thrown away the old icons. They were created in the early stages of our development, and they no longer represented the overall visual fidelity of the project. The current ones are better in line with the present art style.

Initial sketch art of the drop-down style inventory, with old icons as placeholders. 

Current version of the inventory screen, with ammunition counters and the classic paper doll. 

But it was the right call, and that choice gave the inventory a lot more clarity, without having to scroll through the whole list, and sub-tabs. Ease-of-use and speed are everything when you're creating the UI, and that's what we went for. 

Now you can drag & drop items to your hotbar, like the health items and weapons, and equip them in real-time. The inventory screen pauses the whole game, so you don't have to worry about enemy attacks, as you read through the flavor text. 

 Sound design

We can't present you the current sound fx, so we present some moving pictures.

The original sound design in Kalaban was godawful. It was just a bunch of freeware and stock effects cobbled together by me. They were only meant to give you a general idea of what you might hear in the game. For the longest time, we did not have a real sounds for any of the inventory items, or effects for the UI. Those details were only recently been added to the game. 

The enemy sounds in the game were particularly awful in early development. The werewolf monster taunts were recorded by me, and I made them as total placeholders, so that they could be replaced at any time. Now, finally after a long wait, our audio mastermind Eetu re-designed the mutant sound effects. And my god, they're a thousand times better than the old ones!

Combat with the Blow-up mutant. 

In other news

Our game was finally launched on Steam Greenlight on Halloween. Some people have missed the point of our very retro intro cinematic, which is not that surprising. I do understand, that for those people who have not grown up with PC games of the nineties, that cinematic can be really confusing. Some people thought that it was just laziness to create such visuals, or that perhaps we don't care enough to put more effort. 

But in fact, the cinematic looks pretty much exactly like we wanted it to look. We wanted to faithfully re-create the cgi videos from the mid-nineties, and all the details in that animation was done with this in mind. The game in itself is done with a quite serious tone. We wanted to have a bit of fun with the trailer, and show our love for the old cinematics, and their wonderfully cheesy nature.

I think people have different kind of ideas about nostalgia. A show like the Stranger Things is set in the 80s, and takes story cues from the old Stephen King stories and Spielberg movies. But at the same time it has very modern visuals, with CGI effects, and all the frames looking polished and perfectly lit. That's what viewers today expect, not the authentic retro quality, which would actually represent the era truthfully. And that is totally fine. We've been taught to expect the certain kind of visuals, no matter what the subject.

Anyways, our game is on Greenlight right now, so go give it a thumbs up, and help us fulfill our dreams: Kalaban at Steam Greenlight.

Friday diaries: Creating the Greenlight trailer

Hello there!

On Halloween we're going to put the game up on Steam Greenlight to be voted into the store. We're currently rushing to get the intro cinematic finished. It will be featured with the in-game footage.

We envisioned this cinematic to be the cheesiest and most glorious retro nineties piece we can create. All prerendered graphics of course. So first we began by sketching out the look for it. We had something like the cg cutscenes of Command & Conquer (1995), the intro video to Dungeon Keeper (1997) and the introduction to Diablo (1996) in mind. The scanline effect, the hammy post-production effects and jerky animations were a must have.

About three weeks ago I learned how to create this very retro-looking, but kinda awesome fog effect in 3D Studio Max. The moment I saw that on screen, a lightbulb went off in my head. It looked almost exactly the same that I had seen in the first Command & Conquer many years ago. Now, looking back, that game and Red Alert (1996) had awesome in-between mission cinematics, done with top level computer graphics at the time. When I saw those cutscenes for the first time, I was genuinely impressed, and I had no idea how they animated them.

All of the scenes in this Kalaban cinematic however, have been created in a frenzy. We only had about a week to create the whole animation, due to the fact that we also had to make the game look commercial before the trailer. The character animations proved to be especially tricky, the monsters in particular. They're the same models used in the in-game sprites, and because they were never properly rigged, I had to get crafty with their animations.

I'm personally a sucker for all things nineties, especially the video game cinematics of that era. The live action FMVs (full-motion video) are my absolute guilty pleasure. The ones in old Command & Conquer titles are one of the best that I've ever seen. These days of course you can run photorealistic graphics in real-time, but back in the day developers had to resort to animations or acted out scenes to achieve that cinematic feel.

We still haven't done live action cutscenes at Rayhouse Productions. That's because building the sets, getting the props, the costumes and hiring the professional actors requires a lot of money. Even a half-decent cast requires some dough, not to mention a place to shoot the scenes in. Since Kalaban is strictly a low-budget indie game, we can't afford those yet. Who knows, if this game is successful, maybe you'll see some live action cutscenes in the future.

Be sure to check out Kalaban, once it goes live on Steam Greenlight, and be sure to give it a thumbs up!

KALABAN at Steam Greenlight

Friday diaries: Games that inspire us - Part 4

Hello, readers!

This week we will be wrapping up with our line of 'Games that inspire us'. There might still be one possible future recommendation after this, we'll see.

Honorable mentions

So, basically there are just way too many games for us to even count, which have inspired us during the years. I personally got my first computer in 1997, and during those first couple of years I played A LOT of games. I mean, I tried every possible demo and shareware I could get my hands on. Sports games, racing titles, boxing games, turn-based strategy games, you name it. Back then I was just so amazed by this new interactive medium (for me) that I wanted to try 'em all out.

A point worth mentioning is that we didn't have an internet connection when I started my gaming hobby. Nope, the games came on demo CDs, or on some friend's floppy disks. If I would've instantly had a decent internet connection, downloading and trying out games would've been so much easier. In my youth, we either bought magazines which had these CDs on them, or swapped existing ones around. So that way I never had this surplus of games, that the kids today have.

And also, at that time not every PC ran every PC title. Even if your computer was brand new. Our first computer had an integrated 2MB graphics chip, which didn't allow hardware acceleration. That would've required buying an extra graphics card, which we couldn't afford at the time. So, my first 3D shooters were all software rendered.

Quake II (1997) with software rendering VS. with hardware acceleration. 

1. id Software games

 

 Keen 4 on the left, and the first scene of Kalaban on the right.

At first I was going to mention Doom (1993), because that game has had such a huge impact on PC gaming in general. But come to think of it, most of the 90s id titles have inspired me as a game designer. You can look at the overworld screen in Keen 4 (1991) for example, and see that it looks similar to the overhead perspective in Kalaban. I used to play that game a lot with my big sister, and I think we once got the whole game beat. The game also had this open-ended Zelda style design, where you would unlock different parts of the map, or access them once you've acquired a certain item.

The influence of Quake (1996) also cannot be underestimated. The game has a very strong Lovecraftian horror theme, and the sound design is to this day nothing short of fantastic. The game takes place in alternate dimensions, which are really nightmarish and gave me night terrors for years. Gameplay-wise it's a classic old school shooter with highly tactical combat, and it really takes the players to their absolute limit. The opening area in Quake is also really clever, starting immediately ingame, and letting you choose your difficulty and episode while getting used to navigating the 3D world.

2. Warcraft II: Tides of Darkness (1995)

 

  Comparison of the horde in Warcraft II, and the one in Kalaban.

This one is a bit more specific. I first encountered Blizzard's Warcraft II on a demo disc, and I hadn't played the first one at that point. I had only seen the first one on my school's computer as a shareware. Some of the older boys from my school had installed it on the machine at the back of our classroom. We used to play Warcraft and other shareware titles in between classes on that computer.

But back to Warcraft II. I remember instantly falling in love with the hand-crafted animations in this game. The design on the characters and the world is masterfully done, and you can see that the developers clearly put a lot of time and effort into it. In my mind, the graphics still look pretty neat today. I think that the art style in this game has stood the test of time better than some of the more photorealistic titles of the same era. You really get the impression that you're controlling miniatures, which have come to life on a real-time battlefield.

Also, a thing worth mentioning is that when we began creating the character animations for Kalaban, this game was our main starting point with the look and the perspective. It's not a straight-up imitation of course, but something we drew inspiration from. Warcraft II has this slightly slanted topdown look, which isn't really isometric. Bonus mention goes to the wonderfully cheesy cutscenes, with some fantastically overdone voice-acting. Everything in these early Warcraft titles (and often Blizzard games in general) feels epic, and everything is so grand that even the voiceover feels in place. The story in itself is quite serious, but the game is filled with comedy.

 3. Blood (1997)

 

In comparison, neither one of the games shy away from gore and horror-themed settings.

To anyone who has seen Kalaban in motion, this is should not come as surprise. Cultists, masses of undead minions, a gothic-themed 1920s setting and of course, tons of gore. This classic horror shooter from Monolith Productions has it all. This game is personally one of my favorite FPS games of all time, and not just an inspiration for Kalaban. Growing up, this game was both haunting and exciting, but to be honest, it never got into my head like Quake did. I might've had dreams about it, but not nightmares. Maybe it's the more cartoony violence and sprite characters, but even as a kid I was perfectly able to distance Blood from reality.

I think the level design in the game is superb, and it was done with the same engine as Duke Nukem 3D (1996). The theme in this game is well-presented, and it's consistent, although the game makes many pop culture references, to both horror movies and written fiction. The easter eggs and secrets in the game are wonderful, and always a joy to find.

The protagonist in Blood, Caleb, is an undead gunslinger and without a doubt an antihero. We wanted the action to match the craziness which goes on in Blood, just from a topdown perspective. Storytelling-wise the games are quite different, as Blood is an old school shooter, and its levels are basically 3D monster mazes.

4. Diablo (1996)

 The first boss in Diablo, and the aftermath of a battle in Kalaban.

The loot, the monsters, the creepy and shadowy environments. Ah yes, where would we be without Diablo? Like Warcraft, this game was also developed by Blizzard Entertainment, but by another team called the Blizzard North. I do have to confess that Diablo II (2000) had a much larger impact on me than the first one, but it was a necessary step in evolution. The game still has a fantastic atmosphere, and I like that they've taken the hardcore idea of roguelikes and put it into a mainstream game.

The game was a modern, realtime take on the role-playing and dungeon crawling. There had been a few similar titles like it on the PC, such as the Ultima 8 (1994) from Origin, but none of those were done with the same level of quality. Diablo truly is a "gameplay first" type of game, where it lets you get right into action.

The game has a branching storyline, and when you start the game, you can never know which one the game is going to choose. In addition to that of course, the environments are procedurally generated. Advancing towards Diablo, the main antagonist in the game, is pretty straightforward, as you descend to the hellish dungeons beneath the cathedral. When you've reached a whole new area in the dungeon, an exit appears on the overworld, through which you can travel back to where you were.

Diablo really sticks to the wisdom that simple is beautiful, and it doesn't hold back important information from the player. Everything in the UI is simplistic and straightforward. The chance for a better loot drop makes you wanna replay the game, time after time.

The misconceptions

 

A lot of people have told us that Kalaban reminds them of Postal (1997). Maybe it's the art style, the perspective or that both of the games feature brown-coated men as protagonists. I don't know, to me it seems a bit weird. Sure, I have played Postal 1 and 2, but neither of those games have inspired me in creation of this title.

The abandoned gas station in Kalaban.

Kalaban is more of an open-ended story simulator, where Postal games are like Carmageddon: you can choose to complete the challenges, or play around killing NPCs for fun. They thrive on shock value, and that has not been our goal. Sure, our game has a lot of gore and horror elements, but it's all done in a story-oriented manner.

I think the closest analogy of our game would be topdown System Shock, with a retro alternate history theme. Sure, the gameplay is a bit different and our game has NPCs instead of emails and audio logs, but the goals are similar. The game has RPG style mechanics, but without leveling up and gathering experience. Some might call it "Metroidvania", others would compare it to Zelda, but the official genre of course is "action adventure".

Friday diaries: Games that inspire us - Part 3

 

Hello there!

It's time for another tale of inspirational games. This week we have the Sanitarium (1998), a demented and weird adventure game. The game is seen from an isometric perspective, with prerendered cutscenes thrown in between and in the middle of story sections.

Our mockup of Sanitarium set in the world of Kalaban.

I first saw this game in Pelit magazine back when it was released. During that time I was more interested in 3D shooters and real-time strategy games, so I never got my hands on this game back then. The first time I properly saw it in action was during a screenwriting session with Tuukka, in early 2011. The atmosphere was instantly haunting and chilling, as the game starts from an asylum, and you can't remember anything. Your head is wrapped in bandages, and you've been in an accident.

During an early section you explore a town filled with disfigured children, with no adults in sight. The story immediately raises scary questions: Who are these kids? What happened to the adults? Did the kids murder them?

I've always found psychological horror and atmospheric stories to be more interesting than straight-up gore fests. When I think of gory movies and games, I think of works such as Total Recall (1990) or Blood (1997). To me the gore factor takes away the tension, and it takes direction more towards a macabre thrillride. They may shock you, but they will not truly get inside your head.

On that note, there will be a couple of graphic scenes in Kalaban too. The game is seen from a topdown perspective though, so it takes a certain distance to the shock factor.

To me, one of the few works which successfully combines gore with psychological tension is John Carpenter's 1982 The Thing remake. It has a haunting atmosphere, filled with paranoia and suspense. And it also features truly nightmarish monster visuals, all done with masterful practical effects.

Sanitarium has some elements of graphic content, but it's always done in a way that enhances the atmosphere. I'm personally a huge fan of prerendered artwork, especially from an isometric perspective, so this game has a special place in my heart. There's just something about prerendered art that makes me feel cozy. One of my favorite games of all time, Diablo II (2000), also has really timeless prerendered art. Of course, prerendered art is not just a thing of the nineties and early 2000s, and it's still used in games today, like the Clash of Clans (2012) mobile game.

When we started creating the current topdown version of Kalaban back in January 2015, I remember thinking about this game. The writing on the first scene reminded me very much of the style in Sanitarium. The way you click on things, and the way Bob comments on them, etc.

Kalaban was originally designed as a three act story, but we decided to put our focus on the first act and make it as good as we can. The original idea was that first part would be more like an adventure game, second part would be more action-oriented with open-world exploration, and the final part would be all action. Now, all of those elements will be in the current game we're working on.

I'm a strong believer of games that serve a smaller world with lots of detail, instead of a huge open world sandbox with shallow gameplay. Sanitarium is definitely a game that belongs in the former category.


In case you haven't tested out the Early Access of Kalaban yet, then download the newest version now: