Devlog 1 [March 2021] can be found at these two links: [On RPGMaker . net] or [On the RPG Maker Forums]

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Hello! It’s the end of May, which means it’s time for the next devlog!

There’s a few things I want to discuss, and those are:

1. Sprites (+ Other Things Done This Month)
2. Plans for June+July
3. Thoughts & Plans for the “Major Update”

1] Sprites

So let’s start with the sprites, since that’s what I said I’d be doing in the first devlog.

Honestly, I went pretty beyond what I said I was going to do. Also, it’s pretty important.

In March, all I had planned was to find the right style and get Briar’s idle + walking sprites done. That was mostly because I didn’t know how difficult it would be to settle on a style or animate it, and so I wanted to give myself a lot of time just in case. And while it did take a bit of trial and error, I made a style that I liked a lot! 

Pixel art isn’t my forte anyway, so I’m unsure why I thought I was gonna manage that. Small-scale lineless art, on the other hand...

And the animation process ended up going quicker than I thought, as well! So not only did I finish Briar’s idle pose & walking sprites, but I made Aadrios and Keir’s idle + walking sprites, as well as idle sprites for the other 3 protagonists!

So here comes the playable crew!

Karine, Keir, Briar, Aadrios, Elk, and Jay. This is the first time all 6 have been officially presented. Which do you like, appearance-wise? I’d love to know!

I worked on a number of other things between the two months, such as figuring out each area of the game, starting up on a few mechanics, and otherwise… some of which I’ll be getting into later in this log.

2] Plans for June + July

Sometime next month (June), I want to show a video of the “Barrier” Scene & Miniboss Battle with the new sprites of Briar, Keir, and Aadrios! I hope that you’ll enjoy it!

So to start off June, I’ll be working on Briar, Keir, and Aadrios’ cutscene sprites and battle sprites. At least enough to get this video made. After that, I may need a little break on spriting.

Throughout June + July, I will be posting the fullbodies (& reference sheets) of Karine, Elk, and Jay. The plan is to host a stream on twitch later this month where I draw a fullbody for one of these three. The character that I will draw will be determined by a poll on the twitter account, so go check that out! By the time of posting this, the poll should be up around next week.

In April + May, I also sorted out a lot of the areas these 6 will be traveling to. That’s why one of my primary goals before the next devlog is to start working on the enemies! Whether it’s concept-ing or spriting itself, it’ll be a pretty enemy-focused two months. I’ll be starting that after the Barrier Scene video.

3] Thoughts & Plans for the “Major Update”

So in the first devlog, I talked all about this Major Update Demo and what sorts of things would be in it. I’ve had a good amount of time to think in between logs, and I’ve come to the conclusion that it definitely won’t have all of those things. For one large reason:

THAT’S A LOTTA STUFF!!

Both from my end and the player’s end! Honestly, I’d rather you all not get burnt out, especially since carrying save data would likely not be possible between the “blueprint” major update and the final version. 

I said the Major Update would contain about... 30% of the game? Hey, that’s a pretty sizable amount, honestly. And I hadn’t even realized it at the time, especially given the style of this game! Also, with pretty much all of the features and characters being in that blueprint, there wouldn’t be too much more to look forward to other than the story itself. All six protagonists would be available, and with all the eventing involved in that, I might as well keep going until I finish the full game instead of stopping & making a demo out of what I’ve made.

So, I definitely don’t want this Major Update to drop you at the beginning of the story and play around 30% of it, BUT, I don’t want absolutely no sort of update between now and the completed version of Call of the Overseer.

That’s why, at the moment, I’m heavily leaning towards an eventual “Gameplay” Demo. It’ll be a battle-centric demo that’s almost like a playground for you to experience all 6 characters combat-wise. It would likely consist of one large dungeon that will not be in the final version of Call of the Overseer. There would be little to no story/context involved in this demo, but it would still contain some character dialogue here and there.

I’ve considered other types of demo’s, but this one’s appealing to me the most. Let me know what you think about this sort of demo!

Well, that’s about all I wanted to say for this update, so in conclusion:

• The sprite-making operation was very successful.
• I’ll be posting a video in June of the updated Barrier Scene with the new sprites.
• I’ll primarily be working on figuring out enemies for the next 2 months.
• I plan to host a fullbody drawing stream for the winner of an eventual twitter poll sometime this month.
• I’ve been reconsidering what I want from this “Major Update” demo.

Yeah, that about sums it up! I’m on break now, so I’m hoping to get even more done in these next three-ish months!

So, until next time!