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Concept art from The Upturned

[ If you haven't played The Upturned, beware of spoilers! ]

These are the common enemy types, the Crows and the Chompers (or just "hotel guests", but the game's code refers to them as Chompers). I realized Chompers looked completely unlikeable and lacked character, so I made them cuter.<...

The dark middle phase of development

Hello! One notable thing that happened in the last couple weeks is that I learned a more advanced method of texturing objects, so stuff can look like this while having much less polygons:

I am mostly happy about this, only slightly scared by the fact that it will probably result in a drastic cha...

So many new things!

Hello, and boy do I have some neat things to show you today.

The past two weeks have been spent creating the "anomalies" game mechanic, which is a core mechanic in Lethal Company. There has been a lot of deep thinking about the design of Lethal Company's total randomization and gradually increasing difficulty, which is essential.

As an example of this gross math stuff, I figured out...

What exactly is the objective?

You hear a deep humming down the hall. You call for your friends, but there is no response. Concerned, you drop what you're doing and run to find the source of the deep whirring. As you round the corner, and the deep humming begins to shake your body, you see it. A giant, red pill.

(This is the ...

The long journey of this game's random level generator

The past week has been mostly about getting the level generation the way I want it. That means fidgeting around with it. 

A lot of fidgeting.

There are a few considerations I'm making with these randomly generated levels: 

• Dead ends. How many, and how long are they?
• Loops. The basis of non-linear level design is to have loops, so there's more than one ...
  2022-07-20 19:44:56 +0000 UTC View Post

Why multiplayer?

Hello! If you haven't seen the teaser for Lethal Company, take a look:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vt08pWqO6Og 

The cat is out of the bag so I can talk about it now: Lethal Company is a multiplayer game. Why?

Well, starting most notably with Phasmophobia, the "sur...

It's come a long way, but it has a long way to go.

Hello, I'm in high spirits. Seemingly I fixed most of the issues with Lethal Company which were plaguing me, and it's in another very stable version. Yes, the game is actually functioning pretty reliably it seems! 

Why that last fact is so impressive to me is soon to be revealed when you see what this game really is. Announcement trailer and Steam page are coming soon! I am just wait...

End of first phase of development

This week I did more work on the intro scene, preparing to work on the elevator level transition (which will be seamless, unlike in The Upturned where I didn't bother.) I also added interactable doors and began to add in sound effects and ambiance.

I am at the end of Phase 1 of development, whic...

I figured it out! (Lore and inspirations)

Hello. I solved nearly all the problems I had with the game's objective, and this has allowed me to get things rolling.

(Here is the current elevator model, made by my friend Zenonclaw.)

I won't go into depth describing what the game's concept is now, but I will say that I recognized the "I...

Inventory and Ladders!

Hello, I just got finished setting up my first, basic inventory system. In this video I also show off the ladder system which I made a couple weeks ago. Another major thing in this is the HUD; you might be able to guess that it's inspired by Outer Wilds and a little by Metroid Prime. One of the major things that will set Lethal Company apart from its biggest inspirations (which are still a secr...

New logo art + first piece of music!

The past week I've spent time improving some fundamental code to make the game function. For this project I am required more than ever to organize everything like a maniac and think like a game designer.

And it has been a small emotional journey. I am really amazed that I have gotten this far. It's like this new project is just BARELY making it with my level of expertise--and my luck at f...

What is the game looking like?

Hello! I've spent the past week modelling for the first "intro scene" of the game and adding in more player abilities such as ladder-climbing and crouching.

I've put together this cell-shading / outline shader which is perfect for the aesthetic I'm going for; I want the game to feel stylized yet gritty, and the outlines add so much contrast and roughness to textures.

2022-05-26 04:41:00 +0000 UTC View Post

What is the shape of the game?

Last week I went through some inspiration for the visuals of the game. I've also been brainstorming how this game will play.

Right now I've decided for certain that Lethal Company will be in the first-person perspective, with randomly generated mazes and randomized monsters. I want it to be "infinitely replayable."

The actual shape of it, however, I've been brainstorming. Here are a...

What is my next game called?

WOOO PATREON WOOO YEEEEEAAAHH WOOHOO OH YEAH BABY WOOOOO THIS IS SO CRAZY WHOAAAAAAAAAAA THIS IS GOING TO BE SO EPIC I JUST WANNA SCREAM WOOO

That was the teaser text for non-patrons. Now that they're gone, we can talk. We can get serious.

I suppose you just started supporting me at the start of my patreon, since this is my first post. Thank you! Well, I guess I'll let you in on wha...