Courier Video Series: Systems (and how I did them)

Hey, I started a new video series behind the development of Courier (using C2, of course!). It's sort of a different entity than the devlog thread I keep on the forum, so I wanted to keep all of the video features in one location as they're released.

Don't forget you can help the project out by becoming a patron in the link below!

Systems, systems! Everywhere!

My fifth video feature is a feature about Lorin, your classmate and friend. There's also a special bonus look into the production of the second boss.

Video feature four details some of the texturing techniques I've used in Courier:

My third video feature shows the beginning of the game and how the story starts out:

In this second in the series, I show how maps are made in Courier:

In this first video, I highlight some of the magical abilities you gain in Courier:

very nice, cool features, it starting to look quite the adventure !

I added a new feature today about mapping! See some of my C2 workflow:

I've got a new feature video out! This one you get to see an early (and in-development) look at how the game begins and the start of the story. This is probably one of the biggest looks at the game yet, so check it out!

Nice soundtrack

Great video series, some nice advanced tips for other devs to learn.

Great video series, some nice advanced tips for other devs to learn.

Thanks a bunch! One of the next ones I think is going to get into a bit more of the nitty gritty of how the systems with together. I just need to make sure it stays interesting for the non-devs too.

I added a new feature today about mapping! See some of my C2 workflow:

How many objects in this layout demo at last?

( I guess that it might more than 10,000. )

> I added a new feature today about mapping! See some of my C2 workflow:

>

>

>

How many objects in this layout demo at last?

( I guess that it might more than 10,000. )

yes, I see a lot of instance placed for making the terrain... I would use tilemap for this kind of work, that would be difficult to make all combination for the tilemap, but the result could be almost the same...

>

> > I added a new feature today about mapping! See some of my C2 workflow:

> > [saving space]

> >

> > How many objects in this layout demo at last?

> > ( I guess that it might more than 10,000. )

> >

>

> yes, I see a lot of instance placed for making the terrain... I would use tilemap for this kind of work, that would be difficult to make all combination for the tilemap, but the result could be almost the same...

>

rexrainbow and Ribis

Nothing of the sort. 1,287 objects on the layout after adding a little more after that video was recorded (and 40 MB vram).

Those reasons for not using a tilemap are precisely why I didn't. It would be a much higher workload with potentially inferior results and for a negligible performance increase. Sitting still, I'm at 14% cpu and 60 fps with all of the game systems running. Moving adds z-sorting, dust kick-up from the player, and a few other things so it does increase to about 19-20% cpu then.

I ran experiments with bouncing most of those terrain objects down to paster objects at the start of the layout. It turned out to be far less efficient than just multiple instances of the same objects (which are never checked for collision). It also takes a huge hit to the vram. A tilemap would either lack the diversity or require a significantly higher amount of work. If I put in the time to do all that, and it has that many possible outcomes, though, it actually seems as though it might be heading more intro the realm of huge vram consumption like the paster objects.

So I fully understand it looks strange to use so many instances, but I don't see any better solution in C2 and it has an almost negligible impact on performance so long as I'm not targeting mobile (where fillrate would be the problem).

1,287 objects in a layout totally is fine I guess.

It is impressive that using objects as brushes.

I ran experiments with bouncing most of those terrain objects down to paster objects at the start of the layout. It turned out to be far less efficient than just multiple instances of the same objects (which are never checked for collision). It also takes a huge hit to the vram. A tilemap would either lack the diversity or require a significantly higher amount of work. If I put in the time to do all that, and it has that many possible outcomes, though, it actually seems as though it might be heading more intro the realm of huge vram consumption like the paster objects.

So I fully understand it looks strange to use so many instances, but I don't see any better solution in C2 and it has an almost negligible impact on performance so long as I'm not targeting mobile (where fillrate would be the problem).

I like your method how you making the levels, but how big is the layout?

for example you can use a tilemap (without any collision, just for design) to make some graphics and reduce the instance of the level... it's hard to make the combination with a tilemap, but you can also make 2,3 or more tilemap with different texture and mix together

>

> I ran experiments with bouncing most of those terrain objects down to paster objects at the start of the layout. It turned out to be far less efficient than just multiple instances of the same objects (which are never checked for collision). It also takes a huge hit to the vram. A tilemap would either lack the diversity or require a significantly higher amount of work. If I put in the time to do all that, and it has that many possible outcomes, though, it actually seems as though it might be heading more intro the realm of huge vram consumption like the paster objects.

>

> So I fully understand it looks strange to use so many instances, but I don't see any better solution in C2 and it has an almost negligible impact on performance so long as I'm not targeting mobile (where fillrate would be the problem).

>

I like your method how you making the levels, but how big is the layout?

for example you can use a tilemap (without any collision, just for design) to make some graphics and reduce the instance of the level... it's hard to make the combination with a tilemap, but you can also make 2,3 or more tilemap with different texture and mix together

It would still be extremely limiting to try to make it work into the rest of the game. Even though there are more objects overall with my method, that cliff only took like one frame and then a circle to mask the edges. It only needs to be done for things that aren't straight anyways or to at times give variety to the ground. The level in the demonstration is I think 4,000x3,000 pixels, so I'm quite happy with the object count.

rexrainbow Thanks! I'm more looking at it as a less-limited way to use tiles, really. So most things are made of just big tiled background objects (walls, grass, dirt, etc), sometimes with some masking. I do have a few gigantic layouts that push the object count up quite a bit, but it's never really all on-screen at the same time and I have graphics settings in the menus of the game for users to disable (remove) things like swaying grass and to stop leaves and trees from swaying among other things. It really works surprisingly well, and any other method I've tested would either limit how it looks or crank the vram up considerably.

Alright, it's time for a new video feature! This time it's on texturing:

I show fake reflections, bump map us, multi-layered textures and more!

See some of my design process for character art, animation, cutscene work, and more!