I am making a very similar game. I had mine inspired by games like Baldur's Gate, so naturally I'm going with point and click. I also have an extensive HUD. Mine is probably going to be solely inside a castle though. I haven't decided yet. I've been working on it for quite a while, and it's been challenging. I haven't shown it off much yet.

I use both Modo and Zbrush. Modo has proven very helpful for this kind of game.

Anyway, yours is looking pretty good so far. Are you only going to use 4 directions? It felt a bit awkward trying to go straight in any direction since it only went in diagonals.

I finally got my camera set up in Modo so I can easily bring in isometric animated sprites with ease. That took a lot of work, but will be so nice and save me so many clicks. I don't even have to open the image in Photoshop before bringing into Construct 2 anymore.

My only concerns are memory use. This is why I'm going to keep the levels small. Since I'm aiming for a roguelike, this will make it easier to randomize as well. I believe Ashely recommend to stay under 500 (possibly 400) for max compatibility with PCs. If you're going for mobile, I figure it will be even harder.

I posted something about this topic not too long ago. It didn't seem to get much attention.

The reception on Steam Greenlight Concepts and FB indie devs has been rather cold (and a tad hostile from some) because of the game's appearance. It seems that any game using physics puzzles and silhouettes will instantly be compared (with 'clone' accusations abounding) to Limbo... I'm having a good think about whether or not to invest the next few months of my time trying to make this work as a full-up game, or just put it down to learning.... The snag is that using silhouettes allows me to get away with much more simple graphics than I would otherwise have to use; even the animated character is full of limb-position crimes that you can't see because it's all black. I also like the visual appearance the silhouette gives... Meh...

Throughout the process of making a game, I often find it useful to write down problems and questions, then find solutions.

Here are some examples.

Problem: My game is being compared to Limbo.

Questions:

1. What made Limbo special?

2. What makes my game special?

3. What can I do to make my game stand out?

Problem: I'm not sure if the silhouette style is being well received.

Questions:

1. What can I do to improve how it looks without changing styles?

2. Is the background style complimentary to the foreground?

3. Can I use this style to add interesting game mechanics or features?

4. Can this style enable me to do things I could otherwise not do?

5. Is this the best choice for my game?

Problem: I'm not sure if I have the motivation for this.

Questions:

1. Was I motivated when I started? Why?

2. Can I keep motivation until the end?

3. If I am not motivated, why?

4. Why would I want to finish this?

5. Why would I want to abandon this?

6. What is keeping me from finishing it, and how can I overcome it?

Well, anyway, you get the idea. I do this all the time. Looking at each problem objectively can often lead to new ideas or solutions. It can also help you determine if this is a good project to finish or not. If you keep running into problems you can't solve, it may be best to start fresh. Otherwise, keep going!

Well, the real deciding factor would be the environment/level graphics. The first character would need a similar style of level graphics to match. When we see how the characters would look in-game, it will make a difference. You've shown the pixel art character in-game, but are you going to do new level graphics for the vector character?

In brief, EA are often unfinished games that rely on pre-purchasers to support its continuing development. A bonus for supporting the game during development is player feedback in theory helps make for a better finished game. The problem is many EA games in the past don't ever get finished so its received a bad reputation. Many EA titles are also broken, full of bugs and are unplayable or with very little content so gamers auto-skip over any EA games.

TNP is definitely not like most EA games, its very polished with a good amount of content. If its sold as a finished game right now, it will do well and justify its price tag.

Thanks, that definitely clears things up. As many games as I've bought off Steam, I've never even looked at early access.

imothep85 I'll answer in English so everyone can understand. Steam doesn't allow devs to share numbers. That said, no, it isn't a hit or even a small success for now, not even close. Early access games don't sell much if there is no zombies or craft in it.

After a 2 years development and a small advance on revenues to finish the game I still have to give back, I'm far to have made any money with it.

What is early access? My goal is to get on Steam, but my game won't be ready for a few months. As long as I get it done by the end of the year, I'll be happy. But when I hear people talking about Steam and not making anything from it, it makes me nervous. I'm not looking to get rich right away, but it has to be worthwhile at least.

I guess when you have shading and shadows on the ground you can't mirror.

40 frames would be smooth.

If you keep the light mostly overhead, you can still get away with mirroring. Most old isometric games seem to keep the shadows mostly underneath. I will have another look at them and see soon, but I most likely will mirror at least a few animations to save some time and memory usage.

At least 8 frames for each sprite. Animations would add to that literally exponentially.

Well, I think some of the directions could be done with mirroring, so you wouldn't really need all 8.

Here is a test render I made a while back in Modo. I think some of these could be left out and mirrored. Baldur's Gate did it that way. I saw the shield switch hands while turning.

I have a couple isometric prototypes going, an RPG and an RTS. I haven't gotten enough done on the RTS to show it off yet, but here is a pic of the RPG.

The RPG prototype is tile based. I originally made it using an array to generate random levels, but later decided to place them manually for more control.

The bottom picture shows the grid system I built in Photoshop to easily place tiles that would lock into place on a grid in Construct 2. This took several hours to make. Basically, the first frame of the animation is the grid, and it changes to the actual ground image when the game starts. This produces less clutter in Construct 2, and enables fast placement of tiles.

I never finished this RPG prototype, so the character models are still Golden Axe placeholders!

I am currently working on the RTS because I think it will be easier. It doesn't need a grid since it will be on an open map with a tiled background. Everything will still be isometric though.

I am basically taking the approach of older games like Baldur's Gate with pre-rendered 3d images (made with Modo and Zbrush).

Unfortunately, Construct 2 does not have any built-in framework for isometric games, so you have to set up everything for isometric yourself.

Note that these two pictures are not of the exact same scene, so if you see tiles placed in the bottom image that don't make sense, just ignore them.

Well, I don't know. I mean I have like 16 groups and more to come since the game is still a few months from completion. Some of these groups can have up to 200 events.

I do have an older project that used multiple event sheets, but I didn't really feel like it was any better for me. It can start to get a bit crowded at the top with multiple event sheets.

I can experiment with using multiple event sheets and combining some of these things to try and make it more manageable.

However I do it though, I will probably need to use the search feature to find things from time to time that I forgot which group or event sheet they were in, so this request would still have some use. It seems like I would still get use out of it.

It is sometimes difficult to find what I want even with multiple event sheets. It can get tedious looking at each event to find something. Combining the search feature with the ability to select an event and go to it still seems useful.

Since my projects usually involve large numbers of events, I find myself using the search feature from time to time.

The thing is that I don't always want to work with only the results that the search brought up. Sometimes I just want to get my bearings or find where something is.

As it is now, if I use search, I can find the event I want, but if I clear the search, it scrolls me back to the top.

However, I noticed that I can click an event to highlight it, and it will still be highlighted if I clear the search. If there was a shortcut key or something to click that would go to this highlighted event (and maybe clear the search as well), it would be great.

It would function similar to pressing f2 to go to a bookmark, except in the case it would go to the currently highlighted (or active) event. In other words, the one you last clicked on and is shown as yellow.

If this already exists and I missed it, please let me know.

Alternatively, if this is not possible, maybe add a box near search that will go to what line we type in. So if we use the search and see, okay I need to scroll down to line 880, we could type that in somewhere and save some scrolling or opening folders.

You may have to make 2 versions for Steam, 1 with WebGL + shaders for people with dGPU and one without for those on notebooks on iGPU.

Is there no way to make this an option in-game like at an options menu?