Oh man, that's terrible news, I keep my fingers crossed for your plans and wish you only the best! Regarding the group, I haven't been really active on here and my personal opinion is that smaller groups need their owner/admin around all the time to keep everyone entertained and focus on growth of the community, until the community entertains itself. If you want to invest the extra time and keep it up, I'd be happy to chip in with a few bucks.

Yikes! Get well soon!

I got distracted. Ever since I submitted my last jam game on a "Clipper" flying boat two years ago, I wanted to build something on a river steamer - I love these cozy, enclosed space settings. This year's instance of the same jam started, and I started working on it. Didn't finish due to Easter holidays, but recorded a mood video of what I got so far. Really happy with the outcome.

@Ben B. Thanks! No, this is not part of Beneath The Order, that's what I meant with "distracted". Shiny object syndrome is a pain in the a**! 😆

Great idea. I like the idea of an informal hangout much better than, say, Q&A sessions where you're feeling less entitled to join if you don't have any questions. But I won't add another entry to my schedule until this Christmas madness is over 😅

DEVLOG 03: Beneath The Order | 17/09/2024 | Game Intro Procession Over the last couple of days, I mulled over the game intro. The player is being escorted to a ceremony, along with their brother, as they're both due for implantation of a "radiation protection device". In their community of the so-called "Subsumed", this occasion marks their transition from teenagers to young adults and mine workers. Let's just say this implantation isn't going as planned and this marks the beginning of the game, but that's not the topic of this devlog. The challenge was to guide the player through a cutscene, but an active one, where they can take part, at least in a limited manner. Over in the VR Creator Club community we discussed several approaches and eventually I decided to try a sedan which is being carried through the scene. This turned out to be quite a challenge! I started naively implementing several approaches to position and steer the carriers: first, having one lead object and several follower objects which try to maintain their relative position to the leader. Then, independent NavMeshAgents, still trying to maintain their formation. Things turned out to be too cumbersome in the long run, because for good results, I would have to split their path into many subsegments instead just telling them all "go to the target at the other end of the scene". Also, my narrow alleys didn't really allow me to implement NPCs constantly encircling the player. Getting rid of NavMeshAgents meant looking for alternatives. I even tried flocking behavior with all the steps from Boid's algorithm but that was like breaking a fly on a wheel. Without NavMeshAgents, I also had to ensure that members of the group stayed grounded. I started with gravity, then went for the sledgehammer approach and simply tucked everyone to their raycast-down position. When I finally got a working solution for the formation problems, I had to ensure the carriers work properly: one in front, one behind, hands on the sedan handles, navigating through super tight alleys. They had to move steep stairs up, turn on very tight corners, and the sedan should tilt correctly and somewhat realistically. Sorry for everyone usually playing on high comfort level or with vertigo – the current stage of my implementation really isn't for you!

@Ben B. Hey, thanks for taking the time to record a video and commenting, it was humbling to see you speaking about my game! I didn't catch all of it, though, since the YouTube sound was sometimes a bit too loud. I think you mentioned that the characters look too cute for the game world? Currently I'm working with what I have, i.e. Synty Studios art packs, and I'll use their Sidekicks characters soon for special NPCs, but everything else is beyond what I'm capable to do. I neither have talent nor patience for 3D modeling. Some things are currently hindering me from investing much time, but one of the bigger issues is also quite an important one: I'm starting a new company! Those who read the blog know that I started the game out of a semi-unemployed situation (having to shut down my own business after 14 years since I failed to generate new revenue) and I wanted to take it slow and focus just on the game while making plans for my next career moves. Seems like fate didn't want to leave me hanging for too long: I met someone in a similar situation who was open to start something together, then asked my old co-founder to join, and now we're three guys starting something new. It's also VR and also very close to gamedev, so it's ticking some boxes. This is all pretty much in "stealth mode" right now, so I can't tell more yet. But here's the twist: it's Unreal Engine. Unitys licensing conditions are simply hostile for any business which has consulting/service parts included, so we couldn't use Unity. This was a bit of a learning curve, but I'm getting there. Unity's most recent public license drama (someone on Reddit got his license revoked) makes me doubt I still want to use it, and I'm tempted to migrate my game to UE5, too...