Starspawn: A Miskatonic Mystery

"this is my daughter R'lyeh, pronounced Riley"

We're zeroing in on the elements we want for the top-down 'navigation mode' of the game. There's no combat, but we still want things to feel dynamic and keep you on your toes. We have some exciting traps coming next!

Help me make a dream project: a documentary film (on Blu-ray) about the SCUMM engine and the incredibly-imaginative, brilliant LucasArts games that redefined the adventure genre. It'll feature designers Ron Gilbert and David Fox, artist Mark Ferrari, and many many more, but only with your help.

1 like = 1 instance of Lovecraft using the word "queer"

automated tests heck yeah

They fixed it 🙌 we haz automated UI tests #gamedev

Well gosh darn it. The latest ren’py version adds a powerful automated test suite and good OpenGL optimizations, but also breaks the sprite manager class we depend on for the whole top down mode 😔

When my father asked me what cosmic horror was I had to pick a book he'd actually recognize and I blurted out "Moby Dick." I stand by this. See also: this print.

label .give_diana_grant_seen_prof: main "Yep. He actually made {b}less{/b} sense after that. It almost sounded like he'd been experiencing things in the wrong order." diana "Huh. Okay. That's a new one." main "Dude's nuts." diana "Duh. Did he say anything else?" main "He knew my name before I said anything." diana "Interesting... Well, if he's experiencing things out of order--" main "You're just gonna run with this?" menu(screen="choice", side=True): diana "You got a better theory than time shenanigans?" "In {i}Slaughterhouse-Five{/i} it's a metaphor for PTSD. We probably just met at a mixer or something.": $ game_state.change_rapport(diana, +1) diana "Good reality check. It's always worth considering plain old madness... It {b}could{/b} all be in his head..." main "{b}Something{/b} definitely is." "Lucky guess?": diana "Hunter. I know you don't want any of this to be true, but {b}come on{/b}." main "Okay, umm, he could have... supernatural... luck?" diana "And it turned him into {b}this{/b}? I appreciate your willingness to brainstorm here, but I'm gonna stick with time shenanigans for now." "Literally any theory would be better.": $ game_state.change_rapport(diana, -1) diana "You can't just say that and not provide an alternative. How many impossible things have already happened to you today?" main "More than I'd like, that's for sure." diana "Exactly."

We've been busy working on the script and some top secret UIs, so there hasn't been anything particularly photogenic to share. But here, have a chapter one story beat

Screenshot of the Tiled map editor showing a library. Welcome desk on the bottom, stacks in a T shape, stairs going up to a nice study area. Space beneath the overhang provides nothing

Playing with multi-level maps, doesn't make that much sense as a library at the moment but the tileset looks great. Guess I can't do much with the space under the overhang though (we don't have "you can see through walls if you're under them")

A drawing of a messy and very weird professor's office full of occult items and damaged goods. Translucent pink squares overlay the clickable areas since we're in debug mode

It's Friday night so you know what that means! That's right--we're implementing a point and click puzzle

Happy Happy!

Thank you!

Update 2: Update 2! · Starspawn - Lovecraft Mythos Visual Novel/Dating Sim Feature developmentMap puzzlesWe are continuing to work through our feature backlog. Lately we have focused on two of the top-down-mode adventure/puzzle elements: rooms with a

We have posted our second update :D in case you're curious what we've been up to!

#gamedev

the lit area around the bulbs is mostly just the absence of the dark nighttime overlay, but there's some additive yellow in there too. more obvious around e.g. a fireplace

top-down pixel art map of a new england college campus. brick buildings, one has a big gym sign... it's nighttime and dark. gas lamps around the map glow with yellow cores and reveal the true colors underneath, tinged yellow

Added additive lighting for night scenes, real bulb glow, colored tints

Fair. We do have some timed decision menus, which only work as a gameplay element at all if they block rollback, but of course we could get rid of those too I guess, but I like it as a jump scare

I am told that people expect the ability to rewind visual novels, so we wouldn’t really need them at all in that scenario, but I also hate that and think choices should have consequences

Ok question for the #gamedev crew. I think it would be neat to have an indicator by menu choices that shows dialogue tree flows like “this moves you forward” vs “opens a sub-menu of questions” or “exits a sub-menu”. These placeholder emoji are terrible of course. Thoughts? Good/bad idea?

Visual novel screen. Weird gym background. Ethnically ambiguous character is thinking (Alright. That's enough sitting here and moping...) Options are (Getting the feeling that this day will never end if I freak out every time I see a monster. Let's play ball.) (Madness ≥ 50%;) (I should go back to my room, lay down, and mope there instead.) [Madness < 50%)

lockable choice menus

Sun Tzu in his Art of War once said "those who save consumables will be buried with them."

visual novel screen, a vertical text box to the left reads "Brody: Yo, Hunter! You made it!" In the background is a very strange and dilapidated gym. oh, and Brody, who's in the middle, is huge and green and has tentacles for hair and webbed hands

who up finally making it to water polo practice

Ugly checkbox screens showing lists of game state keys and inventory items like C1_DONE_INTRO cl_seen_beach cl_seen_stealth cl_seen_shrine cl_seen_fortress_exterior cl_seen_fortress_entrance cl_seen_bas_relief_room cl_seen_sculpture_room cl_seen_control_room

Made a screen that’ll let us set really granular game states and jump around the story

Seems like a nice chill spot to hunker down and finish the game, and not at all like a setting in the game

Right back atcha!

Thanks so much to everyone who contributed to the kickstarter, we’re gonna have so much extra art now! Well above the bare bones we need to produce a satisfactory result—this is gonna be great

Starspawn - Lovecraft Mythos Visual Novel/Dating Sim Your scholarship is in danger, your friends aren't human, and something ancient awakens in the dreamlands. Welcome to Miskatonic U.

Last night to pledge! Every little bit makes the game that much better at launch 😇 www.kickstarter.com/projects/485...

Pixel art of a weird horned dinosaur skull fossil, but it’s got 8-9 eye holes of various sizes clustered together

ewwww

Yay he pledged 🫶

Somebody just wrote on Kickstarter to make sure you can romance the boys. Yes! This game is gay as hell!