#imsim

[gloomflower]

Someone on Peripeteia discord server had a dream about me doing art of Marie with long hair giving a smile at the camera, so I made it a prophecy.

[bryce-bucher]

J(a)SON Post #2

Interfacing:

Games like Deus Ex, VtM:B, Prey 2017, etc. include interesting interfaces for things like computers, security terminals, etc. Rather than just simply showing the player the information they need to see and then moving on, they opt to allow the player to explore an interface with a degree of control closer to that of a real device or an operating system. The first time I saw the interface for controlling cameras in Deus Ex, all of the synapsis in my brain fired at once when I realized you can just manually rotate the cameras and enable /disable them individually. It doesn't take that much extra effort to include this degree of interactivity, and it baffles me as to why so few big budget games do so. At a certain point in development, I realized I needed a system like this, so I set it up so that I could easily create and assign an interface to any device that needs one. As you can see in the photos above, each interface has its own pre-render that depicts a closeup of whatever the player is interacting with. This allows me the freedom to basically do whatever I want with them, and it opens up the door to some pretty fun possibilities. On a surface level it allows a higher degree of player freedom as they can do things like manually set the timer on the c4, but it will also allow me to do some more ambitious stuff like create a micro-os for the computers that lets you check email, mess with a pseudo-code terminal, and play picross. This week I've been working on the ATM, which will allow you to enter any bank account information that you come across and drain whatever amount of money you want from the account. I'm looking forward to sharing more of the interfaces as I develop them, so I guess you'll see them then.

Conclusion:

Twas tha night before christmas when I wrote this post, but sadly I have not even remotely been in the christmas spirit this year. There isn't any particular reason or anything it just hasn't even felt like december weirdly. I think this post is kind of spiritually connected to my second Basidia post, as it similarly showcases my love of fun and interesting ui in games. Anyway, I hope ya'll have a happy holidays, and I'll see you again next week when I make yet another J(a)SON post.

[crazcartridge]

this is waht the world looks like to me

[grayrazor]

I was really excited about the "Immersive Sim" renaissance, but after having played the early access releases of Gloomwood and Blood West and the Fallen Aces demo, I wasn't sure it was the genre for me. They felt more like a frustrating challenge than a fun one, like I had no options other than creeping along, waiting for enemies to be in exactly the right alignment, and cheezing the AI's pathfinding limitations.

Ten months later, after having a lot of fun with the System Shock remake, I decided to give them another shot. Made a lot more progress. On reflection, I think I had previously made the classic Dark Souls newbie mistake of bashing my head against a difficult route instead of feeling around for an easier one. By just avoiding large crowds of enemies instead of trying to melee backstab them, and finding hidden routes with secret caches, I was able to get the weapons and ammo to actually take them on.

[petal-monster]

It's currently Creator's Day over on Itch, so I'm taking the excuse to recommend my girlfriend's latest release: Hexcraft: Harlequin Fair. It's an indie Immersive Sim where the npcs have dynamic behaviour and will actively pursue their goals as they share information - leading to all kinds of fun, emergent situations that at times present Difficult Challenges and occasionally really great slapstick (as depicted above!!)

Hexcraft has really minimal handholding, leaving you to try and piece together what you’re meant to be doing and how to actually go about doing it, which directly encourages you to engage with its systems and discover how they play off of one another as you slowly unravel the mystery of What Is Going On. And once you're done with the main game, you can check out the free expansion Harbour Dawn!!

If I had to pitch to you the way most game critics write about stuff it’d be “STALKER meets Pathologic” or maybe “Vampire the Masquerade: Bloodlines meets Kitty Horrorshow” and I hope those pitches interest you because frankly I think Hexcraft is criminally underappreciated. The game is so intricate and feels like an evolution of old-school PC rpgs had we emphasized systems and simulations in a way that largely got left by the wayside when game's progressively started reiterating their own design frameworks ad infinitum (But I digress, that's a whole other post!). Importantly though, Hexcraft was my favourite game of 2021, and writing about it was a big part of how I met the most amazing person in my life <3

So if you'll indulge a sappy lesbian on tumblr(dot)com, you can pick the game up on Itch or if you'd prefer on Steam, and keep an eye out on GDC next week: she's going to be giving a talk on the design of the game!!

[valereth2]

I hate how it turned out but here. Here is the annual Halloween video. Happy Halloween

[ritasanderson]

In 1999 DE should add System Shock like audio logs made by people who is slowly being consumed by the helminth strain, i think

[tothepointofinsanity]

Been playing Cruelty Squad again recently (not making any gains with art because I’m sad and in pain for unspeakable reasons) and CS’ creator is working on a new project called Psycho Patrol R. By the time it comes out I’ll probably be either dead or graduated. Either way, it’s an immersive sim so I look forward to it.

[violetreminder]

Fuck it, I'm gonna play Deus Ex

[druckers]

just watched the last vid for petty metal age and jesus fucking christ i forgot how chilling sabotage at soulforge is

[bryce-bucher]

J(a)SON Post #3

Stealing Money For Fun & Profit:

Most of my week was spent playing dark souls 2 again, but aside from that I spent most of my time working on the ATM's functionality. The ATM is heavily inspired by the ATMs in Deus Ex, and just like in that game you can input an account's information and then drain it. In the gif above you can see an example of me sneaking into the nefarious Doctor Spider's evil bank account and stealing 200 bucks. You can also blow up the ATM to get 75 bucks worth of wads of money to come out of it, or you can try to hack the ATM and get it to lock up like a dummy. Pretty simple stuff, but it always feels amazing to sneak into someone's bank account and steal all their money, and in the game as well! For those interested, I used jwildfire for the background fractal textures on the ATM UI. That program is amazing and I'd highly recommended checking it out (especially if you have an affinity for y2k visuals).

Building a Gas Station:

After a while spent purely implementing devices and mechanics, I was really itchin' to make an environment. I decided to start putting together a gas station since it's the smallest environment segment I have planned for the main map. In the images above you can probably get a good feel for my process on an environment like this. I haven't ever really done whiteboxing before this project, but I've found it to be very helpful when having to make more detailed environments. I actually hate having to litter an environment with smaller details and objects, which is the main reason why most of the environments in my previous games feel pretty sparse. I can't just get away with broad strokes this time around though, so I started to employ "words" that dictate where a planned object should go. Texturing all of the products in the gas station is easily the most tedious part, and it burns me out pretty quickly. So far, I've only textured 4 chip bag variants and 4 cereal box variants, and most of the products are yet untextured. These environments always look pretty terrible before I get them in engine and all lit up, so I have to trust that it's gonna look and feel a lot better once that is done.

Conclusion:

It's new years eve the day I'm posting this, so I hope ya'll have a good 2023, and I hope that I can actually maybe release something next year lol. There is a big collaboration project that I have a game in that is supposed to come out early next year, so I'll be posting about that when it's out. Next week I'll be back on Basidia, but until then I'm gonna keep playing Dark Souls 2. See ya.

[dildoteamtaskforce]

So, I brought Fallen Aces and it's everything I hoped it'd be.

[mudwisard]

god knows i have so many games in my backlog but i seriously just want to replay the deus ex series

[thankjpg]

Cruelty Squad