Shadow Core visual update

Hey folks.

Here’s a quick dev log about the many changes we made to the Shadow Core. We reworked several things and we now feel that our game mechanic is much sharper and aesthetical than before.

Overall its new controls are much smoother and easy to pick up, its look is more polished and fits better with the rest of the Light Fall art and its feedback for the player is easier to read in the heat of the moment.

Old versus new

Guess which one's the newest? — Guess which one’s the newest?

We knew the old version of the Core would be a temporary one but it took many iterations before we finally created something we were proud of. You can compare the two versions, side by side. The new version (right, in case you couldn’t figure it out) is more polished and in general fits much better with the game. Our old Shadow Core stood out from the rest of the art and took away from the beautiful scenery Mat created.

Improving the in-game feedback

The Shadow Core is a very useful mechanic, but it can also be complicated sometimes. Especially when a lot of stuff is going on in the level and the player has to manage his character’s position and movements, the incoming dangers and manipulate the Shadow Core on top of that.

The Shadow Core will save you many times from harm but it doesn’t make you invincible. You cannot spam it and dodge, block or escape all the traps and dangers with it. We had previously developed a ressource system (like Mana for spells in most RPGs) that allowed the player a fixed number of uses for a certain amount of time. In the game right now, you can successively use the Shadow Core four times, before it runs out of energy. To replenish the energy, the player simply has to touch the ground or a level platform. This allows a liberty of movement for the most skilled players but also prevents them from only using the Shadow Core to beat a level.

Here’s an image of the Core and the feedback shown to the player:

With each use of the Core, a fragment of the triangle fades out. This shows the player how many uses he has left.

We also added a visual feedback when the player triggers the Shadow Core but hasn’t released/placed it yet. In the heat of the moment, we found out we would sometimes think we had triggered it but didn’t or vice versa.
You can see the eyes of the character glow when the trigger is activated.

No, the character is not high. He's simply... visualizing where he will place the Shadow Core. — No, the character is not high. He’s simply… visualizing where he will place the Shadow Core.

As for the controls… you will have to play the game to see how smooth they are ;)

Thank you for the support and the Bishop trio wishes you Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! (Try not to drink too much, heh.)