Update ... 2

And I'm back home... Linux works and the best  I didn't broke too much stuff in Windows ( I'm as surprised about this as you ). Lets believe that in new year things go as good as this :)

Greg

Update ...

Not long ago I was preparing for trip to Poland, buying Christmas presents and now we are already past this holiday and waiting for new year. Continuing my tradition I didn't done too much in this period of time. I was focusing on resting and spending time with family and friends.

This of course didn't mean that I did nothing :) Thanks to some voodoo magic Linux build once again slowly coming together on my laptop computer. I want to believe that I didn't broke too much in Windows builds doing all this changes. Well we will see when I will be back and will try compile and run game.

Other than that not too much happened. Till I will have running game on my laptop I'm blocked. Good information is im really close to finishing this :)

TBC

Greg

6 years and sad news.

When I started project I seen it as simple remake. Little Big Adventure with fully 3D graphics. In next 6 years whole concept evolved into project you know right now. In this period of time some things changed:

• My expectation grown a lot from what I initially wanted achieve. 
• Technology that I using is a lot better
• There are better tools for game development.
• I'm a lot older and experienced than before.
• I'm also a lot more tired than before.

some other not so much:

• Project still exist, it's still is developed but there is still no game.
• I'm still experimenting with technology.
• I'm still doing most of things on my own.
• I'm still failing to deliver updates on time :)

Still 6 years is really long time and all of this shouldn't take so much time. I know this too well. If I decided to do game on some existing technologies like Unity 3D, Unreal, Crytec or any other free one I would create game ages ago. But I'm stick whit this stupid idea of creating my own technology. I know that this is bad for game. I know that because of this decision I spending time developing things that in other engines I would get instantaneous. I know pain of waiting for this game and disappointment that another year passing without releasing game. I know all of this too well.

But well for me both engine and remake are equally important. In the fact one wouldn't exist without other. Everything started with dream about my own engine. I knew I want to do it but I also knew that technology without game is useless. This was begin of Little Big Adventure Remake. Time passed and I can openly tell that if not this remake I would probably long time ago just gave up on engine. But I cant.

If you look under posts and movies related to this remake you will see why. There is so many people interested into this project that I would fell terrible knowing that I never gave them even occasion to play this game so I still continue my journey of developing remake even if sometimes I'm tired or close to giving up. I'm taking then day or two break and return to topic once again. With fresh strengths and new ideas.

Sadly not all stuff going how I planned them. Recently I needed to reinstall operating system on my PC. Before I reinstalled all my programs and configured projects few days passed. In this time project didn't moved forward at all. Next few months also don't look too colorful for project. But well more about this in next posts.

Sadly because all of that I wasn't able to prepare proper video preview and I'm not sure I will be able to do it in next 2-3 months. I will for sure try my best to brings some updates. But well if I will fail I can just say sorry and try to to show you some really big when things will return back to norm :)

Greg 

L.B.A. Preview 18

Well it took one month longer than initially planned, some of you in meantime probably give up on me assuming that project was finally dead. Well I need to surprise you here: it's still alive. This is almost like @IsLBA3outyet. Always the same answer.

In the end I cannot say that road to creating this video was easiest because of amount of changes that was done and generally the mood I'm in recently. But here you have it :) I want to believe that next one will go better and on time.

What you guys think about idea of making next Video Preview in form of Twitch or YouTube live stream ?

Greg

In between #2

With each day we are coming closer to new video preview and I know that its suppose to be already out but this time you need to wait a little bit longer. This is fully my fault and well ... I don't feel too bad about it. Week of proper vacation without doing anything on computer was really nice. In the end I really regretted that I even packed my laptop to my bag and was caring it around. But well next time I won't make the same mistake and will just leave it at home.

So there was this week missing from our development time but the rest was also a little bit sloppy. I was resting a lot and doing a little but now once again development moving forward.

We done a lot of changes in way we handle physics in engine and we plan to continue this work for a little bit longer. Like always this broke some of the stuff and now I try to recover everything I find.

This changes require some changes in out object properties system which happening right now. This is not easiest change which require a lot of caution because one not noticed mistake may cost us later really a lot of time.

Next pretty big change was done in animation system. I maybe should call even extending because we added some functionalities we need for next game features. But ended changing some of existing one.

On top of that all we experimenting in free time on look of Citadel Island. I expect that in 1-2 weeks we should have new video showing all this features and probably a little bit more :)

Greg

In between #1

"I will spend my time on gameplay." I thought at begin of the month. But next two weeks quickly proved me how wrong I was. It also shown me how immature White Rabbit Technology is. Don't understand me wrong. All pieces I need are there but they require changes to be usable.

So far most of  my problems is related to evolution of technology in last 1-2 years. Physics code wasn't really properly improved, there were some untested code paths and my approach to some stuff changed.

In weeks like that I sometimes think that it would be a lot easier for me to just abandon this project. But then I always return to it in next days. Dreams won't come true on their own. 

Greg

L.B.A. Preview 17

So this time I skipped you pleasure of looking on my face :] I didn't done this purposely but when I finished recording it was already evening and when I checked result: strong shadows made my face look like somebody beat me up and in some shots even worse :/ so next time I will fix this. Well with this I will end my prolog speech and  here you have new video:

Spoiler alert

I just start to seeing how "Exciting" this project may be for you :P You wait whole month to get another video preview. In this ~3 minutes presentation you see my ugly face for first 1.5 minute and then there is short wideo of naked Twinsen running around surround by grass and some brown geometry :]

Well we don't have clear idea how to improve form but we improving content in second half of video:) We spend already a lot of time working on stuff for next week video preview and there is still some time :D I believe that in this short time we still be able to create some game improvement. For now I won't say more and will leave you with this small spoiler:

Greg

L.B.A. Preview 16

The extra time we took for this milestone allow us to do some really cool stuff :) And even if not everything is finished we are proudly present you new video this time with nice round number 16 (0x10):

Greg

A little bit longer ...

We have some break in posting and we are fully aware of this but we are in middle of really big milestone on which we try to fully focus so you will need to wait a little bit longer for proper update. For now we will share with you some sneak peek of current progress:

This is still begin of work and a lot need to be done but finally all pieces coming together and we should have really interesting next video preview :D

Thanks also for all support that you give to us it give us strength to continue this ambitious project :)

Greg

L.B.A. Preview 15

Yep it's this time of year, were we have new preview. This time number 15 which by coincident is exactly the same number as internal build number :)

As you can see this time there are some visible new gameplay elements which give slightly impression that this may be even game :] Just slight of course but as you see project going forward and we don't lying saying this all the time.

But well this milestone is behind and we can move to next one: Recovering some basics of movie system with editor to bring back moving platforms in sewers and prison. When it will be done I don't know but we try our best :)

Greg

Slowly but steady.

There are days when I completely don't know what to write posts about. There are so much changes in so many places and non of them look like it is really worth showing right now. But well maybe my expectations are too big.

Generally progress on game moving forward. Extension of animation system I was talking so much for last few weeks start taking shape and already brought new stuff to game: first version of jumping and new problems to resolve :) So I slowly sculpting this system trying to make it work. But improvement won't be visible without good input data so I spending some time trying to level up in my "animator" skill.

For interested I reading currently "The animator's survival kit" which is really good book if you like to learn about animations. After reading half of it I see visible change in quality of my animations: they are just bad not terrible anymore. I still need a lot more practice to get to some satisfying level but I will get there.

Other then that there are a lot technical things like changes in Constant Buffers, Recovering of editor tools, improving of graphs widgets and generally a lot of small changes which make my life easier.

Probably some of you are also curious what waiting us in future :) After animations system in place there will come next preview of game and we will see then. Like my teacher of Japanese was saying: one cookie at the time.

Greg

Wiping dust ...

Wow it's getting dusty here and I see few spiders webs in corners so I think I should do something about this. So we took some break from posting :) it's mostly my fault because I was lazy. No wait it's not that this sound bad. 

Generally last few weeks cached us time when we are limited with our free time :/ We try to balance this with focusing on stuff we need to do for project. Sometimes skipping other parts like posting news. Of course there is no excuse for not doing it for so long but well you need to forgive us this. We do it for free :)

Generally we are in funny part of project where we don't move a lot with project because of my experimentation with animations systems. Most of them are failure which I just thrown away quickly. But I gaining valuable experience in field I'm not expert. This is really good and allow me to come with even crazier ideas :D What I want to achieve is system which won't require a lot of animations because I will need to do them, will be intuitive in usage, flexible so I can do all stuff I want to do with Twinsen and it wasn't dead end. 

This last part is tricky for me because I want to create something what won't be final stuff but in the same time will be nice base for more complicated system. When you finally make system like that you know that what you done is good otherwise there is always something there what bother you when you try to use it.

And so time fly between personal live, creation of animation system, creating testing animations tracing bugs and generally improving stability, reliability and features of engine. Soon I believe I will find design of animation system and when this happen programming should go quickly :)

Cheers, 

Greg

Dark depths of development

Last two weeks like always we fall into dark depths of development. Slowly carving our stuff and preparing them for another show. In sucha moments I always feel a little bit bad when I see how other projects in matters of weeks changing quickly, growing and then I'm stop feeling bad. Mostly because very often they disappear as quick as they shown and Little Big Adventure Remake still exist.

So we still doing what we should do and we do it in bigger team:] We joined our forces with music Jesse Gorter. If this name sound familiar to you it's probably because you could hear a lot of his music in our previous preview videos. 

Long story short: We cooperate with him for long time but now he is officially one of CoffeMonsters member and have access to all the stuff we do :)

He right now creating alternative soundtrack to L.B.A. We plan to use this tracks for Remake but you never know he may change his mind and make even more awesome music in the end. We will see what future will bring.

Aside from that like always Alejandro working on design trying to bring new look to game. I'm dived again into low level code and doing some under hood changes for engine and tools. I planned them for long time but I never had occasion, mood or time to do them. I decided that now is good moment and well I'm still stuck there. Fixing what I broke, fighting with quick hacks that I introduced and staring using new cool features :) I cannot wait to utilize full potential of them.

So as you see project is still alive stronger than ever.

Greg

Concept devlog

Hi everyone!

My name is Alejandro Machado and I'm this project's concept artist. So I'm going to be in charge of designing all the different species that populate Twinsun, the main characters, the clothing, the devices, the buildings... Well mostly everything.

And this leads to the question: What are we supposed to do in this game? As we all remember, the designs in original Relentless are quite awesome. They're cute and endearing and we all love them.

But it's also true that they're designs from the very beginnings of the polygon era. That's more than 20 years ago and many things have changed. We're not longer limited by the graphics and aesthetics in games have evolved over years. And we mustn't forget that this project has become more and more ambitious since it's beginnings. In conclusion, my main function here is to develop a graphical update for the entire LBA universe.

On today's post I'm going to talk about Funfrocks army and their concept evolution so far.

Clone troopers (quetch)

These are the enemies you step into at the mere beginning of the game. They're the clumsy yet dangerous Funfrock's minions that crowd every single crossroad and critical path.

They posed quite a challenge on the go, because they must look goofy but still suppose a threat on Twinsen's life: even when they're the easiest enemy, if you make a mistake they can take you down within seconds with their rifles and grenades.

Originally the idea was to make a heavy redesign of them, taking out the goofyness and going for a dark and threatening aspect.

This idea didn't advance too far anyways. If we consider the other clones, the more dangerous ones (rabbibunnies, spheros and grobos), then this design would outpass them. Besides, the entire idea for the game would go too far into the wrong direction.

So we decide to go back to the roots and look the original game for an inspiration. This time I decided to emulate the overall shape of the original ones, but adding some threatening aspects. In this case, the arms would be bigger and stronger, and the uniform more complex, full of weapons.

Spies (quetch)

This mysterious guys will be an addition to the game. Their function will remain secret for now, but we can take a glance at their overall aspect.

On my original approaches, I imagined this guys full covered in clothes with this big disturbing eyes who stare at you, making you nervous at anytime.

Even when we kinda like this idea, the main problem with it is that their intention was to clear. You know they're interested in you because they're looking at you.

So, after some trial and error I finally come up with this new design where their eyes are covered with the mask. So they can make you think they're at their own business while they don't lose any detail of you, with their microphones and other special devices.

Hope you like this first post and be expecting my next ones.

See ya!

Alejandro Machado

L.B.A. Preview 14

Promised 4 weeks passed and we are back with new preview. Almost everything went as we planned :] We are +5 builds further in development and on good road to make another preview even better. But before we will get to all comments from our side I recommend checking out new video:

New year update

Our holiday break just ended. We took time to spend it with families, rest a little bit and gather strengths for upcoming year. And in this lazy mood we passed to another year of development. For me this is sad and in the same time really happy moment.

Sad because this is 6th year of development and I still cannot show you finished game. I spend endless hours on it and its still far from finished. Happy because I see progress and how everything improving. So lets look on year 2015 and check what changed in project:

Year 2015

If I would be asked to describe shortly what we done in this year I would say that we focused mostly on Technology development. Between 01/01/2015 and 31/12/2015 there was 569 commits to git repo. Which giving nice number of more than one commit per day :D . And a lot changed:

• CoffeMonsters Team
• Announcement of change "Angelus Productions" -> "Coffemonsters"
• New Logo/Blog/Facebook page 
• New member: Alejandro Machado
• Started redesigning of game
• Improved project generator:
• New system based on python script
• Added code generation to process
• Added Visual Studio solutions generation.
• Added support to Visual Studio 2013 
• Improved building of external libraries
• New build system for continuous builds
• Created build script in python with Windows/Linux support
• Created Jenkins configuration for build machine
• Finished port to Linux (earlier Editor part wasn't finished)
• There were migration to never versions of: bullet physics and Qt
• Changes in resource system:
• Added support to animations
• Added support to meshes
• Added support to levels
• Improved Blender exporter
• SQL queries tool added to editor 
• Improved RTTI code
• Improved Rendering Code
• Better management of releasing resources
• Better management of constants buffers
• Improved multithreading
• Improved performance
• Added support to Cascade Shadow Maps
• There was added new animation system.
• Support on game side
• Editor to it in editor.
• Changes in communication editor <-> engine
• All communication is happening with use of events

This list I wouldn't call completed but it should give you overview of amount of work that was done. Remember that in meantime I was changing job and moved from Canada to UK. If not this this year would probably be even better :D

Year 2016

This year will be a little bit different :] We will of course still push technology forward. I plan to change file system management and do more improvement wherever I see place :) but it's no longer our priority. I feel that our technology matured enough to move step forward. Our goal for this year is game and we already have some great achievements in this matter:] 

Game work on AMD and Nvidia Graphics cards.

This is important because it's proving that resource system work the way it should :] Right now game require support of OpenGL 3.2 but I have already plan to increase it at least to Open GL 3.3 to support ARB_instanced_arrays which will be useful for vegetation.

06/01/2016 we created first build of game.

Yep this was big achievement for us because finally I could share build with Alejandro. This is important step because now I will be able to continue work on creating system for continuous build release which should allow us to have new build each week.

Another small "break"

I know that we didn't posting a lot in last month. Well we didn't post at all :D but this state will continue for next 3-4 weeks. I know that this is long time but we want to use this time for planning and finishing few started stuff we started. When we will return we will repay you this silence with really cool stuff :] This one thing we can promise you.

So to next time.