Hey, hey! People don't hate the comic! In fact, some of you seem to have mistaken 'terrible' for 'kind of good.'
The incomparable Jerry Tracy, of Saturday Bulletin renown, wrote a remarkably alliterative review for us (unsolicited, I swear). And my brilliant cousin, Melanie, was kind enough to spread the word on comicsindisguise.
I didn't know what to expect when we launched Sapceman, but it hasn't turned into a failure yet. Jordan gets all the credit for it being funny - people freaking love that Fancy Feast line.
For my part, I am starting to indulge the perfectionist in me a little too much. I started out spending about an hour on each comic, but as they go along, I'm sinking more and more time into them. I really love drawing these, so it's been worth it, but I think it defeats some of the point to make it too detailed. So I'm going to have to get back to cheap-and-dirty.
Keep reading. Do it.
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Some of you have had your hands on ROLLAB in person, but I wanted to get a few screenshots up for everyone else to see. (At some point I'll post a series of progress screens so you can watch the evolution from our very first working prototype to the finished product.) Even though the game's not nearly complete yet, the transformation from where we started is really dramatic.
On the left is the unfinished initial splash screen. That screen will definitely be revised before launch (and knowing me, it'll be several revisions). On the right is an actual gameboard. It's not a working level - more of a test platform. Functionally, though, it's probably 80% complete.
So here's what you're looking at:
Along the top of the gameboard, there are binary and numeric counters for time and moves. Since ROLLAB is a puzzle game, players will work to solve each platform either as fast as they can or in as few moves as possible - or both. Some stages will have a set time limit and some will have a set number of moves in which to solve the level, but most will be open-ended with no time or moves limit. The game saves your best time and fewest moves for each level, and once you've completed a stage, you can come back at any time to try to beat your best score.
To the right of the counters is your health meter. Ahh ... the health meter - virtually ubiquitous in every game that isn't Tetris. For our purposes, the meter will let you know how healthy your ROL material is. As you ... wait. What is ROL? Oh yeah, I might have forgotten to mention that.
ROL is an acronym for Recombinant Organic Liquid (a stretch, I know). The premise of the game is that this genetically-engineered liquid is actually made up of living organisms that respond to different stimuli. We give you a sample droplet of ROL for each level, and you use its unique properties to solve the puzzles.
As such, you'll be able to heat the ball up, freeze it, make it nearly solid, and "teach" it do a few other cool tricks. But those tricks come at a price: every time you heat the ball or freeze it, you'll kill some of the ROL organisms. You're hurting the living cells in your ROL. And thus the health meter.
You'll only be able to alter the state of your ball so many times in the course of any stage before the ball dies - so you have to be smart about it and take care of your ROL.
The test platform itself is pretty straightforward. There's a green entry port where your ROL sample enters the level. There's a red exit port, which is your goal. The yellow injector port is where you'll be able to change your ROL's status by heating it or freezing it, etc.
And then ... there are the tiles.
Right now, all the tiles are blank, but soon they'll be much more interesting. The tiles are really the heart of ROLLAB's puzzle mechanic - sliding and arranging them in order to navigate your ROL to the exit port. But some tiles will be immovable. Some will be electrified. Some will be breakable. It's up to you to make the best use of the ROL's abilities and your own quick wits to navigate each test platform successfully.
We've got lots of little extras in the works to keep the game interesting and fun, too. You'll uncover power-ups, unlock new status abilities for your ROL, find ways to wind the clock backwards in time, and other nifty play mechanics.
As you progress, you'll be "teaching" the ROL material new genetic tricks. The further you get, the more resilient the ROL becomes, and the better it will perform for you. How you play determines the course you take through the game.
I know it still doesn't look like much, but it's already so much more than I imagined the game would be. By the time its ready for release, ROLLAB is going to be something Adam and I can be really proud of. Man, it's already something I'm really proud of.
The next post will be a little more development-oriented, as I want to get into some of the technical challenges we've faced so far. But hopefully you've gotten a good little taste of this dream project of mine.
Any thoughts?
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It might not be much by Nor'eastern standards, but it might as well be a foot and a half by Knoxville standards.
Why does it have to do this when I'm at work?
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Alright! Thanks to good ol' Byram, Sapceman no longer has to be enjoyed in complete silence. If you would like (and you certainly should like), you can now leave comments on every issue of the comic!
I planned on having comments from the beginning, but it took some time (and a lot of pestering on my part) to get them in place. After about six hours of tweaking from me, it's in full-on robot chubby mode.
Take a look. Leave some comments.
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The other day, I picked up Fallout 3 with a plan: play the game, pick it apart, and ultimately come away dissatisfied and disappointed.
In fact, I already had this whole blog post planned out. I'd write a pseudo-review of Bethesda's much-lauded reinvention of one of my favorite game franchises, culminating in a disdainful reproach for the way they betrayed the spirit of a true classic. It was going to be cleverly injected with discreet references to the first two games (and even to Fallout Tactics, which I dearly loved). I was going to be duly respectful, but skeptical, of this genre-breaking edition of a game series that didn't need to have its genre broken.
The bottom line was that although Fallout 3 is a good game - and expertly produced - its bleak, gritty landscapes and cookie-cutter inhabitants just didn't win me over the way they did the entirety of the mainstream gaming media.
Ha ha. Then I actually played it.
From 4:00pm yesterday until about 5:30am this morning, I did something I haven't done since high school: got completely lost in a game. Completely.
So after thirteen and a half straight hours of (almost) uninterrupted gameplay, I, uh ... yeah. Yeah.
Adam suggested I try recording my progress while I draw an issue of Sapce. I'll do another one of these with a full issue soon. Just wanted to test it out to see how it worked.
This is about two hours of work on Issue 50 (towards the end) compressed into six minutes.
Sapceman Test from Christopher Echols on Vimeo.
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Just for fun.
Link from Christopher Echols on Vimeo.
The Making of Sapceman #55 from Christopher Echols on Vimeo.
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If you went to oneredtwo.com looking for my portfolio, only to find yourself here ... well, don't worry. The portfolio page is going to get a revamp as soon as I have time. Until then, enjoy the blog or check out some Sapce.
I think I'm going to do some posters of the things I loved as a kid. Here's a sneak peak at the early stages of the first one.
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