Housepets! Tails of Babylon! * Developer's Thread *

Buster · Post by **Buster** » Sat Jul 25, 2015 7:28 pm

that reminds me, did i post the finished neighbor cats 2 sheet? or just one of the WIP versions?
Well, If i forgot to post it here, it's on the wiki.

Post by **Obbl** » Sat Jul 25, 2015 7:40 pm

I only have the Marvin, Jasper, Res, Delusional Steve sheet, so no, I don't think you posted it here

SuperStar · Post by **SuperStar** » Sat Jul 25, 2015 7:43 pm

Well, I have it in the game files, so it must have been at some point.

Buster · Post by **Buster** » Sat Jul 25, 2015 7:54 pm

Obbl wrote:I only have the Marvin, Jasper, Res, Delusional Steve sheet, so no, I don't think you posted it here

well, i have both sheets with all eight cats done.

they're the 5th & 6th sheets on http://hpgamewiki.deadzone.ws/index.php/Sprites

SuperStar · Post by **SuperStar** » Sat Jul 25, 2015 8:33 pm

Oh, I have a question. Is Tiger gonna remain on the big sheet? Or will he be transferred to a normal sheet?

Buster · Post by **Buster** » Sat Jul 25, 2015 8:51 pm

can you think of a fourth dog that needs oversized sprites? Cause if not there's little reason to move tiger to a different sheet. Someone needs to fill that spot.

And before you suggest a wolf, they have more than enough to need multiple sheets of their own, and are somewhere after jess and the racoons in terms of my schedule.

SuperStar · Post by **SuperStar** » Sat Jul 25, 2015 9:03 pm

No actually, I think that's all the big dogs. I was just worried it would cause some slight issues with the sprite, but after testing it on the Game it seems to be good. No problems.

Invisan · Post by **Invisan** » Sun Jul 26, 2015 5:16 am

Which ones are currently the oversized ones Buster?

Post by **D-Rock** » Sun Jul 26, 2015 9:22 am

So what do we do with the two separate threads now? Still use this for development talk and the new one for gameplay feedback?

Anyway, things seems to be going smoothly. Haven't been able to find time to make new sketches, though. I really don't like night shifts...

SuperStar · Post by **SuperStar** » Sun Jul 26, 2015 9:26 am

Yeah, we should continue to use this one for development, and use the other for public announcements and feeback.
BTW, KingFan, can you rename this thread to "Housepets! Tails of Babylon! Developer's Thread"?

Buster · Post by **Buster** » Sun Jul 26, 2015 12:04 pm

Invisan wrote:Which ones are currently the oversized ones Buster?

Star requested Rex, Boris and Yeltsin's sprites be scaled up further. I suspect because Rex and Boris are noticeably taller and bulkier than every other pet, and Yetsin's size tends to be inconsistent. (Half the time he's Rex & Boris' size, the other half he's between Fox & Fido in height.)

KingFan202 · Post by **KingFan202** » Sun Jul 26, 2015 2:58 pm

SuperStar wrote:Yeah, we should continue to use this one for development, and use the other for public announcements and feeback.
BTW, KingFan, can you rename this thread to "Housepets! Tails of Babylon! Developer's Thread"?

there ya go

Douglas Collier · Post by **Douglas Collier** » Sun Jul 26, 2015 7:20 pm

Played the game - I thought it was pretty great. ^^ One thing that really bothered me though was the amount of money they were receiving, since pets are generally pretty much broke in the comic - $10 is as much money as Bino spent on Sasha for an entire year when she was his girlfriend. Maybe move the decimal to the left one spot? That way it would be truer to the comic.

Also, one thing I was thinking might be nice was if the attack pattern matched the order the characters are in (i.e. Peanut attacks 1st, Grape attacks 2nd, and Tarot attacks 3rd); this would give the option in the menu to change their order in the group a purpose.

SuperStar · Post by **SuperStar** » Sun Jul 26, 2015 7:25 pm

Douglas Collier wrote:Played the game - I thought it was pretty great. ^^ One thing that really bothered me though was the amount of money they were receiving, since pets are generally pretty much broke in the comic - $10 is as much money as Bino spent on Sasha for an entire year when she was his girlfriend. Maybe move the decimal to the left one spot? That way it would be truer to the comic.

Also, one thing I was thinking might be nice was if the attack pattern matched the order the characters are in (i.e. Peanut attacks 1st, Grape attacks 2nd, and Tarot attacks 3rd); this would give the option in the menu to change their order in the group a purpose.

Thanks for trying the game out Douglas, and thanks for your input. However, things are that way for certain reasons.

1, we sort of have to make the money high enough, because this is an JRPG, you're gonna need to be buying equipment and the like a lot.

2, it all has to do with the speed stat, Grape has the higher speed then Peanut so she attacks before him.

GameCobra · Post by **GameCobra** » Sun Jul 26, 2015 8:54 pm

SuperStar wrote:2, it all has to do with the speed stat, Grape has the higher speed then Peanut so she attacks before him.

Aye. Speed in this game determines the attack order, thus why she got the most. certain enemies will attack before Peanut and Tarot, but Grape should have enough agility to hit first. unless she's underleveled badly. in which case, i'll look into it more in the future. She was fast enough from what I saw. =P

I plan on doing something far down the road to help make it so she isn't getting the first strike all the time, though. Bats have to get some pecks in before Grape, but for now, Grape should be able to get first strike almost certainly in every battle.

Post by **Obbl** » Sun Jul 26, 2015 9:49 pm

Is there a way to tell who's going to strike in what order? That made the gargoyle fight (from demo 2) really difficult at the outset as I'd never had an enemy attack before my group finished. It took a while to figure out the actual attack pattern, but that can sometimes change your strategy.

CHAOKOCartoons · Post by **CHAOKOCartoons** » Sun Jul 26, 2015 9:58 pm

Again, by looking at their speed stats or observing who goes when during combat. There is also an option to scan an enemy by pressing A(?) before selecting an enemy to attack. You can see it's stats there, though I'm not sure if you can check it's agility.

Buster · Post by **Buster** » Sun Jul 26, 2015 11:09 pm

Um, chaoko, Help. I think one of the sprites is borked.

Extra pose 12 on Boris (facepalm). The arm looks weird after scaling it up.

CHAOKOCartoons · Post by **CHAOKOCartoons** » Mon Jul 27, 2015 12:03 am

Hmm, I see what you mean. It's not toooooo broked, just a bit off.
I've edited the sprites a bit, the first appearing more like the smaller face palming sprites. The second one is an edited version of the one you already had. I made both his arm and hand a bit wider, but had to lower the position of his hand. On both, the shading looks a bit off, but that's because I'm not as good at pixel shading as you

. Personally I think the first one looks a bit more natural, but what do you think?

Post by **D-Rock** » Mon Jul 27, 2015 2:01 am

About the money deal, yeah, I thought it was too much, too, but since our merchants include Corey and Jack, prices are going to be high. Tarot could tell them when they meet her and Sabrina that they will DEFINITELY be needing to save all of that money. Maybe after the first battle and getting the loot money, they could question it like this. http://www.sandraandwoo.com/2009/12/21/ ... encounter/ Then it would be revealed that Nue did this to fit in with the JRPG theme.

Also, had an idea of a possible boss.

Only someone who isn't distracted that easily.

Then I realized, how in the world would that be implemented? I mean, it can't go on land, they can't fight at sea, unless we come up with a good scenario. Ideas, or scrap this?

CHAOKOCartoons · Post by **CHAOKOCartoons** » Mon Jul 27, 2015 2:47 am

Sounds like a good reason for the money thing. On the subject of the Dolphins, I think it would be a cool boss to have, always good to have call backs to smaller moments from the comic like this

. I would say that we could incorporate it in chapter 4 with Fox at the Zoo, but this took place at Theme Park World. We could always have a part where one of the parties has to go to Theme Park World. In terms of the boss fight... platforms on top of the water?

GameCobra · Post by **GameCobra** » Mon Jul 27, 2015 7:20 am

The currency system to me is similar to Earthbound. The kids amusingly could hold over $10000 in their pockets, so there is some of that humor in this game as well. =3

Of course, Keene or the Bank or everyone's parents will confiscate that in the end...

SuperStar · Post by **SuperStar** » Mon Jul 27, 2015 9:00 am

GameCobra wrote:Of course, Keene or the Bank or everyone's parents will confiscate that in the end...

"Peanut, Grape! Why do you have so much money?!"

"We needed it to buy the gear we needed to stop Nue and save the world!"

"Were you LARPing with Joey? Wait, how did you get so much money?"

"We got it off Raccoons and Dogs."

"You beat up poor Raccoons and Dogs for money?!"

"What? NO!"

And then like that, they never got an allowance again.

Buster · Post by **Buster** » Mon Jul 27, 2015 10:23 am

CHAOKOCartoons wrote:Hmm, I see what you mean. It's not toooooo broked, just a bit off.
I've edited the sprites a bit, the first appearing more like the smaller face palming sprites. The second one is an edited version of the one you already had. I made both his arm and hand a bit wider, but had to lower the position of his hand. On both, the shading looks a bit off, but that's because I'm not as good at pixel shading as you . Personally I think the first one looks a bit more natural, but what do you think?

The second one is closer to what i was going for, Thanks for your help.

KingFan202 · Post by **KingFan202** » Mon Jul 27, 2015 10:57 am

D-Rock wrote:About the money deal, yeah, I thought it was too much, too, but since our merchants include Corey and Jack, prices are going to be high. Tarot could tell them when they meet her and Sabrina that they will DEFINITELY be needing to save all of that money. Maybe after the first battle and getting the loot money, they could question it like this. http://www.sandraandwoo.com/2009/12/21/ ... encounter/ Then it would be revealed that Nue did this to fit in with the JRPG theme.

Also, had an idea of a possible boss.

Only someone who isn't distracted that easily.

Then I realized, how in the world would that be implemented? I mean, it can't go on land, they can't fight at sea, unless we come up with a good scenario. Ideas, or scrap this?

Nue or someone gives them legs / feet? lol

GameCobra · Post by **GameCobra** » Mon Jul 27, 2015 12:23 pm

Dolphins would be a funny in-game joke. Dolphins would make awesome mages to fight the party. I will make sure the fans learn to hate the almighty power of the dolphins. They will be like the wizards from early-game RPGs who use to wipe parties with their AOE spells.

A amusing bonus dungeon will be to stop the King Dolphin since the party gets sick and tired of dolphions and just wants to beat the King Dolphin just to feel better about themselves. And grab some Dolphin gear :3

Buster · Post by **Buster** » Mon Jul 27, 2015 12:38 pm

KingFan202 wrote:
D-Rock wrote:Then I realized, how in the world would that be implemented? I mean, it can't go on land, they can't fight at sea, unless we come up with a good scenario. Ideas, or scrap this?
Nue or someone gives them legs / feet? lol

Do what FFVII did for Emerald Weapon, give the party an accessory that lets them go underwater, but only for a limited time unless they have a particular ability.

Amazee Dayzee · Post by **Amazee Dayzee** » Mon Jul 27, 2015 1:38 pm

You know, a dolphin with legs would actually be pretty funny.

GameCobra · Post by **GameCobra** » Mon Jul 27, 2015 1:52 pm

A humorous plot idea for dolphins: They are given the power to conquer the world by travelling the surface. the pets don't consider Dolphins a problem... until the game progresses and they get increasingly aggravated by them.

I would love to throw in all sorts of crazy ideas Dolphins try to take over the world, but in this game, we should just limit it to magic, walking and flying on the surface.

Buster · Post by **Buster** » Mon Jul 27, 2015 3:03 pm

So, that's all the extra poses done. any errors i need to fix?

CHAOKOCartoons · Post by **CHAOKOCartoons** » Mon Jul 27, 2015 3:35 pm

Everything looks perfectly fine from the looks of it. Good job Buster!

And about the money being confiscated thing, when would that happen? I assume after defeating Nue, but then you'd have to start from scratch during the after game portion. We could totally do that for the sake of the joke, but it'll certainly come off as a bit mean (especially if the player had saved up A LOT of money for the end

).

GameCobra · Post by **GameCobra** » Mon Jul 27, 2015 4:06 pm

They are awesome, Buster. They look very generic and fun to watch

Buster · Post by **Buster** » Mon Jul 27, 2015 4:20 pm

And, Yeltsin's caught up.
It is not a good sign when anyone that size starts glaring and cracking their knuckles.

Post by **D-Rock** » Mon Jul 27, 2015 4:26 pm

I think I like the floating platform thing for fighting the dolphin. Out of curiosity, is it possible for the engine to give the enemy a "hide" option in battle? I recall Mother 3 had something like that, in that a boss would go underwater and be more difficult to hit until it surfaced. And dolphins need to come up for air eventually.

And about the money thing, confiscating it right before facing the real threat really is too mean-spirited. How about some unseen benefactor takes it after the battle, leading to a situation like this and this.

Douglas Collier · Post by **Douglas Collier** » Mon Jul 27, 2015 6:35 pm

Rex is looking quite dark.

SuperStar · Post by **SuperStar** » Mon Jul 27, 2015 8:31 pm

I uh... I... I wasn't... I wasn't serious about... uh... I wasn't serious about the whole money confiscation... I... I wasn't...

Post by **D-Rock** » Mon Jul 27, 2015 8:40 pm

Dude, calm down.

Just another one of those things that happens here. Though it should be lampshaded somehow.

Buster · Post by **Buster** » Mon Jul 27, 2015 9:22 pm

So... We're confiscating lampshades now?

Post by **D-Rock** » Mon Jul 27, 2015 11:03 pm

Hey, Kingfan, how about lampshades as low-level armor pieces?

But I still have to finish the weapons.

GameCobra · Post by **GameCobra** » Mon Jul 27, 2015 11:32 pm

Lampshades.

Bad armor - awesome protection against blindness.

Oh, the irony X3