This blog represents the artistic side of the upcoming projects from SND Games that are currently under development. All content shown
should be considered a work-in-progress. All feedback regarding gameplay should be directed to the main blog of SND Games.
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Monday, October 17, 2011

Week #004: Let's Talk! Hero Tower Defense

Welcome back loyal watchers and those not-so-loyal that won't be reading until tuesday evening! Unfortunately, last week was pretty slow for me, and I don't have much to show this week (or rather, much that I can show...).

[Human Female - Base Assets]:[||||                     ]:[018%]
  [Initial Hairstyles]:[|                        ]:[002%]
        [Equipment Structure]:[|||||                    ]:[019%]
   ["Maximum Steel" Plate Armor Set]:[||||                     ]:[016%]
[Total Progress]:[||||                     ]:[015%]

I did, however, take a little time tonight to put together a progression list. These seem to be in demand, which I can understand, since it's certainly more fun to see solid numbers instead of a lot of the word "soon". Having a definitive goal can sometimes help me push forward as well. This should also help you to understand just how much I get done and at what rate, which might give an idea of just how much time a game like this takes to produce. I won't lie, it's quite the ambitious project!

Please keep in mind that these progress lists may be rather dynamic. I'll update it at least each week (and consider sliding it off to the side as another blog gadget, to be updated "live", or at least at the end of each night), but there may be currently unaccounted for assets that might drastically skew the "total progress" number. For example, I didn't include any equipment that may need created outside of the initial plate armor set.

I'll probably make it a nice and shiny visual eventually too, once an idea fitting in with the rest of the blog theme comes to me. I was going to use some candy, but I... ran out.


That aside I did want to preview the updated idle stance for our player character here. I wound up 'tweening it for a bit more smoothness, and went ahead and put in Heaven's Tail as an example of how things will look in-game. Please don't let this preview skew the outcome of the poll oh who am I kidding Heaven's Tail is going to win.

Speaking of, don't forget that there's still another week for you to vote on your hairstyle of choice. Tell your friends to vote, if you want! You can find the options in last week's blog post. The top three hairstyles will be included in the game as the initial three style choices at launch. Runner-ups will be filed away for future inclusion. You can find the poll directly to the right. Voting for your choice via comments will not get your vote counted.

That'll be all for this week, I'll try to bring more goodies with me next week!

21 comments:

  1. Sweet!!! I saw what you did there =D

    TY for the progress way better then the words as you say =D

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  2. Yes, thank you for the progress bar :) Now we need to get Sam and Dan in on this for the other blog :P

    Not much to post on this week so just keep it up and can't wait for next monday :)

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  3. Hello!

    I'm really looking forward to HTD, but I'm a little troubled by the fact that no male hair styles have yet been released for voting (or at least for people to look at, and know what they like).

    Also, I just wanted to leave a small thought in your mind...

    I know you have your own artistic preferences, and you have every right to do as you wish, but... your design for the female character (in some particular clothes) looks very... "showy" or "exposed."

    I personally believe that the girl sprite should be more adequately clothed, rather than having her breasts bulging out of her bra, looking like something out of the playboy mansion.

    Just think about it (despite the fact that it's probably too late to change the sprite anyway...)

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  4. Is it just me, or does the girl's plate armor have nipples?
    Something tells me Sam and Dan's HTD designer is a little too "adoring" of his sprites.

    If you want my advice, cut her nipples off! LOL

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  5. @ Sly Kamaui - I think it's just far too early to put numbers to the coding progress yet. I managed to find a method for putting a number to what I'm doing, but as I said it's really only based on what I currently have my sights set on and not what I might be doing a month from now.

    TL;DR: that "total progress" bar shouldn't be read as a countdown to when the game will come out.

    @ (Greek for "hello") - We've been tossing things like this around for a while now, and I personally want to work to design the characters and armor so that they're both fun to look at and sensibly functional. The version of the character that's really only wearing that strapless vest is the base character herself; what she'll be wearing under the armor or before you equip any armor at all. It's safe to assume that all (maybe most...) of the armor won't be very revealing. Cloth and leather might be more revealing than plate, but it still won't be "she's wearing more skin than armor" territory.

    @ Anonymous (12:27 AM) - No one dares mock Batman's suit nipples to his face. You'll learn.

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  6. @Kevin "Cloth and leather might be more revealing than plate, but it still won't be "she's wearing more skin than armor" territory." Damn! Lol I really was hoping for the chainmail bikini =P

    One of my favorite hairs (witch i voted strategically to see if all 3 would fit the top) is at risk of going down. But not yet! I'll recruit all my rl PTD friends to come here and save the librarian =D

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  7. @ Gon - Do it! Not to skew the votes but I'd be very happy with Heaven's Tail, Yesterday's Breeze and the Librarian being the first three.

    I'm really only disappointed with how poorly Casual Curls is doing since I really liked that one too, and how well the Royal Chain is doing since it was my least favorite (and I think it shows).

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  8. HELL YEAH Yesterday's Breeze :D

    i have been telling some of my friends to vote for it :D its rlly the best in my opiniont, Vanilla Extract aint bad but we need one of every kind like long hair, short, tail and so on...

    Rlly like the bar that you put on the blog about progres and think its a great idea to put it right and upload it every day, its work but would make this blog so cool.

    Last thing, this is you re progres for this week, right. whell hope that other stuff wont be so hard to programe and draw couse in one week its just 15 % :( i know its much more work than PTD but rlly would like it to not wait several weeks for an update witch by the looks of it will take that much. so i hope it will go faster in the future :)

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  9. I know that completion of progress won't mean the release of the game, just excited to see more visual stuff. :)

    And though I am one of the people against high heels and impractically revealing wardrobe, the bikini chainmail needs to be implemented somewhere at some point in the game to not only satisfy those who so desperately want it, but also to give those of us who don't a good laugh because ultimately it is a good laugh.

    And I did notice the nipples on the suit this time more than others for whatever reason. Haha yeah very true tho, if Batman can have massively perky nips in his suit, so too can this hero. :P

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  10. My top 3 include Heaven's Tail (wich I knew it would be there) Librarian, I voted cause I was feeling it would be tough fight and Royal Chain wich i foresaw way better days =S lol

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  11. γειά σου (Greek for "hello")October 19, 2011 at 5:33 AM

    Hello again!

    I just wanted to say thanks for replying to my message earlier, and also to apologize a bit too...

    When I was talking about the girl's breasts bursting out of her bra, I definitely did go "over the top" (no pun intended).

    I was kinda angry about how "out there" the girls of today are, and I just felt like this was another example of "Female Monster Hunter Armors" (all of the people who have played Monster Hunter at some point would know exactly what I'm referring to).

    Anyway, keep up the great work! (And please try to come up with some more Male designs for us to see...)

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  12. I really like the new progress list, also i like the HTD logo.

    only i liked the letters of the word hero more in the sketch, i there a reason why you adjusted it?

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  13. LOL Love the progress post-its (sp?) XD

    Think the librarian is safe now (or kinda... lol)

    Thumbs up for Sly liking my chainmail bikini idea! I got several other awesome gear ideas (and that one is the only one that could have some... hate? lol) Kevin ask Dan to show you the ideas I sent him... when was it... OMG... day 10 means 10 weeks means... 2 1/2 months... jesus... lol I WANNA PLAY! =P

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  14. @ Sly Kamaui - I removed the arm straps that were there in earlier designs due to technical reasons, this may have made the nips more obvious. I did try to redesign the chestpiece at that time but couldn't get anything that looked good and ultimately decided that I was wasting time and it was good as it was.

    @ (Greek for "hello") - It's all good, it's a legitimate concern that a lot of people are having. I'm all for sex appeal myself, but I've seen some recent game characters with their most concealing piece of armor being their gauntlets, which is just ridiculous. I'd really like to strike a balance here, and like I keep saying, cloth and leather will probably be home to more revealing outfits. Just not plate.

    Males are currently on hold for several reasons, and I'm focusing on females. When work on the males resumes I'll be sure to be posting some of that, and I'm sure we'll do another hairstyle poll.

    @ Anonymous (4:43 AM) - It was honestly a Flash tantrum that made me turn to the more plain lettering, a tantrum that it seems to have recovered from. It's safe to assume that the logo will be rapidly changing up until launch (if not even after).

    @ Gon - Might do polls/contests for armor designs later on too, this is still something we're deciding on...

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  15. Hey, just thought i'd let you know, i find the logo very well done, the bright colours mixed with cold colours really catches the eye, it also depicts some of the games elements(not the actual elements in the game)

    the orbs clearly show the elemental bases which are included in the game, the sword and shield also depicts that it is a more so right now a melee type game.

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  16. Okay yeah I see the difference now, brought out the frontal piece a lot, but yeah, I don't see problem with the extra bit of protection of the sensitive area. :P

    And I posted something on the main blog that got overlooked so I'll repost it here:
    "I really am liking the logo for the most part. My only complaint is the lettering of HERO TOWER DEFENSE. I liked the lettering on the sketch so much more. And the gradient on HTD sadly makes it look a little cheap. :P"

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  17. @ Sly Kamaui - Oh, I saw it. :D For the moment, the logo is so up in the air that I'm mostly just sitting back and taking notes.

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  18. i am loyal but... it's Thursday. love chain mail bikini idea. i don't like the logo it hides light(as if it were the worst) and show shadow to much (as if it were best ;)) soooo yea really that all i got to say.
    lux
    PS sorry if already said AND LIGHT IS THE BEST + shadow worst >X(

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  19. you should add elements for kingdom rush to the game. so that if your guy is melee, he stands in the path fighting the enemies.

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  20. Smooth idle stance is great! Thanks for the details Kevin!

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