#loosely playtested..everything should work

[mild-milk]

new cc-free desert bloom park for oasis springs :)

includes a pond, playground, wedding arch, grill area, food stall, easles, garden planters, bathroom w/ changing station

packs used: life & death, horse ranch, growing together, island living, seasons, get to work, jungle adventure, outdoor retreat, movie hangout, perfect patio

full view of park below the cut

📥DOWNLOAD (Google Drive) or

on the gallery ID: mildmlk

[guessimate]

CC free unpopulated hood (main hood) Download

Ultimate Collection required. Neighbourhood camera mod required (like this or similar)

Information about the map above:

pink outline - community lots

blue outline - lots which should be ready to turn into apartments with the use of the changeLotZoning apartmentbase cheat

The neighbourhood is not historical, as I don't think you can achieve that with no CC, and I wanted the download to be accessible to people who don't like downloading anything requiring CC.

There are some modern lots, and there is also a beach area you are invited to explore.

However, the neighbourhood is mostly loosely inspired by China (Takemizu Village, Shang Simla, and other depictions of Far East), in terms of the outside look of the buildings. The insides of the buildings were totally made up by me.

In the bottom left corner of the map there is a 'military' part of town. Most of these lots have a wall instead of a fence. If you don't like that, I suggest you remove at least one wall tile so there is a 'free' entrance, and the yard is not technically 'indoors'. It may be required to do so if you'd like to do gardening on those lots. There are some other lots more suitable for gardeners you might want to choose instead.

Download

The neighbourhood contains 97 lots and I am not able to take screenshots of all of them... so if you're interested in playing in this hood, you might have to download it and check it out with your own eyes.

I am sorry for not posting here for a long time. I haven't really felt like playing, and instead I have been working on this project since I created the terrain. It took me ~3 months to populate this island... with lots only.

I am not a builder and this is my first [and probably last] project of this kind, so I am sorry, it is not perfect. I am open to feedback and if you notice anything buggy or glitchy, do let me know, please. I didn't have time to properly playtest everything, and I am going to come back to my regular gameplay for a while. Maybe next year I will populate the hood with sims and fix the mistakes I made in this version, but I can't promise anything.

There are 0 sims, and 0 subhoods (not even stealth hoods generated, to my knowledge), so I believe it should be possible to turn this hood into a subhood too. But I am not turning it into a BV destination, as I don't want to touch secret lots with NPC-s at all.

The neighbourhood was created without any cc (or defaults). I only had essential mods in my Downloads folder (plus a camera mod). Also, buyable career rewards were used in the making of this hood.

You should be able to delete all the .bkp files [and leave only the .package files], but just in case I included everything the way it is in my Neighbourhoods folder. The backups were automatically generated when I opened the lots in Lot Adjuster.

[ostrichmonkey-games]

Everything I see from Dark Confluence looks sick, and you should use this as an excuse to talk more about it

I don't think I've actually talked a ton about what Dark Confluence is going to be like as a completed game, so I'll take this as an excuse to do so lmao.

So, I like the souls-borne "series" a ton. But my favorite part of all the games is the world that you're let loose in and get to explore. Piecing together the story through bits and pieces, hidden clues, secrets, implication and interpretation. The goal of Dark Confluence is to do that together at the table.

To that end, Dark Confluence is all about the setting and unfolding story you all put together. It is as much a game as it is a chopped up setting book that never tells you exactly what's going on - because that's the fun! Making it all up! Crafting your own unique crumbling, melancholy universe and then rooting around in it to see what you can make sense of.

Character mechanics draw a lot from my other game Extracausal, so its a lot of tag/trait based stuff, but there's also DNA from games like Wanderhome in there, with how the Realms ("levels") and Lords of the Tower ("bosses") work. I want the game to give the table a bunch of tools for getting into weird and complicated situations, and then stringing it all together into something uniquely cohesive.

Most of the mechanics are mostly done and written at this point, all that's left is just all the other writing lmao. There's 36 character backgrounds (each with their own set of 3 unique items), 12 Realms, 12 Lords, 18 Magical Spells, 18 Artifacts, 18 Major NPCs, 36 Creatures and Wretches (and more!), all of which have embedded within them little "lore sparks" for the table to play around with. Nothing is "canon", but there's a lot of moving parts - building blocks - for the table to play around with.

You're all gonna be wandering around your unique version of the Infinite Tower (the dark confluence of the multiverse), confronting the Lords of the Tower as you shape the universe to come. Along the way, you'll meet weird and interesting NPCs, horrible and dangerous Wretches, and uncover and create your own deep lore and secrets.

As a reward for everyone reading through all this text, here's a new Artifact

Ossifrage Great Bow; tags - ravenous, violent A great bow shaped from many fragments of bones. It glistens in the light, bleeding like an open wound. Effect: The wielder never runs out of arrows, as the bow fires massive, barbed, missiles grown and harvested from the skeleton of the wielder themself. Burden: The wielder’s sternum must be kept pried open, beating heart exposed. Augments The bow can launch a flurry of smaller arrows that darken the sky The bow can steal the bones of another whom it has injured The projectiles fired from the bow leave a burning stream of blood in their wake

And! A new Spell!

Fragmentation Effect: Unleash your manifold soul, allowing the hungry, grasping hands of Fate within you to reach out and unravel whatever they touch. Requirement: Consume an entire age’s worth of Fragments, becoming infinite, fractal, and glorious. Ember Moves Like tangled strands of a knot, all Fragments are secretly connected. All Fragments must take a Curse. The howl of the dying cosmos echoes louder, consuming the dreams of those within the Realm, replacing them with something else. One of your many soul-pieces sloughs off, becoming a Fragment all its own, one with the Fate of bringing about your final Dissolution. They say that souls are the building blocks of the cosmos, and the gods merely stonemasons. From where then, do souls come from?

It's gonna be done eventually. I might be on the lookout for playtesters once I have the text done. So, keep an eye out for that maybe?

[rpgmgames]

March’s Featured Game: acai cOrner

DEVELOPER(S): moca & Mitty ENGINE: RPG Maker 2003 GENRE: RPG, Adventure, Surreal SUMMARY: acai cOrner is about Mizuki, someone who has fallen into the sewers and who happens to find their favorite electric guitar! Upon obtaining the guitar, Mizuki turns into a magical girl who must defend herself against spooky sewer creatures using the guitar's magical powers.

Download the game here! Our Interview With The Dev Team Below The Cut!

Introduce yourself! *moca: Hi, I'm moca, a Starbucks barista aspiring to be a writer and game developer. I have been making RPG Maker games for about six years now, with my first two projects being a Pokémon fan-game and a Corpse Party fan-game. Those two happen to be my two favorite franchises as well! I have also created the RPG Maker game MOMOKA (IGMC 2018). I have founded a group called 'Team Shibu!' dedicated to making horror games! Our current project is a RPG Maker survival horror game named 'Katharsis'.

*Mitty: Hey there, I'm Mitty! I've been working with Moca on several games for a while now, helping with mostly graphics! Please support him, as he is very kind and hardworking!! I'm also the main developer of a game called "Marinette", so I hope you'll check that one out too, when the demo is released!

What is your project about? What inspired you to create this game initially? *moca: acai cOrner is an experimental spooky RPG Maker game that only uses 4 colors! You are a magical girl with a just-as-magical electric guitar that you use to fend off spooky sewer slimes and other weird enemies you find in the surreal sewer system. It's half exploration and half RPG battles. What inspired me to create acai cOrner initially was to actually get myself back into the groove of making games again. I had just recently came back from a hiatus and found myself having trouble getting back into the development of 'Katharsis'. That's when I decided to make a short, experimental game to get the juices flowing.

How long did you work on your project? *moca: acai cOrner was finished in just about under a month!

Did any other games or media influence aspects of your project? *moca: I had always wanted to make a Yume Nikki-like game and thought this was the perfect opportunity to try. So for the more surreal parts of acai cOrner, I took inspiration from Yume Nikki and a Homestuck random planet generator. Gameplay wise though, I took inspiration from a RPG Maker game called Ghost Suburb 0! I really loved how unique it was, especially with the timer and no dialogue aspect. I knew I wanted to do something with a timer, so I tried a rogue-like approach with the gameplay.

Have you come across any challenges during development? How have you overcome or worked around them? *moca: If you played any of my previous projects, you know that acai cOrner is vastly different than anything that I have ever done. I'm so used to using words to describe the violence in my games, so when it came to making the story, I had a lot of trouble. It wasn't until I looked deeper into why people like these types of games that I had realized that people like to interpret the story on their own, guided by exploration, to enjoy these games. After that, I let loose a bit and made something more open-ended. Another challenge was the difficulty. I was the only one playtesting the game, and since I knew the game front and back, and had no trouble getting the ending. That's why when I sent out demos to friends, I was really discouraged to hear that the experience was mostly frustrating and rage quitting-inducing haha. I worked closely with their feedback and made changes accordingly to make the experience less frustrating but still difficult. *Mitty: I think I was going through a weird artblock during the development of the game, so for some of the illustrations and backdrops for each area's fights, Moca sketched out the basic idea of what it could look like, and I just put my spin on it! It made the work much easier and faster!

Did any aspects of your project change over time? How does your current project differ from your initial concept? *moca: Well, the game was meant to be short so there wasn't room for any big changes. Sure there are a couple gameplay changes and enemy tweaks, but not anything mindblowing. I added in the idea of making four surreal worlds kinda last minute, if that counts, haha.

What was your team like at the beginning? How did people join the team? If you don’t have a team, do you wish you had one or do you prefer working alone? *moca: In the beginning, it was just me! I didn't think I was gonna need any outside help since this was supposed to be a relatively easy project to release, but the further in development I got, the more I realized the game needed pizazz. The four color limitation wasn't enough for my lack of graphical talent. That's when I contacted Mitty about helping with the games battle backdrops and sprite animations! She is also a member of Team Shibu!, but we have collabed together even before that. Her art really made the project shine and I enjoy working with them on games! *Mitty: Moca contacted me, and I wanted to help! We are working together on another game called Katharsis, so we are quite familiar with each other. I like working with other people, especially if I'm not in the lead, it releases a bit of the pressure I feel sometimes ahaha

What is the best part of developing a game? *moca: To me, it's seeing everything come together and just... working exactly the way you envisioned it. As a game developer, you section the game off into parts to make development much more organized and faster but seeing it all come together in the end. Pure bliss *chefs kiss*. *Mitty: I like a bit of everything, but currently I've been enjoying animating and spritework, as well as map assets' designs a little more than usual!

Do you find yourself playing other RPG Maker games to see what you can do with the engine, or do you prefer to do your own thing? *moca: Mm... not really! I have an idea of what the engine can do, so when I do go out of my way to player other RPG Maker games, it's usually for writing inspiration rather than gameplay inspiration. Ghost Suburb 0 is something that I accidentally stumbled upon and immediately fell in love with it the minute I played it haha. (Fun fact: the developer of Ghost Suburb 0 is apart of Team Shibu! and is in charge of monster design!)

Which character in your game do you relate to the most and why? (Alternatively: Who is your favorite character and why?) *moca: There is a rat in the game that is internally called 'Ratthew' who leads you into a funky room. I relate them the most. *Mitty: I relate to the land sharks the most on a spiritual level. They are pretty much confused beans, and that's very relatable.

Looking back now, is there anything that regret/wish you had done differently? *moca: I wish I added more random spooky events and trap rooms. But the game was also supposed to be short and I knew that if I kept adding more and more things, development was never gonna end haha.

Do you plan to explore the game’s universe and characters further in subsequent projects, or leave it as-is? *moca: Well, by the time this interview comes out, there should be a new update for the game. The update should include 100% custom music by a talented composer, and a nerf in difficulty. As for sequels, who knows! The next time you see acai cOrner may be in 3D.

What do you most look forward to upon finishing the game? *moca: Definitely the fan reaction! The satisfaction of seeing your work being noticed by people and actually enjoying makes me happy. It's also the relief of just... finishing something! *Mitty: For this particular project I was obviously looking forward to seeing what people said about the little animations and such ahaha! I also was curious about the reaction to the timed difficulty mechanic, I had never seen anything like that before Moca presented it to me, so I had no idea on what people's feedback would be.

Is there something you’re afraid of concerning the development or the release of your game? *moca: How people will handle the difficulty. The game isn't supposed to be completed on your first playthrough, but in 2-3 playthroughs. There are rooms and places that are meant to waste your time that you should ideally skip the more you play. By later playthroughs, you should be shaving time and be better. I understand that it's not handled as best I could, but I think the experience should still be challenging and hopefully fun! *Mitty: I was a little conflicted on the timed mechanic, I loved it because it's pretty original and helps set an interesting athmosphere of worry and unease, and also seems to tell a bit of the vague story; and at the same time I don't like it much because I prefer more story-driven games and the vagueness mixed with the mechanic feels different from what I'm used to playing! I think it's more of a personal taste kind of thing, it was an experimental jam game, after all!

Do you have any advice for upcoming devs? *moca: Take it easy! Take short breaks throughout development. And most importantly, have fun. If it's a hobby and it's making you overly stressed, just take a step back!

Question from last month's featured dev @ressurflection: What would you say is the weakest part of your game development? *moca: Procrastination. I'm so bad at sticking to my own schedule, it's something that I try to keep in check when working with a team especially.

We mods would like to thank moca & Mitty for agreeing to our interview! We believe that featuring the developer and their creative process is just as important as featuring the final product. Hopefully this Q&A segment has been an entertaining and insightful experience for everyone involved!

Remember to check out acai cOrner if you haven’t already! See you next month! 

- Mods Gold & Platinum

[draugsresurrection]

Draug’s Resurrection 0.9.0

A major new version of Draug’s Resurrection is now available. Link to the download on RPGMaker.net.

Here we are. Version 0.9.0. Draug's Resurrection is now a finished game, but not a complete one. Or maybe the other way around. At any rate, it is a game that can be played from start to finish (assuming no bugs) as a full experience. I'll get to the particular changes and bugfixes since last release after a perhaps preachy, perhaps whiny message:

I'm not particularly thrilled by the fact that nobody besides myself has playtested it since 2013. I absolutely can't fault anyone for not wanting to play a blatantly unfinished project. Still, it means all kinds of concerns, from difficulty, balance, to writing and gameflow logic all coming strictly from a single viewpoint. To say nothing about how many little bugs might've slipped under my playtesting. Then there's entirely external issues, like how or if it'll even run on modern computers. There's certain things I'm loosely aware of, like how it REALLY wants you to Run as Admin (explained further in a Readme within the files, and the game *should* now give a warning directly if not the case), how it might be called out as a virus by antiviruses, to awkward walking speeds (shown here), and have some documentation about them, but I'm sure there's many, MANY more potential concerns.

In short, what I'm trying to say is that it's paramount that if you experience bugs or problems that I be notified in some way. I'm fully aware there is a LOT of work I still need to do before Draug's Resurrection is truly, truly complete. But I cannot do it well without outside guidance.

This extends beyond just bugs, too. As touched upon earlier, I'd be eager to hear any thoughts things like game balance; what spells and gear you use, what you avoid, what monsters you dread fighting, if characters truly feel different from one another, clarity of objectives and of how the battle system operates, and so on and on. Even going a step further, things like suggestions of alternate dialogue branches are more than welcome. I have every intention to follow through on everything I humanly can; I didn't come through the last ten years to drop it at the very end.

Anyway, those changes:

+ True Endgames now exist, consisting of three wildly different scenarios based on a variety of factors throughout the game. This marks Draug's Resurrection as a complete game. However, many balance fixes and additional content needs to be added before I can call it truly finished.

+ Critical hits have completely changed. They do much less damage (generally 1.3x instead of 2x, although higher for crit-oriented skills like Sever), but now instead of doing more damage, they also boost the user's Charge while lower the target's. Some crit-skills raise their user's stats on a crit. After a crit, attempts to give Focus Strike/Meditation to the user to allow for a powerful follow-up. Basic attacks have much higher crit scaling, hopefully making them more viable later in the game.

+ Most enemies had their existing elemental resiliences further increased, particularly in regards to Slash/Bash/Pierce. This should make having a variety of different elemental skills more desirable instead of relying on one skill again and again.

+ Elemental resilences are now calculated before Defense/Resistance. This will make elementally-demanding foes like Blobs much easier to handle.

+ Battle toptext now displays the potency of ailments and the power of debuffs for Damage+Ailment and Damage+Debuff spells/skills.

+ Running from battles now mentions if rewards will be lost when running from a Determined Encounter.

+ Added the spell Aurora and the Sutra Dispel. Both function the same; they reset any stat-changes made to the target during the course of the battle. No enemies currently use Aurora, as it is situational, but eventual plans do exist to add it during an AI upgrade.

+ Human enemies have a cooldown on Ambrosia, so they won't obssessively waste time reviving a hopelessly defeated comrade. They will also no longer use Vigoor/Ecclesant Herbs, as they heal little and can easily result in heal-locking.

+ All Wall Spells have been nerfed fairly significantly; in short, their damage multiplier generally went from ~1.6x to ~1.1x. Beams have received a similar but much smaller nerf, as they're more difficult to use effectively.

+ The Axe skill Crush requires significantly more recharge now. Siege doesn't hit as hard and has an accuracy penalty. Armour Shred is less accurate, slower, and less powerful. Mystic Reaver is now P.Bash + M.Pierce instead of pure Magical Bash. High-speed spells (Sonicboom) have even less recharge. Other high-damage weapon skills have been minorly tweaked, typically downwards.

[thesevenseraphs]

Bungie Weekly Update - 8/24/17

This week at Bungie, we’re exploring a new European destination.

It’s a busy time at Bungie, and abroad. Earlier this week, our Bungie away team boarded planes and trains to travel to Köln, Germany for gamescom. They’ll be there all week spreading the news about Destiny 2 and celebrating DeeJ’s birthday.

Earlier this morning, Pacific Time anyway, we showed off some of the new fun, exploration, and adventures to be had in one of Destiny 2’s new destinations, the European Dead Zone. Devrim Kay VIII is on hand to give you a quick tour of the EDZ and to show you what to expect when you start exploring on September 6th. There will be new loot to discover, enemy forces to dispatch, Lost Sectors with hidden treasures to find, and much, much more.

Take a look for yourself.

This wasn’t the only thing we showed off this week. Under the shadow of the moon, as it hogged the spotlight from the daystar for a few hours, we put out a brand new action packed Launch Trailer. If you haven’t seen it yet, go watch it now. We’ll wait for you.

We’re still not done. This week we’re also shedding new and renewed light on Destiny 2’s cast of characters. First up is Cayde-6, a favorite that many of you already know and love.

Next is a mysterious renegade named Hawthorne that you’ll meet in the wild.

Ok, now we’re done… for today at least. If you want to check out some direct feed EDZ gameplay and impressions, make sure to check out all of the videos and coverage coming out of gamescom this week.

PC Beta Imminent 

Only 4 more sleeps until you can play Destiny for the first time on your own personal computer. For players with early access (via pre-order or code), the ability to pre-install the Beta begins on Friday, August 25 at 10 AM Pacific Time. To pre-install, you must go to Blizzard’s Battle.net app and click the big “Install” button. If you pre-ordered at retail, take the Bungie code you got from your retailer and go to wwbungie.net/redeem to get your PC Beta early access code.

Before you jump in, you might want to take some time to get familiar with how you’ll control your Guardian and let loose your wide arsenal of weapons and abilities on any enemies foolish enough to stand in your way. To get you started early, we’ve created a quick image to show the default controls for Mouse and Keyboard on the PC. 

The PC Key-mappings are customizable, so you can map them out to fit your personal play style.

In the PC Beta, you will also have text chat available for sending tactical callouts and witty banter to other players in your Fireteam(/f). You can even whisper(/w) “why does Kyle keeping falling off the edge” or “hey, come run Inverted Spire with me!” to someone on your friends list. There are multiple text chat visual modes you can cycle through(T). After beta, but in time for launch, we plan on adding a Team channel (similar to team voice chat) and the ability to whisper to Clan members.

This Beta is a Test! We will learn a lot to help support the full PC release on October 24. We want to know what you think! We have a Feedback Forum set up and ready. If you think you might have found a bug, let us know in our Game Issues forum. Thank you for helping test the PC game and our servers!

PAX Facts

Starting on Friday, September 1, we’ll be taking over the Paramount Theatre to bring Destiny 2 to PAX West. We have a whole lot of fun planned for everyone who attends, and this will be your last chance to play Destiny 2 early before we push it out to everyone on September 6.  All you need is a PAX badge and you’re good to go.

Balcony seating is reserved for panel discussions. We aren’t revealing big Destiny 2 news, but we do have some fun topics to discuss for those looking to get insight from our studio and the community we serve.

Noon – FRIDAY – September 1

Leading the Destiny Community

Bungie Community Managers are not the only voices that serve the player. The Destiny Community benefits from a network of leaders with audiences all their own. Learn all about the challenges that content creators face as they spin up videos, podcasts, and streams that entertain gamers when they’re away from their controllers. Hear war stories from the front lines of the Internet. Score some tips on how you can begin that adventure yourself.

3PM – FRIDAY – September 1

Bringing the Guardians of Destiny to Life

Cosplayers take the act of becoming legend quite literally. PAX always brings some of the finest costume creators into the spotlight. Watch them strut their stuff in suits of armor (and capes) of their own creation. Meet the artists behind the masks. Cheer for your favorite heroes from the world of Destiny. This is not a contest. Every Guardian who represents the Cosplay Community will be a winner.

Noon – SATURDAY – September 2

Forging a New Destiny Weapon

Before a weapon makes it into your hands, it passes through many of ours. It takes many creative disciplines at Bungie to fill the gun rack. See the creation of Destiny weapons from the first vision to the final tuning. Learn how Concept Artists, 3D Modelers, Animators, and Designers forge weapons that are worthy of heroes. Come and meet the gunsmiths at Bungie that keep your vaults filled with wonderful armaments. Witness a creative regression for some of the most iconic weapons in Destiny’s brief history.

3PM – SATURDAY – September 2

Building Better Worlds in Destiny

Before you explore the worlds of Destiny, they are built from the ground up to reflect an artistic vision. Learn how Concept Artists and Environment Artists work hand in hand to create the places where your characters fight for their survival. See some of the earliest visions of the worlds you’ve come to know, and how they influenced every step of our creative process. Get a glimpse at the tools we use to build better worlds. 1PM – SUNDAY – September 3 

Destiny PlayTest War Stories

Before Guardians can face each other in competition, we wage countless wars against each other at Bungie. Our playtest labs are arenas where studio heroes are born and the games you play evolve. Learn from the combatants about how the battle for the best idea rages inside our walls. When shots are fired, everything is up for grabs: The maps you know, the modes you master, and the way every Character and Weapon is powerful.

As you can see we have a good mix of Bungie and community lined up to share stories and experiences with you. Join us to ask some questions or to tell some stories all your own. We can’t wait to see you there!

As you can see we have a good mix of Bungie and community lined up to share stories and experiences with you. Join us to ask some questions or to tell some stories all your own. We can’t wait to see you there!

Custom Service

You have “Q”s, they have the “A”s. Destiny Player Support are working hard to make sure you have the info you need for everything Destiny 2.

This is their report.

Early Access for the Destiny 2 PC Beta begins at 10 AM Pacific on August 28, 2017. The following is a list of confirmed issues that may impact gameplay:

Players may encounter issues when playing the Destiny 2 Beta with drivers that are out of date. Updating drivers to the latest version grants the best experience when playing Destiny 2 on PC.

The Destiny 2 Beta may not run when installed to a folder with some localized character types in its name (e.g. Greek, Cyrillic, Kanji, etc.). Players should ensure that they install the Beta to a path that does not include these character types, or use the default install location.

Players may encounter issues when joining the Fireteam of another player on their same local area network. Players who encounter this issue should ensure that they have UPnP enabled in their network settings.

MSAA is still under development. As such, players may encounter various issues including visual artifacts and performance degradation when using MSAA.

Multi-GPU support is still in development. Players may encounter issues including visual artifacts and performance impacts when using NVIDIA SLI. AMD Crossfire support is not available in the Destiny 2 PC Beta.

The Destiny 2 Beta must be launched from Blizzard’s Battle.net app. If players launch the Beta client directly from the executable, they may receive an error message or the Destiny 2 Beta client may become unresponsive. Players who encounter this issue should close the Beta client through the user interface or by pressing Alt+F4, and proceed to launch the Destiny 2 Beta using the “Play” button in the Destiny 2 tab of the Blizzard app.

GeForce GTX: If players wish to have the optimum experience in the Destiny 2 PC Beta, they can download and install NVIDIA’s new Destiny 2 Beta Game Ready Driver. Simply download and launch NVIDIA's GeForce Experience, then proceed to click the "Drivers" tab to download the update, or download it from the NVIDIA website here.

Bungie.net Update: Profile Recovery

Players now have a means to recover a previously made Bungie.net profile that no longer has any authentication methods linked for sign-in. If a player wishes to recover their account, they may proceed through the following steps:

Identify the authentication method used to create the Bungie.net profile that was closed or lost

Ensure the authentication method has been unlinked from any active Bungie.net profiles

Click "Create a new account" and use the account credentials that were originally linked to the desired account

Select "Recover" next to the desired Bungie.net profile and complete the account reclamation process, which may be identified by profile membership ID's or Bungie.net join dates

Please note the following:

For a Bungie.net profile to be recovered, it cannot be linked to any active authentication methods. If linked, it will not be presented to the player during the account recovery flow.

Players will have up to 90 days to recover lost or closed Bungie.net profiles. After 90 days, this process will be unavailable.

For additional information concerning Bungie.net Profile recovery, creation, or linking, please see this Help Article. Additionally, we are actively investigating issues impacting various features on Bungie.net, including Groups and Clans. If you encounter any issues after the most recent update to Bungie.net, please post a report to the #Help forum. Stay tuned to @BungieHelp on for the latest updates on our investigation.

[xenocorp-devblog-blog]

The Formidable Tale of Xenophever, Part 2

Yaaay the first day of production at last.

I was genuinely excited by the whole process of working for a year on my very own videogame concept with very nice working conditions and a team of people I really enjoyed. Genuinely terrified too. I was the coding spirit of the team, and that's a lot of responsibilities I wasn't sure I could handle on my own.

We had our own room shared with another working group, and now was the time to develop Xenophever for real.

(yeeeeee)

Our first challenge as a team was to prove our vision for Xenophever was not only interesting but also technically viable. The summer prototype I had built on Game Maker helped communication with our teachers, but one issue remained ; we saw the game camera as isometric, and some of the teachers were still doubtful. Nothing in Game Maker makes the process easy, so improvisation was key. Now I know there is a lot of clever math tricks to be done to convert distance into things and whatnot, but I had not taken a math class for years and never had the best time with this discipline. So my very un-spanish self ended up following a spanish tutorial so I could make the magic happen in the engine while the artists were learning to twist characters and settings to an isometric grid Game Maker did not technically took into account. Despite our various problems, we created the first version of the Bartender, built blocs and props, developed two different moving systems (arrow keys and point&click since we were not that sure) and finally got an approval on the camera matters.

(thanks spanish person, you probably saved Xenophever)

The next major difficulty to come in code was the actual AI. I had pulled together a solid first draft with the summer prototype, but the pathfinding system was to become more difficult given the sets of rule we had went for in the level design. Again, almost no math notion here. I had very difficult days plucking off my hair trying to find a solution.

In the animation department, Florian was leading raging battles against various solutions to cover the massive amount of animations we had planned for the game. Eventually he ended up settling for Spine -and that's the beginning of a beautiful tale I would never dare to explore on my own name, because he will probably touch the subject himself soon enough.

During this time Louis, fellow game designer and overall mastermind, scheduled what was to come for us for the whole year according to the deadlines the school demanded us to consider. Valentine, head artist, worked on designing the first aliens while we were implementing the animation system of the first species that covered the entire set of clients in this early stage.

Maxim, our environment and UI artist, was busy conceptualizing and implementing our first Structure, the Bar. Once in the engine, I could fiddle around with depth and integration. The production was starting nicely despite the technical problems we faced.

(my early desk, before it completely drowned under post-its)

So we started to feel homey, but something had yet to be build. I think the first time we actually worked as a team boils down to the concept and execution of the main menu. Not a single person had been left out of the process, and I think even today, the main menu is one of the prototype's strengths when it comes to its universe and hooking the player into the game. Then we decided to rent a photography studio for promotion -and fun-, and we ended up blasting off funk, retrowave and 90's tubes as we tried to get somewhat useable pictures of the crew. We had good fun together, it blew off steam from our personal issues with the project. Many things happened during this event, including (but not limited to) :

(if this doesn’t convince you we’re qualified to work on anything, I don’t know what will)

Afterward, it was all back to those problems with a fresh eye. I ended up getting some help from my mom that probably saved me from being stuck in a bug forever (thanks mooom), and Maxim faced his most resilient problem in the production ; the restroom. We weren't exactly sure how explicit we wanted to tackle certain subjects and how badly we were willing to get PEGI-ed, so Maxim's first designs were slightly tame. Not only he had to design toilets that were supposed to work with a great deal of anatomies (we were not certain about every alien design, but even then we knew it would be no fun if everybody used them the same way), but it had to fit in the octagonal space the level design allowed. After many attempts, Maxim settled for a living plant-monster thing feeding off organic decays, and lovingly named it "Dawyjozon". Flo and I then worked on the animation routine of the two aliens we had, and then I tried to figure out for WAY TOO LONG WHY EXACTLY THE CLIENTS KEPT THE TOILETS WITH THEM OUTSIDE OF THE RESTROOM AND- well. I figured it out eventually, but this bug was the regular thing to expect at each new animation update. I'd say I stopped finding it hilarious reasonably fast, but I'm pretty sure the rest of the team disagrees.

(Fate thou have forsaken me (again))

When we reached our first serious milestone in January, things accelerated fast. At this point artists were not late, we already had 3 of the 4 aliens planned in the final game, 4 of the 6 structures, only one mini game of the 3 we ended up having and... And a serious design problem. In the state it was, the game was not really fun nor challenging. The systems worked but loosing was extremely hard. No tactics nor strategy were required, the world felt a bit flat, and we fell into a lot of lecture and interface issues. The playtests results we gathered that day helped us focus on the big picture a bit more efficiently.

(ultimately we remained excessively purple)

After that day, things get blurry for me. We were close to the deadline our teachers had set that forbade us to include any more design tweaks. I had until then to bend the system from an alien-observer simulator to an actual game. Louis worked hard on this with me, crafting two systems next to the first one. We brought the drinks into the game with various effects -they were a huge game-changer-, the last species made its way into the prototype and Maxim, now finished with most of the level design, slaved over the interface until we had something viable to show. My whole life became a programming battlefield night and day, but eventually, during the beta session our school had planned on an E-sport bar, we were somewhat ready. (okay the game crashed twice) (at least no unexpected toilet showed up) (so there's that)

(thanks to the people who tried the game and gave us feedback!)

Things were still not over. Not only we were entering the dreaded stage of debugging and tweaking, pixel-perfect territory and other annoyingly precise tasks, but Louis and I started tackling the dialogue bits of the game. Good bits. I had fun. It still was a very hard week of work. Over 800 possible dialogues were written for each species and nature.

About that time I also needed to tackle everything in the sound department. Originally I had great plans for a very complex soundtrack and tons of spatially localized VFX to bring the nightclub to life, and of course I had to cut my expectations drastically. I focused mostly on the feedback and the bare minimum for the aliens to be distinct from each other. And as for the original soundtrack, I had been working on finding the right type of ambiance for the game since the past year, but nothing truly satisfied me and time was running low. I settled for the main theme from "Messing With The Wrong Tentacle" and a few other themes to build around, and ended up with a decent amount of music that covered the game from intro sequence to the various types of game over the player could tumble upon. The code had been hard, but I'd say music had been one of my greatest enemies during the production. Yet I am still satisfied with the work I've put into the soundtrack with the limitations I had (Logic 5.5 on PC for the dinosaurs that have any idea of which version I'm talking about). And the deadline don't wait for your changes of heart.

(f you’re french you might get a song stuck in the head forever by staring too long at this GIF)

We also had to come to term with some of our mistakes. In design, the very limited moveset of the Bartender was thrown away to allow the player more reactivity and freedom, and we had to admit the hybrid tablet/PC thing we were going for simply did not work that well on PC, that ended up being our only platform. It's not as smooth an experience to drag and drop things with a mouse than with a finger. Many overcomplicated layers of User Interface were left in, as it was a bit too late to refine now. Visual feedback was clearly not as strong as what it should have been, the NPC/NPC dialogue system was a bit off and glitchy, and the dynamic light system never ended up in the final prototype. Still, we had a pretty solid game. So solid, in fact, the engine had troubles handling it. I had many concerns as to potential memory leaks or infinite loops, and as an honest confession I never properly learned how to code, so I could have been making critical mistakes without even knowing. As it turned out, and despite all the flaws in my code, our integration method that saved countless time on my part was actually destroying the engine's capacity. The direct consequence of that implied an utter inability for the game to load and run on various PC configurations. We rattled our brains to disarm the disaster, but despite a week of hard work re-cutting every sprite and reworking the texture packs until they ended up into somewhat acceptable range, the game could not run properly on many configurations regardless of any identifiable pattern. In the end, we gave up. I don't think Game Maker is the best engine to for an artstyle such as ours and the visual ambition we had (and despite all the blood, sweat, tears and overall blast I had working with it -it actually gave us plenty of other advantages that I'm really grateful for). In the end, what mattered was bringing this prototype to our end of the year reception and making it run. We tried the installer on the local computers. It ran. We had to accept the situation, at least for a time.

We packed the final prototype a Friday. But technically they were not checked until next Monday. Which was good given I found out one last bug the Saturday that made me run under a raging storm with clearly not enough clothing to re-upload the corrected version in the school.

Never piss off the Deadline Gods.

And at last. The first version of Xenophever was completed.

Then we had a month.

During this month, several things happened. First off we had to prepare the game presentation in front of professional guests, we finished the trailer properly, and then the dreaded question of "and what next ?" started peering from our empty taskboards.

We have been questioning the possibility of pursuing the game for several months now, but June was the deciding time in which the team agreed on its future.

In the end, Maxim and Valentine wanted to pursue their path on their own, and the rest of the team wishes them the best of luck in this decision and many great and inspiring projects to work on. For the rest of us, well... It seemed like we were going to be stuck together for a bit longer. The final day came at last. We were back in the Final Spot again, same place in which we had our open betas. During the morning, professionals played our games and exchanged feedbacks (and we are forever grateful for those, they're incredibly useful in our current refont -but more on that later). Then we finally presented our postmortem in front of a compact crowd alongside our classmates and their projects Bloom, Rio 2050  and Arashi. The burning afternoon passed by with a glass of custom Xenophever cocktail the adorable staff prepared for the occasion, and we ended the journey the evening on a french beach and even more alcohol. That's a life I can get behind.

(and since this day, Louis became a table and lived very happily ever after)

So yep. Our first attempt at Xenophever was packed and done. I honestly could have hardly dreamed of better production conditions and a better team. Many thanks to ArtFX and our teachers for making this happen, many thanks to our classmates for running the race alongside us -especially to the Bloom team who bared with us daily through our various debates on insect reproduction, politics, toilet and strip tease reunions or animation reference research (Florian probably wishes he could unsee a thing or two), many thanks to our families, friends, and everybody that followed us on social medias at the time. And at last, thanks to the team. Valentine and Maxim have been formidable companions and will always have a special place in the heart of Xenocorp. Here's a link to their respective Artstation platforms in case you want to show them some love anyway, because these guys deserve it : Valentine : https://www.artstation.com/ardal Max : https://www.artstation.com/tortosambrosini And then... Then we took July off. I was exhausted beyond anything possible, and if we were to take the hazardous road of indie development... We'd need some strengths.

Tomorrow, I'll uncover the last part of our journey ; the aftermath, and what the hell we've been doing with all that. Thanks for the read. Wow. This post is really long.

See you tomorrow ! Raquel (and Xenocorp as a whole), out.