The Kristala Dev Blog - Issue #28
Hello, faithful feline-lovin' friends and fantasy aficionados! Welcome back to another magically entrancing issue of the Kristala dev blog.
This is the only place where you'll receive a monthly, in-depth look into the entire development process for 3D dark fantasy ARPG Kristala, an indie game built in Unreal Engine 4 by the incredibly talented team at Astral Clocktower Studios.
As mentioned above (and frequently touted across all our social channels), Kristala is a dark fantasy game—which means we definitely want our characters and environments to properly convey that particular element.
We really loved how the demo was looking at the end of 2020, but we thought it embodied a bit more whimsy than it did darkness, so we've officially embarked on a complete overhaul of the entire demo level, including character models, level design, environments, and more.
Now we're well on our way to achieving the proper vibe for the game, and we're ridiculously excited to show you some of the changes that have already been implemented over the course of the last few weeks.
Are you ready to get dark, dear friends? Trust us...we've got you covered.
Concept Art
As part of our demo overhaul, we recently welcomed a few new team members into our motley crew in order to help us better establish the dark-fantasy vibe we're going for—including the newest member to our Concept Art team, Harold.
Luckily for us, Harold is incredibly adept at understanding exactly what we mean when we put in requests like, "Can you hook us up with something ominous and slightly menacing?"
For his first concept piece, we tasked Harold with an environmental shot showcasing the first Kristal Checkpoint that appears in the Dalamase swamp level featured in the Kristala demo.
The Dalamase lies within Nisargan territory and contains several moss-laden, bog-entrenched, abandoned fishing villages that pockmark a vast, overgrown, tree-laden swamp.
Here's a look at Harold's interpretation of the Checkpoint and its surrounding environment. The denseness of the trees and the wetness of the ground really drive home the "this environment is a creepy, murky swamp" vibe, which we're suuuper stoked about.
After seeing how stunning and chill-inducing his first piece was, we wanted to see Harold's rendition of a portion of the Dalamase's Dark Forest.
This eerie, tree-laden level area of the Kristala demo is chock full of strange, secretive creatures that may or may not welcome your presence. One such oddity is a stick-like, mannequin-esque being called the Twigativa (or, as we like to call them, Twiggies) that vaguely resembles a cat-like Anagativa.
What makes these creatures especially horrifying is the fact that only some of them seem to be capable of life. While many remain still, unmoving as they stand sentry over the Dark Forest, others unexpectedly come to life without warning.
The hard part for you will be determining exactly which ones are which... ;)
We mentioned earlier about the abandoned fishing villages that line the Dalamase swamp. After finishing up the Twiggy concept pictured above, Harold then moved on to a third environmental concept featuring one such village.
For this piece, we also had Harold try his hand at reimagining the appearance of the Lantern Trees that can be found throughout the Dalamase. These lush, stunning, luminous trees are not only ridiculously beautiful, but they also serve a very important in-game purpose too.
As you make your way through the swamp, you'll quickly discover that many of the enemies that dwell within its boundaries either omit or dispense a poisonous substance that'll slowly eat away at your health bar.
To combat this type of noxious damage, simply consume the fruit of the Lantern Tree to receive a boost in poison resist. Doing so just might help you survive a bit longer amongst the poisonous flora and fauna of the Dalamase.
Up next for Harold? Tackling a concept for a damp cave level area that's home to a very secretive creature featured in the Kristala demo.
The narrow entrance to this cave widens into a cavernous room to reveal several clusters of glowing crystals and a series of mysterious doors. We'll let you discover for yourself exactly where each doors leads, but for now—enjoy this look at Harold's Nisargan cave concept.
Last on Harold's list of concepts for this sprint was an environmental piece showcasing an area of the Kristala demo that we've been referring to internally as the Treehouse Clearing.
Featured prominently in this concept is the hulking trunk of an enormous Jhacanda tree whose thick network of branches supports the weight of a gigantic Nisargan treehouse dwelling.
We love how the treehouse itself is illuminated by several sources of light that shine out from its windows like a beautiful beacon of warmth amongst the dreary, damp fog of the Dalamase.
Curious about Harold's process for building out each concept's composition? Stay tuned to the Kristala dev blog—and to all our socials—to learn how you can get exclusive, behind-the-scenes access into Harold's entire, step-by-step process.
Although the feline-like Anagativa and the rodent-like Kotakaya are the most prominent creatures featured in Kristala, the Kota aren't the only rodent race that thrives on planet Ailur.
In fact, contrary to your typical Kota foe, the Hemani are friendly rodent creatures that have willingly integrated into the Ana way of life. For this reason, most Hemani you'll meet along your travels are more than happy to assist you however they can.
One such creature featured in Kristala is a sweet and gentle Hemani named Cloudette, an NPC you'll encounter in a unique level area called The Hermitage.
Before we show off Cloudette's beautiful concept—created by an incredibly talented concept artist (and friend of studio) named Amanda—say hello to Game Producer Allie's IRL hamster, Cloud, who served as the furry inspiration for Cloudette's character.
With the help of our friend James, a super gifted concept artist, we were able to cross off another important character concept this sprint...one who serves a large role in Kristala's core storyline.
Svar Ekat is a hairless Anagativa who originally hails from the Sykomana clan, a mysterious clan that's gifted in the art of both telekinesis and telepathy. Bored by the perceived monotony of his home clan's lands, Svar eventually severs ties with the Sykomanans and sets out on his own as a rogue, covert traveler.
We don't want to say too much about Svar just yet, but we can assure you that this furless feline has a fiendish face you won't soon forget. Don't believe us? Just have a look at the concept for Svar and we think you might agree.
As a rogue wanderer traversing the wilds of Ailur, you'll rarely spot Svar without some sort of blade or staff in his grasp. We're still working out which of the beautiful weapons that James designed will be Svar's go-to form of defense, but we definitely wanted to show them off too.
These are all so gorgeous and detailed that you'll most likely end up seeing each one of these featured in the full version of Kristala in some capacity.
Which piece do you think matches Svar's aesthetic the best? Which piece is your favorite? Let us know in the comments section below.
In ACS concept artist l_aciel's world, badass armor was on the menu this sprint—something she's ridiculously adept at designing.
We've showed off l_aciel's base armor concepts for the six clans of Anagativa in past issues of the Kristala dev blog, but we think this next concept is her best work yet.
Members of the raven-coated Myrtuna clan are incredibly skilled in the art of necromancy, an ancient area of focus that closely aligns them with Ailur's spirit realm. Although this connection with spirit has its benefits, it also allows souls that have passed onto the spirit realm access back into the living world.
In order to maintain order and properly police spirit access, a group of gifted Myrtunan warriors decided to band together to form Ailur's elite group of Spirit Hunters. Here's a look at the Spirit Hunter armor set that will be featured in Kristala.
Shifting gears back to the dark-fantasy overhaul we're currently performing on the demo, our next character concept features a revamp of our mutant Gilsanka enemy that's native to Ailur's sprawling swamplands.
Freely roaming the abandoned waterways and bogs of the Dalamase's abandoned fishing villages, these fish-like Gilsanka are one of the only enemies in the Kristala demo that engage in combat using both melee and magic combat.
Here's a look at several versions of this aquatic mage, followed by a peek at a few of the weapons you may find the Gilsanka wielding in game.
Stay tuned to the programming section of today's dev blog to see how you can expect these baddies to behave in battle.
The last concept we were able to cross off our list this sprint is a character concept featuring a jolly and loveable Ana NPC named Neil of Nisarga.
As his name suggests, Neil is a member of the Nisargan clan. He's a merchant NPC you'll meet as you embark on your journey to becoming a Raksaka warrior.
Like any merchant, Neil of Nisarga has all the trinkets, items, spells, and charms you'll need to surely aid you on your way. We especially love how Neil's concept captures the colorful, eclectic, hippie-like aesthetic of the peaceful, nature-loving Nisargans.
3D Character Design
If you thought our concept artists were the only ones bustin' buns this sprint, you'd be sorely mistaken. Our 3D modelers were just as ambitious during the month of March.
For today's 3D modeling updates, our resident character modeler, Bianca, kicks things off with her work on the second and third Kotakayan Soldier variants featured in our demo—including their leather- and buckle-adorned armor.
After finishing up the Kota soldiers, Bianca then started in on the models for our custom, fish-like Gilsanka mage enemies.
Using the concept we shared with you earlier in this issue as her guide, Bianca started by blocking out the initial shape of the Gilsanka model.
Once she had the base down, Bianca then started adding in the unique details included in the concept, like the sharp, pointed spinal fins along the character's head, neck, and back—and the fine, thin webbing between its fingers.
Bianca also blocked out the ropes, shells, and hooks that serve as the Gilsanka's armor. Stay tuned next month to see how this enemy's model progresses.
If you've been keeping up with our dev blogs over the past couple issues, you'll know that we've been working hard to come up with a way to create realistic-looking fur for our various animal-like characters.
This sprint, 3D Generalist Joe continued working with hair cards to create the fur for our Kota soldier models in a way that keeps their overall polycount as low as possible.
Moving forward, Joe will continue to refine and improve the look of the fur, adding a dither effect to the hair shader to soften the edges of each card.
With Joe working on rodent fur, Lead Character Modeler Pete started creating hair cards in Zbrush and applying them to our female main character to familiarize himself with how they work and how they can be manipulated.
Once he played around with the cards a bit, Pete found them rather easy to create and, surprisingly, pretty practical to individually edit. Here's a look at some screenshots Pete shared with us during this beginning phase of the process.
After working with the hair cards for awhile, it dawned on Pete that he could actually create a proxy texture that would easily troubleshoot the orientation of each card.
Essentially, if the green arrows pictured below are prevalent, the hair cards will look correct; if the red bars attached to the arrows are too prominent—especially in the silhouette—that represents something that needs to be addressed further.
To further test this, Pete isolated an area on the model's brows that would be easy to control and manipulate.
Next, Pete exported the hair cards into Unreal in order to build a universal hair shader that could then ultimately be applied to every fur-havin' character in Kristala. Convenient, right?
While building up the hair shader, however, Pete struggled to find a way to actually bake out the flow map information (meaning: the directional flow of the hair cards) onto an image pulled from the 3D suites our modeling team typically uses, like Maya and Blender.
Though the reasoning behind the necessity for this is ridiculously technical and specific, the presence of the flow map itself greatly improves the look of hair and fur in Unreal.
Why? It's through this very flow map that Unreal generates the life-like shapes of specular highlights that naturally occur from various light sources on fur and hair.
After a bit more research, Pete was finally able to to start the official furring of our Nisargan female player character.
During his first official pass, Pete was finally able to make the textures and shaders work in tandem. Though the fur cards in the screenshots below still need quite a bit of editing, Pete is definitely on the right path.
Stay tuned to future issues of the dev blog to learn where you can find a complete, step-by-step, detailed tutorial on how to create and master the process we used to create realistic fur using hair cards.
3D Environmental Design
In the world of 3D Environmental Design, ACS team member Cass kicked things off this sprint by continuing his work on the large, decrepit Cathedral that serves as a centerpiece for our Nasahara level.
The once-grand Nisargan city of Nasahara was tragically ransacked and set ablaze by a band of ruthless Kota soldiers during the Great Kotakayan Rebellion. The resulting destruction was so brutal that many of Nasahara's beloved structures and landmarks were obliterated, leaving its streets abandoned to this very day.
Even so, some say they can still hear eerie laughter and menacing whispers emanating from the city proper, a frightening set of sounds that seem to grow louder the closer you get to the massive Cathedral.
Here's a look at Cass's texture work for this beautiful structure, one of the few buildings that still stands after the carnage that took place in Nasahara so long ago.
