first update of the year - I never know when it's appropriate to stop pretending I'm resting and actually work .. and it happens each year.. I wonder how others do it? 🤔
but I digress
now according to the games lore the Brainsuckers are capturing spaceships (or at least used to)
those crash on the planet, the Brainsuckers open it up somehow (like a shellfish)
and then they promptly eat the brains of the crew - and use the remains of their body for experiments
this is an important story point because it explains some of the creatures backstory
(e.g. parasites from the spaceships, body horror experiment enemeis)
..the thing is even though it sounds like a good idea that is logically built up
when it comes to explaining it ingame things get tricky
so I thought why not hint about it in the level background (or skyboxes in this case)
e.g a skybox with a spaceship graveyard (not easy as it sounds)
and there could be giant magnets to capture ships ..
thing is it's not obvious what these are for and I would still need to explain
about it in a manual or something
one of the first problems with a spaceship graveyard level is that you need spaceships
of course there are plenty of asset stores around but finding something with my games
style and my low poly demands is near impossible -- for now I'm trying to make as many as I can
naturally I made things even worse for myself because I want a big shuttle to be one of the levels
because I thought it would be interesting and look cool .. and be easy to do .. turns out it isn't
as I found out modelling a spaceship is rather simple (any sort of geometry will do and just call it a ship)
the problematic part is texturing them
usually the cop out is to have add a lot of details to the surface and let the lights and shadows
do the hard work - a now ancient trick discovered by lucasarts for movies - but this is a bit tricky with a lowpoly style
another problem with 3D models - too often they look better without textures
until next time