I'm trying to come up with a nice UI for the main game. So far I don't have an MP/magic system even though I might want one, but I can't think of a logical way to add it to the game play since my game stands on its combat alone.
The combat engine got tweaked a lot. While at heart it still plays similar to Zelda 2, I wanted the combat to be a little faster and to rely less on blocking bullets (thrown swords). So, I thought I'd throw some Double Dragon into the mix and have two attack buttons. Since you can duck for low attacks, this makes a total of 4 instant attacks from a standing position. I made a flow chart (on paper) of possible animation transitions between each of the attack positions (including repeats for combos) and it looks good (on paper).
Using the 360 controller as a reference, this would have A button as jump, X button as attack left, B button as attack right and Y button for context sensitive action. Since I know there's gunna be people who have problems with this type of control scheme I'll add an alternate option for X as attack forward and B as attack backward relative to facing direction. Also, this is not a fighting game/beat 'em up, the combos are purely graphical - the per hit damage and speed should be standard across all attacks (like Zelda 2) so a player doesn't "have" to ever use one attack button or the other, it's purely a comfort thing.
I've decided to use my cartoons as a character basis since they're easy to pose and quite emotive. If I were to hire an animator I could just show them my model movement chart and they could probably go to town on it. Because of the character's stubby little legs it might be tricky converting to a more accurate human analogue for models, but that shouldn't come up.
The next part up would be to decide between sprites or vectors. Sprites are easy to work with, but vectors look nicer and can have smoother movements. Since my model design has very few parts (2 arms, 2 legs, the body section, the head section and the eyes) I could model them separately and just "pin" them together for animations as opposed to drawing full characters.
Just not sure yet
Projects
All paper work since I've been playing other games
Gaming
Bought Starcraft 2... ya, for $59.99 USD... as a Digital Download. I feel ripped off, but only because I've been so spoiled by the comfort of Steam sales.
Been mostly playing Just Cause 2 - The story is completely ignorable, it's all about the base raid action. There's a lot to destroy and the game world is huge, probably the largest hand crafted game world available. Hijacking helicopters doesn't get old and the enemy mix is just annoying enough to kill you some of the time while still keeping you aggressive against them.
Also, looks like Ys titles are coming to Steam... so, yeah. I might get stuck on those for a while. The 3D games are good action, but I liked the edge ramming of the original titles.
Other
Spent my entire design budget on a Bowflex PR3000... Ya, I'm irresponsible. I need a wife to keep me in check.
Or something, Lok
