Monthly Devlog | July 2024 | No. 66

In July, the Depths of Erendorn development team made substantial advancements across various aspects of the game, reflecting a concerted effort to enhance both visual and gameplay elements. The 3D modelling team focused on creating and refining new character hairstyles, incorporating intricate designs and Nordic-inspired braids to offer dynamic customisation options. The Set Piece Design team added detailed visual elements such as chandeliers, new textures, and crucial assets like the fast travel stone, significantly enriching the game’s environment. Meanwhile, the client team worked on refining the user interface and fixing critical bugs, including those related to combat mechanics and levelling-up processes. The server team improved the game’s infrastructure by resolving navigation data issues and stabilising server functionality, while the sound team developed and implemented impactful audio effects for both character and enemy abilities. The environment team enhanced the game’s landscape with new assets and improvements, and the animation team updated enemy animations to ensure smoother and more immersive gameplay. Finally, the VFX team advanced the visual effects for various abilities and enemy interactions, further contributing to the game’s immersive experience. As always, join us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Reddit for daily updates on Depths of Erendorn. Alternatively, join our Discord for all the latest! – now let’s get into it!

‍

3D Modelling

‍

Throughout July, the 3D modelling team at Depths of Erendorn made significant progress in creating new hairstyles for characters. They experimented extensively with various designs for the top of the hair, achieving the desired result and moving into the refinement phase. The team also worked on determining the style for the sides and back of the head, with valuable input from the concept team, ensuring a cohesive and polished final look. Additionally, the team completed a new hairstyle featuring intricately layered braids inspired by Nordic styles. This design includes a selection of braids running across the head, complemented by a ponytail on top to manage the additional hair, showcasing the dynamic and authentic customisation options available for characters in Erendorn. Examples of the work completed by the team can be seen below.

Set Piece Design

‍

Throughout July, the Set Piece Design team at Depths of Erendorn made progress in enhancing the game’s interior decoration. They completed a set of chandeliers, adding elegant and detailed touches to the game’s interiors. Additionally, the team created a new rope and chains trim texture, which will be utilised across various elements to enhance visual authenticity and cohesion. Key assets such as the fast travel stone were completed, crucial for player navigation, and work commenced on a wall decoration trophy to add to the game’s environmental details. The team also enhanced the interior aesthetics with two additional chandeliers and completed a tankard set. Further enriching the game’s environment, they finalised additional rocks for the fast travel asset and began laying the groundwork for a new weapon set. Examples of the work completed by the team can be seen below.

Programming

Client

‍

Throughout July, the client team progressed in enhancing the user interface, refining gameplay mechanics, and addressing persistent bugs. They began implementing a new map panel accessible with the M key, designed to serve multiple UI functions, including integration into the fast travel menu. Extensive efforts were made to identify and address rotation bugs in combat, involving rigorous testing and logging. The team corrected abilities with mismatched animation types, streamlined logic checks for triggering animations, and stabilised the combat testing process by fixing core issues. Additionally, they enhanced the levelling-up process, ensuring accurate communication of stat changes and improved ability descriptions. The team reviewed Level 2 Ability Blueprints to ensure proper functioning, animations, VFX, SFX, and tooltip accuracy. UI updates included accommodating multiple inventories per player, fixing context menu issues, and resolving display problems. They also developed systems for VFX/SFX persistence for Active Effects, enhancing visual and auditory feedback. Additional work completed by the team can be seen below.

‍

• Created a map panel for displaying a top down view of the entire region.
• Added the ability to zoom and pan around the map.
• Began working on a map-trackable component that will be added to entities and objects of interest.
• Replaced animation triggers across all character’s Animation Blueprints.
• Fixed an issue causing projectile launch triggers to be overridden.
• Fixed a bug causing all enemies to turn incorrectly when attacking.
• Fixed a bug where Custom Steps (Animations/VFX/SFX) could not be inserted if the parent had less than 1 child log.
• Fixed an issue with the Dry Test Level that caused entities to be referenced incorrectly.
• Fixed an issue causing the grid not to show during combat in certain areas of the world.
• Fixed an issue where target tiles were being saved incorrectly in Dry Templates.
• Fixed a number of Dry Templates with incorrect action nesting.
• Fixed a large portion of Level 2 Ability Template triggers and FX socketing.
• Added any missing Ability Templates.
• Applied cost information for Level 2 Ability tooltip data.
• Implemented a Cast Effect animation state for Knight and Dwarf.
• Fixed any incorrectly assigned Level 2 Ability animations.
• Fixed an issue causing the incorrect music track to play.
• Implemented an Ability Controller to allow players to cast abilities that require tiles and directions.
• Added targeting options to allow X amount of target cursors to display in the direction selected when casting Tile + Direction abilities.
• Implemented the ability for Active Effects to target tiles in addition to entities.
• Created generic SFX/VFX actors that can be applied to Active Effect targets and persist for their duration.
• Added a slot in Active Effect Data Assets to integrate persistent FX with OnApplied/OnProc/OnRemoved triggers.

‍

Server

‍

The server team continued their advancements in stabilising and enhancing the game’s infrastructure. They concentrated heavily on navigation data, implementing new validation methods that drastically reduced errors from over 24,000 to approximately 500 in the test chunk. This process, though time-consuming, has significantly improved data integrity and mapping accuracy. The team also resolved a server crash issue related to non-existent chunks and fixed bugs causing navigation paths to lead to non-existent locations within game world chunks. Testing and fixing newer abilities, particularly those interacting with the now-corrected navdata, resulted in a seamless experience for players. Additionally, the team addressed server crashes occurring during the start and end of adventures, preventing characters from being trapped in an endless adventure state. A comprehensive rework of the population tracking system was planned and initiated, ensuring accurate slot reservations and optimal server capacity management. Combat optimisations included reducing the size of active effect logs sent to clients and refining trap-trigger mechanisms to retain caster information while recognising the triggering entity as the ‘host.’ Additional work completed by the team can be seen below.

‍

• Fast Travel locations updated.
• Containers now open for other players when a player opens a chest.
• Updated trainer NPC location.
• Fixed a crash when loading an invalid chunk.
• Fixed getting locked out of future adventures if no zone servers are available on trying to adventure.
• Fixed unsubscribing from cache updates on the server coordinator.
• Refactored Cache storage functions.
• Reduced Queue cycle times.
• Debugged some suspicious GrantProgression logs.
• Refactored Cache storage of adventures related to the ending of player adventures.
• Refactored how entities are transferred between servers.
• Commands are now rejected if sent from a client that has been sent to another server.
• New connections to previous servers from players who used to be assigned to them is now handled much better.
• Fixed Duplicate logs for chest spawning in two events.
• Server population monitoring code adjusted.

‍

Sound Design

‍

The sound team at Depths of Erendorn made significant strides in developing and enhancing the game’s audio elements, throughout July. They concentrated on crafting new sound effects for enemy abilities, such as the Plague Arrows and Toxic Arrows used by the Fen Elves, which add a menacing layer to these attacks and enrich the immersive experience. The team also focused on character abilities, aligning audio with new animations and VFX. They created distinct and impactful sound layers for various abilities, including the Rockbark’s roots ability, the Venomspitter Frog’s venom spit, the Black Bear’s slam, the Coldweave Spider’s ice web blast, the Flare Beetle’s chitinous flare, and the Sonic Strikers’ deafening screech. Additionally, they developed the sound effects for the Thunderclaw Crab’s Chain Lightning and the Vampire Bat’s Sanguine Restoration, incorporating subtle variations to keep the audio fresh throughout a lengthy battle. Examples of the work completed by the sound design team can be seen below.

‍

Environment Art

‍

The environment team continued to tackle the improvements to the game’s landscape. They focused on researching, conceptualising, and beginning the formation of a new settlement gate and surrounding wall. Additionally, the team corrected errors related to landscape HLODs and implemented material fixes due to Substrate changes, along with tweaking the ocean material and systems to improve coastline effects around the new rocky area. They also embarked on creating a new watchtower asset for the initial area, designed with a rustic, temporary construction feel. Using Speedtree and Maya, they crafted and refined tree logs for the watchtower, ensuring performance efficiency in UE5. Moreover, the team upgraded old assets with new scaling wood materials, loaded cart-packed blueprint actors, and improved the cart cloth material and tent rendering/shading. They began laying out the blacksmith area, started set dressing in the settlement, and created a scaling texture wooden planks/beams kit. Several packed blueprint actors were assembled from collections of props and assets, including potion shelves, bookshelves, market tent decking, bar/shop counters, sign stands, and decking steps.

‍

Animation

‍

The animation team at Depths of Erendorn have continued their efforts in refining enemy animations for Alpha 1. The team began by importing missing skeletal meshes and animations into the engine, ensuring all necessary components were in place for smooth enemy integration. Focus was placed on updating early game enemies, including the Rockbark Treeman, with major improvements to enhance the fluidity and realism of their movements. The team also dedicated efforts to updating the Icacian Necromancer, creating and editing new animations to provide this character with a unique and distinctive presence, setting it apart from other enemies. These updates collectively contribute to a more immersive and dynamic gameplay experience, enhancing the visual and behavioural aspects of the enemies in the game.

‍

Visual Effects

‍

In July, the VFX team at Depths of Erendorn continued to enhance the game’s visual effects. The month began with the finalisation of concept art for enemy VFX, establishing a clear direction for their implementation. This led to the initiation of in-engine development, including the creation of particle systems and visual effects shaders to bring these concepts to life. The team also focused on developing and optimising dust kick-up effects for running and abilities, refining these effects to balance visual appeal with performance efficiency. The visual effects for the Black Bear’s Slam ability were completed, including a dynamic charge-up phase and a powerful slam effect. Additionally, the team crafted a striking Life Drain effect for the Icacian Necromancer, using sparks and smoke to create a vivid representation of essence being drawn from enemies.

That’s it for this month’s devlog, but have you seen our monthly roundup of June yet?!