That's odd that it didn't work for you, SteamPenguin. I've been having occasional server issues, and I wonder if it coincided with your visit.

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Quoting: "Hamish, post: 5606, member: 6"Ah, a true Linux gaming aficionado then. ;)

I still have the Quake 3 Arena tin, and Railroad Tycoon II, Heretic II, and Myth II: Soulblighter are all in my collection as well. I miss Loki.

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Thanks, Troy and Cheeseness! I appreciate the tips.

I did find Open Game Art when I wrote an article about how indie game developers could find quality art for their prototypes. I haven't searched too seriously through it, though, but maybe it is time for me to revisit it.

I haven't learned 3D modeling, but ever since reading Programming Linux Games by John Hall many years ago, I liked the idea of taking a 3D model and being able to render 2D sprites from multiple angles automatically.

Visual inconsistency is one issue brought up early in development, so what you're seeing is an improvement but definitely still my programmer art. You can see an early in-development video here: View video on youtube.com As you can see, the grass was a bit more neon, and everything between the characters and the background were drawn with no attention paid to consistency. But even that was a huge improvement over this even-earlier version: View video on youtube.com

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Thanks for the comments, everyone. Regarding the artwork, it's less neglect and more a lack of funds and talent. As Troy mentioned, I did have an artist, but aside from creating the concept art (seen at http://stopthathero.gbgames.com/development-blog [External Link], she ended up swamped at her day job. By the end, I ran out of savings and couldn't afford to find someone else.

I used to have the opinion that game play matters way more than graphics. Otherwise, go watch a movie, like Final Fantasy VII, right (zing!)? But in the last few years, I've realized that aesthetics are a huge part of game design. I realize that the lack of animation and professional quality art hurts this game, but that's partly why it isn't v1.0 yet.

I've gotten some good feedback from playtesters, and so I decided to offer a pre-order (initially $5) and then offer it for sale as an alpha (initially $7.50). It's very clearly not finished, but since people were enjoying it, I thought I could at least offer it for sale during development so people can try it earlier.

Now that there's a free demo, available since the Sound Update was released (now $8.50), it allows you to get a taste of what the game is and see if it is something you'd enjoy before buying. As I update the game, including adding animations (coming in the next update), new minions and heroes, and game play modes, I expect to increase the price, so people who ordered earlier are getting the full game for less as well as supporting development.

Based on the comments here, I definitely need to step up my search for an artist. Adding animations already multiplies existing art needs, and I'm not going to be able to keep up by myself.

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