The roof for the cabin doesn’t have a symmetrical model so I did have trouble making it fit above the walls. I did my best by just adding several roofs but because of the way it was built it dips into the house. I will see if there is a way I can slice meshes in the engine or I will resize it to make it high so the insides don’t feel so cramped. All in all the cabin isn’t as large as the first level but it is more varied than just a simple box shape. Also finally created a blueprint for the interactable items so that I can easily add different types without having to make them from scratch. I didn’t have a proper template before. Took a few nice scenery pictures before I started set dressing the house with props.
Adding props to the house was a ton of fun and really brought life to the house. I made sure to make new and simple materials to replace the textures they had so they’re just flat colors. That way it stays within the aesthetic plus it’s a lot cheaper on performance. There were a lot of nice and handy props that came with the modular cabin so I’m lucky for that, and I’m really lucky that the western asset pack I bought also had a clock tower because a big part of the cabin was clocks. I thought I would have to make them, but I searched “clock” in the engine’s search tool on the off chance that I had the props for it. Lo and behold a clock with two separate hands/arrows that I can manipulate. Will take some time to figure out how to use it fully but it was quite a coincidence I ended up with what I needed without realizing I had bought it.
I updated the text for the save points, where it floats above the source of light instead of appearing on the screen. It won’t always be clear but at least it’s more interesting and dynamic. The text follows the player so at least they can tell it is a save point.
What took most of the day was figuring out the best amount of foliage and its light settings, such as dynamic or static shadows. The place was very pretty with tons of grass and flowers but I had added so much originally that it was quite expensive in terms of performance. I kept taking out more foliage, changing the settings to make it not cast shadows. It was still too much. When eventually I just decided to remove all the grass and keep the flowers. Since the grass took up most of the area it was the easiest choice to remove. It was either all or nothing. If I couldn’t keep a ridiculous amount of grass it’s better that I didn’t keep it. The place still looks pretty with the flowers moving with the wind at least.
I will continue working on the new level, making sure I figure out the way I can use all the space as efficiently as possible. It is nice to have a big open field to explore but if it’s nothing but just foliage than that’s a bit of a let down. I have some ideas already.
GoldenGratus Games 