Development went quietly this year, so quiet in fact that it might have appeared to some that the project had died: "I founded this 2 years ago and every once in a while i check the forum or I see a 'discount' in humble bundle. Just admit it: this project is dead. :-(" I wrote a longer reply to this forum post , which we thought might be of general interest to many of you, who are probably asking…
Leonard wrote on the NOWHERE Steam Greenlight page about our current progress: Hi, Leonard here. I'm sorry for the delays towards releasing the next alpha. I've been spending the past year in R&D hell developing technology that helps us getting the game to become as dynamic as we're envisioning it to be, and moving it sufficiently far away from anything that people can buy currently. That means…
Screenshot of recent prototype work for Nowhere. Article on that coming soon. Three months ago I started a development log for NOWHERE and its associated tooling in a github gist. It wasn't really supposed to be read by anyone but other developers, and was more meant as a self motivation exercise, but the convenience of updating gists resulted in this blog not getting updates for five months while…
In this article I provide a chronicle of our turbulent terrain development, what lessons I've learned and what's next. Also, why tetrahedra (probably) rule and voxels (mostly) drool. It was nearly one and a half year ago that we showcased an early tech alpha of NOWHERE that had organically growing and sculptable terrain. I had put high hopes in this approach, but found that, while triangle meshes…
It's time for another NOWHERE tech write-up. I've been tweeting about my work on Twitter up to the point where I was nudged to write a longer blog post about what the hell I'm actually doing, so this is an attempt at doing just this. A chronological description of my trials and tribulations and where I finally ended up. The importance of tooling can not be overstated. There are no tools out there…
Leonard wrote in the Nowherian forum about our current progress with NOWHERE: Right now is, hands down, the worst part of development. There are no fancy graphics to show off, no intricate gameplay, no surprising AI, no badass music, just unglamorous system design that interests no one so we can get all the aforementioned stuff in a manageable form that doesn't keep becoming a sluggish and…
This post is partly an explanation of what's currently going on, partly an attempt to summarize the situation for ourselves. First, the bad news. With the final release of NOWHERE scheduled for the end of 2015, we're currently about 30% into development, and tech wise, it's going great. As you know our goal is to be 99% asset free, that is: all assets are generated on the players computer, for the…
Six more weeks have passed since I first posted about Adaptive Volumetric Meshes , which have since turned into Voxel Mesh Hybrids after some refinements for the sake of simplicity and ease of use. It's the driving tech behind the procedural and player-authored meshing that our game in production, NOWHERE (alpha available for download), requires. After the recent refinements, it's time for another…
Aside from all the hardcore video game making going on, a bunch of super exciting business related events happened during the last few weeks as well. Enough reason to post a summary. Hold on to your seats. March 4th : Thanks to everyone involved (which most likely includes you), NOWHERE has been greenlit on Steam. That means our greatest hurdle to a Steam release has been overcome. All existing…
This week I reached a major milestone in my implementation of the new general meshing tech for our game in production, NOWHERE (alpha available for download), which is going to replace the previous implementation we used for sculpting and will do a better job at covering the different procedural modelling approaches the game requires. To commemorate the occasion, I did a little write-up. Beware:…
Although Valve has announced recently that they would rather switch Greenlight for something else, we still haven't really done something with it, although we paid the $90 admission fee a long time ago. So we figured, what the heck, let's try it. If you have nothing better to do right now, why not head over to Greenlight to give us a big smackin' YES? It will be totally worth it your time, and we…
About three months have passed since the release of Alpha 75, and it's about time for an update. This video walks you through the changes in Alpha 91 of NOWHERE, which you can download right away from your Humble Store account, if you have backed the game or are about to do so. Windows, Linux and Mac OS X builds are online. Changes: - NEW: The readme.txt has been updated to reflect latest changes.…
This is the day. The day that our love child NOWHERE goes into official crowdfunding to allow us to work full time on the game that we always wanted to play. The NOWHERE site has been completely rebooted and now features the concept trailer that we have put everything into within the past week. Until now I was very hesitant to give the big picture away, but as we depend on your support, this is…
We've been taking our sweet time, but here it is, finally, Alpha 75, with a dozen new features, available for everyone who is alphafunding the game (have you seen our new site yet? Tell everyone!). As usual, you'll find the new download on your account page. Changes: - NEW: The readme.txt has been extended with new information and quickstart guide. Check it out. - NEW: Sculpting/terrain engine!…
During a concept phase last year I mused over the Maslow scale of needs and how we might use it in our game. I just found the monologue in my notes and thought it might be an informative read for folks interested in our design process. What if the game is about climbing up Maslow’s scale of needs? We provide opportunities to learn and master all levels, from the ground up. There is not much to…
A friend once told me that blog articles need pictures. I took the liberty to add a few unrelated screenshots of NOWHERE tests and debug sessions to this post. Sooo, a new blog post. In about ten days, our new crowdfunding site and teaser video will go online, showing off new concept art that Sylvia has drawn for the game, along with a new alpha presenting the features that I've been working on…
It's time for a little status update. What is happening? What are we up to? Where is the game going? When will the next alpha be released? Until now, Duangle and NOWHERE have been primarily funded by my day job. I've been entertaining this split personality thing for the past ten years: do mediocre wage slavery during the day, work on music and art in the evening and on weekends, in the hopes of…
No new alpha this week as I'm still wrapping up the tech required for the next big feature, and my day job is currently in crunch mode (Did I mention I quit my job last week? We have big (crowdfunding) plans. More about that around the next month.). Instead, here's a video:
Four weeks have passed, and still no new NOWHERE alpha in sight. What's happening? Time to give you all a little heads up. The colony as it looks at the moment was already cool enough to make a few jaws drop, but we're not happy. The game's world is supposed to be a rich diverse place, yet with a kind of homogeneous look but featuring a lot of distinct landmarks; as if that wasn't enough, each new…
NOWHERE Alpha 54 is now available for players who are preordering / alphafunding the game. As usual, you'll find the new download on your account page. Windows, Linux and Mac OS X builds are available. Changes: - NEW: Full support for XBOX 360 Gamepads. - NEW: Sound and music are back; shield absorber produces a dynamic effect (try colliding with walls). - NEW: The menu has been simplified. A new…
In this post, I will tell how Nowhere came about, why I think such a game is important and give you a short outline of the story, setting and gameplay (which are intertwined, as it should be). It is a temporary post that I will take offline in a month, as it contains quite a few spoilers; but I felt it is important to tell you what's going on as we need your money to be able to work on this…
Roaming through canyons to find some energy to absorb NOWHERE Alpha 53 is now available for players who are preordering / alphafunding the game. As usual, you'll find the new download on your account page. Windows, Linux and Mac OS X builds are available. Controls: - WSADRF: accelerate forward / backward / left / right / up / down - Space: decelerate / brake - WSADRF+Space: maneuver mode (precise,…
Rolling through the colony NOWHERE Alpha 51 is now available for players who are preordering / alphafunding the game. As usual, you'll find the new download on your account page. Windows and Linux builds are available, Mac OS X build follows soon. Windows and Linux users also have access to our in-game IDE called "Liminal". See this and this blog post for more details. The editor is young and…
Behold, the feeble beginnings of what is one day going to become a procedural floating city NOWHERE Alpha 50 is now available for players who are preordering / alphafunding the game. As usual, you'll find the new download on your account page. Windows, Mac OS X and Linux builds are available. Windows and Linux users also have access to our in-game IDE called "Liminal". See this and this blog post…
NOWHERE Alpha 46 is now available for players who are preordering / alphafunding the game. As usual, you'll find the new download on your account page. Windows, Mac OS X and Linux builds are available. This release features our new in-game IDE Liminal, which is being designed with strong support for stereoscopic visualization, rapid prototyping/live coding and a low latency edit & continue working…