Lots of changes and bugfixes since last time!
The two main changes are the new submenus in combat, remade with the brand new and complete menu-system.
Magic menu:

Item menu:

There’s nothing astounding about their looks, but they are much more clearer than before and plus, they scroll in and out when needed! Super handy.

For the next update my goal is to make a dungeon map of some sort. Time to test this new smaller resolution!

The other day I told you about my plan to switch from 640×480 to a more reasonable 320×240.

Well, that’s now my top priority.

I mainly need to change my battle engine and my in-game menu .

I started with the battle system, and it’s finished at about 50%. It should be over already, but I ended up recoding the entire menu/commands system from skratch, passing from crappy snippets of code to a much more structured one, complete with sound and animations (the same kind of animation I had in the in-game menu, aka fast scrolling boxes when you switch options).

Here is a screenshot of before, in 640×480 (click for larger version):

Followed by one after the change, in 320×240 (placeholder-heroes are a little bit messed up, I have to fix them)

I feared that 320x would be too small to fit everything in, but with the help of Interference’s font, I think it actually looks good

I made these changes a while ago but did not have time to put it online.

You can now level up! You receive XP at the end of a battle and it makes you level up, gain abilities and have some stats upgrades! (It’s working, but I still have to figure a formulae for stats upgrades. Fighters get more strengh, etc)

(There is some debug text overlaping the textboxes, but still, they’re screens )

I had some trouble finding a good formulae to augment the XP needed to level up, but I ended with this:
From Level 1 to 30: 50% increase (lvl 1) gradually going to 25% increase (lvl 30)
From Level 31 to 50: 25% increase (lvl31) gradually going to 10% increase (lvl50)
Then: 10% increase

Look at the end of the post to see that in numbers.

Also new, you get gold at the end of a fight.

I have a problem that is with me from the beginning. Everytime I’m in some kind of loop, like, let’s say, inside a menu or in my battle system, Verge3 uses 100% of my CPU. I have no idea how to make it work less aggressive.
I am making sure it runs no more than once per 1/100s, but if 1/100 has not passed yet, it just runs in the loop until it has. :/
I guess I could put everything in a HookTimer function instead of a simple while() loop, but then I heard that if HookTimer takes more than 1/100s to process, it could get ugly. I’ll post in the forum for that, so if you can help me, head over there in a minute

Here is the xp needed in numbers.
The numbers is the total amount you will need at that level to level up.
Level 1: 17
Level 2: 27
Level 3: 41
Level 4: 61
Level 5: 90
Level 6: 132
Level 7: 192
Level 8: 277
Level 9: 397
Level 10: 566
Level 11: 802
Level 12: 1130
Level 13: 1582
Level 14: 2201
Level 15: 3042
Level 16: 4177
Level 17: 5697
Level 18: 7718
Level 19: 10385
Level 20: 13878
Level 21: 18418
Level 22: 24274
Level 23: 31769
Level 24: 41287
Level 25: 53279
Level 26: 68269
Level 27: 86856
Level 28: 109718
Level 29: 137609
Level 30: 171357
Level 31: 211517
Level 32: 259307
Level 33: 316177
Level 34: 383852
Level 35: 464385
Level 36: 559413
Level 37: 671546
Level 38: 803862
Level 39: 959994
Level 40: 1144229
Level 41: 1359783
Level 42: 1611981
Level 43: 1907052
Level 44: 2252285
Level 45: 2656207
Level 46: 3124756
Level 47: 3668272
Level 48: 4298750
Level 49: 5030104
Level 50: 5878474
Level 51: 6811681
Level 52: 7838208
Level 53: 8967387
Level 54: 10209483
Level 55: 11575788
Level 56: 13078723
Level 57: 14731951
Level 58: 16550501
Level 59: 18550906
Level 60: 20751351
Level 61: 23171840
Level 62: 25834377
Level 63: 28763167
Level 64: 31984836
Level 65: 35528671
Level 66: 39426889
Level 67: 43714928
Level 68: 48431770
Level 69: 53620296
Level 70: 59327674
Level 71: 65605789
Level 72: 72511715
Level 73: 80108233
Level 74: 88464402
Level 75: 97656187
Level 76: 107767150
Level 77: 118889209
Level 78: 131123473
Level 79: 144581163
Level 80: 159384622
Level 81: 175668426
Level 82: 193580610
Level 83: 213284012
Level 84: 234957754
Level 85: 258798870
Level 86: 285024097
Level 87: 313871846
Level 88: 345604369
Level 89: 380510144
Level 90: 418906496
Level 91: 461142483
Level 92: 507602068
Level 93: 558707611
Level 94: 614923708
Level 95: 676761414
Level 96: 744782890
Level 97: 819606513
Level 98: 901912498
Level 99: 992449081

Sorry for the lack of updates. I’ve been really busy with a job’s project deadline approaching fast. I spent the little time I had left on the weekdays to play a little Final Fantasy Tactics.

Also, the fact that I’m considering moving from 640×480 to 320×240 of resolution (since I’m alone in this project and am not too good at art) has put some things to an halt, while I decide the way I’ll do things. I will have to sacrifice some aspects of the battle system and menu in order to make it looks acceptable. It’s a lot of work and it might not be a pleasant one :/

I’ll keep you posted on how it goes!

I could not find time this weekend to work on my project, but will do so soon!

Have a pleasant tomorrow, everyone!

Alright, I needed my own chr for a long time, so that’s what today’s update is about!

With no further delay, I present you Hero!

(I took the head here, but I did the rest. I thought he looked plain, so I made him a sword hehe. But I don’t think it’ll stay there very long.)

Wow, that took me a long time… now… I just need to make 15 other frames :’(

Here is a forest I just cooked in, like, one hour. Tell me what you think! (Is it too square, not enough colors or variety?)

I did some tile artwork. I did an acceptable water animation and I’ve been trying for over an hour to make an animated gif of it but everything just goes wrong. I’m actually so pissed that I’ll try again tomorrow. More details to come.

Edit: Finally! Here is some of the changes I made (new grass, water, etc etc). It’s small, but hey! It’s way better than last time

This week I did some more tile-related work. I did some grass tiles, a better incorporation of mountains and a lame-ass water animated set. There’s no screenshot today but believe me when I say that I’m gonna start from skratch for that one hehe.

Edit:
Since Kildorf asked for it, here is a cluster of them: :’(

Edit 2:
It seems the gifs above are not always in sync hehe, but eh, it’s not good anyway so…

This week I decided to switch my focus on art instead of code. So I tried to make some tiles for a world map!

The first thing you need for a world map is, of course, mountains This is what I ended up doing: (note: I suck at pixel art haha. But I’m getting better)

It’s a looping 64×64px tile:

And here is what it looks like when assembled into a map:

I’m really new at pixel art, so feel free to comment on it and give me some advices