Man it's been a while. 
I've been holding off on making a new update because I like making these when i completed a few things. Recently, one thing would lead into another and i'd end up with six or seven UI pages or scripts half finished and messy. 
BUT NO MORE.
I have finally finished phase one of production: in engine set up and UI
that means that, besides touch up and swapping placeholders for final products, i shouldn't really need to open up the game for a while now.
I am a week behind scheduled though, but I guess that can't be helped.
With everything now done, i can finally switch my focus, 100% of my focus, to asset production.
Models, artwork, Proper icons and the like.
I've also been hammering away at the story, trying my hardest to wipe away any and all plotholes that might pop up. That, however, also means that the story is slowly growing longer and longer. at first i thought it would only be 9 chapters. Now I'm up to 11. I'm not complaining, it just means that there's gonna be more to edit and refine during phase three if production.
I'm still worried about the sheer number of things i'm going to have to make but i should (SHOULD) be able to hit my target of a July completion date.
Well, with all that out of the way, on with the list:

​-Changed skill tree buttons to add variety.
-Finished quick craft page
-finished equip page
-finished ate/drank/injured critically/ autosave pop up messages
-auto save has been added to the game’s options
-rewrote the opening to the game to give it more of a mythical feeling
-lengthened the 3 chapter again and once again split it into 2 chapters (just so much to play with here that I feel that it would do the story an injustice to just skim over it)
-added in field checks (chests, switches puzzles, that kind of thing. All based on the skill trees)
-added unique “counts” to certain skill progression so now some may require the player to kill X number of foes or collect Y amount of items
-added in skill count check and unlock checks to the record manager
-Added in “Data chips”, collectables that unlock certain skills
-added in “training chips”, collectables that can be traded to trainers for strengthening the characters
-ADDED IN DORIAN (the last playable characters) finally…
-added in Scythia’s work bench (a place where the player can upgrade Dorian’s bike or make unique arrows for Nickolas)
-Added in the guardian assistant so players can now manage inventory, switch party members, rest and heal or have characters “spend time” together
-Can now gift items to NPCs to raise affinities with them
-Biomes properly planned out now
-Active pair page is complete
-Database page is complete
-Personal inventory (and all it’s tabs) is complete
-Mounted functionality is complete
-Guardian assistant UI is complete
-Map page is complete
-NPC interactions page is complete
-Mounted UI is complete
-Scythia’s workbench UI is complete
-Quick switch of equipment is complete
-Quick switch of Nick’s arrows is complete
-Dorian’s mode (normal to combat legs or normal to bike) is complete
 
Finished Phase One

Happy new years everyone. Hopefully everyone had a fun time.

Made a bit of progress in between eggnog, work, and counting down the new year.
I am now full into working on the UI but there's not much to explain now. Most of my time is spent making things look pretty or filling out lists..... so yeah... I did rework how the ay spawning system makes skill trees. Because exploration is a major part of the game, i made it so exploration Ay have unique skills to interact with the world. they also have their element generated first and a skill tree made off that (so we won't end up with, say, a fire Ay with the ability to freeze water).
I also cleaned up and finished the crafting system and the durability system for the game.
Well, i can't seem to make this entry go on for more than these 2 paragraphs so i guess i'll call it here :3
Here's the list:

 -Worked on the script (Finished 3 more scenes and added more details to the scene summaries to help future me)
-Finished the “pick-up-able” item.
-Added a list to the UI that shows everything the player has picked up. Each entry will slide in, fade out, then despawn (has been debugged and working 100%)
-Added in damage to weapons (had durability for weapons in place and damage to tools but not weapons… odd)
-Debugged the minable objects to now get damaged when hit (better/ suitable tool takes less damage and deals more damage). Once the minable object is destroyed, it spawns a “Pick-up-able” item (can also hit it with weapons but it damages the weapons and not effective that much)
-Added system to spawn a mesh for the active tool/weapon (need to actually model them though) and attach them to the character
-Finished all 62 random/generic Defence skill trees (41 Common, 21 Uncommon. The Uncommon gen might take a Common skill tree so 62 possibilities)
​-Moved the simple craft Ui
-Finished placing everything for the map page (need to connect it)
-Started work on the simple craft page (Still need to finish it + need to connect it)
-Changed the way skill trees are generated for exploration “Ay”. Now the element for an exploration ay is generated first and the skill tree is generated based on that. (only for the exploration skill trees)
2020-01-02
-Added in a whole lot more skills to help fill up the Exploration skill trees (lost count on how many more but I’m pretty sure I’m well over 200 skills by now)
-Made all 58 Exploration Skill trees. (21 shared among all elements, 4 elements with 27, and the last element with only 6 = 58) Total now is 182.

According to my original plan (made in May 2019), by next week I should have the functionality of things pretty much done. There's bound to be small bug fixes or things I over look but the bulk of it all should be done with regards to the core game-play. 

After that, I have given myself one to two months to completely finish the UI, visuals and all.

Step three is where I worry. I gave myself three months after that to finish the Models and Assets needed for the game. This includes character models, modular sets, foliage, rocks, trees, THE HEAVENS AND THE SUN! (no really).

And lastly, after everything is imported and in place, i gave myself the last month to add the physical game-play, as in effects in engine based on physical properties like sound based on whatever is being hit, Damage calculations based on weapon types, rag-doll physics, IK feet placement and reactionary particle effects.

If i do ALL of this according to my timeline, I should have the game done around June-July time.
BUT
That's not the end of things. After all that work, comes Kickstarter.

I....don't have enough money. Simple as that, I currently make enough to get by and maybe get a gift out to my family during occasions. I am also not versed in the way of music and the vocal actors. My plan at this point is to release a "Silent Demo" at this point (Maybe with just the first chapter of the story included) and start a Kickstarter campaign to get the funds for the last few bits of the game.
DON'T WORRY, i'm not expecting to get everything I need (I'm not THAT lucky). If i get enough for just the cost for the composers (About $100-$200 per track with about $2000-$3000 tracks of music planned), that'll be enough to release the game and (judging on how well it does) maybe patching in an update for voice acting.
Yes I know not to build up my own hopes too much and Yes I know that I still have a whole-lotta work to do but I wanted it to be out there and clean that I do have a plan and I'm not just blindly working away at a dream.

Hopefully all this is clear and doesn't just come across as a mad-man's ramblings. If you read this and think of something i missed or if you have any tips or ideas, please voice them. This is my first time taking on anything- ANYTHING- of this size so I am kind-of just doing what those who failed didn't do. :3

Merry Christmas to those that celebrate it (and a happy, day off work for those that do not).
This time around I managed to get a lot of the UI details fixed and I finally, FINALLY, got the character controls to a point where i like them. no more jittery stop when the character jumps and i'm happy for it. Spent time balancing the speed afterwards (supersonic speed was a bit too much.)
After that i made a whooooooole lotta skills... a ridiculous amount. For some i had to add in new stats for the character to keep things simple for myself (fun things like a cooking stat for example :D ).
Tonight i spent a good chunk of time just taking all those skills and making 62 unique skill trees out of them. these will be used for the "Ay" generation for common or uncommon Ay. Still need to make 60 or so trees for Defence Ay, 60 for speed Ay and 60 for exploration Ay...... as well as Unique and Rare Ay will have set Skill trees that I'll have to make but at this point it's just really copy pasting and switching in skills so i don't see it being as bad.

Welp that's it for tonight, gonna chill and play a few games now.
Here's the list:
​-added the in-game cloak to the HUD
-finally fixed and debugged the controls
-added page to equip and unequip items from the 2 active characters as well as see how much food and water they have left
-Added in a “Map Page” (Not Set up yet)
-Added a “Ay Details” tab to the “Active Pair” Page (Not set up yet)
-Moved equip page to the “Active pair” page as a sub-tab
-Moved “Characters met” list, the menu locks, and “Locations discovered” list to the Records manager (Takes the stress off the “System Manager”)
-Made a “Simple Crafting” page (Not set up yet)
-Made it so when Common/ uncommon Ay are generated, their skill tree is based on their type and not purely random. This should avoid making unusable Ay.
-Added in a new Stat “Defiance”. Where Defence deals with physical damage, Defiance will deal with the magical damage
-Added in all the skill tree skills (Took forever, 180+ general…. Lost count of how many exactly (Non-unique) skills X_X) and applied what stats they effect
-Balanced the character speed (was going super sonic before)
-Added in the stats “Power Efficiency”, “Metal Working”, “Cooking”, “Crafting”, “Meat Gathering”, “Stone/Mineral Gathering”, “Plant Gathering”, “Ay Bonding”, and “Support Bonding” to the player character and the skill effects list.
-
Finished all 62 random/generic Attack skill trees (41 Common, 21 Uncommon. The Uncommon gen might take a Common skill tree so 62 possibilities)
-Made it so every skill on every tree can be uniquely unlocked 

Interesting how deciding what settings i want to open up to the player leads me to a whole 4 hours of trying to get a colour blind mode (later turning into 4 different modes). It was a bit hard to figure out but luckily i found a repository that did the same thing and i managed to copy the owner's theory into a real system (may need a colourblind person to test this out for me though, anyone know someone?)
Besides that, most of this night was spent setting up the save and load manager. It's now all ready for use and saves the settings apart from the game saves so the player can take presets between saves.
With this, i also cleaned up the main menu set up.
So yeah, not a big update but a lot of important progress made tonight :)

Here's the list:
​-Started working on the settings page
-Added in pre-sets for Key bindings
-Added in “Colour Blind” modes (haven’t connected it to the ui yet so can’t turn them on yet but they’re made and working? May need to find someone colour blind to test.)
-Set up the Game, Audio and Visual settings
-Put the 3 into a “Settings Save”
-Added in the “Audio maker” to the characters (no audio in game yet though)
-Created a “Save Manager” and set up the game to load up the settings (or set up default settings) upon start of the game, saves differently than other information
-Created the “Save” and “Load” functions of the game (have to decide what I want to save)

I have been hording all the logs up until now but NO MORE. here is every log since i started. Enjoy ;)
Work Log Posts (Just remember that images and videos cannot be copied over right now so sometimes the log entries refer to things that you can't see. sorry):



12 hrs · ​
Game Progress update:
Oh boy, this was a tough night. between the crashes and things just not working out, i was ready to pull my hair out. but yeah, it all worked out. I made a post earlier sharing my excitement for the skill tree system working. It's been working for a while but my problem was that i wanted a 3d visual for the entries in the skill tree. but because opening the menu paused the game, the 3d visuals (materials and animation) would all have been frozen. Took me a few hours to figure out how to tell the game that i didn't want this one set of things to be paused when the game is paused (had to do a bit more jumping through hoops than that but you get the idea). I added a cool blur effect to the image that really makes it look like a ghost or something is surrounding the crystal. plus the simple blury shapes floating by didn't take too much work but i think it adds to it. I also made it glitchy to keep with the theme of the rest of the game (though i'm not sure if i like how it looks right now). Meh, I'll put it a side for now.
2nd was the map system. i had it kinda working before but it was still very messy and complicated for me if i wanted to add in more maps (not the system itself but just all the bits talking to each other), not to mention that it took me a few hours to fix my conversion between the 3d world space to a local, 2d map (eeeergh my head hurts). Welp, it's over now and now all i have to remember to do when adding in new maps is that the data-tables don't like spaces when naming rows.
what else, what else....
I've also enhanced the barrier skill i made a while ago. now the slow-mo aiming portion of the skill also gives the player a quick summary of the target as well as tells them how to cancel the skill. This will make this skill double as a scouting tool so i hope people will enjoy using it.
Lastly, i started adding in locks for fetures that don't unlock unlit later in the story. havn't done so for the skills or UI elements yet but they should be quick.
In total (I mean from the very start of this project) the crash count has gone up to 28 with luckily (knock on wood) me only having to go back to an old back up 2 times. That being said, i'm gonna back up this project and go play something.
(Just need to close my laptop before anything else goes wrong) :3
Here's the list:
-Enhanced the Barrier skill to also show a quick summary of the monster being targeted as well as a prompt as to if a barrier will be made or not (in the corner of the screen)
-Applied a new material to the Barrier skill
-Finished the visuals for the Skill trees. Could have gone with simple buttons but I decided a nice, mine-map look would fit nicer
-Added a camera reset button
-Made the camera reset button key-bind-able for the player
-Updated the “Clicked a menu button” animation to include the locks now.
-Added locks to the “next” and “last” buttons when in the different menus to check if the player has access to quest, rep, inventory and database pages.
-Fixed up the map system so it’s a bit easier on me. (so many crashes :’( )
-removed redundancies in code to clean up a bit.

December 16 at 12:51 AM · Game Progress update:
I've been putting the skill tree stuff off because i honestly didn't know the best way to unlock the skills. It came down between "Do i want a skill point based system?" or not. I decided i didn't. Though it's a bit more work (not too much), all skills are now unique on how they unlock and everything is recorded in the new "Records Manager" that will track the achievements of the player. story wise, these skill trees are tied to AIs that are learning about the world through the player's characters. so it would only make sense that the skills that they learn and pass along to the characters are unlocked by experiences and not bought with points. I've also decided that the "sound meter" and weather indicator (as well as maybe the HP and Power bars?) will be locked until those AI in the game are attached to the character. again it only makes sense story-wise that the AIs have sensors can tell this stuff and the characters cannot by themselves.
I've also been playing around with the character controls. I just can't seem to make them feel right but i think it's better now than before. this'll be one of the things i don't think i'll finish until i get some game-play testing after the models are imported.
Lastly, I've fixed small U.I. elements that were just irking me. Simple things like aligning text or thinning out bars or adding a bit of animation to older materials (i think) makes everything look a bit nicer.
The biggest thing i did was set up everything for the sound effects. Now the landscape materials all have "Physical Materials" attached to them. now if i wanted to, a simple ray-trace from a character's foot hitting the mat or a sword dropping onto it can trigger the right sound to play. so instead of every step sounding the same, i can have the clanging of metal boots on tiles sound different than leather shoes on a dirt path. :D
these things we take for granted all around us takes quite a bit to translate into games but i think it's worth it.
Well that's it for this update. I have a potluck to cook for tomorrow so my game-dev time for today will have to end here.
'ere Da list:
-Fixed the justification of the Name text in the NPC Info Widget so that it’s always centered now.
-Placed out placeholders for the Support character image, Noise meter and Weather indicator on the UI
-Enhanced the HP, stamina, and CP bars so that they are not just flat colours.
-no longer have a toggle run. Gotta hold the run key now for run (didn’t like how it felt before)
-Added physical material information to the landscape. This can be used later to make unique sounds play based on what the player is walking on. (a simple ray-trace when the character is walking once the real models are in place and this will be done+ I can have cool things like only wooden areas can catch fire or something)
-Added Physical Materials to Gear. Boots will affect the sounds the player will hear depending on what they’re made of.
-Made the “Noise meter” that the AI will use to “Hear” the player when moving
-Connected the meter to the UI so the player can now see how loud they’re being
-Debugged the movement controls again, just can’t seem to get it feeling right. :\
-Finished the third Guardian ability (Glow) (Not sure if this is gonna be the last, might think of a few more)
-Set up the Personal-inventory Equip Page (not connected yet)
-Skill tree entry, skill tree sets, and the skill tree holder were all created and are working 100%
-Tied Skill trees to the Ay (Will have to make lists of possible skills in each but the trees are functional)
-Updated the “character” page to incorporate the skill trees
-Added in the “Records Manager” to record game statistics (Game time, number of kills per foe, etc.)
-Added in artwork and a tool tip for the Skill Tree button (similar to the stats buttons I made a while ago)
-Updated the Ay generator to either randomly add a skill tree too an Ay that is common or uncommon.

December 14 at 4:31 AM · Game Progress update:
So when i decided to let the player map out their own keybindings for this game, i expected maybe eight or so keys.... I now have 26.... lol i'm not even sure if this is it for new things to add and stuff. (not looking forward to finishing that UI page). Anyways. got alot done that fell into the "OH SHOOT HOW DID I FORGET ABOUT THAT?!" category of things. For a game about exploring and being a "Guardian", you'd think me adding crouching, sprinting and "Guardian abilities" would assume that'd first few things i'd do. Well jokes on you, I'm an idiot :3
In all seriousness, I've finished 2 of the 3 guardian abilities (a pulse of energy that the player can set to either damage foes or id things around them and a barrier that can isolate a target foe so you won't get swarmed) and i've already planned out the third to be easier on me to finish (Simply setting your character to glow to scare one type of foe away while attracting another).
I'm gaining a new found admiration for games like breath of the wild and horizon for all the little stuff that goes into a massive world.
I've also went back and changed the colours of the materials tied to characters. I made these before i finished the plan for the story so small details didn't match. all good now.
I've added a video for each of the abilities to this post to show them in action (the barrier is using the Pulse material right now because i'm too tired to make a new mat right now :3 )
Here's the list:
-Set up keys for crouching and the 3 guardian abilities
-Set up keys for crouching and running
-Toggle for running has been made and is working. Pressing the key will toggle the character to run (no need to hold, will stop running when the char stops walking in general)
-Toggle for crouching has been made and working. Running and crouching will automatically disable the other so not to mess up animations. (also, your speed will change depending and running will cost stamina while crouching will not, don’t want to mix that up)
-Reworked priority’s and how the game handles input from the player to accommodate the running and crouching as well as optimize the response times.
-Finished the first Guardian ability (Pulse)
-Fixed colours of the “Enraged” material so that they all match the colours I’ve set for each character
-Made an “Enrage” material for Afa
-Fixed the popping visual glitch from the NPC info UI
-Finished the Second Guardian ability (Barrier)

December 10 at 5:50 PM · Game Progress update:
Pretty happy with the progress made. Fixed a bunch of bugs and added in quite a bit of UI elements. I also changed around a few things like one of the abilities for my characters so that it wouldn't bother other aspects of the game. The biggest thing i did was get a bunch of ui artwork into the game. I've been doing my best to not let anything be a simple, flat image. Everything has a bit of detail or movement to it :)
I've also added in the keys for activating the Ay system and for switching characters on the fly (see some of my earlier posts for videos on these working).
Also, i added a new UI element to all the NPCs to quickly show the player info of said NPC as they pass (will have to Update this depending on what information i want to share or not). Last major thing to mention is that, while i've been making backups of this project the entire time, this is the first time i've also made an online back up. Not sure if i'll need these but i'm feeling more comfortable if i have some kind or fall back should something happen.
So here's the list :D
-Modified the cloaking ability so not to use the custom rendering layer. This will stop it from conflicting with the semi-transparent materials needed for the other parts of the game
-Fixed MiniMap material to slowly revealed itself as the player moves (before it only showed what was near and never expanded or recorded where you’ve already been)
-Fixed UI background material
-Made the main 8 button materials for the player menu
-made tool tips for the button
-debugged new ui
-Set keys for switching characters and activating “Ay”
-Switching between active characters is now done and working 100%
-Upon death of the main character, the game will switch character if the support character is active
-Upon death of support character, the game will remove the support character
-Made a visual rep for the “Ay” (using the temp model for now)
-Made an UI element for quick glance information for all AI (friendly, foe or wildlife)
-Debugged AI info UI
-Made an online backup of the game

December 5 at 4:28 PM · Game Progress update:
Little bit of a different update today. Besides a few small things here and there, I've been focused mainly on the script for the last little while. I've planned (in detail) most of the main story as well as roughly typed in most of what happens in each scene (pretty much scene for scene summaries for each of the 11 chapters.) I've outlined the main story and the character arcs for each character + I made sure it will flow well with the game-play. cues for boss battles and reactions are also laid out plus i double checked and reordered all the openings for each chapter. My Guess for the final word count is around 60-70 k just for the main story. (meaning it might be 10 hours worth of dialog at a normal speaking pace for just the main story itself so...... yeah. not bad).
Of course once i actually finish the script, i'll have to write out the scripts for all the side quests and npcs and...... okay not thinking about that now. Anyways. I'm gonna continue working on the script for maybe another hour then get ready for the karate class and work tomorrow. might clean up as well.

December 1 at 12:17 PM · Game Progress update:
So I finished the last of the fighting mechanics, the "Ay" system (pronounced like "Eye"). this is going to be the fun way of "Leveling up" that i described in an earlier update. basically there are no actual exp and levels to the characters. You can "Bond" with sprites called Ay. These each come with a type (Attack, defense, speed, or exploration) as well as a skill tree of their own. you can only have 1 active Ay at a time but you can bond with an unlimited amount meaning you can have different load outs depending if you're getting ready for a fight or just going out to explore. of course you only get the skill tree of the active Ay so it's a bit of a risk-reward system.
Besides that, finished a few more UI elements, and backgrounds and went heavy on the script (finishing all 11 chapter openings and finished typing out the script for the first 2 chapters total) and worked a bit on the AIs needed for the game.
Now I'm off to play witcher :3
Here's da list:
-Properly split the first chapter into 2 because of length. (there will now be 11 chapters in total)
-Finished the script for the main story’s chapter 2
-Implemented and updated the finalized timeline to the game (It effects gameplay)
-Refined AI Schedule system
-Completed AI for all non-hostile, human/ friendly characters (for standing idle, wandering randomly, or following a set path)
-Started the territorial and hostile AI
-Slight tweak to the loading screen material
-Added a general BG material for the UI pages
-applied and animated the BG mat and new, simple, black background panels (just black squares to make everything look nicely sectioned off)
-Created the “Ay” generating system
-The script was complete for all of the 11 Chapter openings (the last chapter will have a few different endings I still need to script out but they are at least planned out)
-Continued work on the script

November 27 at 6:14 AM · Game Progress update:
I did it, i actually did it. lol I made progress in the UI side of things (Actually in the artistic side and not functionality ^_^ ). I'll admit, it's not too much, but it is starting too look nice. BEGONE DEFAULT UI ELEMENTS! (Check the videos out if you wanna see em)
I could also KILL my past self for such the sloppy scripting job he did when making the map system. had to trash the entire thing but thankfully, this new system seems much better (plug and play, so-to-speak. all i need to do is plug in the map textures and it should auto gen the in game map). Needs a bit of debugging but yeah pretty much done.
Also....somehow i forgot to implement a dodge and block system in my FIGHT GIANT THINGS game.... guess i thought it wasn't that important at the time? anyways, that's in place now and just waiting for character animations. (Also made those keys bindable for the player)
Lastly i continued working on the script. i already finished what i want for the demo (hah, like that's anywhere near done) but that doesn't mean i leave the script. Is it egotistical for someone to like the story they made themselves? 🤔
Welp, that's it for tonight, gonna take a shower and head to bed, here's the list:
-Cleaned up the controls’ code
-added in dodging/ blocking system
-Trashed and restarted the map system (Nearly done, just have to debug it)
-Started writing out the different ending possibilities (finished planning them generally and even started the script for a few of them)
-Continued work on the script (clarified notes and wrote 2 more scenes to start chapter 2)
- “Loading” icon created and used to create a nice loading screen material
-Created the main button materials and applied it to the appropriate buttons on the main menu and the Player’s HUD (Think I'll need a few more types but this is a start)
-Created The Materials for all the inventory filter buttons and icons for the inventory slots and applied them in game (Filled the player's party with temporary "Null" items in the video so i can see how it looks)

November 22 at 2:55 AM · Game Progress update:
While i did make some good progress, I've decided today (or tonight) should be a "Get everything cleaned up and organized" day. I've made a new to-do list (only of things i have LEFT to do and not including everything i've already done) that you can see here: https://docs.google.com/…/11vTCjmYcbzfCt1lbs4vDMbfh9m…/edit…
I've also gone back and debugged a few things, fixed up a few things, and really just removed some placeholder code that I've been dancing around for a month now.
I'm also slowly starting to worry about the day (a day i know will come) where I'll have to sit and just copy past entries into all the data-tables.... *Shutters*
-Continued work on Dorian’s model
-Debugged character controls
-Added camera zooming key binding (as well as how much and if the player wants to invert the controls for zooming in and out)
-Added camera control invert option (Giving full control of key binding the camera might become problematic but I can allow the player the choice of inverted or not)
-Created the tutorial system (of course I’ll need to make a list of what the tutorial will say but that’s for later)
-General Debugging and optimizing (Thrilling, I know…)
-Made a new To-Do List of everything I have LEFT to do (Not including everything I’ve already done)

November 21 at 9:52 AM · Game Progress update:
Wahooooooo. It's been a loooooong time since i last lost myself in my work like i did last night. 7 hours flew by as i math-ed my way the new wind system, modeled the characters, fixed materials and a whole lot. :3 I EVEN WHITE-BOXED (a bit) and fixed up a few bugs. i'm slowly making my way down my to do list (i think i'll rewrite it tomorrow night to get a better idea of just where i am). I am so proud with how some of this stuff is coming along though (See the attached for previews :3 ). That being said, I really should get to bed now (I don't think i'm making much sense in this update). So with all that said, here's the list:
-Started work on 3 of the playable character’s models (Dorian, Scythia, and Jiri so far)
-Fixed up the sky. (I know I said I liked it before but it wasn’t quite right, now I like it much better)
-Connected the sky to the time manager. At midnight (in game), a hole opens up in the clouds, showing off the twin moons of the world)
-Placed a placeholder for the tower to line up the location for where the sky parts
-Updated the sky material (Still not 100% on it but putting it aside for now)
-Started placing placeholders for the stronghold of Pius
-Finished the system for spawning in clouds. These clouds react to the weather in each spawn zone and will spawn weather particles as they float by (still need to make those particles but that’s by-the-by)
-Created an internal wind system that will blow the clouds nicely (as well as a certain, flying protagonist depending on how windy it is in the area)

November 18 · Game Progress update:
As i continue on, working on the UI, i started debugging and fixing up things i overlooked or glossed over. i really didn't mean too but yeah. finished alot of things and i think my game runs smoother now because of it. YAY FOR AN ACCIDENTAL GOOD WORK PRACTICE!
lol After that i switched over back to the script. while i am done the script for the demo, i decided i should at least work a bit on what comes after so that i won't be stuck with only writing for the last month of development.
I think i'm gonna use the rest of the night to unwind now. Made good progress and i think i can justify it :3
-Debugged the character page and fixed an error with the character preview
-Debugged Relations (man I still need a proper name for this page) page, fixed visual glitch
-Adjusted animation speed for clicking a menu button (was too slow before)
-Edited the inventory to show and identify items currently equipped on the characters
-Added new filter to search for only equipped and items in the character’s personal equipment in the inventory page
-Reformatted the script for the game
-started finalizing details about the characters
-Started work on Chapter 2 of the script (there will be 10 chapters. The story is already done, the script itself only needs to be written)

November 17 · Game Progress update:
I am now going full force on that thing i said i was going to do before getting distracted by that other thing that totally took my attention from this thing :3 .... okay In all seriousness, i'm making great progress with the ui for the game and i even made a 2nd mini game for it (it's a checkers-esk game that the people of this world play :D ). I've also overhaulled the quest system and pretty much finished it. Currently, I'm 5/8 of the major ui pages done. after this, i'll finish up the ui pages tied to the NPCs and i think that'll be it for the boring, tie-things-together phase of things. I'm still not ready to fully put down the coding and pull up the drawing tablet though (still have a few things to connect and......to be honest a few bugs i need to squish). welp, enough of me yammering, onto the list:
-Finished the 2nd minigame (just have to make an ai for it as well as set the rewards for winning or penalties for losing)
-added a system for recording discovered and completed quests as well as the current, active main quest
-completed page for viewing the quests in the game (need to fill the lists for the main and side quests)
-added a filter to show only active quests
-Set up system for passively checking if the quest is complete (need to figure out the specifics for each quest before completing this but it’s set up so anything can trigger the check)
-Set up a function to manually complete a quest (this is for the unique or story quests that have a single completion requirement)
-Set up the notification for accepting or completing a quest (need the artwork for the UI to complete this fully but pretty much done)
-Finished connecting the story page. Upon completing main quests, this page automatically updates to log what’s happened in the story so far (I need to remember to write in entries for each main quest. I also need to draw a “Chapter not unlocked yet” image)
-Finished inventory page (need images for icons and unique images for all weapons or materials etc.)
-Finished the support/bond (still need to finalize the name) page :3 Just gotta take a picture for each of the supportable characters in the game (can’t until I model them of course)

November 12 · Game Progress update:
And thus, i have started to finish (that's funny to say) the UI for the game. one page down and a whole lotta little stuff done today. Now i'm going to get myself cleaned up, go to a karate class then get ready for work tomorrow.
Da list:
-Finished navigation between pages in the player menu
-lengthened the animation duration for “new location” pop up window
-Finalized the timeline for the game (certain events and in the story required it as well as it gives me more to work with when going into details of certain events)
-Finalized each of the playable character’s histories.
-Added system to display what has happened to each character/update their history upon story or side story events (what exactly is being added can be defined by the script)
-Finished connecting the “Characters” page to all functionality (ie. Displaying stats, bio, likes/dislikes etc.)

November 11 · Game Progress update:
Sadly it feels like progress has slowed this last little bit for me :\ be it family obligations, plans or me needing just half a day to myself (half because i couldn't bring myself to kill an entire day) it's been meh. but hey, still got stuff done and i'm chugging along. Not as much to say as the last update but here's the list:
-Updated mini-map (now I can add smaller maps as well as other maps not in the overworld i.e. Dungeons)
-Created “safe zones” that stop the need for food and drink within them.
-Modeled several “Tudor” style building parts and started creating the buildings in the first stronghold
-Updated and created materials for the Tudor building parts
-Created the sky cloud layer that limits how high the player can get to before the clouds start damaging them, also made it possible for a hole to appear in the layer for story purposes (need to make a nice, night sky to be seen through the cloud layer’s hole)
-Updated old file of “Daemon” enemies
-Modeled and UV-ed (Thank goodness) 3/60 of the weapons planned for the game (15 for each character)

November 6 · Game Progress update:
First thing's first, business man Joe is back and making connections :3 got into contact with a few music composers and i think i've picked the one i'll go with. Emailed her and we spoke (she understands that i'm waiting for a little later to handle the audio side of things but she did give me her rates and all the info i needed so all good). Boss battles and a system for triggering the story, side stories, quests and what have you has been created along side it's ui (but as always, the ui isn't done yet and i need a list of all these things to get the system to work but hey, what's new about that). Besides that, i think i'm done most of the script that'll be in the demo (look at me already talking about a demo only 5 months into work :3 ). I'm going for a T rating so not to limit myself or restrict what i can and cannot do. I'm starting to see the light at the end of this (that light may be at least another 6 months away but at least I've located it :D )
Onto the update list:
-Created the “Gifting” UI and connected the functionality/ NPCs reactions to getting gifted items
-Started work on the wildlife models
-Finished the script up to where the demo will end (first pass, will look at it later to check for edits)
-Created “Event UI” that’ll play before boss fights and during story clips
-Finished the trigger for spawning / starting boss fights (need a list of all these events though I’ll have to wait for the script to be done first before I’ll know how many will be in the game)
-Finalized several designs for wildlife (these are the neutral AIs that wonder the wastes and only attack what attack them) (Had concepts a while ago but never really picked finals till now. Have more to shift through though)
-Updated the story player to allow side/quest stories alongside the main story
-Contacted a music composer and gained information for the OST of the game (no deals made yet but I have her contact, prices, times and all information needed for when I’m ready for it)
So yeah, while i didn't really work on the UI, i did work on the artist side of things right? (script writing is art and you can't tell me otherwise :P)


November 1 · Game Progress update:
Interesting bit of progress made, I was originally just planning to set up most (if not all) of the remaining UI elements as well as fix up some of the small things that have been bugging me the entire time I've been working on this game...well i did that but i also spend 30 minutes trying to fix all the redirection UE4 made for me instead of just renaming the files i wanted it to rename. this DID break everything but luckily enough, I HAVE LEARNED HOW TO MESS WITH PROJECT FOLDERS. My game has over 8'000 shaders to recompile but yeah. all's good. (btw, don't threat, i'll be making many more shaders and other trinkets that'll require me to recompile everything anyways so no sweat).
Well now I'll be taking a nap and hoping nothing else explodes. *Sigh* wow that was a mouthful. ONTO THE LIST!
-Created “Inventory” UI
-Created the “Settings” UI (Graphics, Audio, Game, and Key binding tabs)
-Created the “Shop” UI
-Set Up “Stat Trainer” UI (haven’t made the UI just yet)
-Reorganized world loader to make room for dungeons and other maps
-Key-binding properly set up for customization (replaced my temp set up from a month ago)
-Added hotkey for player’s in-game menu
-Game now Pauses when in the menu
-set up fishing mini-game to create a dummy model of the character fishing and update animations for that model depending on what’s going on in the mini-game
-Balanced fishing mini-game (again)
-Fixed Camera Clipping
-Set all debugging cubes for loading zones to hidden
-added a bit of randomness to the Crystal material
-Added an editable distance “Darkness” to hide the edges of the unloaded map
-Set Up NPCs UI for an “Accept/ View Quests” tab (haven’t made the UI yet)
-Fixed an Editor Crashing Error with my file (THANK GOODNESS. I WAS GONNA FLIP!)
goodnight guys 

October 29 · Game Progress update:
I never knew how tedious simply exchanging materials for all the proxy levels would be. well it's done and now i have everything set up to start making the landscape look pretty (besides the foliage models of course :3). No more brown material. Besides that, the water surprisingly looks good with the few things that are in the world now and the fishing mini game is a bit more manageable now :3. I'm now torn between going back and working on the UI again or starting on the painting of the landscape. there's also all the assets that still need to be modeled, the materials that still need to be made, the sky that needs to be put into the world (getting tired of looking at a black void to be honest) the script, the data-table entries....lol at least, at the very least, all of these tasks are easy to do. besides the models (i've been saying that a lot, haven't i?) each task should only really need one full day to itself. Anyways, i'll get to each eventually. Update list:
-scaled the landscape x2 (and edited the landscape loader to make up for this). Plans seemed not to fit with the smaller scale map
-Updated landscape material with the new textures created (just need to paint them on)
-Created the “poisoned water” that boarders the playable land. (this’ll be used so the player doesn’t fall out of the map + the world looks nicer with water :3)
-Created a “water level” to house all the poisoned water and added it to the list of levels to be loaded with the overworld (made sure that this only loads on the first time the overworld is loaded and not every time the player goes into a new chunk)
-Edited fishing minigame to set spawn point before the player starts the minigame
-Fishing mini-game balance changes

October 25 · Game Progress update:
Only one thing on the list for tonight. I FINISHED THE FISHING MINI-GAME!!! whooooot. lol of-course i'll need to play it a dozen times for balancing and just to see if it's fun but yeah, it's done, working 100% and kinda challenging tbh besides that...nothing else for tonight (had some adult-ing things to do that i'd rather not go into at the moment). Once i have the models for the main characters, i have to remember to add in the different fishing animations and toggle between them to really sell the whole "Fighting with the fish" feeling of the mini-game. Some particles here, and textures there and i think this'll be great as something fun the player can do if they wish to do so (you can buy fish at the market so this'll only really save the player money). As for what i said last update, I'll continue work on the UI next time but for tonight, i think that's all i'll be doing for the game.

October 24 · Game Progress update:
I surprising have a lot to write about this time. not only have i started doubling down on the UI, I've made arrangements for the loading screen artwork (I feel like a businessman, maybe i should get a monocle).
besides that, figured out why a certain bug kept poping up (me being dumb and not planning where the game FIRST loads up the characters triggered the world generator to load up 2 locations and glitch everything out). Lastly, i found a new way to make some of the ui look nicer with 3d models being used in the textures (for example, when showing off the weapons, i'll show the in-game model rather than a separate 2d art piece). this'll keep the game looking consistent and save me drawing time but i worry about the details needed in the models for this to look good. I also haven't tested for performance so here's praying i won't break anything trying to implement this. (wow that's a lot of text. i haven't had an update this big since the 2nd one :3 ). Anyways, onto the update list:
-Created Player’s in game menu and pause screen
-Created the animation for transitioning from the menu to other ui pages and implemented it for all the menu buttons
-Created “Characters” UI
-Created “Active Pair” UI
-Created “Quest Log” UI
-Created “Story Log” UI
-Created “Reputation” UI
-Set up for the “Equipment” and “Settings” UIs
-Planned out the shopping and Blacksmith (repairing enchanting etc.) UIs
-Planned out the fishing minigame
I'm thinking for tomorrow, i'll spend the time, after getting the last few UIs made, connecting them all to their functionality i made a while ago. All-in-all, not a bad bit of progress (if i may say so myself ^_^ )

October 20 · Game Progress update:
Needed a break from the material making (NO MORE SUBSTANCE DESIGNER PLEASE X_X ) so i decided to do some general debugging and add in something i put off while making the inventory manager for the game. While i did finish most of the hard stuff, i keep finding these little bits here and there that i'd put off or had over looked. I'm thinking that my next work sections will be focused on the UI (finally) that way i'll know for sure what i'm still missing and what absolutely needs models and materials to work. Anyways, the list:
-Created Cryst Material and imported it into the game (created a temporary mesh to see how it looks. Not 100% sure if I want to keep the mesh)
-Created the “pick-up-able” materials, breath of the wild style (where they’re physical objects that you can kick around and such)
-Implemented a system to check minable resources in the activated zones and update them/ respawn them as needed
-Implemented the mining/ gathering system and durability for tools (right tool for the job uses up 5 times less durability than the wrong tool)
-Added a way for the game to check if the active character’s inventory can hold the picked-up mat or should it be sent to the storage (yes all of this still needs ui but at least it works :3)
-General Bug Fixes
-Continued modeling foliage but maya crashed so I gave up on that for tonight….

October 19 · Game Progress update:
Asset production is a GOOO...
yeah so everything is kinda self explanatory this time around....
-Tweaked World loader
-Started Modeling foliage and minables (A giant mushroom and an alien tree :3)
-Created Cliffside Material
-Created Dirt Material
-Created Ruins’ Pathway Material
-Created Desert Sand Material
-Created Quarry’s Ground Material
-Cleaned up Materials already made (I made these for another project that didn’t end up going anywhere. These include clover, marsh, and forest ground materials)
-Imported everything into the game

October 15 · Game Progress update:
Turns out that most of the hard stuff is done. Had a bit of tweeking but yeah. i now HAVE to switch over to the asset production side of things if i want stuff like the combat, mine-ables or intractable do be created....sooo...i guess i know what i'm doing next. Anyways, here's what i've done since the last update,
-Finished Story and Event scenario player (UI needed)
-Made a system to change the title screen based on player progress (have to design the levels to make em pretty :3)
-Started work on modeling the first set of buildings. (canonically my game has a few different regions that were made at different points of time so I’m making them each have a different style of architecture) The style I started on is called “Romanesque” and seems to be the most common for medieval churches or parliament buildings
-Optimized world loader. It now dynamically loads the chunks as you go rather than loading all of them at once. Speed/ fps of the game is the same but load times are much quicker. (though you do get the odd jump in lag every once in a while, if you’re loading a highly detailed chunk of land) (See attached for a visualization of it in action)
Depending on how fast and good i am at asset production will determine if this WAS too ambitious or not :3 that being said the parts i thought would be hard to implement actually went by easily. I can confadently say that this map, this whole game, is gonna be huge but besides that, it's still running smoothly (Even with 5 or so systems that are being checked every frame)
Here's preying the particulates and effects don't kill my fun

October 9 · Game Progress update:
so i was lazy in the morning and didn't really do much. had to do some chores and didn't feel like working on my game (i'm still a child and i know it :3)
Eventually i did start working on it and i made some good progress.
-Finished the crafting, enhancing, repairing system for weapons, gear, and tools (Needs UI)
-Created system for recording character’s individual and part total reputation per region (this’ll be used for unlocking items in shops as well as unlocking the stat trainer)
-Character Relations (Name is still a work in progress :3 ) system has been created. Some NPCs will have quests unlocked based on a character’s reputation or their relations with that character as well as certain event scenarios can unlock if you get to know the character enough, giving you more on their background or the playable character’s background. (of course, I still need to make the UI to let the player check the list of NPCs met and how much they favor your characters…. dialog screen is set up though)
-Game now restocks all the shops every in-game day (list of items on sale needs to be made. UI of shops themselves needs to be made)
Yeah so soon i'll be running out of the functional things to implement and i'll have to switch to the artsy side. (Cough Cough wouldn't mind finding someone to help me cough cough)

October 6 · Game Progress update:
Smaller update before i have to get ready for tomorrow (work and stuff, you know)
-Set up inventory and personal inventory system (Needs the UI)
-Set up requirements for crafting system (Needs the UI and list of recipes but everything is there)
-Economics of game set up (What is valued at what and where? Surplus and demand etc…) I still have to get the shops coded in but everything is there and ready for em so i don't think it'll take me more than an hour or so.
I've been avoiding doing any visuals until i have the game functioning. Now I fear i might end up with a week end of nothing but UI creation or modeling.....please pray for me.....


October 5 · Game Progress update:
Wow, i'm actually making a lot more progress than i thought i would by now :3
-Database (the game’s Bestiary and item logbook) set up
-Ai behavior set up and mapped out
-Scripted player’s “New game” started
-finished the Loading and unloading system for AI in different world chunks (just have to make a list of the ai to load and what type [Hostile, NPCs shop keep etc.] they are)
-Finished Time manager and set it up for easy expansion (ie. Made it easy to add more time-based events), internal game-cloak is ticking properly
-Finished the Weather spawning system (just need to add visuals. Any system that is affected by the weather will be in charge of those effects; ex. An ai trying to track the player through fog)
-Finished temperature system and the loading, unloading, and tracking of temperature (just have to make a list of all the major temperature changing points)
-Added system to determine sub-stats (stealth, climb speed, etc.) and character’s abilities based off the 3 main stats. Update-able and editable now.

October 1 · Game Progress update:
last night was the first, real game-dev night that I felt i got stuff done :D
-Finished, optimized and cleaned up the over-world loader
-added in a main menu and loading screen
-Finished the basic sculpting of the landscape and even started on some fine details
-Set up "managers" for the inventory, npc and ai spawning, weather and temperature, story and dialog, and event scenarios (Support) systems
-Moved over scripts i made in my test level (Including the re-spawn system, and temperature points)
-Removed the temp material on the landscape
-Moved the loading system to the "System manager" so that everything is (from a coding stand point) much more logical in flow [had the playable characters in charge of loading the world before :3 ]
So yeah, while nothing is pretty to look at yet, i think i can call it a good, Set-up night 

September 26 · Game Progress update:
Hoo boi this was frustrating. Between me not knowing the optimal way of cutting up the landscape, to all the memory crashing, cutting up the landscape was a pain. but it's done and now i finally started the first pass of sculpting the landscape. I'm using the ingame world map as a material for a template as to how and where i should sculpt the thing. Going pretty well tbh (again for a first pass). actully, besides the weirdness on the cliffs, i'm really liking how this is starting to look. replace the plain brown with rock or dirt textures, add some foliage, rocks and the like, populate it with npcs and buildings, and some landmarks....bla bla bla.... and i think i have something here. 

September 12 · 

Game Progress update:
Gonna start doing these little progress updates with the headers so those that really don't care (most of my friends tbh :3) will know not to read my posts.
Finally finished PLANNING the over-world and setting up the landscape in engine. took 2 whole days to get the landscape to behave (and to get it to stop crashing). Next step will be to actually sculpt it and then subdivide it, making proxy levels to make it easier for a computer to show everything on screen. Currently,the game's over-world seems to be on-par with say skyrim on just how big the entire thing is (whoops).
Edit* just if you were wondering, Ue4 crashed 12 times in total with 6 of them crashing the entire computer and 2 of those 6 forcing me to go back to a backup


Pure Work Log:
2019-10-02
-Database (the game’s Bestiary and item logbook) set up
-Ai behavior set up and mapped out
-Scripted player’s “New game” started
-Time Manager set up
2019-10-05
-finished the Loading and unloading system for AI in different world chunks (just have to make a list of the ai to load and what type [Hostile, NPCs shop keep etc.] they are)
-Finished Time manager and set it up for easy expansion (i.e. Made it easy to add more time-based events)
-Finished the Weather spawning system (just need to add visuals. Any system that is affected by the weather will be in charge of those effects ex. An ai trying to track the player through fog)
-Finished temperature system and the loading, unloading, and tracking of temperature (just have to make a list of all the major temperature changing points)
-Added system to determine sub-stats (stealth, climb speed, etc.) and character’s abilities based off the 3 main stats. Updatable and editable now.
2019-10-06
-Set up inventory and personal inventory system (Needs the UI)
-Set up requirements for crafting system (Needs the UI and list of recipes but everything is there)
-Economics of game set up (What is valued at what and where? Surplus and demand etc.…)
2019-10-9
-Finished the crafting, enhancing, repairing system for weapons, gear, and tools (Needs UI)
-Created system for recording character’s individual and part total reputation per region (this’ll be used for unlocking items in shops as well as unlocking the stat trainer)
-Character Relations (Name is still a work in progress :3) system has been created. Some NPCs will have quests unlocked based on a character’s reputation or their relations with that character as well as certain event scenarios can unlock if you get to know the character enough, giving you more on their background or the playable character’s background. (of course, I still need to make the UI to let the player check the list of NPCs met and how much they favor your characters…. dialog screen is set up though)
-Game now restocks all the shops every in-game day (list of items on sale needs to be made. UI of shops themselves needs to be made)
-Buying and selling is finished (again, besides the UI)
2019-10-10
-Finished Story and Event scenario player (UI needed)
2019-10-14
-Made a system to change the title screen based on player progress (have to design the levels to make em pretty :3)
-Started work on modeling the first set of buildings. (canonically my game has a few different regions that were made at different points of time so I’m making them each have a different style of architecture) The style I started on is called “Romanesque” and seems to be the most common for medieval churches or parliament buildings
-Optimized world loader. It now dynamically loads the chunks as you go rather than loading all of them at once. Speed/ fps of the game is the same but load times are much quicker. (though you do get the odd jump in lag every once in a while, if you’re loading a highly detailed chunk of land)
2019-10-15
-Tweaked World loader
-Started Modeling foliage and minables (A giant mushroom and an alien tree :3)
2019-10-19
-Created Cliffside Material
-Created Dirt Material
-Created Ruins’ Pathway Material
-Created Desert Sand Material
-Created Quarry’s Ground Material
-Cleaned up Materials already made (I made these for another project that didn’t end up going anywhere. These include clover, marsh, and forest ground materials)
-Imported all created materials into the game
2019-10-20
-Created Cryst Material and imported it into the game (created a temporary mesh to see how it looks. Not 100% sure if I want to keep the mesh)
-Created the “pick-up-able” materials, breath of the wild style (where they’re physical objects that you can kick around and such)
-Implemented a system to check minable resources in the activated zones and update them/ respawn them as needed
-Implemented the mining/ gathering system and durability for tools (right tool for the job uses up 5 times less durability than the wrong tool)
-Added a way for the game to check if the active character’s inventory can hold the picked-up mat or should it be sent to the storage (yes all of this still needs ui but at least it works :3)
-General Bug Fixes
-Continued modeling foliage but maya crashed so I gave up on that for tonight….
2019-10-21
-Created Player’s in game menu and pause screen
-Created the animation for transitioning from the menu to other ui pages and implemented it for all the menu buttons
-General Bug Fixes
2019-10-24
-Created “Characters” UI
-Created “Active Pair” UI
-Created “Quest Log” UI
-Created “Story Log” UI
-Created “Reputation” UI
-Set up for the “Equipment” and “Settings” UIs
-Planned out the shopping and Blacksmith (repairing enchanting etc.) UIs
-Planned out the fishing minigame
2019-10-25
-Finished Fishing minigame :D
2019-10-28
-scaled the landscape x2 (and edited the landscape loader to make up for this). Plans seemed not to fit with the smaller scale map
-Updated landscape material with the new textures created (just need to paint them on)
-Created the “poisoned water” that boarders the playable land. (this’ll be used so the player doesn’t fall out of the map + the world looks nicer with water :3)
-Created a “water level” to house all the poisoned water and added it to the list of levels to be loaded with the overworld (made sure that this only loads on the first time the overworld is loaded and not every time the player goes into a new chunk)
-Edited fishing minigame to set spawn point before the player starts the minigame
-Fishing mini-game balance changes
2019-10-29
-Created “Inventory” UI
-Created the “Settings” UI (Graphics, Audio, Game, and Key binding tabs)
-Created the “Shop” UI
-Set Up “Stat Trainer” UI (haven’t made the UI just yet)
2019-11-01
-Reorganized world loader to make room for dungeons and other maps
-Key-binding properly set up for customization
-Added hotkey for player’s in-game menu
-Game now Pauses when in the menu
-set up fishing mini-game to create a dummy model of the character fishing and update animations for that model depending on what’s going on in the mini-game
-Balanced fishing mini-game (again)
-Fixed Camera Clipping
-Set all debugging cubes for loading zones to hidden
-added a bit of randomness to the Crystal material
-Added an editable distance “Darkness” to hide the edges of the unloaded map
-Set Up NPCs UI for an “Accept/ View Quests” tab (haven’t made the UI yet)
-Fixed an Editor Crashing Error with my file (THANK GOODNESS. I WAS GONNA FLIP!)
2019-11-02
-Created the “Gifting” UI and connected the functionality/ NPCs reactions to getting gifted items
-Started work on the wildlife models
2019-11-03
-Started Worked on the game’s story Script
2019-11-06
-Finished the script up to where the demo will end (first pass, will look at it later to check for edits)
-Created “Event UI” that’ll play before boss fights and during story clips
-Finished the trigger for spawning / starting boss fights (need a list of all these events though I’ll have to wait for the script to be done first before I’ll know how many will be in the game)
-Finalized several designs for wildlife (these are the neutral AIs that wonder the wastes and only attack what attack them) (Had concepts a while ago but never really picked finals till now. Have more to shift through though)
-Updated the story player to allow side/quest stories alongside the main story
-Contacted a music composer and gained information for the OST of the game (no deals made yet but I have her contact, prices, times and all information needed for when I’m ready for it)
2019-11-07
-Updated mini-map (now I can add smaller maps as well as other maps not in the overworld i.e. Dungeons)
-Created “safe zones” that stop the need for food and drink within them.
-Modeled several “Tudor” style building parts and started creating the buildings in the first stronghold
-Updated and created materials for the Tudor building parts
2019-11-11
-Created the sky cloud layer that limits how high the player can get to before the clouds start damaging them, also made it possible for a hole to appear in the layer for story purposes (need to make a nice, night sky to be seen through the cloud layer’s hole)
-Updated old file of “Daemon” enemies
-Modeled and UV-ed (Thank goodness) 3/60 of the weapons planned for the game (15 for each character)
2019-11-12
-Finished navigation between pages in the player menu
-lengthened the animation duration for “new location” pop up window
-Finalized the timeline for the game (certain events and in the story required it as well as it gives me more to work with when going into details of certain events)
-Finalized each of the playable character’s histories.
-Added system to display what has happened to each character/update their history upon story or side story events (what exactly is being added can be defined by the script)
-Finished connecting the “Characters” page to all functionality (i.e. Displaying stats, bio, likes/dislikes etc.)
2019-11-16
-Edited the distance fog to make the clouds look more natural
-Created the 2nd Minigame of the game
2019-11-16
-Finished the 2nd minigame (just have to make an ai for it as well as set the rewards for winning or penalties for losing)
-added a system for recording discovered and completed quests as well as the current, active main quest
-completed page for viewing the quests in the game (need to fill the lists for the main and side quests)
-added a filter to show only active quests
-Set up system for passively checking if the quest is complete (need to figure out the specifics for each quest before completing this but it’s set up so anything can trigger the check)
-Set up a function to manually complete a quest (this is for the unique or story quests that have a single completion requirement)
-Set up the notification for accepting or completing a quest (need the artwork for the UI to complete this fully but pretty much done)
-Finished connecting the story page. Upon completing main quests, this page automatically updates to log what’s happened in the story so far (I need to remember to write in entries for each main quest. I also need to draw a “Chapter not unlocked yet” image)
-Finished inventory page (need images for icons and unique images for all weapons or materials etc.)
-Finished the support/bond (still need to finalize the name) page :3 Just gotta take a picture for each of the supportable characters in the game (can’t until I model them of course)
2019-11-17
-Debugged the character page and fixed an error with the character preview
-Debugged Relations (man I still need a proper name for this page) page, fixed visual glitch
-Adjusted animation speed for clicking a menu button (was too slow before)
-Edited the inventory to show and identify items currently equipped on the characters
-Added new filter to search for only equipped and items in the character’s personal equipment in the inventory page
-Reformatted the script for the game
-started finalizing details about the characters
2019-11-21
-Started work on 3 of the playable character’s models (Dorian, Scythia, and Jiri so far)
-Fixed up the sky. (I know I said I liked it before but it wasn’t quite right, now I like it much better)
-Connected the sky to the time manager. At midnight (in game), a hole opens up in the clouds, showing off the twin moons of the world)
-Placed a placeholder for the tower to line up the location for where the sky parts
-Updated the sky material (Still not 100% on it but putting it aside for now)
-Started placing placeholders for the stronghold of Pius
-Finished the system for spawning in clouds. These clouds react to the weather in each spawn zone and will spawn weather particles as they float by (still need to make those particles but that’s by-the-by)
-Created an internal wind system that will blow the clouds nicely (as well as a certain, flying protagonist depending on how windy it is in the area)
2019-11-22
-Continued work on Dorian’s model
-Debugged character controls
-Added camera zooming key binding (as well as how much and if the player wants to invert the controls for zooming in and out)
-Added camera control invert option (Giving full control of key binding the camera might become problematic but I can allow the player the choice of inverted or not)
-Created the tutorial system (of course I’ll need to make a list of what the tutorial will say but that’s for later)
-General Debugging and optimizing (Thrilling, I know…)
-Made a new To-Do List of everything I have LEFT to do (Not including everything I’ve already done)
2019-11-26
-Cleaned up the controls’ code
-added in dodging/ blocking system
-Trashed and restarted the map system (Nearly done, just have to debug it)
2019-11-27
-Started writing out the different ending possibilities (finished planning them generally and even started the script for a few of them)
-Continued work on the script (clarified notes and wrote 2 more scenes to start chapter 2)
- “Loading” icon created and used to create a nice loading screen material
-Created the main button materials and applied it to the appropriate buttons on the main menu and the Player’s HUD
-Created the Materials for all the inventory filter buttons and icons for the inventory slots and applied them in game
2019-11-29
-Implemented and updated the finalized timeline to the game (It effects gameplay)
-Refined AI Schedule system
-Completed AI for all non-hostile, human/ friendly characters (for standing idle, wandering randomly, or following a set path)
-Started the territorial and hostile AI
2019-11-30
-Slight tweak to the loading screen material
-Added a general BG material for the UI pages
-applied and animated the BG mat and new, simple, black background panels (just black squares to make everything look nicely sectioned off)
-Created the “Ay” generating system
-The script was complete for all of the 11 Chapter openings (the last chapter will have a few different endings I still need to script out but they are at least planned out)
-Continued work on the script
2019-12-01
-Properly split the first chapter into 2 because of length. (there will now be 11 chapters in total)
-Finished the script for the main story’s chapter 2
2019-12-04
-Modified the cloaking ability so not to use the custom rendering layer. This will stop it from conflicting with the semi-transparent materials needed for the other parts of the game
-Massive script planning, layout and progress
2019-12-05
-Continued work on the Script
2019-12-08
-Fixed MiniMap material to slowly revealed itself as the player moves (before it only showed what was near and never expanded or recorded where you’ve already been)
2019-12-09
-Fixed UI background material
-Made the main 8 button materials for the player menu
-made tool tips for the button
-debugged new ui
-Set keys for switching characters and activating “Ay”
-Switching between active characters is now done and working 100%
-Upon death of the main character, the game will switch character if the support character is active
-Upon death of support character, the game will remove the support character
-Made a visual rep for the “Ay” (using the temp model for now)
-Made an UI element for quick glance information for all AI (friendly, foe or wildlife)
-Debugged AI info UI
-Made an online backup of the game
2019-12-12
-Set up keys for crouching and the 3 guardian abilities
-Set up keys for crouching and running
2019-12-13
-Toggle for running has been made and is working. Pressing the key will toggle the character to run (no need to hold, will stop running when the char stops walking in general)
-Toggle for crouching has been made and working. Running and crouching will automatically disable the other so not to mess up animations. (also, your speed will change depending and running will cost stamina while crouching will not, don’t want to mix that up)
-Reworked priority’s and how the game handles input from the player to accommodate the running and crouching as well as optimize the response times. 
-Finished the first Guardian ability (Pulse)
-Fixed colours of the “Enraged” material so that they all match the colours I’ve set for each character
-Made an “Enrage” material for Afa
-Fixed the popping visual glitch from the NPC info UI
-Finished the Second Guardian ability (Barrier)
-Fixed the justification of the Name text in the NPC Info Widget so that it’s always centered now.
-Placed out placeholders for the Support character image, Noise meter and Weather indicator on the UI
-Enhanced the HP, stamina, and CP bars so that they are not just flat colours.
-no longer have a toggle run. Gotta hold the run key now for run (didn’t like how it felt before)
2019-12-14
-Added physical material information to the landscape. This can be used later to make unique sounds play based on what the player is walking on. (a simple ray-trace when the character is walking once the real models are in place and this will be done+ I can have cool things like only wooden areas can catch fire or something)
-Added Physical Materials to Gear. Boots will affect the sounds the player will hear depending on what they’re made of.
-Made the “Noise meter” that the AI will use to “Hear” the player when moving
-Connected the meter to the UI so the player can now see how loud they’re being
-Debugged the movement controls again, just can’t seem to get it feeling right. :\
-Finished the third Guardian ability (Glow) (Not sure if this is gonna be the last, might think of a few more)
-Set up the Personal-inventory Equip Page (not connected yet)
2019-12-15
-Skill tree entry, skill tree sets, and the skill tree holder were all created and are working 100%
-Tied Skill trees to the Ay (Will have to make lists of possible skills in each but the trees are functional)
-Updated the “character” page to incorporate the skill trees
-Added in the “Records Manager” to record game statistics (Game time, number of kills per foe, etc.)
-Added in artwork and a tool tip for the Skill Tree button (similar to the stats buttons I made a while ago)
-Updated the Ay generator to either randomly add a skill tree too an Ay that is common or uncommon.
2019-12-18
-Enhanced the Barrier skill to also show a quick summary of the monster being targeted as well as a prompt as to if a barrier will be made or not (in the corner of the screen)
-Applied a new material to the Barrier skill
-Finished the visuals for the Skill trees. Could have gone with simple buttons but I decided a nice, mine-map look would fit nicer
-Added a camera reset button
-Made the camera reset button key-bind-able for the player
-Updated the “Clicked a menu button” animation to include the locks now.
-Added locks to the “next” and “last” buttons when in the different menus to check if the player has access to quest, rep, inventory and database pages.
-Fixed up the map system so it’s a bit easier on me. (so many crashes :’( )
-removed redundancies in code to clean up a bit.