Introduction & Summary
Hey all, my name is Cody Smith, but I go by Rabbyte on most platforms.
I am a 29yo hobbyist technical artist with a bachelor’s in computer science with a minor in graphic design.
I have been in a cycle of false starts on this project for about a year where I will work hard on an aspect of my concept for a few weeks and burn out since I’m in a one-person echo chamber.
The positive thing is it’s all progress I can go back to and I learn new skills along the way.
I have found that I can get stuck in rabbit holes of research, which are informative, but crash coursing yourself in metallurgy for a few weeks in order to better understand the heating color phases and corresponding temper colors of iron in part of my research of the manufacturing chain of medieval metalworking is a lot to digest, when I could bypass all of it and just throw together something that passes the sniff test.
I suppose I’m looking to start a team to both take steps towards making my efforts tangible, and also to gather perspectives and spread the load that time and time again burns out hobbyist solo devs. “Apes together strong” and all that.
Project Type/Genre & Platform
My genre goal is a sandbox action-adventure game catered to both players who like focusing on combat, as well as players who would rather do technically rewarding things like crafting and trading.
The Idea
The idea is pretty straight forward, a detailed but contained world where the player can focus on whatever aspect they want whether it is combat focused or not. The goal is to explore facilitating the player with as many options as we can offer with a shallow skill floor, but with a higher ceiling for players who would like to go deeper into the options we provide.
Perhaps an example of the range will explain better:
Player A takes goods into town to trade for gold and a few supplies, he chooses his items to sell and asks for their value transaction done. Simple, no questions asked, quick, and the status quo remains unchanged.
Player B takes his goods into town to trade for gold and a few supplies, and waves at the shopkeeper as he approaches. The shopkeeper has known them for a while and puts their attention to Player B warmly greeting them back. Player B asks for the goods value and a few supplies, but the shopkeeper insists Player B gets a little extra for their kindness offering them 5% more value either in the form of currency back or extra supplies. Player B could accept the kindness and gain some physical gain, or politely insist they want the usual price and gain some future positive reputation.
Players can either keep things simple by just doing surface mechanics, or interact with deeper systems that will influence the world around them in some way
I also want to put special focus on processes that normally get glossed over in games such as healing, resting, inventory access and management, and make them more physical and diegetic where possible.
My initial concept for inventory functions is you have to actually carry items around and what that means for gameplay is you have a backpack, and it has a space limit, not only that but if you pack to heavy your mobility is affected, and in order to do things like fight or sleep you will need to take off your pack.
I’m not focusing on realism as much as the feeling of these systems and want to make as fun and rewarding a system as possible.
I want to keep the scope small, but clearly from my rambling so far, I have plenty of ideas in the chamber.
Progress
Here are a handful of images of things. it’s not everything, but it will give some idea
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/12Li-zVSlH1e-5fkqoKHJQDbaSwwlCMKd?usp=sharing
My primary focus has been exploring different environmental elements
A list of things I have been working on in no particular order:
Male and female base mesh created and rigged (while I am happy with them atm if a stylistic change comes nothing is finalized)
A pipeline in blender for creating hair for character customization
An initial outfit for the characters
Models of gear for various professions and disciplines including carpentry, smithing, cooking, mining, leather working
Models for various backpack elements for a modular system, as well as water skins, lantern, candles, rope, torch, bedroll, bear trap
Sets of biome specific stones and variant textures
A tree creation system in geometry nodes that allows for a lot of control. Along with several already created species of trees at various stages of growth (currently around 125 models)
A map layout and initial heightmap (may invest in a professional solution, if necessary, but current tests I am satisfied with)
Dynamic day night cycle skybox in shader graph (a framework to be expanded upon)
Metal heating/temper shader (this one is a proof of concept, but its temperature accurate)
Two foliage shaders that interact with my tree creation process to represent both deciduous and conifer trees.
Several atlas textures for foliage
I have been experimenting with shape keys/morph targets, so I have a bit more technical knowledge.
I have a network experiment for peer-to-peer multiplayer, but it is mostly for learning, and would need to be implemented better for an actual project.
I am very much still in the experimenting stages and the first stage of development as a team should be to go back to the drawing board and hammer out an actual plan. I have an initial design document, but its 10 pages of bullet points which are vague ideas at best, mostly just a list of inspirations to explore.
I have a literal bookshelf of resource books I’ve collected on topics from botany to HLSL and game design patterns
What We Are Looking For
Well, there are the things I don’t know, and the things I don’t know that I don’t know
I’m writing this in one go off the cuff, so I guess that speaks to my professionalism
But in general, I’m looking for a character artist, shader programmer, environmental artist, sfx/musician, and an animator…
Everywhere you look you will find solo devs who make good progress, but usually they fault on delivery, burn out, lose the financial security to continue, or are “idea guys” who never take the first step. I think that if they stopped trying to do everything in isolation, they could create something truly special
Really, I’m just looking for any generalist in the same boat as me who is willing to learn and create. You don’t need to have experience just the drive to make something. I have the passion to make these ideas a reality and want to explore my ideas with like-minded people.
Contact
Best place to reach me is Discord - rabbyte. / Rabbyte#0463
My email is R3ngad33@gmail.com
I will check my messages here on Unity, but it will be slower
I look forward to hearing from you
I am currently based out of Illinois around Chicago