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Knock, knock, adventurers! So, are you ready for a new diary log where we’ll tell you about the game development process and show you gorgeous visuals? Then you’ve come to the right place!

We’ve been writing our diaries for quite some time. If you’ve started reading our reports recently, you might have missed a lot! Before we start talking about something new, we’d like to recall the events that we’ve already shown you in past diaries.

Redraws

So let’s go! Our artists continue improving already finished art in their free time. For example, here you can see what the process of redrawing one of the orcs from the Steppes looks like.

And how do you like this special enemy named Grum?

Progress

In the last diaries, we showed you the “Goblin Town” event, in which you’ll visit an unusual location. Building a town is not an easy task, so work on this event continues, but we can show you a drawing of a goblin at least!

New cards

For the third time in a row, we’re showing you new cards that will later be added to KOTCL. Lots of red here!

Animations

Animators continue to teach our Ritualist new spells and movements. Here we present you several new animations.

We’ve also created many new movements for the orc shaman.

And the final enemy for today is a dangerous demon, the Keeper of Illusions, whom you can meet in the Northern Gate.

But we’re not only working on enemy animations, we’re also hard at work at making Vanadis’s cut-scenes. We’ve already shown screenshots of those scenes, but today we want to show them animated. Are you ready to play?

That’s it for today, thanks for reading! See you in the world of Midian!

Hello everyone! Today we’ll talk about His Majesty — the Plot — and the lore of our game! We’ll talk about what gives the motivation to continue, what makes the surrounding game world open up! Our story will revolve around Knock on the Coffin Lid. And so we give the floor to the Redboon’s game writer!

Did the concept of Knock on the Coffin Lid’s plot change during the development?

The world in which the game takes place was invented before the game itself, at the dawn of the studio’s existence, during our creative searches. The game itself doesn’t aim to tell everything about its world; it only exists in this world, obeying its laws and logic. The concept of the game’s world remains unchanged throughout the development.

The game’s plot concept was practically not rewritten, but it was expanded and fleshed out at a dramatic rate. First there was one character, and then we decided to make three. Then we had an idea to make unique texts for all the characters, and if you need to rewrite the texts, then why not tell three stories at once instead of one? Or we could at least show the same events from different points of view, add some details, tell more about everything that’s happening. As it turned out later, this was just the beginning.

When we started thinking about the endgame content, it was decided not to limit ourselves to the game mechanics — the story should also go on. Since the characters are locked inside a time loop, “continuation” in the classical sense of the word is impossible. But the plot doesn’t freeze; it lives on, acquiring new details. The main task at this stage is to give the player a complete idea that all the events are interconnected, and that all the characters that the heroes meet along the way are not there by accident — they are part of the global picture that unfolds in front of the player. Fortunately, this task isn’t as difficult as it may seem at first, because, from the very start, there were no events and characters “detached from reality” in the game.

You are the best person to be telling us about the world of the game. Tell us where we find ourselves at the time of the start, and what is happening in this world.

The plot develops as a mosaic — a different presentation is hardly possible in a rogue-like. First, there’s a resurrected hero who will obviously try to take revenge on his killer. Everything is simple, understandable, and even banal. But as the heroes learn more about what’s happening around them, the player gradually starts to realize that the story is not strictly about revenge and maybe not even about revenge at all. Any new information is an element of the puzzle, a piece of the mosaic that makes up the overall picture.

I should be careful when talking about specific things, because acquiring knowledge about the game world is not mandatory, but is an interesting part of the game play, and we receive positive feedback on the plot from players who like this approach.

I’ll try to tell you only what our first hero, Persival, knows himself. He is the bodyguard of Ingvar, Lord of the Northern Gate. He’s in the northern part of the continent which is inhabited by elves, dwarves, and outcast humans, on the border of their lands, where the interests of the three races intersect. The relations between them are tense, but Lord Ingvar, thanks to his power and influence, maintained order and was the guarantor of peace in this region. Now Ingvar is killed, poisoned, and it starts a chain of events… A chain of events :)

A strange man (?) Mortis resurrects Persival and doesn’t demand anything in return, but he’s also in no hurry to answer questions. All the hero can do is to return home, to the south, to the Northern Gate. BY THE WAY! The Northern Gate fortress is located to the south of Persival, but it was built and named by people who live even further south, beyond the Northern Ridge. Therefore, they are Northern :)

On his way south, Persival will have to pass through the steppes inhabited by warring orcs and goblins, to get into the swamps, and reveal the secret of its inhabitants. Well, at the end of his journey he is to find out if everything is quiet in the Northern Gate (SPOILER: it isn’t).

Events are intertwined in a tangle of cause-and-effect relationships, which Persival cannot unravel completely. Maybe the other two heroes will handle it better?

What works were you inspired by?

I like the principle on which the Warhammer 40,000 universe is built: small stories are woven into global events, and global events are divided into small stories.

In other words, everything scales easily from the fate of a person to the fate of humanity, and we look at the same picture whether we’re zooming in or out.

Of course, Warhammer is not unique in this regard, but it’s a very bright representation of this idea and there’s lot to learn from it.

I can also mention the Might & Magic universe, in which everything is theoretically possible. Going from classic fantasy to sci-fi is something. You shouldn’t be afraid of going beyond and limiting yourself to classical concepts about the genre.

It’s worth mentioning the Strugatsky brothers’ Noon Universe. Although I’m not a fan of their work and have a very general idea of the Noon Universe, it’s one of the inspirations; we have to just admit it.

All of the above applies more to the world in which the events of the game take place. As for the plot itself, the main source of inspiration were the requirements and wishes of my colleagues :)

So you mean that the team has influenced the writing of the plot? Or do you completely control this process?

All the team members can influence all aspects of the game. One of the artists creates a cool character — I say that such a character has no place in our world. I come up with a cool story — but the game designer says it won’t be interesting to play. The game designer comes up with an interesting game situation — the artist says that they won’t be able to draw it well. Together we decide how to redo these things so as not to give up on them altogether. Sometimes it’s possible to solve problems amicably; sometimes someone hogs the blanket a little — it depends on the circumstances.

So how does this concern me? If I had full control over the plot and its development, it would be a different plot :):):) But it doesn’t upset me at all. I understand perfectly well that coming up with a game plot is not the same as writing a story. It’s just a different type of job.

Tell us about creating Persival. He seems to be a very trivial person, which makes it more interesting to know why you chose this type.

I wanted Persival to be something like an alter ego of the player. They both know practically nothing about anything that’s going on, they have a lot of questions, and they are trying to figure out the situation. For the sake of experiment, they can do evil, but doing good is always more pleasant.

The big problem is that Persival can do good or evil things but he doesn’t have a split personality. Starting the game anew, we don’t reset the character’s personality, as is customary in games with freedom of choice. It’s the same Persival who remembers his past incarnations. He can’t deeply sympathize with a character that he coldly condemned to death half an hour ago, or even killed himself. He is what he is, and the game, in particular, gives an answer to the question of why he is exactly like that — if you search a little. The more Persival talks, the more real and understandable he becomes.

As for the rest of the characters, they are much less neutral. Being neutral would be plain boring. The game should definitely get more interesting, otherwise why continue? The new heroes have fewer questions about what’s happening around them, which means more opportunities to unravel their personalities.

Therefore, Bjorn does have a split personality, roughly speaking :) And it suits him perfectly. Vanadis is also not simple at all. Her story develops through revealing her identity — no spoilers.

 

How did you come up with Mortis? Is this a collective image?

In our game universe, there were already templates for characters like Mortis and Millenis. When the game designer needed them, I just dragged them out into the light of day and filed them down a bit.

They’re sort of “Illuminati”; their task as characters is to conspire. They know much more than ordinary mortals, they want to learn even more and they really don’t like to talk about themselves — this makes it more interesting for players to get information about them.

Is something changing in the game’s plot right now, or is it completely written and sitting on the shelf?

As I said, the story is locked inside a time-loop and can only go deeper. The plot is ready; there’s a complete idea of how EVERYTHING will end. The canonical ending is waiting in the wings to please and surprise everyone. But as for the details, the work is in full swing. It depends on how detailed and multifaceted the plot will be, how we’ll bring the players to the final, how many answers they’ll get and how many questions they’ll have left.

The world of Midian is capable of giving us many more stories. Have you thought about what could happen in the game world after the end of the story, which no one knows yet?

It would be cool to answer this question when everyone already knows the ending. It would make everyone smile :)

We could dedicate the next story to the Brothers of Fire, the Mite Cult, move the setting to the other side of the Northern Ridge, into the past, or into the future… There are a lot of options.

The world of the game has a core around which a lot of places, events and characters revolve, so all the stories will somehow be woven into the main idea, touch the global plan, reveal the fate of the world — because in general it is not accidental, it has its original meaning and the ultimate goal. As I said, it will only get more interesting, otherwise why continue? :)

Blitz poll

What literary works inspire you?

I read mostly classics, giving preference to foreign literature of the XX century: from Camus to Houellebecq, from Kafka to Vian — it’s hard to say how it inspires me, but it does :) :)

Three best fantasy/sci-fi movies in your opinion?

1. The Matrix trilogy;

2. Sucker Punch;

3. Sunshine.

What games do you like to play when you’re not at work?

Classic RTS and horror games, tons of TRPGs, energetic shooters, ancient platformers. Monster Hunter (I played all the games, but currently I’m playing Rise, of course). Oh, many games. Today I played Icewind Dale and Red Faction Guerrilla. I finished the first BioShock the other day. I’ll start the second one after I take a break from shooters. I’m a gamer to the core, but I don’t really keep track of novelties. For me, there are no old or new games — there are only bad and good ones.

We’ve already asked our game designer, so we’ll ask you: what game genre would you like to work with in the future?

The classic RPG would give me maximum opportunities.

That’s all! We hope that everyone found this interesting! By the way, ask questions in the comments, we’ll try to answer them below or in future interviews.

Hello everyone! We’re continuing our interview series with the developers from Redboon. We’ve already talked with the sound designer, the game designer and the writer of Knock on the Coffin Lid. It’s time to talk to the Redboon studio head Andrey Medvedev himself.

How did the idea of the game come about?

Randomly, after the Slay the Spire hype. We’d been making a turn-based card game, a combination of Hearthstone and UFO. But we realized that we couldn’t handle such a project, especially as our first. Slay the Spire just came out. We liked the mechanics, but it lacked plot, and many didn’t like the visuals. So we just went for it :)

What does the path from the idea to the actual development of your own project look like?

Like a snowball. First, the core of the game is made — rules, mathematics, and parameters are invented. Then you start building up the game. And here’s when an endless stream of ideas turn into infinite Trello cards. This is the main reason why the game has been taking so long to be made :)

An indiscreet question: how much does it cost to develop your own game?

It’s hard to say exactly. We spend what we earn from other jobs and freelancing on the game. In the moment, it doesn’t seem like “a lot”. But when the development is delayed, it’s scary to look back at the costs. The expenses can scare and demoralize you. We try not to look back at it:) After all, we’re not doing this for money. We like the process itself. But we definitely want to make money to have more time for our next game.

Let’s say you need to make another full-fledged location in the game where battles will take place. How much will it cost?

The game has biomes and battle locations. If it’s a battle location, then it’s not expensive. The background is drawn in a couple of days, then it’s animated, the sounds are added. It costs 3–5 thousand rubles if you order it from freelancers. It’s difficult to talk about a biome, since at least 20 pieces of such backdrops are needed.

Why is the game not released on other platforms?

Simply because it’s not ready yet.

Blitz poll

Do you play other games in your spare time? If you do, which ones?

Yes, but I don’t have enough time at all to play something serious on PC. I have to settle for a tablet. I’m playing EVE Echoes now. When I need a reset, I go for a Vampire Survivors session if there’s new content.

What is your ideal day-off?

Peaceful and quiet :)

Top 3 best movies of all time?

8 mile;

Interstellar;

Forrest Gump;

And Arcane is a masterpiece of its own.

Traditional question: imagine that the work on KOTCL is completed and all roads open up for you. What game genre would you like to work on in the future?

I haven’t thought about that yet, because we have not yet implemented everything we wanted in KOTCL.

Knock, knock, adventurers! It’s time to tell you about what we’re doing behind the scenes of Knock on the Coffin Lid. Today we’ll show you several new events and the progress we’ve made on them, and more!

Progress

Before moving on to something new, let’s talk about the events we’ve shown you in past diaries. In these last days we’ve received several updates to their appearance from our artists. It’s time to share this with you!

If you recall, a few diaries back we showed you a creepy tunnel leading somewhere into the unknown. Well, it hasn’t become cozier since then, but the real heroes aren’t scared of that, right?

The “Three Graves” event has been completed and it has turned into a real art piece! Last time we only managed to show you the first sketch, but today it’s a full-fledged, beautiful work of art. I wonder what kind of story we’ll be told in it.

Let’s also recall the “Mysterious Idol” event with a boy praying on his knees. To whom is he praying and what does he want?

 

And the last bit of progress for today: our artists have significantly improved our Demonic blacksmith’s forge. Any person would be proud to work in such a place!

Updated animations of enemies

Speaking of updates, we’d like to focus on animations which several people are working on at the same time. Today we’ll show you two enemies at once — the Armored Zombie and the Ritualist.

 

New events

So now it’s time to talk about something new, something that you haven’t seen yet, have you? Let’s start with a few events. Some of them are already done; others are in the process of being created.

This event was completed some time ago, but we haven’t shown these frames yet. I wonder what is going on between these two. A quarrel? Reconciliation? We’ll find out soon!

And this event is in the early stage of rendering. Are you ready to visit the mysterious goblin town?

New cards

We are also continuing drawing card art. Periodically, we fix or change something about it, so some of these cards might get into the game in a modified form.

That’s not bad for a week’s worth of work, eh? We hope you enjoyed our animations as much as we enjoyed making them! Don’t forget to drop by next week. We’ll promise to show you a lot of interesting things!

When you hear the words “Game Designer”, you probably imagine a person who’s responsible for ensuring that disparate mechanics are combined into one fascinating game. That’s right, but what exactly do game designers do and how do they get into the profession? Today at Redboon we talked with our game designer Alex about his profession in general, and about the process of working on our game Knock on the Coffin Lid, in particular.

How long have you been working with the team, where did you start, how did you move into the game designer position?

I’ve been working with the guys for a little over a year. I started part-time, simultaneously working as a test lead in another “non-game dev” company. Working two jobs was very tough; I just got bogged down at a certain moment and worked 18 hours a day. Sometime last August, I decided that I had to choose just one thing. I chose gamedev.

All my life I’d dreamed of becoming a game designer. But it’s not taught anywhere, so I became a programmer, then QA (Quality Assurance, that is, a tester). Then I started working for RedBoon as a tester hoping to grow into the position of game designer.

I had worked as a tester for 3–4 months, and then I asked if there was an option to try myself as a game designer. The guys discussed that and gave me a task — to try and come up with an idea for Bjorn (the second character). I sat for a couple of days and came up with the concept of Bjorn’s gameplay and everyone liked it. So, that’s why Bjorn is the way he is now.

What comprises a game designer’s work in general?

We come up with new mechanics, items, and events, set tasks for their rendering; we communicate with the writer so that everything is within the plotline of the world. We work with Unity to implement everything that we come up with, configure AI of the enemies, fix bugs, and, in general, think about how to make the game better. It ends up being a kind of one-man band. In large companies, game designers are more narrowly focused, but in our case we have to do everything :)

That is, everything from a complete change of the game balance to the auditioning of hundreds of candidates for voicing Persival and Mortis.

The main challenges you faced while working on KOTCL?

Limitations. Unfortunately, boundless imagination sometimes meets insurmountable obstacles. And there can be many of them. Both financial (some things turn out to be too expensive to do) and technical (some things take too much time or effort to do). Therefore, no matter how much you want to do something unimaginably cool when developing something, you have to cut some corners. And even though our team is super-cool, it’s still small compared to big companies. Balance! Balance is needed everywhere, both in gameplay and in work.

How does a game designer’s day start at Redboon?

In the morning, I usually devote a couple of hours to read reviews on Steam and Discord, then I watch a couple of streams. I think the most important part of a game designer’s job is to make sure that players have fun. That’s why, in addition to implementing your own ideas, you pay attention to the elements of the game that players didn’t particularly like or the ones that don’t work the way you wanted, and immediately make a note to yourself: “Think about how to make it better.” After that, I take some of the scheduled tasks and set to work :)

Anything funny come up during development?

Of course, we’ve had some funny cases. It’s worth remembering at least the typical mistakes like when we gave Persival (the starting character in KOTCL) 5000 HP to test a new feature and forgot to remove that, after which Super-Persival got into hands of the players. Or when the character accidentally became half the size of the screen…

Even if these are just errors or mistakes, it’s funny. (Also, players recently found another bug with a companion wolf shouting threats at enemies. The game didn’t know that some companions shouldn’t be able to speak .) Generally, our team has a good sense of humor, it’s comfortable to work in the office — we even have a separate work channel for memes :)

So Bjorn and his mechanics of absorbing health in the elf form and turning into a lycan were entirely invented by you?

Well, he could turn into a lycan even before that. That is, the general concept was there. But otherwise he was just “Persival no 2.” There was a rage mechanic where Bjorn accumulated rage when receiving and dealing damage, and when the counter reached 100, he turned into a lycan and stayed in that form until the end of the battle. And there were no more than 30 cards created for him.

I came up with the Spirit mechanic, and the effects that make players constantly balance between the forms. Because, although Bjorn deals a lot of damage in the form of a lycan, he also gains a curse and loses health. You have to return to his normal form in order not to lose control, but there are other problems for the player here — you have to pay with health for each attack. This ended up as the meaning of the gameplay and the plot — you need to balance and not lose control.

I also had to come up with equipment for him and other things that affect the game.

Blitz poll

Which game, book, or movie universes do you like?

Myths of Cthulhu, Discworld, Dark Souls, World of Darkness (The Masquerade)

Is there any game that has changed your life?

Every game changes it in some way :) But games are still games. I can’t say that they change me dramatically :)

What do you play outside of work?

League Of Legends, as well as various non-online projects. I like to try new products.

What game genre would you like to work on in the future?

I’d like to work on a Horror game :)

Knock-knock, adventurers! It's time for our next developer diaries that include even more new events, progress on things we’ve already shown earlier, and new card art.

New events

Today we’re going to show you two events that are currently at a very early stage of rendering. In the next diaries you’ll be able to see how the art will have changed.

The first event is called “The Three Graves". You can try to guess in the comments what you have to do in this event :)

We called the second event “The Unknown Idol". Our progress on this one has gone a little further than what we’re showing you today. Still the work is not complete yet, so we’ll leave it for next time.

And the last new event for today is “The Old Cemetery of the Northern Gate". Do you think a new zombie apocalypse is coming?

 

New cards

Last time we showed you new icons, today we’ll focus on new card art. Our artists are working on new cards every day and they’re getting better and better!

 

And here's a joke from our team:

Progress

The events that we presented last week were almost ready. However our artists will keep working on them until they think that the images look perfect. For example, the process of drawing the backgrounds for the “Ritual” and “Demonic Blacksmith” events has begun. We’ll definitely show you our progress on these events later.

How do you like them?

New animations

We continue improving the animations of our orcs! This week we’ve worked on the archer orc; his movements have become smoother. He’s also gained some new movements and animations. Even his bowstring has been paid careful attention to.

That's it for today. See you in the vast world of Midian!

Probably every gamer likes to get mesmerized by beautiful landscapes when gaming. You stand on a mountain and look into the distance… What beauty! Or you look at the detailed design of characters, or their intricate costumes. Or at weapons! In short, we love things through our eyes first! But as soon as you turn off the sound, part of the magic is gone — you instantly notice that the sound constitutes a considerable part of the overall atmosphere.

We are a Redboon team, we are indie developers and we want to talk about how games are created using the example of our own experience — card roguelike Knock on the Coffin Lid.

When we started working on Knock on the Coffin Lid, we learned from our own experience how important sound is, and how much effort should go into making everything in the game — from blows to the pressing of interface buttons sound decent. And it seems, we’re succeeding in that because Knock on the Coffin Lid has already been nominated in the past for “Best Audio” at the last Indie Cup!

To tell you more about this, we interviewed our sound magician Anastasia.

What is the correct name for your profession?

Sound designer.

What is the job of a sound designer? When we talk about a composer, we know that she/he creates the mood in a scene with music.

Yes, they are responsible for writing music. A sound designer, or sound producer of a project (I do a lot of things for the project), creates unique sound effects for a game or a video, records voice acting, processes the results of voice acting, and integrates them into the project. I also work with a sound engine that interacts with the game engine. If you work on a 3D project, then you also modulate the sound space in which the player is located, adjust positioning, reflection, diffraction, and interference. If this is a 2D game, like in our case, then you only adjust the balance to make it comfortable and pleasant so that you can hear the music well, and so that the sound effects are not too sharp.

It sounds very complicated. So, do you do work with voice acting, too?

Yes. I’m not a voice actor myself. Special people are hired for this, or we use libraries with ready-made voice-overs, for example, of monsters, which you can use to create different characters. But the final version is put together by me.

Do you also work with the voice actors themselves?

I do. For example, for Coffin Lid, we recorded a voice library with a guy and a girl. They are both extreme vocalists. They have a lot of interesting vocal techniques with distortion and imitating different scary sounds, like for zombies or monsters. The girl makes incredible ultrasound voice effects that I want to use for the vampires. We’ve recorded a large library and we’ll use it in the future with new characters and enemies, or we’ll remake the older monsters that could do with improvement.

Do you also take part in the auditions for actors?

Yes, of course. For example, for the voiceover of the videos, candidate actors send us several versions. I take part in choosing the right actor, the right intonation. I direct what can be corrected or added in a particular scene.

Now the team is looking for a real Irishman to voice Bjorn, right?

Yes, that’s right. We listened to several options, looked for a suitable one. We needed a person who could do old English pronunciation. It matches the image of Bjorn. Unexpectedly, we found such an actor in Los Angeles.

You joined the project after it had started. What were the problems with the sound in the game when you started working? How were they solved?

There were indeed several problems. The first thing I noticed was that the sounds didn’t have variations. That is, if it was a blow from a weapon, then there was only one version for that blow. We immediately moved to a new audio engine, where all the new content was made with variability. Even if one sound is followed by the same one, it will have a slightly different tone so that it’s not annoying. We also added some variability to the old sounds we liked.

We also added adaptive music. It can’t be heard in the whole game right now, but it’s there where the composition of the track itself allows it. For example, the first location — now it’s not just three different compositions playing there in turn. The players have a certain intro from one composition while they haven’t done anything. When the players strike their first blow, the music adjusts and more active music starts playing. We tried to make it unnoticeable to the player, but it was necessary to make battles and the game itself more dynamic.

I also had to fix small errors. For example, we noticed a large number of low frequencies in some sounds. They’re not audible with ordinary speakers or headphones, but if you connect a large audio system, you’ll hear the rattling of the subwoofer. We were like: “Is this a bug or a feature?” We had to fix it.

Did the variability of the sound apply to the enemies, too?

We’re recording a library of monsters for this very purpose — to add variety and variability so that the players won’t get bored with something at the very start, and so that they won’t decide that they’ve had enough of the game. This effect on the player can be cumulative, you know: here I got a bug, maybe I don’t like something else, and then there are annoying sounds. We’re trying to prevent that.

Right now I’m creating a library. We’ll change the variants that I don’t like and add new sounds. But it seems to me that even now the game already sounds different and more interesting than when we started. There are a lot of sound events in the game when the entire interface is voiced, and it interacts with you. It’s like the sensations of a paper book combined with an electronic one — the tactility, the rustle of pages, the swish of paper under your fingers. Such tactility is important in both UI and gameplay.

How do you create the atmosphere in KOTCL?

There are several important issues: the story (the lore and the plot), the location (what kind of place is this, what kind of characters are here), and the soundtrack. All this should work together. Looking at the big picture, you come to realize what sounds are required: serious or not, scary or cute. When serious music is playing in the background, and you add funny sounds, the player might get confused.

Picking out the atmosphere, you rely on the animation and the lore, so if you have a swamp, then the sound effects should reflect it: it’s not just frogs croaking, but also wood creaking, the swamp squelching, the winds howling. The players should understand by hearing the sound alone where they are and that they’re not safe. I always ask to see animations of everything I’m working on. You need to be in sync and see the personality of a character. If these are the main characters, then we also study their personality to understand how they sound. For example, I did a test voiceover for the very first video of the new hero Bjorn, and the whole team was like, “Well, no, we didn’t imagine him like that!”. They imagined a character with a low voice, and I made his voice high, but angry. It sounded more like a classic elf.

It turned out to be a game of contrast: the elf himself is scrawny and small, but his inner beast, the Lycan, is huge, serious, and heavy. This added atmosphere and color to his image. But in fact, we are now looking for another voice actor. The team wants Bjorn to always be “heavy” like that.

Did anything unusual happen during your work?

Going back to our library and the voice actors I work with, the guy has excellent low tones; if you lower the pitch by an octave or two, you’ll get a huge monster, very scary. But the funny thing is, he couldn’t do something growling and very scary, it just turned out to be growling, because the guy himself is very peaceful. But we’ll fix that sound separately.

And the girl… She’s something else! We have characters in the game — demons whose voices I imagined as some kind of ultrasound. I couldn’t find such textures in the libraries. It’s difficult to make them, but Olya was capable of it. I recorded her, and it’s totally… there was a feeling that I was scared; it was creepy. It was an ultrasound, but with distortion, with a strain. I got goosebumps.

Is any of this already in the game?

No, we don’t add sounds to the game in small portions. It’s easier to make a big pack and add everything at once. I can’t wait to finish the library and add it to the game.

Knock-knock, adventurers! Today we’re going to show you new, interesting shots from behind the scenes of Knock on the Coffin Lid's development. There are three new events in the program, as well as updated icons, and new animations. Let's go!

New events

Let's get straight to the new additions. This time we have quite a lot of them!

Earlier in the video diaries we showed you a funny character that we created at the request of a winner of the last year's tournaments.

Since we’ve started talking about new characters, we’ll show you two more. This event is called “Ritual” and its main character clearly has a passion for magical arts (probably dark ones).

Another event, called “Court Mage”, involved some magic too.

By the way, while our artist was creating this character’s image, a reference appeared spontaneously. Do you recognize him?

These are not all the new events, but we’ll leave the rest for future diaries so that we can show a little more progress.

New icons

In addition, we’ve finished the work on lots of new icons. They’ll tell you what effects affect your character, allies and enemies.

Progress

Do you remember the forge from the past diaries? We’ve finished colouring it, and now it looks even more impressive!

New animations

While most of our time is devoted to Vanadis’s cutscenes, updating animations is also underway. This week we are ready to show you an orc hunter armed with a spear.

In addition to unit animations, our team is also working on new effects. Today we want to show you a few of them. The last animation is a very powerful witchcraft!

We really like the way the cutscenes of Vanadis turn out, so we want to share one frame from them with you.

That's it for today, thank you for reading! We'll return to you soon with fresh news and cool art!

Knock-knock, adventurers! Here’s what’s new behind the scenes of “Knock on the Coffin Lid” development! Just a little reminder: the game is in early access on Steam and it’s heading towards its release.

Progress

Let’s start by showing how the game’s early art has changed. In the latest diaries, we showed a certain gloomy tunnel. Today we’ll show you our progress with it.

This event is called “The Abode of the Mite”. What will happen here is known to everyone who has already played KOTCL. For those who haven’t played, a short explanation: in one of the game’s big locations, the Rotten Bog, there’s a cult of a certain “Mite”. The locals worship this monster as a deity, make sacrifices to it, and scare away strangers. The Mite creates new monsters, like the Mite Queen. What other creatures will we find in the Mite’s abode?

Last time we also showed you a picture of a high-ranked member of the military. The art is completed and you will soon see the final result in the game ;)

New events

We keep making frames for new events. For example, how do you like this blacksmith? He’s a very harsh man, but we are sure that he’s a master at his craft.

And here is another event — “Caravan”. We showed a frame from it in the video diaries. Most players assumed that they’d be hired to protect a caravan during a journey. What do you think?

Updated animations

We also continue to update animations for all enemies, friends, and allies in the game. Today we want to show you some draft frames.

For example, take a look at this orc. Everything about him has been improved — from the movement of equipment elements to the general animation of the character. He seems to be more alive and ferocious than he was before.

Last time we showed you some animations of Sister Lilly, today we’ll show you the second witch, Sister Lana.

And one more thing…

Finally, we want to show you something else that we’ve been working on for some time. We are showing this image for the first time. This picture is not from another event. We’ll leave room for some intrigue here :)

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Thank you for reading our diaries. We hope that it was interesting and visually stimulating for you ;)

Knock- knock! We’re continuing to actively develop our game, Knock on the Coffin Lid. Every day we see new incredible art and updated animation frames, and discuss various ideas.

This week we’ll show you the art for some new events, updates of the events from the past diaries, and, of course, some animations!

New events

Let’s start with a couple of new events that are already being worked on.

The first event will show us a new character, clearly a high-ranking commander. Do you think he’s a good guy or a villain? Will he help you or will he try to stop you?

He was redrawn several times and changed his position until the picture started looking just the way we wanted.

The second event is a dark and creepy tunnel full of dead people. It leads us in an unknown direction, but we have to reach its end. What awaits us there? This event is at an early stage of rendering; we’ll show our progress on it in the future.

Progress

As we promised above, here we’re showing the progress on the events, sketches of which were featured in the previous diaries.

Animations

We have prepared several animations for these diaries. There really aren’t many of them right now, as our team is very busy with an extremely important task — completing all the the cut-scenes for Vanadis. Let me tell you, they’re turning out just great!

Now, to something else: work on “giving life” to the enemies continues. For example, see this cute witch that would gladly cook you in her cauldron.

How do you like this smiling vendor? How can such a person deceive a tired traveler?

Thanks for reading! We are already collecting new content/materials for future developer diaries because we want to release them more often. We do have something to show! See you on the roads of Midian!

Knock-knock, Itch! We are back with a new update on what we are doing now with Knock on the Coffin Lid.

Early in June, we opened access to our third hero, Vanadis. She even moved to the main version of the game, so now anyone can play her. Right now we are working on cut-scenes that will both open and close her storyline. It has turned out pretty well so far. We can’t wait for you to see the results from the work of our screenwriters, artists and animators!

In addition, besides Vanadis, Tarot cards for all three heroes are now available to players: 21 Tarot cards, 7 cards for each hero. What are “Tarot cards”? Each card is a unique challenge, pre-configured for a specific character. They are available in “Free Game” in the “Millenis’ Nightmares” mode.

Will you be able to complete the game if different elements strike the battlefield?

What if you have to travel blindly, not knowing where the road is leading you?

Right now we are collecting a lot of feedback on Tarot cards, fixing bugs, and studying the reaction of the players.

Also, our cool artists are adding new cards for the cards!

If you follow our developer video diaries, then you already know that we’re also working on a global redesign of the quests and events. This is the biggest and the most important task for us right now. The idea is the following: if the main story of KOTCL reacts to the hero’s rebirth and changes when you replay the main events over and over again, then why can’t the events do the same?

We want them to change with each new game and surprise you with their turns. Thus, it will be even more interesting for you to return to Midian where the events take place.

By the way, about the events: we’re also working on several new events simultaneously. For obvious reasons, we won’t reveal their plots, but we can show you a few sketches.

We’re also working on updating the effect icons that are displayed under your hero. We want you to be able to easily distinguish positive and negative effects by color alone, and to understand more easily what is currently affecting you and your enemies.

If you’ve read up to this point, then you will clearly be interested in yet another image that we haven’t shown to anyone before. Check it out!

Thank you for reading. We hope it was interesting! See you in the next diaries and in the world of Knock on the Coffin Lid! Safe journeys to you!