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Neon Tail - An Open World Skating Game

A topic by Rocket_Juice created Apr 15, 2018 Views: 8,044 Replies: 80
Viewing posts 1 to 72
(4 edits) (+4)

Hi, we are Rocket Juice! We are a tiny team of 3 full time Indie Games makers based in Taiwan.

Neon Tail  is an open world roller skating game where you follow a young girl’s adventures and save the streets of Bluepulse City from dimensional disaster. She will meet many colorful characters and explore many fantastic locations of the city, from its various districts (shopping, business, residential etc) to its subways and sewers, to the unknown planes of existence.

The game is inspired by the urban dynamism of Jet Set Radio, the character development, narration, and emotional connections from Life is Strange, and the open world freedom from new gen Batmans.

This is  early prototype video:

Features

  • Plot missions
  • Side Missions
  • Unique roller skating controls
  • Fantastic sci fi city to explore
  • Free roaming activities
  • Explosive soundtracks
  • Memorable characters, playable and NPCs
  • Interesting Collectibles

Links

We will update the progress of Neon Tail  here!
Admin(+1)

This looks like a a really interesting game. Have you considered customizing your game page at all? I don't think the default theme does the project justice.

Thank you for your interest in our game! And yes, we'll customize it :)

(+1)

Neon Tail - Devlog 01   (March 10th, 2018)

A lot of things are happening lately. I’ve laid down several courses for the project to take depending on our situation. But beside preparing documents, plannings and other stuff indirectly related to the game content, I improved several basic control details, actually changing a lot to the playing feels.

  • The grinding control, feels and orientation.
  • The jumping has a smart animation selection, avoiding flips when detecting walls.
  • Added slight aerial control, making a tremendous difference in combo difficulty.
  • Wallrides are now separated into 2 states : classic wallride, with gravity pull and no control over direction and Boosting wallride.
  • Added a mockup of the residential area, preparing a whole new environment workflow as given the size of the levels, the usual way won’t make it. (back to the ugly checker environment for now, but we’re working on it!)
  • As usual, lots of miscellaneous bugs fixed.

This looks awesome!

Thank you!!

Neon Tail - Devlog 02  (March 18th, 2018)

I've been poking around level design ideas in the residence area and been figuring out how a giant spill of coffee can serve as a grindable rail from many angles.
Other than that :
- Set up and testing new environment and props workflow.
- Refined mockup, reorganize, updated or modeled environment and props.
- Created a bunch of tilable normal maps.
- Grinding now zooms out on player's left stick input.
- Head follows camera all the time, instead of following only at low speed and looking forward at high speed

(1 edit)

Neon Tail - Devlog 03(April 21th, 2018)

Hi there! I've been busy writing the game's designs, designing workflows, testings, modeling props, adding small animations, writing editor tools, and tweaking small changes to the wallriding code.I'm slowly replacing the mockup geometries with occlusion cullable props.Previously for the prototype, the environment meshes were huge, so no occlusion culling, and we had big pixel ratio problems. It wasn't optimised at all but I knew it, we were simply rushing for a presentation. Now with the LOD and the occlusion culling and a workflow written down, these should allow us way more details and flexibility as we slowly build up our props library.Hopefully I will be able to put up tons of NPCs, destructible objects, fun things etc...

The environment is completely a work in progress, as well as everything actually, but I believe the foundation of everything is ready for the executive work, so it's getting there, one small step at a time.

Have a nice week end!

(1 edit)

Neon Tail - Devlog 04(April 29th, 2018)

Hi, this week’s devlog shows some progress over the props, slowly but steadily appearing in the environment. Still a long way to go, but I’m on it.
The lighting needs some attention too, I’ll get at it when all the props are created and placed.
Falling from the glass building’s slope sprung me out super far, I wasn’t expecting that… I’ll have to take a look at what happened there when I have the time.
Anyway, one thing at a time, too many things to do, not enough time, I’ll see you next week! :)

(1 edit)

Neon Tail - Devlog 05(May 12th, 2018)

Well, I did some props. I'm taking a little time to try out design ideas on props.
I'd like to add the ability to place the character on either side of the screen for the selfies, will do that later.
I should probably move on to character modeling and animation, there's a lot to do and doing one thing for too long is dangerous for my schedule. I don't want to get entangled in design too long even if I'm not satisfied, since anything can be tweaked forever without improvement, and that will make me come back with fresher eyes.
See you next update! Smiley

(+1)

Looking nice, and the updates are very informative.

(1 edit)

Neon Tail - Devlog 06(May 20th, 2018)

This week's #screenshotsaturday is just me skating around to show a couple of new props I did, such as the Doggoshop, a small empty booth, where I can sell smaller props, either fruits, magazines, toys, anything actually.
I also did more level design friendly stairs grounds and ramps.
Ah I also did cool giant speakers and animated them so they bounces to the beat, but I didn't have time to implement them in the game yet, so that's gonna be for next week.
See you next update! :)

(2 edits)

Neon Tail - Devlog 07(June 16th, 2018)

Hi, my computer broke so I couldn't work for a while, but I'm back on track with this #screenshotsaturday !

I'm sorry the videos all look kind of sameish, but at least the progresses are clearly visible, however small they are.
Right now we're just creating more props, there's a huge amount of work to do, and a lot of visual decisions to think about.
I'll try to work more on the different grounds transitions, and create more of them. I found a bunch of bugs to fix to with the wallriding (again).
This is going to be a busy month.
Have a nice week end!

(3 edits)

NeonTail_DevLog08 (June 30th, 2018)

Hi, this week's #screenshotsaturday I've created a hologram menu, and made it so the character would follow the screens as it rotates around.
I've updated both the anatomy and the clothes of the guy to match more with the girl.
I've added a small slide park with frogs, with a big statue with a grindable tongue, but the climbing design sucks as the bar to get up there aren't conveniently placed.
I've also started modeling another character, will try to finish him for next week. :)
Anyway, have a nice week end!

(1 edit)
NeonTail_DevLog09 (July 14th, 2018)

Hi, for this week' #screenshotsaturday I got 2 new characters, one is made from another character base and the other a remodeling of style. I'd like to add a big flashy plastic belt to the new girl but I keep on wanting stuff and time is rolling, so I'll see that later.
Other than that invisible bugs fixed, again on wallruns and on landing. Unsurprisingly, new bugs appeared, like when landing the turning animation blend is wrong.
There's also that other animation transition bug from skating to idle that you can see in this video. I'll try to fix those quickly.
Anyway my characters are a bit all samish because I lazily used the same bases to save time, so next week I'll try to model an NPC that will have its own unique look.
A kid, a fat bearded dude, or an old groovy grandma maybe? 


Have a nice week end!

NeonTail_DevLog10 (July 22th, 2018)

Hi, this week is just 2 new characters. I added a groovy grandma, still wondering what to put on her T-Shirt, maybe a hippie color pattern or some fictional rock rap or metal band. She will be a shopkeeper, although I leave open the possibility to play with her as a character. Leaving that for later.

I did "extracted" a shirtless dude from the work I did on the other male model, as it didn't take much time. That actually means I duplicated it and quick tweaked it, that lacks design work, but I don't think it's that bad, I'll just need more different characters in the future and I really gotta move on now.

See you next update!

(2 edits)
NeonTail_Poster

Hi, this week's  #screenshotsaturday is a sort of concept art that can be used as poster, cover, or presentation visual.
In short I've just been drawing for the last 3 weeks, this isn't my main thing and I learned too late some techniques I could try and experiment to shorten the production time for my future drawings. Drawing everything in clean line then painting over in crazy resolution wasn't that smart of me but meh it's something .
If some of you artists have general tips or critiques I would be happy to hear them, I will take note for later, but I have to move on for now as my schedule is pressing me on.
Have a nice week end!


NeonTail_DevLog10 (August 18th, 2018)

This week on#screenshotsaturday I finally started working on the gameplay, hitting those energy spheres to gather as much points as possible before shooting them all in a goal.
The winner is the one who shoots the most points in the goal. There are bigger versions of these spheres, that contains more points, that have their own bigger animations, and are climbable.
This week I've just created some sphere hitting animations and started coding the implementation. Tons of bugs for now, but it's kind of functional.
The update to Unity 2018 broke my UI, as well as the hair physics, but also revealed why I struggled so much with it.
By default Unity can have good physics handling with thing that have bigger scales, like planes tanks and car.
The ponytail is too small for the physics to work except if I made my character as big as Godzilla. I did tests, it's kind of funny as she looks gigantic.
Only 2 solutions : Either scale up EVERYTHING so that my ponytail is as big as a bridge, or code my own physics.
I'll do that later as either way it's quite a big amount of work.
That's it for this week, have a nice week end!

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Neon Tail -  DevLog 12

This week's #screenshotsaturday I did a lot of small fixes.
- Fixed many bugs tied to the slapping of green spheres. The code behind it was a bit sloppy, now it is quite solid. Mainly been about a satisfying input feel, allowing the transition anywhere between the start of an attack to a little while after its ending, while keeping a smooth transition.
- Created a very primitive physics for the ponytail, it's missing the usage of mass and I'm hacking some fake gravity in it for now as time flies and I really need to move on. It will do for now, will come back at it later.
- Created a mockup level for a demo build, as the people who will play it will have never played the game, and as previous tests showed, people would mainly hit walls for 10 minutes, not knowing where to go this level is designed to be less opened to choices, with one large road to test the movement, introducing this dynamic city with many pedestrians and fantasy sci fi, including some basic skating, grinding and introducing the sphere slapping game at the end : hitting the spheres to gather points then unleash it all at the goal at the end of the wall, scoring enough before the timer goes out. Some AI and traps will try to stop you.
To do :
- Air attacks, backward combo and goal shooting animations and implementation.
- Big spheres are special, they hold more points, and I'll have to think of a cool animation where you end up standing on top of it, on the metallic circles around it, from where you can jump again. They can be used as platforms to access higher locations.

(1 edit)

Neon Tail -  DevLog 13

Hi, this week's  #screenshotsaturday got me working quite hard :

- Added and implemented sphere slapping animation backward and aerial, as well as big sphere's jump and stand on it loop.
- Worked on this demo level a bit more with the materials and spheres placements, the grinding rail setting took me forever, and the collisions are mostly done, but still WIP.
- Fixed many invisible bugs.

Things are slowly coming together for this level. Still a lot to do, pedestrians, destructible objects, NPCs, Game Rules, points and timer, goal animations, pedestrian interactions, pedestrian animations, etc...
Made this video quite in a rush, but it's still saturday so it's all good.
See you next week :)

Neon Tail -  DevLog 14

This week's #screenshotsaturday shows steady progress :
- Environment update.
- Re positioned Spheres and rails.
- Created the game rules, simple timer, score, scoreboard.
- Added the "Style Tracker System", tracking jumps, grinds, wallruns, on beat grind and turn around. When a sphere game starts, style combos adds time to the timer.
- Added entering proving ground cutscene.
- Found a funny bug. See the end of the video! :3

Next week I'll add hitting goal animation, sphere game ending cutscene, environment props and start working on pedestrians.
Have a nice week end

Neon Tail -  DevLog 15

For this week's #screenshotsaturday a lot has been done, while a lot of sleep were lost. Also a lot of retries for this video haha.
- Environment update
- Hitting Goal cutscene (missing FX, WIP)
- Intro and outro added (WIP)
- Created and placeholding textured dummy pedestrians
- Animated many moves the pedestrians can do, like watching smartphone, lean on wall, sit on ground, sit on chair with without smartphone, party hard, evade, getting angry, getting hit hard, etc...
- Wrote the Pedestrian Manager, optimizing spawn amount and activities based on distance to player and camera visibility
- Integrated interactions with pedestrians
- Added pushable props physics
- Added secrets in the streets with good precision skills required (hence my many retries)

I'm looking for some electro pop music that are very dynamic, if possible with female vocals in. Something like "Fusq - Perfume" or "She - Coloris" would fit.
I don't have budget for now but arrangements can be made. Or if I really love the tracks I'll sell a kidney or something. ;)

Anyway, I'll keep rushing. Have a nice week end, see you next week!

Neon Tail - Devlog 16

Hi, this week's #screenshotsaturday is of a lesser gameplay quality, I'm exhausted so excuse the missed jumps and such. Tongue
- Added temporarily a free music, recorded some grinding sounds, and created and integrated a bunch of new sounds.
- Made groovy grandma dance, made her into a talking NPC.
- Added the guy who'll let you in the game.
- Added small badges to collect mini quest.
- Fixed wallrun and grinding physics.
- Other dozen small stuff.

To do for next week :
- new bug appeared : Cutscene's ponytail goes crazy.
- VR Challenges and Tutorial.
- polish demo.

I'm exhausted, but like this week, many 4 hours nights are scheduled next week. Have a nice week end! Smiley

(1 edit)

Neon Tail - Devlog 17

Hi, this #screenshotsaturday is almost wrapping up a presentable mini demo of our progress.
The demo is really short but it's something. \(o_o)/
Not public for now, sorry, but that should be feasible some time later. Smiley
Added a loading screen, fixed many collisions, added a secret level, fixed many small bugs, added objective panels, tutorial messages, pedestrian bugs, dialogs, sounds, fonts, lights, UI, optimization, etc...
Really a big bunch of tiny things in the end.
For now I just don't like the cheering sound when a game is won but meh... will change it later :p
Have a nice week end! :3

Neon Tail - Devlog 18

Hi, it's been a long time since I posted a #screenshotsaturday !
But I've got good news to people who wants to try the game, however much the game is a work in progress.
A demo will be available on November 1st, I will post more about it then.
This #screenshotsaturday doesn't show much new features, but mostly everything that is already there has been polished.
Added 2 languages, french and chinese (traditional and simplified), fixed many bugs, added this and that logo...
Started to code in a new tricks & combos system.
And started to make real devlogs, going in depth into game design. More later. :)

(1 edit) (+1)

the game is absolutely amazing! i love it! But i have a question (and i am not able to find it on Google, Yahoo Answers, Wiki-How Youtube etc.) how do you "Unlock" new locations, or "Get" new locations ? ive been wondering this for a while ❤ Thank you!

Thanks for your comments :)

We are building new district now, if you like and want to support us, here is our patreon

or want to get the latest news about Neon Tail, here is NeonTail's Twitter

Happy New Year!!

Neon Tail - Devlog 19

Hi, for this week's #screenshotsaturday , a little more mood work, a little less acrobatics.

- Added Pedestrian clothes, hats and bags management system
- Added Tricks and Combos system
- Added Reputation system
- Added Hypershot system and tutorial
- Added more Keyboard & Mouse support (Icon change and stuff)
- Added a Pause menu
- Changed to night time

Next week I'll work on the surface city, maybe design more characters, and finish my devlog.
Have a nice week end! Smiley

(1 edit)

Neon Tail - Devlog 20

Well, this week's #screenshotsaturday is quite a big one. Been changing many key designs and fixing big issues with the wallruns.
Added animals to make the city more alive, but right now it's so alive it became visually messy. I will use spread pedestrians and animals into a more cinematographic way later.
Here's a list of all the new things we're preparing for the monthly builds for our Patrons :

- Modeled / animated the Zombeanies
- Added pedestrian and Zombeanies invasion system
- Improved Hypershot system (can now shoot pedestrians... Evil )
- Birds, cats, dogs
- Removed Boost from Button B
- Added Spin Boost system (perform Ground Spin then press trigger)
- Improved wallrun system
- Fixed many wallrun bugs
- Fixed and added grind poses
- Added spin pose based on rotation while falling
- Added snow fall + auto optimizing code
- Fixed accidental heaviness on Hypershot
- Added a VR Challenge level
- New NPC basic pose loop added
- Upper city in construction Wink

Happy holidays in advance by the way! \o/

Neon Tail - Devlog 21

This week's #screenshotsaturday I'm finally attacking the story's implementation... This video clip might look unusual, but it's part of the story.
So development wise it's going to be short :

- HUD now displays speed (in km/h)
- Grinding speed goes to a set speed when no triggers is pressed.
- Grinding speed max limit was increased
- Imagined created and coded a simple grid system to move around and encase the player in a performance friendly cluster of particle system. I can now haz snow storm or dust storm and such... with the right sounds and effect it can be really cool. :3

Have a happy new year!

Neon Tail -  DevLog 22

This week's #screenshotsaturday shows a little about what I'm working profusely on at the moment. I also implemented a main menu full of placeholder but it's really not much to see yet. It's all just functional. This is what I did this week : - Implemented saving system - Updated the options, now they're saved - Implemented main menu - Added a first version of the prologue - Added a wake up from a sofa animation - Implemented it based on first mission - Shopping District accessible but all rail collisions are to be done.

Neon Tail -  DevLog 23

This couple of weeks I've been working on a build for the Taipei Game Show, where people will come and go maybe try the game for a minute or two then move on. For this special case, we decided to take out the VR levels and tutorials, and instead of trying to create an impossible 2 minutes skating mastering course, I decided to implement other fun sources, work on the universe, the people you meet, their reasons being here, etc...
Hopefully, people trying the game won't just be facing an impossible challenge of mastering the skating physics within 2 minutes, but will find a street to explore, people to meet, and a city to look forward to.
Also hopefully we'll find a way to help funding our project.  Coffee

- Improved dialog system for more flexibility with missions
- Optimized A LOT the pedestrian management system (most of the time went here)
- Fixed many small dialog bugs
- Added Optrellian NPC
- Added lost hat side mission
- Fixed dialog trigger detection bugs

- and shopping district still in construction

Neon Tail -  DevLog 24

Hi there, I'm sorry this week's #screenshotsaturday is a bit redundant, been mainly debugging and preparing for the Taipei Game Show.
Here's a list of the small changes :

- Implemented the dialog conversation animations to the dialog system.
- Made and added Optrellian's animations for basic reactions.
- Fixed many small things, fixed some problems with textures.
- Shopping District still in construction :O

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Neon Tail -  DevLog 25

Hi, been a few weeks since I last posted a #screenshotsaturday !

Beside the #TaipeiGameShow, there was a huge update with the whole shopping district made available and updated with pedestrians. Ran into a lot of expected performance problems, that I dare think is mostly resolved probably. 

The list of changes since last update :

- You can now skate in the Shopping District! \o/ - HUGE rework on the pedestrian manager for optimization purpose. - Implemented Saving system. - Updated the options, now they're saved on hard drive. - Implemented main menu (functional but ugly. Visual update pending) - Added a first version of the prologue (same, will be more spectacular later) - Added a wake up from a sofa animation - Implemented it based on first mission - Dialog system code improved - Reduced Pedestrian polygon count by around 30% - Added and Animated Drones and props - Many new props will now move on player touch - Fixed grinding bug - General performance optimization

I'll probably keep working on more optimization for all the dynamic props next week, something visually visible for the next #screenshotsaturday could be nice for you guys too.

Have a nice week end!

Neon Tail -  DevLog 26

Hi! For this week's #screenshotsaturday there isn't much graphic work done... but a huge, tedious, boring, tiring and annoying amount of work done with the optimization.
In short, I've been organizing and restructuring the whole district so all the props and animals (and there's a ton of them) goes along with my pedestrian management system, disabling them when unused. Also did a lot of other various and exotic optimizations, be it in codes, materials or light bakes.
This led to a loading time sped up by about 500%, and an FPS increase of around 15~20FPS (yes having tons of active props does that)
The downside is I need to really be careful with what zones can be seen when. Props can be seen popping in and out in some places and debugging... it's just more work.
Ah, also now when you jump while skating forward you will only flip when pressing Rt. Changes nothing except that you can spin earlier without the flip. Feels nice.

Hopefully I'll get to some actual game content next week. Or maybe make another Devlog.
See you next week!

Neon Tail -  DevLog 27

Hello! For this week's #screenshotsaturday , I made several small changes along with a big update with the job system.

- Structured and wrote the Job System
- When grinding, pressing B will fall down without jumping
- When grinding, pressing Y will change grind pose
- Her head now look at the camera during selfies
- Selfie cam is now angled to the side
- Fixed bug with jumping on steep slope
- Added a mini Job to test the job system (Package Delivery)
- Added (and struggled with) a target pointer for the job's target.

Since I didn't post last week, here's also what was done before :
- Constant force Trigger Added (Makes the player float up)
- Disabled a huge amount of small scripts running for no reason, made only relevant ones run.
- Systems are rewrote
- Props and animals are optimized
- Lightmaps and occlusion culling baked
- Jump : Press Rt Flip, don't press Rt no flip.
- Normalize eyes texture on Ruby
- Decrease loading time by 500%
- Modelled, skinned and rigged a new NPC. The first job giver : Tybalt Von Badyke, the chic punk dude.

Next week I'll be polishing this new package delivery job's system. Later on I hope I'll be even able to model a cute package bag, or even better a delivery outfit and make an imaginary delivery company brand. But one brick at a time.
See you next week! ;)

Neon Tail -  DevLog 34


For this week's #screenshotsaturday , steady progress on free roaming activity.

  • The job system is done, a first type of job, package delivery, is coded and is ready for level design phase
  • Created a Notification system. You can receive any kind of message, jobs included. You open the message by pressing down on the dpad, and for jobs you can accept  and activate the job by pressing down again.
  • A small Monument that displays the names of our backers/supporters. (bigger and crazier monuments to come)
  • Added breakable walls in the city.
  • Added a night version of the Shopping District.
  • Fixed a big FPS drop for night version of shopping district. (too many small lights)

Next week we might open access to a new residential area, stay tuned!

See you next week!

(1 edit)

Neon Tail -  DevLog 35

This week's #screenshotsaturday will kind of catch up what I missed showing last week, since I couldn't record and post myself.

As a reminder, here's what was done :

- A small Monument that displays the names of our backers/supporters. A huge thank you to them!
- The job management system
- First job system : package delivery
- A notification system
- Breakable walls.
- A night version of the Shopping District.
- Fixed a big FPS drop for night version of shopping district.
- Replaced fast brake with manual flat land trick.

This week I was mainly focused on creating the shopping system. Setting up everything that's happening while inside a shop.
There's nothing much to show beside a lot of code for now, so I'll see you next week with more updates! :)

Neon Tail -  DevLog 36

This week's #screenshotsaturday on my project ”Neon Tail” I've only worked on the shop system, but that was actually quite a trip around.

- In order to have a shopping system I needed first to create a UI menu, so that's what i did.
- In my UI menu I needed first the datas about each items, so I created the Items database, containing all items descriptions, names, types (such as cosmetics, consumable, food, or gift) and prewrote a little about each type's usage and spent some time working on how/who could access this.
- With the item database done and back to my shop menu, I understood that I had to implement an inventory system, which holds a specific amount of items based on your bag size. Of course the item type would determine whether the item was unique consumable equippable accessible by this or that etc...
- meh, gotta do the items meshes. I tweaked some already done to fit our girl.
- In order to equip the cosmetic type of item, I needed to specify which part of the body it will go to and also specify which hair part I should hide or display based on the head gear. So I wrote all that, it's actually a lot of codes and thoughts game design wise.
- Upon equipping, to make it presentable I created tiny animations, one for body clothes, one for head items. it's quickly done but i'll adjust later, i just want to see my menu work.
- When testing the cutscene, the item didn't appear. Ah.
- My cutscene system wasn't designed to follow the equipment of our character, so I had to update that. Not going into the details of this one but it got me fall asleep of tiredness a couple of times.

Aaand that's one week gone. Well that's a reasonable amount of work for one feature that isn't much to watch. But hey, it's done and functional. I'll polish everything later.
Also i want to model a young bored emo/goth lady vendor that sigh and hate her job.

Have a nice week end, see you next week! ;)

Neon Tail -  DevLog 38


Hi this week's #screenshotsaturday is pretty much coding.
Been super busy lately so sorry about the lack of news.
There's a lot going on with our planning and what direction the project should go. I did created a new NPC, not as alive as I want her to be, but I will come back at it later, like most things. With BitSummit approaching, speed is key. ;)

- Fixed a ton of small bugs
- Modeled skinned rigged animated and coded a new NPC (clothing shop vendor)
- Added a secret Rocket of Fame
- Added the save point function with the Cafe Fafifou
- Updated the Notification Manager
- Redesigned the Job Manager
- Updated the Package Delivery game loop

Have a nice week end! ;)

Neon Tail -  DevLog 39

Hi, this week's #screenshotsaturday for my project Neon Tail, I worked on implementing the new residential area to the game. I have quite a lot of difficulties with streaming scenes. I don't think it is possible with Unity unless I put a couple of assets per scene and async load billions of scenes this way. Actually I think that's how they did it in the game "Inside"

So for now (since the game at present state allows it) I'm simply optimizing enough so the game runs with both area loaded at once. Eventually I'll have to find a way to stream the huge city rather than load it all at once, and at worse, go into loading screens and change scenes. We'll see, BitSummer is coming and as always, I need to speed up.

You can also note that the new area is quite a big chunk, so it will take some time to get it all at skatable. Lots of buildings and bridges and roads have no colliders yet. :P

- Fixed Shop talking bug

- Added Save Menu to break times

- Adjusted Alis shop's furnitures and colliders

- Added hint, go back to Tybalt when Job Notifier disabled by player

- Imported Residential area to the game

- Created Pedestrian Manager for residential area

- Organized dynamic props

- Updated Grinding code so loopings are possible

- Updated all grind collider to the new grind system

Have a nice week end! ;)

Neon Tail -  DevLog 40

Hi, this week's #screenshotsaturday for my project @NeonTail , again I worked on implementing the new residential area to the game. I spent quite some time testing all the grind colliders and chasing small bugs.
I also redesigned the trick and combo system. All tricks are based on spins from a state to another. For example, grinding, jumping, spinning 540 degrees the landing with a manual is a trick named 540 Grind to manual.
You can chain tricks, up to 6 tricks combos, as long as your trick is performed only once in the combo.
You get bonus reputation points by reaching the maximum 6 tricks combo, and you also get bonus points by performing the reverse version of a trick. (starting backward)
Some tricks are still missing, as you can see at 00:30 I will implement them later.

- Updated trick list & redesigned tricks&combo system
- Updated Manual animation
- Created and implemented combo sounds
- ResidenceArea import
- Import Residential Master in main
- Rebake occlusion
- Created and set up Pedestrians / Animal / Dynamic Props Manager

Have a nice week end! ;)

(+1)

Hey this looks pretty sweet, subbed!

(+1)

This looks so cool! You got yourself a follower!

Neon Tail -  DevLog 41

Hi, for this week's #screenshotsaturday , I'm showing around the new residential area, the week was spent pretty much populating and optimizing the new zone. I created a new district management system who is in charge of tracking the player's presence and activating / deactivating the district's content accordingly.
This and fixed a LOT of small bugs. Bugs never end.
Next I'll try to focus on putting things to do, and polish before Bitsummit.
Have a nice week end! :)

Neon Tail -  DevLog 42

These weeks have been frantic for me, it's very hard to find some time to make a video... but here it is, this week's late #screenshotsaturday a ton of work have been done. From what we saw during #bitsummit , we tried to snipe out what new players needs the most, what kind of explanation in what order and what was most effective to teach them the basics. Turns out we would need a sturdy tutorial for our game, with a visual of how things look when done well. I will also need to add a gamepad UI that shows the input of the demo girl in real time.

So here it is, the beginner's basic tutorial with a new level, called "The Garage", that will serve has HQ as well as tutorial and chill place for our characters.

Here's a list of all I've done :
- Analysed feedbacks from Bitsummit.
- Made a new character playable.
- Fixed selfie Screenshot file saving.
- Created a ghosting system that allows me to record my inputs.
- Input can now come from both code or player's input.
- NPC can now ghost a player's input.
- Wrote proper dialog localization system.
- Converted all dialogs to new system.
- Fixed wallrun out of wall direction.
- Added Text autoLanguageSet using new workflow.
- Modeled and created the Garage.
- Finished Garage basic tutorial.
- Added Checkpoints.
- Added Spawn location list based on from which level you come.
- Fixed Target indicator's bugs.
- Fixed SFX volume bug.
- Fixed mission related unintended workflow.
- Created new Data classes for relationships and more localization stuff.
- Grew a bunch of new white hair.

I'll try to get the advanced tutorial done by next week, and fix a bunch of minor bugs that's been in the game for a while.

The pace is frantic, but we're working hard to try to get a solid build by October.
See you next week! ;)

Neon Tail -  DevLog 44

Hi, this week's #screenshotsaturday on my project Neon Tail was quite difficult, due to depressing news and the need for some solo gaming, you chose the right time, steam summer sales.
Anyway, played a lot, feeling better, I'm back to work. I've been spending a huge amount of time rewriting my optimizing system from scratch, feeling like an idiot for not recycling the props and pedestrians and animals, instead of creating that crazy complicated zone structure with bazillion actors that each have their scripts intertwined in so many systems.
Oh well, mistakes are the best teachers. I gained about 20FPS in very performance heavy camera angles, the game runs way faster overall, I'm satisfied but worried about when the whole city will be finished. Well, I should worry about one thing at a time. I need to polish that tutorial.
See you next week!

Neon Tail -  DevLog 45

Neon Tail Starts Steam Early Access on 2019 September  https://store.steampowered.com/app/1126270/Neon_Tail/ 

Please add Neon Tail to your wish list :D

Thank you!!!

Neon Tail -  DevLog 48

Hi! Lately work had been quite frenzy, a huge amount of debugs and polish for the upcoming early access of my game Neon Tail.
For this week's #screenshotsaturday , I really wish I could spend more time creating videos and explaining what's new in detail, but with the oppressive and unending to do list I have before the early access start, here's me just roaming around jumping and grinding happily everywhere.
Have a nice week end! :3

Also here's the link if you want to wish list it : https://store.steampowered.com/app/1126270/

Neon Tail -  DevLog 53

Hi, this week's #screenshotsaturday shows a super hero landing in my personal project Neon Tail !
Lots of work, more than usual... even added 14 new equipable items along with the Halloween event.
Have a nice week and happy ghosts slapping!

Neon Tail -  DevLog 55

Hello, for this week's #screenshotsaturday on my project Neon Tail I'm finally starting to work on plot missions, I drew a little concept of the first in-game sport's game match's opponents, the Acid Frogs, and started modeling "the boss" of their team.
The new area is playable too, we're slowing down on environment creation and working actively on populating the city with missions and events.

Neon Tail -  DevLog 56

Hi, for this week's #screenshotsaturday on my project Neon Tail , some of you might have seen two weeks ago the concept art I drew for the first opponents my main protagonist will face.

Well I modeled them, textured etc... and implemented them, and took some time to completely rewrite the ghost system as it was FPS dependent, thus on some computers people would see weird things.

I also spent some time writing tools for faster future character / NPC implementations.

Anyway, I lazily reused many animations so the eyes goes weird sometime, I'll create their own animations later, at least a good Idle.

I'll try to create a small event including them for this month's build, but it might be too late. Next month there will be a mission with them.

That's it for this week, have a nice week end!

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NeonTail ProgressPreview57


Hi, trying to keep up with #screenshotsaturday on my project Neon Tail !
There's been a ton of work done these few weeks, but I think the amount of new things decreased the quality of those things.
I made a couple of cutscenes and created a new mission to introduce a new character, I managed to make it all functional, but the result is quite unpolished.
I borrowed some animations from other character for dialog reaction animations, but it doesn't fit at all... Still better than nothing. I'll definitively replace them next update!
Some unintentional wrong positioning on some of the mission outcome, but overall it's still satisfying.
This is the first mission that has 6 different outcomes that will change your relationship with this new character, knowing that your relationship with her will have consequences with what she will do and what you can do with her later.
Stay safe and have a nice week end! 

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NeonTail ProgressPreview58

It is getting harder to stay consistent with the #screenshotsaturday while working on my project Neon Tail , I really need to keep it up.

I have so many new things that are hard to show!
Here's a few big ones :

You can now go back when you grind, I created and implemented the trains and cars traffic system, I updated the save system, ghost system, storage box system, added an upgrade feature to it, many shops and items were added along with the new area, and I completely reworked the Reputation system completely separating it from the tricks and combos system which have their own new scoring system.

More to come, I'm working on a new character in a new location that is part of a plot mission.

Have a nice week end! 

If you like our project "Neon Tail",  our twitter and Discord link, see below
Twitter https://twitter.com/RocketJuiceGame
Discord https://discord.gg/5CkE8Qe

NeonTail ProgressPreview59


Hi, I hope everybody's doing fine!
This week's #screenshotsaturday on my project Neon Tail , I've been busy working on the battery and drone workshop.

It's a place where you can upgrade your roller blades and camera drone to add new abilities. I've been mainly working on the room's look itself and started to prepare how the whole system will work.

Also added some more cosmetics, a minimap, and a couple of side quests.
Added a face mask because why not, and who said video game characters are immune to viruses?

Stay safe you all, see you next week!

NeonTail ProgressPreview60

Hi, for this week's #screenshotsaturday for my project Neon Tail I made unlockable abilities that are now properly implemented in the game.
I finished implementing a workshop where you can get a "battery" installed on your roller blades. Each battery has a different amount of energy you will need to use abilities. Each battery also have a different amount of slots to plug modules in. Modules can change your base stats, such as speed, grip, and balance, but more importantly enable abilities such as Spin boosts, Rush boosts, magnetic jumps and wallrides.
Here's a video of me skating around with those abilities installed.

Lately I've been building up stress more than I should and found myself getting angry quite easily. I'll need to find some ways to deal with this, I'm sure this is a quite common thing among indie game devs (actually probably everybody...) stay healthy guys!

Have a nice week end!

NeonTail ProgressPreview61

Hi, this week's #screenshotsaturday for my project Neon Tail I finally finished my Training Facilities. It has some collision bugs and I want to rework the screen menus, but at least the facilities are operational.
There's always a kind of tension between advancing the whole project, reworking the existing feature and polishing / debugging what's already done.
There's also that perpetual lack of satisfaction with my own work. I wouldn't be where I am without it, doing so many different things like art and coding, but I never feel... well satisfied neither.
I guess I just need to keep going until the project is finished. And either ignore or schedule super tightly all the polish gnawing at the sides of my focus, else the project will never finish. :o
Sorry if it sounds like I'm complaining, I'm not! I'm just talking about some difficulties I face during game dev. I'm doing exactly what I want and I'll crush my project! :P

Anyway, have a nice week end!

NeonTail ProgressPreview62

Slowly but surely, some progress! This week's #screenshotsaturday on my project Neon Tail , I'm showing the first race of a match against the Acid Frogs. As usual, new side missions, new items, new plot missions, lots of debugs, tweaking, balance, and I also added a convenient way for me to switch character anytime on the fly.

This year is not an easy one, both mentally and physically draining with all the crazy news... so don't forget to relax and have fun!
Have a nice week end! 😉

NeonTail ProgressPreview63

Hi guys! This week's #screenshotsaturday on my project Neon Tail I've done the dude's skating animations. He's supposed to be a bit less agile and slower than the main character, so I hope the animations shows that a little.

He's still missing a manual animation (which is the main character's for now, very feminine haha) and I'll probably add some Selfie poses if I can. I also would like to change the forward jump.

Anyway, I can refine a lot of course, and that goes for all playable characters, but as usual, I'm racing against the schedules.
Also sorry for the abrupt ending of the video, I ran out of disk space. :P

Have a nice week end! :)

NeonTail ProgressPreview64

Hi, I didn't post anything for a month now, but I've been quite busy on my project Neon Tail nonetheless. I've spent some time brainstorming some plot points that used to be weak, now we're solidly good to go.
I've reworked the plot related dream prologue, with new environment and props, and I am currently creating a real introduction cinematic. This is still in progress, so maybe that's what I'll post next Saturday.

Meanwhile for this #screenshotsaturday , I'll just show some new animations on the other playable characters. The way they play and feel now starts to really split away from each others and reinforce their personality.

Anyway, have a nice week end, stay safe! :)

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I . WANT . IT

No really, hope the fellings go up to ssx3. hype is real XD.

but if i can gice my "advices" (it worth half a yen), when time come, create a solid back strory even if it's supose become a chill "sandbox" game. and PLEASE: add neo-hardcore-cop(should add some chalenge and fun :x)

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Thanks for the replying, and your advices is great and we're now adding plot mission now and design the "new-hardcore-cop"(now side mission "race challenges" are like this feature ) !

Just after that i had think about the fact that cop should be robot, like that characters can complain about the fact they d'ont understand the meaning ans feelling of "ride" and are dumb doll who just follow order

...

yhea i try add some lore xD

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NeonTail ProgressPreview66

Hi, for this week's #screenshotsaturday for my project Neon Tail I'm skating around, shopping, and racing.
Lots of updates this month, dialogs have new animations, added many new moves to the unlockable characters, I finally fixed the turn around at the end of a rail during a grind bug, and I did a big optimization overhaul for better resource and memory management.
I discovered the "Addressable" system Unity had for a while that I wasn't aware of. It kind of resolved some problems I had.
Anyway, I did a lot of very various things, a lot more coming soon, have a nice week end!

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NeonTail ProgressPreview67

This week's #screenshotsaturday shows some fun debug tools I've added for my project Neon Tail , which consists of spawning whatever I want in front of me so I can stress test performance.

Another cool usage is that it can be a little surprise for my next live debugging session. 🙂

Other than that, I've formatted the localization workflow, as it might be wise to slowly start translating the game.

I've also added a Reset function to the street races that allows the player to spawn back to the last checkpoint they touched. There's still the option to abandon the whole race.

Moving on to advancing the plot!

Have a nice week end! 🙂

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I want a dog rider ! (look impossible). There is stand alone moves? i mean like spinning or ride on a single roller on normal state.

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NeonTail Devlog04

Hi, for this week's #screenshotsaturday about my project Neon Tail , I'd like to share my latest devlog.
It's a bit silly, but I do wonder if trying to be funny in my devlogs can help marketing the game.
I mean, that direction is probably a fool's errand, I'm no youtuber nor comedian but I'm trying things I guess.
Also I'm having fun so that's what matters the most in the end. 🙂
I just read a super sad story of an ambitious indie game project (the game Waking), like other people said, indie game developing is really like throwing a dice and hoping for a nat 20.
Well, if I'm going to fail hard, which might happen, I should at least try to have fun on the way.
I wish you all success with your projects, guys!
Have a nice week end! :)

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* here buddy, just look at the whole road you have done * >ヽ( ̄ω ̄(。。 )ゝ< ...

* this can't be a failure * < ᕙ(* o * (・_・ )ゝ< just, who are you ?

* you can do it * < (  ´o`)ノ(╥ω╥) < leave me alone...

Ps: hope it help... and yeah i passed 20 min for doing that.

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NeonTail ProgressPreview67

Hi guys, it's been a while since my last #screenshotsaturday for my project Neon Tail, I've been very busy with life, but still working hard on the game.
I've created a new environment for the new dream sequence, giant alien brambles and plants, trees, rocks and grass.
The main plot is slowly advancing, I've also modeled a huge Alien creature, sculpted the high poly on stream. It was unwrapped, textured, rigged and skinned, but I have yet to animate it then implement it in the game. Maybe next week?
This plot mission is also waiting for the Slums District to be ready, it's supposed to happen in some shady place.
So things are shaping up, still very Work In Progress as you can see, but it's advancing!
I wish you all a Happy Halloween! :)

<3 well done. and happy halloween  too.

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Thank you :D

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NeonTail ProgressPreview69

Hi, this week's #screenshotsaturday for my project Neon Tail I'm advancing the main plot, slowly getting into the action part of the game.
This week I was animating this cutscene, then implementing it in game, adding post processing effects, adjusting the time scale, the gravity, tweaking the ghost shader and the Alien material. Not sure about the alien eyes color yet, it looks like a missing shader in Unity right now. XD
Also note the ponytail physics, I gave up on writing it myself and bought the Dynamic Bone script. It's a bit expensive but we'll be able to have plenty of new cool cosmetics now.
Also I started sculpting a new NPC that will appear soon.
Wishing you guys a nice week end! See you next week! ;)

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NeonTail ProgressPreview70

Hi, this week's #screenshotsaturday on my project Neon Tail I've added the ability to pet doggos and kitties.
I've finally made the skybox-swap-to-night-time feature work properly too, the reflection probes used to not refresh and kept the daytime reflections. So now that everything is properly darker, I've added a flashlight to the camera.
I've also implemented a new important story character, his vest's physics are quite a challenge, and he's lacking his own animations. But he won't be playable for a while so it's alright.
Next step, advancing the plot!
Have a nice week end! :D

You can pet dog and cat: amazing ! a good sign for a future game ! 

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NeonTail_ProgressPreview72

It's been a while since my last #screenshotsaturday 
Since last time on my project Neon Tail , a lot has been done.
- I added a Donation system (ingame, not a real one), where whenever you perform enough tricks and acquire enough audience, there's a chance someone will give you a donation, giving the player incentive to perform Tricks and Combos all the time.
- The game has been translated to French and Chinese. I really want the game to be translated in Japanese, but I don't speak it, so that will have to wait.
- I drew many 2D anime style Portraits for the dialogs.
- Added 2 Main Plot missions.
- Added a backpack to delivery jobs
- Added more secret collectibles.
- Added a few animations, and a lot of Debugs.
I'm wishing everybody a waaay better 2021, and a Happy New Year!

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NeonTail ProgressPreview73

Hello, for this week's #screenshotsaturday on my project Neon Tail , I don't have much to show beside the new (in game) Donation system. To keep it simple, you are a Skate Idol and you stream your skating skills, the more tricks and combos you do and the more viewers you get. Once you get to a very high number which is where I start here in this video, you get a high chance of getting donations. If you stop doing Tricks for too long, your viewer count will start to drop.
This is designed as an incentive to perform Tricks and Combos during missions, and I think it works well, at least for me and my friends.
Also another anecdote, the (in game) donators are all named from our (In Real Life) supporters on Patreon / direct donations. Thanks to them a thousand times!
Wishing you guys a nice week end! :)

Deleted 360 days ago
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NeonTail ProgressPreview74

Hi guys! This week's #screenshotsaturday on my project Neon Tail , I've managed to create a revealing effect to the secret hidden door tied to the plot. I have to admit i don't know how to write shaders, I googled and copy pasted a dissolve shader's code, but it was an unlit shader. To make it back to a Standard shader with normal map, metallic map and additional emissive that isn't used for the “cut“ effect, I pretty much trialed and errored my way out of this one. It took forever but it's working.
Happy with the visual result, hope it won't be too performance heavy.
Wish you guys a nice week end! 🙂

What did we do this week? (August 9th 2020)

https://www.patreon.com/posts/40224347

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NeonTail ProgressPreview75

Hello! I haven't posted anything here for a while now.

For this #screenshotsaturday on my project Neon Tail

I've been working on a new combat system, I've just finished implementing backward skating ground kicks.

The idea is that as long as you keep pressing attack you'd deploy some kind of mist as you skate around.

The moment you stop attacking she'd snap her fingers and any enemy caught in the mist would explode.

My game is about skating around so I don't want the combat system to stop my momentum, and as you might guess, there aren't many other games sharing this problem, so I'm kind of exploring new territories.

Also skating forward are slaps and skating backward are kicks that are slower but stronger, chaining them into combos is an interesting idea but it's a bit meh in practice for now.

Hopefully this will lead to something really good.

Have a nice week end! 🙂

NeonTail ProgressPreview76 - the first dream scene 

Hi guys!

It's been a while since last time I posted a #screenshotsaturday for my project Neon Tail!

I've been hard at work polishing the first chapter of my game.

Map system, total rework of the tutorials, added mini cutscenes, debugged and polished many small things.

Here in this video, the first dream the heroine of my game has was redesigned and is now feeling way more like a mini adventure rather than just a weird linear game sequence.

Things are advancing, I have big hopes for my project.

Cheers, have a nice week end! 🙂


NeonTail ProgressPreview77 - a mini cutscene the first time the player meet some characters


Hey guys, a little #screenshotsaturday of my project Neon Tail where I did a mini cutscene the first time the player meet some characters.

I'll probably populate the plot missions with that kind of mini cutscenes, hopefully bringing some life and personality to my characters while keeping the production time cost low.

Have a nice week end! 🙂