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Sketchbook: Zetheros

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zetheros interpolator

Hi there!

So after getting a bit of industry experience, I thought I'd like to make the transition & expand my skillset from an artist to that of a more well-rounded game developer. This Sketchbook will be dedicated to the project I'll be working on. I'd like to try to update this thread once every Wednesday with my progress. If you have questions, comments or critique, feel free to post them in this thread or send me a message, and I'll get back to you as soon as I can.

There is some nudity and there will likely be some gore or similar themes in this thread, so be forewarned!


Current priorities, in no particular order:

-races assets

-character customization system 

-basic gameplay systems, including; equipment, combat, inventories, crafting, mech building

-learn C++, build rudimentary MMO functionality; (account creation, payment systems, ticketing & gamemaster systems). translate gameplay systems to server-authoritative multiplayer

 -network & multiplayer gameplay tests

-AI systems for testing and bugfixing

-DDoS mitigation & network security, server hardening, robust & extensive goldselling, aimhack & botting preventative designs and measures

-website, auction house / trading integration.


PROJECT NOVA SYNOPSIS:

The Players, persons of unknown races and origins, arrive in chains, packed like cattle in the cramped, cold & plague-ridden confines of leviathan slave ships. Destined to foreign masters in a foreign land, and when deemed useless - destined to die.

The stacked hovels and congested alleys of the cities in Project Nova are overcrowded with those affluent or influential enough to live under protection. Those incapable of affording rising living expenses are exiled or mercilessly exploited. Obtaining residency as an outsider is nigh impossible.

Outside, the inhospitable expanses between strongholds and outposts ruled by warlords are treacherous; colonies of flesh-eating termites, poisonous briars, tar pits, lava flows and roaming packs of deranged cannibals are among the lesser of dangers.


The lands change with the time of day, season, and weather, influencing gameplay from animal migrations, availability of food, diseases and suitable attire. Players will want to construct their mech and band together for any hope of survival in the lawless wilds and wastelands.

Genre:

The game's genre will be a third-person MechBuilding/Survival/Shooter/MMO. If making a MMO is truly out of reach, I will settle for peer-to-peer connections & lobby matchmaking.

Artstyle:

Standard PBR, taking inspiration from Elden Ring, Monster Hunter World, Warhammer 40k, Destiny 2, Morrowind, Howl's Moving Castle, Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind, Dune, Star Wars, Conan the Barbarian, The Dark Elf Trilogy, and much, much more.

Gameplay:

Primarily being a FPS and over-the-shoulder shooter, Project Nova's gameplay will be quite similar to many other games; kill things, get loot, use that loot to get stronger, all while immersed in a sizeable, handcrafted and detailed - but not needlessly massive island.

Platform & Other Details:

Project Nova will be for PC, developed in Unreal Engine 5 and published to Steam. Cross-platform to Xbox and Playstation is desirous. These details may change over time with tech advancements or other unforeseen circumstances.

References, mostly for myself:
https://www.artstation.com/manueljordan
https://www.artstation.com/kubi
https://www.artstation.com/yuzuki
https://www.artstation.com/gilbertomagno
https://www.artstation.com/lakoh
https://www.artstation.com/crazyhorse

Developer Notes:

My goal is to create a genuinely fun MMO that respects a player's time commitment, while learning from the successes and mistakes I've seen from the studios that make the games I've played over the years. To this end, I am maintaining a living doctrine to which I will adhere, outlined below:

- I will not market or 'hype' the development of this game. Marketing, if any, will be worked on when the game is complete and ready for players.

- I am acutely aware of and will never utilize predatory monetization strategies. This includes, but is not limited to the following; Lootboxes & gacha (gambling), removal or 'vaulting' of paid-for content / FOMO (fear of missing out; exclusivity & artificial scarcity), dark patterns (e.g; having to click an unsubscribe button twice), paid early access, P2W (pay to win).

- Project Nova will either be F2P (free to play) with an ethical cash shop and battle passes similar to Path of Exile or Warframe, or a full-priced game with subscription and paid expansion packs.

- I will not use kickstarter, patreon or similar to fund the development of this game.

- I will not take assets from the Unreal Engine Marketplace or any other 3rd party assets and make an 'asset flip' game.

- I will not employ the service of a publisher.

- I will not accept offers of volunteer or unpaid work, or revenue share. Any work done on Project Nova will be done by myself, or appropriately compensated for.

- I am aware of game industry problems that hold us back from our true potential; ranging from 'softer' issues like how stubbornness, fear, ignorance, egotism and nepotism affects decision-making and creates chilling effects, to much more serious issues such as workplace sexual harassment & pay discrepancies, and will use both passive & active measures to deter the bad and foster the good in all of us. This extends to any potential outsourced talent working with me.

- Great games are built with patience, understanding, nuance, deliberation, and, when possible, clear communication with the player base. This will apply to every aspect of the development of Project Nova, from art to balance patches.

- If I hire artists, the art tests will be paid or nonexistent, as I value people's time.

- If the game is successful to the point where I am able to form a company and employ others, it will never become public. I will maintain majority ownership until I am physically or mentally incapable of doing so, thus avoiding the hype, boom & bust cycle that is commonly seen in and is hugely detrimental to the tech and games industries.

-The best kind of leader for a game development company is a benevolent king; one that rules with assertion and absolute authority, but with compassion, empathy, and an open mind. E.g; not threatening to kill one's employees.

- I will not transfer ownership of my intellectual property or any future company I may own to a party that does not care for the well-being of the games industry, it's workers & it's customers, and will work on this project well into retirement.

- Any art generated by AI or assisted by AI will be noted. No substantially unaltered AI generations will be present in any public versions of Project Nova, as per Steam's developer guidelines and my own morals.

- While I would like to get this project done in a timely fashion, there is no project deadline for version 1.0. Project Nova will be ready when it's ready, and I will take no shortcuts.

If you'd like to see more than just the weekly updates posted here, you can watch me work live on Youtube or join the Project Nova Discord.

Have a good one,

Zetheros



Note: The above images were generated by Stable Diffusion using Dreamshaper v.7. I do not claim ownership over them, and they are simply used as references.


Replies

  • zetheros
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    zetheros interpolator

    I've actually been working on this project for about half a year now, though much of that time has been learning the ins and outs of UE. Currently I have an inventory system working, and have delved into replication for multiplayer. The inventory system is multiplayer compatible, and currently allows item transfers between the player inventory, containers, and the equipment system. It is a simple grid inventory with arrays and inventory slots.

    For now, I'm pleased I was able to get so far. Multiplayer and inventory are the only major hurdles for me personally, in making a game. The rest should prove relatively easier.

    There are future plans to improve QoL by implementing a sort algorithm for Alphabetical, ItemClass, Weight, SellPrice, and similar variable-based sorting. Much of what you see is placeholder.

    The priority for this week is improving the human basemesh to allow for cleaner UV layout, modular character heads and armour, and dismemberment.


  • zetheros
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    zetheros interpolator

    Old (left). Still needs work on the legs and arms imo


  • zetheros
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    zetheros interpolator


    thinking about adding black draconic/demonic scales to the arms and legs, cuz it looks too similar to morrowind dunmer. Guess I'm going hand-painted for the artstyle? Texture size is 256px for the entire model. There's still some UV space left over for doodads like piercings, earrings, hair ornaments, etc. Hair obvs still needs work, belly button might be a bit low

    butt


  • zetheros
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    zetheros interpolator

    Last week was productive. I've replaced the base UE manniquin with the female vampire basemesh. Earlier I said that dismemberment was a priority, but I'm kicking that can down the road in liu of making the male base mesh, armour and weapons, and animations. Additionally, a lot of time was spent world building and writing notes in my master document.

    Equipment slots now detect item class. Before you could, for example, slot apples as a helmet item instead of a consumable.

    Progress on the male basemesh is quite straightforward, but making hair look good is hard work and takes time. The male basemesh shares the same UV map as the female one.

    I did get around to painting in the scales for the female basemesh, but I'm holding off on polish work until I get a firm grasp on the modular armour and dismemberment systems. There may be crucial UV or geometric edits I'd need to make, and perfecting art only to have to redo it later due to technical reasons would be an unnecessary time sink.

    Lastly some closeups of some hair improvements, again not final due to technical uncertainties.

  • zetheros
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    zetheros interpolator

    Last week I started prototyping a new race and, more importantly, began designing a character creation interface.

    Mandibles open, revealing two sets of inner appendages, which I believe are called 'maxilla', but I'll be doing more research as well as cleaning up and optimizing the mesh over time. One of the more important design facets of building new races is that they all have to be armour compatible, so that a human helmet will fit on this race's head.

    This is the prototype of the character creation screen. The player character will be displayed in the middle. Show/hide armour, as well as randomize race and name are planned. It's a lot of info crammed into one page, so I'll take steps to make it less confusing, though personally I think it flows quite well.

    I've also been getting a hang of ChatGPT, and have been using it to generate filler text, as well as suggest ideas I may have not thought of. Icons are simple 16px textures that I make in photoshop for placeholder.

    Something I'll need to keep in mind is scope. 8 face types, 8 hair types, 8 'flair' (piercings, earrings, similar detail). This is 240 unique textures and/or meshes.

    Have a great week!

  • zetheros
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    zetheros interpolator
    Wasn't a very productive week, had stuff to do. Hopefully I can get more done this week.

    Changed the face because of two reasons; the first iteration has too many moving parts that I'd have to rig and animate. Secondly I don't think it was relatable enough.

    Have a great week!




  • zetheros
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    zetheros interpolator
    Still debating whether or not to go with handpainted or PBR. The issue with PBR is that it changes an audience's interpretations and expectations. One expects more when PBR is involved; e.g, facial animations. With handpainted, facial animations are less expected due to suspension of disbelief.

    Either way I made progress on the UI, and made some basic tentacles with niagara. I thought they might be useful in the next race I make, but I'll almost certainly just use cloth physics and animated materials. Maybe I'll get back to the vfx for certain aspects of the new race.


    Lastly I've been going through my assets and cleaning file names to adhere to a better naming convention since things were getting messy.

    Have a great week!

  • zetheros
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    zetheros interpolator
    I've upgraded my animation software and have been working out the animation pipeline for modular races, which was a little trickier to comprehend than expected. However with that out of the way, there's just the usual animation and asset creation to do.

    All races have morph maps to their opposite sex as well as to the human female basemesh so that they all inherit the same weight map, which will save me a lot of time, alongside animation retargeting.

    Many thanks to Lukasz Pazera for ACS3!

    https://youtu.be/Xke4DFYM94w




    Have a great week!

  • zetheros
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    zetheros interpolator
    I've decided on PBR instead of handpainted, as normal maps are required for certain height based terrain materials that I want in game. Aesthetics is determined by function, never the other way around. I went back and reworked the basemesh for better compatibility with PBR, as well as literally everything else; from UV mapping to animations, as well as Zbrush subdiv so I don't get annoying geometry patches while sculpting. Essentially a 'one mesh to rule them all' kind of basemesh. Still needs some work here and there; knees are a bit weird and she needs elbows. Not sure about the hip area.

    I'm honestly not sure why I originally had a T-pose when this game will be a FPS. A-pose is a lot better. Maybe I secretly wanted highly dynamic combat animations somewhere in the back of my mind.


    Have a great week!

  • zetheros
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    zetheros interpolator
    While the face has good subdiv, I want to go back and add some supporting geometry for the ears and neck in particular, and possibly arms and legs too. Nostrils and the smile line could use some geo rework as well.


    https://youtu.be/gS2l1T4tqj0
    Have a great week!
  • HarlequinWerewolf
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    HarlequinWerewolf polycounter
    Props for your commitment! This is already a lot of work for a personal project. I definitely think you could do a stylised PBR thing but I kinda like the handpainted look you have in the earlier posts, it reminds me a bit of Valheim, just more detailed. It also works really well from a third person point of view but not sure how well it would hold up in first person. 

    Excited to see more of this :D 
  • zetheros
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    zetheros interpolator
    Thanks. Yea first person would look pretty bad with 256px lol




    Anatomy is not really my forte, but I'll give it a fair go. There's still a lot of work to be done. The male basemesh will go faster, as once I'm done sculpting the female basemesh, all of the musculature can transfer. All I have to do is alter the lowest subdiv.

    While working on this, I've become more appreciative of the works I've seen made by other artists, as well as subdiv workflow and zmodeler. People who sculpt muscles have their work cut out for them, and people who sculpt anatomy well are special.

    Have a great week!
  • zetheros
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    zetheros interpolator
    It doesn't look like I did much last week, but I did a fair amount of research and experimentation with hair, and have ultimately landed on sort of this stylized hair. I was going to go with haircards, even making some custom zbrush brushes for it, but that led down a rabbit hole, and I've deemed it outside of the scope of project nova.

    Other than hair, I keep seeing areas on the basemesh that could be improved, but for now I'm going to move on and work on the human male basemesh or possibly another race. I'll come back later to correct any mistakes or improve anatomy.



    Have a great week!




  • zetheros
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    zetheros interpolator
    Lots to do as usual, here's the female abyssal, played around with some polypaint though I'll do the actual painting in substance + proc materials, I'll be aiming for 'iridescent but not gaudy'... going to be fun making materials for that in UE. Mantis shrimp colouration used for reference


    https://youtu.be/JxniKbwRzFU
    https://youtu.be/yMMSnvn4r0U
    Here's a few generations that I thought were interesting.


    Have a great week!
  • zetheros
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    zetheros interpolator
    More refining, with a quick polypaint. Male versions should start appearing soon.

    https://youtu.be/cgwQgVnJ0Ew
    https://youtu.be/K0UrdWkSO8I

    Have a great week!

  • HarlequinWerewolf
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    HarlequinWerewolf polycounter
    As much as I like this design, I think there's a disconnect between the abyssal and the semi-stylised face shapes of the human. I can't put my finger on the why but I think it's something to do with the detail and noise over the abyssal vs the clean shapes of the human. I do really like the colours though
  • zetheros
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    zetheros interpolator
    ay, human needs more detail. I am also reconsidering my decision of stylized hair, I'll probably go with hair cards. And thanks!
  • zetheros
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    zetheros interpolator
    I really just need to bite the bullet and pick up blender to make hair, there's really no other good option. Gotta channel my inner thomasp. Basically I pissed away all of last week messing with hair cards when I should've been watching blender tutorials. Also humans are stupidly difficult to sculpt, which indicates to me that I lack fundamentals. As I'm posting and rereading this now, I'm already seeing areas that need improvement.

    I'll be working on this while learning my way around blender for this week.


    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e7gBRtNpd-Y
    Have a great week!






  • zetheros
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    zetheros interpolator
    Lost a few hairs of my own trying to get all of this to work while learning blender, but it's working now, so all that's left is actually making the hair look nice instead of seeing how many ways I can break blender with my sheer incompetence.

    I must say despite trying to cram all of this in one week - the plugin is insanely powerful, and blender is useful to have. If I went with any other method I probably would've given up and went with stylized helmet hair.


    Progress was also made on the basemesh.

    Have a great week!
  • zetheros
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    zetheros interpolator
    I've migrated my master document from Google Docs to Obsidian. Documents alone wont cover what I need, which is a wiki. MediaWiki, my favourite wiki format that powers Elderscroll's UESP and PoE's wiki (and Wikipedia, of course!) is too technical for me at this point in time. I'll learn it when I'm ready.

    Here is what my master document looks like after bringing it in from Google Docs; a bit like a neural network. Each node is a separate component of Project Nova, sometimes branching off into more nodes; e.g, Races > Humans, Vampires, Abyssals, and so on. Since memory is not perfect and mine is no exception, I've also made a satellite node cluster specifically for technical notes on the software I use, along with essentially a 'dump tab' (PoE reference) for spur-of-the-moment ideas, which I will later read and filter.



    Something that I'm also keeping my eye out for is a method of populating articles using Unreal Engine data tables to assist in forming an internal wiki, which will then become the foundation for an external wiki for player use & reference.

    I've basically figured out how hair works, so it's not really something I'm intimidated by anymore, which honestly gives me a great sense of pride and accomplishment. It'll just take a bit of time to figure out a workflow and better techniques, what works & what doesn't, etc. I haven't actually done a lot of work here, most of last week was planning and reorganizing. I'll probably move on from hair for now, and go back to sculpting the basemeshes and getting them done.



    Have a great week!
  • zetheros
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    zetheros interpolator
    Didn't get a lot done last week. I've been trying to reset my circadian rhythm to something resembling normalcy; like going to sleep at 2:00 instead of 10:00 - but it's not working. Will try harder, maybe inject weed or rub my eyeballs with cocaine - the kind of stuff zoomers these days do, idk
    https://youtu.be/67LXr0ROItE
    https://youtu.be/dIGtJ1GJDhI

    Have a great week!


  • zetheros
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    zetheros interpolator
    added more detail to the vampire sculpt & started on the infested. I've decided against including the 'automaton' race due to gameplay reasons. Schedule's back to normal so I'm getting a lot more done.

    The lore behind the infested is pretty interesting imo, so I'll share some.

    Essentially the Infested are a race of intelligent, sentient, parasitic worms that have a society with a complex hierarchical structure. When a host becomes parascitized they are not only infested with the worms themselves, but are also injected with a cocktail of symbiotic fungi, bacteria, and viruses; carefully curated and weaponized diseases the worms carry in their guts. Tools, to rapidly modify their host's body.




    Have a great week!
  • zetheros
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    zetheros interpolator
    It's exciting seeing the races come together.


    The Infested still need work, as do all of the races. I plan to add mycelium (hair cards) growths, drool strands & all that fun stuff. One thing that stands out to me is proportions; they're all too similar. Secondly, colour balance; when I bring them into substance I'll need to make sure they look like they all come from the same universe and share a certain colour palette & aesthetic, even though being distinctly different. When someone sees a screenshot of the game they should think, "oh, that's Project Nova".

    Down the line I'll have to work on proportions and make things less human across the races, and make them stand out individually, but while still keeping certain dimensions the same for gameplay reasons; like necessitating hands being roughly the same for holding guns (like Warframe), and bodies being roughly the same size for possible PvP reasons (like Destiny 2). All the while being able to wear armour that will be morphed to their respective proportions.

    https://youtu.be/-4_J2efGQCo
    https://youtu.be/3uSBF3MsbcQ

    Have a great week!


  • zetheros
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    zetheros interpolator
    Didn't get a lot done this week because Baldur's Gate 3 dropped, but I've been working on making the infested race more modular so players can mix and match fungi. Also added some placeholder 'hair' (Perithecia?). Made the back of the fleshy worm pod / ascocarp less noisy and more structured.


    Have a great week!
  • zetheros
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    zetheros interpolator
    I wanted to take a break from sculpting characters, so began work on the mechs. This is the smallest mech available; it has a 4x4x3m customizable living quarters, as well as a modular hull & weapons systems structure. A lot of thought was put into the size of mechs, as well as creating modular systems for both interior and exterior. The arms & legs of the infested race are essentially done as well.

    Unrelated, but I took a bit of time away from Project Nova to begin writing a handbook of sorts for digital artists wanting to learn more about armour, but now that the document structure is in place it'll take no time to add information here and there.


    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ADVaErQ3Nqg
    Have a great week!



  • zetheros
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    zetheros interpolator
    Most of last week was deliberating the look and function of mechs, and of their many nuances. For an example, I spent half a day writing down and comparing various methods of transporting the player character from the first level of the mech to the second, or if there should even be a second level.

    The internal & external size of the mech also took a lot of time to decide on. It has to be big enough to store all of the player's possessions, but also small enough to fulfill technical and gameplay considerations, as well as an overarching 'feel' of Project Nova, that despite piloting a powerful mech, you'll feel vulnerable and small in a vast and alien landscape.

    The carriage will be built of wood, so I spent a lot of time making sure the construction made sense, and the undercarriage - which still needs a lot of work - is of metal construction. The distal phalanges will be made of carbon steel in lieu of leaf springs for a smoother ride.


    Have a great week!

  • zetheros
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    zetheros interpolator
    I think I've mostly finalized how modular spidermech exteriors are assembled, and have lore explanations for how/what/why everything is built. Work was done on a biomechanical & neural interface covering that encapsulates the wooden interior frame.


    https://youtu.be/1zG4eE5v29E

    Have a great week!




  • zetheros
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    zetheros interpolator
    Been a bit busy, so I didn't get nearly as much work done as I wanted. Last week I was working on modular interiors, basically filling out interiors with modular walls and furniture to establish specifications and parameters; e.g, chair height & how that relates to a sitting animation, how doors open and close in a small enclosed environment, if a bed is 2x1x1m it can have potentially 6 interaction points and needs 6 separate animations for getting in bed, etc etc etc



    Have a great week!
  • zetheros
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    zetheros interpolator
    A lot of progress was made, even though it doesn't seem visually apparent. Most of last week was mostly figuring out how things would work on a technical level. I've made every mesh an instance of a master copy and socketable, before I was just duplicating meshes and using the transform tool to move them into position; definitely not the most optimal workflow but it worked for concepting.

    I've now set up the meshes like they would be in UE5 with locators in place of UE's sockets. I've also gone with modular walls + pillars, instead of just modular walls. It just looks better and is cleaner. A workflow of sorts is being established; there are now some measurements and parameters to adhere to when making interior assets, which will likely be expanded upon in the future.

    https://youtu.be/N-GVjTacLu4

    Have a great week!

  • zetheros
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    zetheros interpolator
    Work has been done on essential interior furniture. As space is incredibly limited within a mech, each 'essential' piece must be scrutinized for importance, and will often be multipurpose to conserve space & to respect the player's ability of customization. For example; the alchemy and cooking station were separate furniture pieces each taking 1 square meter of floor space, but they are now one, with alchemy being changed to 'brewing'. It's a brewing, cooking workstation that also dispenses water. Maybe I'll put a Japanese spin on it and have it also play music while you're making beer, deadly throwing potions, or a croque monsieur.

    https://youtu.be/cgulZrpT5T4

    Have a great week!
  • zetheros
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    zetheros interpolator
    I've researched alcohol distillation so that I could make a convincing alembic, which I've incorporated into the brewing/cooking station.

    I realized a max height character would not have enough space to lay down within two tiles, so floor tile width was increased from 850mm to 1m. I have also reduced the ceiling height from 3m to 2.5m, a change I was pondering for quite some time now.

    Overall I'm satisfied with these changes; interiors feel (and are) more spacious horizontally with mostly useless space eliminated overhead.

  • zetheros
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    zetheros interpolator
    A lot of my free time with taken by IRL stuff so not much was done last week. I also caught the flu but it's minor and I can power through. Next week will be similarly busy unfortunately.

    One of the workstations available is scribing & artificing, but the creation and use of magical and mechanical apparati has close ties to ancient slumbering deities as well as the factions system, so I spent a decent amount of time worldbuilding.

    I've reintroduced the player vault as a floor tile, added a wardrobe & processing unit for salvage. Workstation footprint has been reduced from 1m x 1m to 1m x 0.75m to make things less claustrophobic. Comms station has gone from using monitors to holograms for similar reasons.


  • zetheros
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    zetheros interpolator
    I experimented with non-square rooms; essentially more like Robocraft or Crossout; although these games don't have pilots last I checked, and definitely not interiors. Despite a much greater amount of customization, it's very hard not to make something look incredibly blocky with these systems, without utilizing dozens of supporting blocks. Having everything on a grid-based system can work for some games, but I'm going with a hybrid instead.

    I'm sticking with my original plan of fewer pieces with interesting shapes. There will still be plenty of customization with materials and paints; wallpaper, stained glass vs clear, metal type, wood type, and more.

    I've added the rest of the levels to better get a sense of the scale. The first floor is now a basement of sorts.

    https://youtu.be/W17NexQ6Kzo

    Have a great week!
  • zetheros
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    zetheros interpolator
    was especially busy the past several weeks, hence a missing update and lack of progress. It's late so I'm making a half-assed post. Here's an overview of what I've been up to last week, and here's to hoping for more progress next.

    - replaced brass neural interface with a modular stone wall capsule
    - reworked carapace appearance to be more visually logical; thick limbs and squat form capable of supporting a mage tower. Made it less spider-like for people who have arachnophobia
    - weaponry hardpoints


    Have a great week!

  • zetheros
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    zetheros interpolator
    I've returned to working on characters, switching things up and continuously learning new things to stay engaged and productive. I believe the highpoly is getting close to a state where I can start thinking about retopology, texturing, texture & mesh morphs for age, body sliders and so on. I'll have to divide the lowpoly up for modular characters in UE as well, but that's still a bit into the future so we'll see how that goes.

    Human anatomy is really difficult to get right and is a lot of hard work, slaving over minutiae and proportions measuring in the milimeters. I still consider myself more of an armour artist, but I think the skill 'bar' for anatomy is attainable if a make a couple more of these.

    I was originally not going to sculpt the bits & bobs to keep things less NSFW, but I realized that they are crucial landmarks in sculpting, and without them as visual guides it can be more difficult to sculpt certain areas. That said, characters in Project Nova likely will be part of the never nude squad, with undergarments glued to their crotches for all eternity.





    Have a great week!
  • zetheros
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    zetheros interpolator
    Every time I think I'm ready for the next step, I see areas that can be improved upon. Especially so after adding polypaint, which revealed a lot of flaws. Waking up in the morning with fresh eyes and opening Zbrush for the first time of the day also really helps in revealing flaws. When you work on something for hours on end, it can be blinding.

    Reference is more important than I thought in regards to human faces; a lot of changes over time are noticeable with the face in the image below, that's largely due to me switching back and forth between several refs. I think I'm starting to gain a foothold here however; starting to form those neuron connections that allow me to 'see' commonalities behind certain facial structures, shapes and proportions that people deem attractive. This will help me sculpt faces and bodies faster in the future.

    In short, while I have a grasp on how a human body looks ecorche-style, I'm starting to develop an understanding on how to take that structural knowledge and 'stylize' it to what we know as beauty.

    TBH might still need a few weeks until it gets to a point where I think is acceptable, mostly because I'm learning all of this as I sculpt, but it's nice looking back on the progress made as I go.


    Have a great week!

  • zetheros
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    zetheros interpolator
    Short on time today so no time to write a proper entry. Here's last week's progress

    -Improved face by gaining different perspectives by watching my streamed content (same method that PvP players use to git gud) as well as looking at the model on a different monitor. Anything you can do to get more perspectives & cover your artistic blind spots is hugely important imo.



    -Added underwear.



    -Full basemesh retopo done excluding auxiliary meshes; teeth, tongue, eyes, etc.



    -Sculpted teeth & mouth.


    To do:

    -Research implications on adding full nudity to a video game. Legal / Moral / Cultural / Does this add meaningful substance to the game? Would it make the game better? What audience am I targeting? For now though I'll be using clothed models because it'd be awkward running around in UE5 testing locomotion cycles in just her birthday suit

    -Retopo aux meshes.

    -UVs, baking, hair, lots of back & forth between multiple apps to get everything looking right.

    Have a great week!
  • zetheros
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    zetheros interpolator
    Did some work on the vampires. Polypaint needs to be redone however. Wings are a decent amount of work, due to their surface volume. Basically take a character and add half. This workload will propagate to animation, clothing and armour development, but I think is worth it.


    Scales are a bit tedious but are actually pretty fun to sculpt imo. I do make use of alphas, but even still, some elbow grease is required. Still quite a lot of sculpting work to be done.



    Have a great week!
  • zetheros
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    zetheros interpolator
    Redesigned the infested race, the large bulbous egg carrier in the back plus head tubes/tentacles would've been too annoying to clothe, armour, and there would be animation clipping with furniture. I've replaced them with thin fungal appendages that can move and animate, and that take up the same area as the vampire race wings, so these two races can share the same shirt/cuirass armour design, with a cut-out back.


    It is considered indecent to appear in public without one's burial mask. Infested players must wear the mask they died with or other headgear that covers them, or face prejudice and negative disposition among most of the living denizens of Project Nova, and concerned disapproval amongst their own.



    Blocked out the undergarments of the abyssal race.



    Hand drew all of the leathery, scale-y details here, and I feel like I accomplished the aesthetic I was after. Still needs alphas and more sculpting to polish the detail.


    A whole day was also spent worldbuilding and expanding the internal wikia.

    Have a great week!
  • zetheros
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    zetheros interpolator
    Infested wings & mask, gave vampire race unique underwear, did more work on the lobster race underwear. Spent some time tinkering with the scale of the mechs earlier last week, I removed the stone capsule & am thinking of going back to more mechanical roots rather than magical.






    Have a great week!
  • zetheros
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    zetheros interpolator
    Relatives visited last week, so my weekends were eaten up and I didn't get as much done as I wanted. I did a lot of document work; created a lore-friendly and logical explanation for a player death + respawn mechanic that works in the context of an MMO, as well as more world building and notes on player progression. I also rewrote the Project Nova synopsis.

    More work was done on the infested race. It's a particularly detailed one, and having undergone a redesign, it's taking a bit longer than usual.



    Have a great week!
  • zetheros
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    zetheros interpolator
    More work was done on the infested. Subdivision level increased to 7, putting the body around 14m quad polys. I'm in the process of smoothing out a lot of the high frequency noise, doing more detail passes, and will be grouping large swaths of detail with colour later for visual clarity. Mostly happy with the underwear design at this point!




    Have a great week!
  • zetheros
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    zetheros interpolator
    Bit of a slog, but that's just how it is sometimes. Progress is steadily made and that's what's important. Hope everyone had a good holiday!


    Have a great week!
  • zetheros
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    zetheros interpolator
    Refine, refine, refine. A last minute change to the wings material was made. I thought a silvery infestation would be interesting, but it's just a bit too far out there, aesthetically. I want to keep things grounded. Player customization of wing colour within a select colour range and possibly model will be ideal.


    Have a great week, and happy new year!
  • zetheros
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    zetheros interpolator
    Happy 2024! Here is the yearly recap for 2023. I will likely do many of these. Best of luck to my future self; keep on that sigma grindset you handsome bugger.

    In 10 months I have:
    -Worked on inventory, container, and equipment systems in UE5 as well as user interface.
    -Established internal development wikia in Obsidian, populated articles with Project Nova world development as well as developer best practices & notes.
    -Decided on the artstyle.
    -Purchased and learned how to use Auto Character Setup 3 (ACS3) for Modo, as well as the Hair Tool for blender.
    -Designed and worked on modular mechs, their general shape, appearance, size, function and background world lore.
    -Established the four initial races for Project Nova, Humans, Abyssals, Vampires and Infested and have highpolys mostly done.
    -Somehow convinced (Coerced? Bribed? Swindled?) roughly 500 poor sods to subscribe to my youtube channel, raising my number of viewers to 930, up from 430. Most of these people are middle aged American men who have never touched a women in their life. Nevertheless, I am grateful of this self-validation, regardless of the source.

    Last week I worked on the Abyssal race. One of my Youtube regulars convinced me to sculpt everything, and make separate lowpolys for both the bodies and underwear. Personally I think he is just a crustacean enthusiast.

    Side note, I'll be uploading the Sketchbook images elsewhere and linking them in this thread to save polycount some server space. This will also allow me to post larger images.



    Have a great week!
  • iam717
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    iam717 greentooth
    i like the idea and color of her.
  • zetheros
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    zetheros interpolator
    thanks iam717!
  • zetheros
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    zetheros interpolator
    Added more detail to the vampire race, as well as a tail. Why do I put scales on everything? Am I stupid? So much work >:(




    Have a great week!
  • zetheros
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    zetheros interpolator
    Removed the heavy scale detail from the face, we got a bit too horny last week; removed unnecessary horns that would interfere with clothing and armour systems. Worked on better horn>hard scales>soft scales>skin transition. Reworked head and neck scales to be less pointy and jagged. forearms were tedious, wings were a massive PITA requiring 2 retopos, but reduced polys from 55m to a much more manageable 19m at subdiv level 7.

    Note to self; don't retopo > project hipoly detail until you've nailed the silhouette or you're gonna have to do it again


    Have a great week!

    Oh yea, I also found this massive fucking lobster that I can clean up and use.

  • zetheros
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    zetheros interpolator
    More detail work on the vampire race, getting there, bit by bit.


    Have a great week!
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