And here it is: Semblante 2.0, the IGF version. It’s a full revamp of the previous version, as we ported the game to the Construct Game Creator.

As it is a full port and a redesign, pretty much everything is changed between visuals, mechanical tweaks, level design etc. We will improve this version as the time goes by as since we had more than 48 hour to develop Semblante 2.0 the code and all the production pipeline is much simpler, which makes improvements, bugfixing and asset implementation way easier than what we could achieve on the Game Maker version.

And yes, Semblante is one of the 391 games competing at the 13th Independent Games Festival. We submitted it for all the tiny bits of publicity we can get and to receive feedback from the judges and peers.

To download the latest version of Semblante click here. Or you can go grab it on the game’s main page.

See you.

Hello everyone!

I’m very glad to announce that Tsar Project is now officially  in production!

The next Tsar Update Bruno will lay more details in every department’s work, but for now I’ll give you a shot from the studio and some information on my work:

In the background our beautiful 64sq ft pinning board, full of references and WIPs, including beta versions of the game’s map, sound design equalization and chord maps, plot drafts and else. It is a greatly useful feature for a creative studio, indeed.

Those in the foreground are little models I’ve done recently of two types of guards we’ll have in the Kremlin, they’re made of platicine, and still WIP, but are already useful in finding the right angle for their sprites.

Behind them you can (NOT) see three models of our protagonist, in whom my work is focused now, primarily in doing his basic movements animations and sprites.

Last but not least there is the Tsar Project logo!!! We have decided to use the same principle of the studio’s visual ID in our in development projects, so the typography is the same Cedilha Script and the logo in a brush stroke monogram of Tsar (actually, Царь).

Type to you later, and have a nice week!

Yesterday was Aduge’s 3rd birthday!!!

After a long era of post starve, we have fresh news that just came out of the oven! And smells like cherry!
We are eager to say that Aduge is now an official supporter of N Design 2010, the National Conference of Design Students from Brazil, which will happen from 11 to 18 july in Curitiba, Paraná.

N Design is an event that brings together design students from all over Brazil to discuss topics related to design, generally speaking. This year the event’s theme will be “Immersion”, proposing to have more in depth discussions as well as the participants enjoyment of the event, caring about the continuity of the activities after it. The main activity format will be the “Divings”, workshops from students for students about something related to design (or not).

You may ask yourself what does it have to do with us, huh? We’re doing some interesting things for this event. It’s a very special package filled with:

· The MegaDiving, that is a series of divings with the theme “game developing”. It’ll be five days with activities about concepting, game design, graphics, audio and project management focused on small team game development. Our intention is to spread the indie word, looking forward to stimulate people to take part of the indie movement.

· An exposition about Art Games on which we’ll expose ten games that can convey the concept of games as an art form, so that more people can get to know about it. We had not yet decided what games will be there, but we’ll have a post about it later on.

· The organization of a gaming space on the Event’s Living Center. Thanks to the coordinator of the Positivo University’s Game Course, Rafael Dubiela, who is also assisting 4 adugans with their graduation projects and helping us make the exposition possible.

· Run the project management system of the event. This item may seem kindda funny and needs a further explanation. Two adugans (Ingrid and Marcel) and Florzinha (which helped Aduge on the Global Game Jam) joined CONDe (N Design Organization Committee) to manage the N 2010 project. They became part of CONDe family, ended up proposing the exposition and the MegaDiving, to then make this support formal so that all of Aduge’s effort towards N could be grouped in one place. Apparently with only an indirect link with a game developer, Project Management is a well esteemed area of Marcel, one of Aduge’s business differentiation and a subject that we put a lot of effort on our graduation.

We at Aduge are very pleased with the opportunities that are arousing through N Design! If you are a Brazilian design student don’t miss this event! (and if you are not, you should consider tenderly visiting us for this nice conference =)

If you want to know more about N Design, access ndesign.org.br (portuguese only).

More info about our work coming soon!

After 11 months working on Tsar Project we are finally “ending” the pre-production stage. The pre-production was all about a discovery process, mostly the first opening of a double diamond process,  that in a way validates the early concept stages.

What must mark the beginning of production is a stage where we do not have any kind of uncertainties or doubts and can work on a “final” version of the software, without getting around different ways of doing things and without any big scope or feature changes.

The Production Planning we discussed the answers to questions that our testing and experimenting didn’t solve 100% and even the ones that testing and experimenting themselves had raised. The end result of our planning was excellent. More details… on the next chapters!

By the way, the one posting is Marcel Pace, executive producer of Tsar Project. (I rarely post here… You know, sound, music, project managing and process managing… kinda busy here, hehe! )

We are finally back from the Global Game Jam and we’d like to produdly present the result of our 48 hour effort: Semblante.

Before I start, a brief clarification. “Semblante” is a portuguese word that means “visage”. A good reason for the choice of this particular name was because it is a phonetically pleasing word (when spoken in native portuguese at least) the other reasons are pretty much subjective and we leave to each one his own to think about it or not.

The game is still a little incomplete as of now, even if it has a beginning and an end, as we need to work out some of the mechanics, asset implementations and general level design. Semblante is also quite simple, you control Jung inside its own mind as it searches for its own identity (represented as a mask) while avoiding the shadows that lurks within. The metaphor is obvious and I will not linger on it anymore.

The mechanics are pretty simple. Jung has 4 mechanics. It can move, jump, shine and scream. To shine, the character needs to stay in light spots to charge its body. Jung glows for a limited amount of time and while it is glowing, shadows are repelled by it. Jung can also use its remaining glow to scream and attract shadows to itself. We have a lot of bugs to work out still but the core mechanics are all there.

The guys at PUCPR jam site (we are at the right, with “uniforms”)

Aside from the game itself and talking about the Jam itself. It was a pleasing (and exhausting) experience to participate on a Global Game Jam. The extra hands were crucial for the game to come into fruition. In the name of the team I’d like to thank, Flor, Santo, Paulo and Rossato for their effort and dedication during the Jam. We also want to thank Bruno Campagnolo for organizing the Jam Site and the free sodas and sfihas. We’d like to do it again next year!