Campfire Ghost Story: Tale of the Golden Cartridge!
over 5 years ago – Sat, Jun 08, 2019 at 02:02:40 AM

Gather around the campfire... it's spooky story time

There is a famous ghost story called "The Golden Arm." It was famous BEFORE Mark Twain made it... more famous. Have you heard it? Surely you know one of the many versions of this tale. It starts with a mysteriously deceased love one who had an arm made of gold. Of course, the golden arm was stolen from their grave. The thief, who is typically their spouse, comes back from the grave to get it back! "OOOooooOOooooOOOoooo.... Where is my Golden Arm!?"

That is exactly how I felt I on my hunt to secure a manufacturer for your Golden Cartridges. I was like a relentless ghost haunting any and all prospective manufacturers. Because, as accurately predicted in my previous update post to you, "Spoiler: There's always a problem... the secret is just always anticipating it and being ready." But like the revenant ghost from the story above, I found our Golden Carts!  The original ghost story ended with horror, but our story is on track to have a happy ending. 

Equal parts relived and excited to let you know that I got and paid the invoice for 600 Gold Cartridge shells last Monday.  Even more good news, by way of some supernatural magic beyond my comprehension, they are scheduled to arrive at the lab before the gray carts. O_o

Oh yeah. Don't forget! We're doing the final assembly of the carts, boards, and packaging for Dungeons & DoomKnights physical materials here at our lab-- conveniently located in the swamps of Florida's Tampa Bay Area. Getting all the parts here is priority #1. It is really exciting. Thank you for making this this retro NES video game project possible!

Now... want to talk about the game?

I have gotten a lot of messages from backers who are new to our video game community. If this is you, welcome again! Each of our game does "Design Notes". We've been calling them that since 2003-- back before it was trendy or expected to write regular posts on game development (and sometimes oddly personal things.) Dungeons & DoomKnights does not have an official website yet... so posting them here on Kickstarter for you makes the most sense.

Yet another Pixel Artist Joins the Party

A friend/co-worker of mine said, "I don't like the way you shaded your backgrounds. It looks like it's for the NES, not the SUPER NES." After an awkward moment of silence I replied, "This... is for the NES." He laughed and said, "Oh. This is really good then." Then he joined the project to take our backgrounds to the next level. 

Graphics for the NES

I love pixel art. Especially modern pixel art. But back in the days of the original NES, things were... very limited. Nothing was quite as simple back then either. Exploring those boundaries has been the most fascinating part of this project for me. Some of you reading this are experts of the 6502 Assembler and can hand code 8-Bit graphics in your sleep. But there are A LOT of curious minds reading this who want to learn about the oddities of these old systems for the very first time. Our 3 pixel artists certainly did....

Our initial conversations went something like this:

Pixel Artist: We have 64 colors to work with right?

Artix: Not really. You only get to use 4 colors. 

Pixel Artist: Only 4 colors!?

Artix: Well, 4 colorsper tile... 

Pixel Artist: Ok, so I can make a monster with 4 colors? 

Artix: No, monsters and characters only get 3. 

Pixel Artist: WHAT!? Why do monsters only get 3 colors?

Artix: Well, they get 4... just one has to be transparent. So only 3 are visible.

Pixel Artist: /facepalms

Artix: Also, Dungeons and DoomKnight's style uses black as one of the colors. So....

Pixel Artist: I ONLY GET 2 COLORS FOR MONSTERS AND CHARACTERS!?!?!?!

Artix: Pretty much.

Pixel: But MegaMan has more colors than that!

(Every... single... one of them... said this. Not Kidding)

Artix: True. But only because they drew another sprite on top of his head that had the face color. It was a brilliant hack.

Pixel Artist: Well, can we do that then?

Artix: We are... with the axe. That is how the character is so wide when he swings his axe.

Pixel Artist: Wait... why not just make the character super wide?

Artix: Oh, the NES can ONLY draw 8 sprites across a single row. Total.

Pixel Artist: ....

Pixel Artist: You're kidding me, right? So no monster can be wider than 8 sprites?

Artix: Um, less than that. You forgot that our hero is 2 sprites wide, and when we draw his axe over him, it is 2 sprites wide too. So you already used 4 on that line... you only have 4 left. 

Pixel Artist: What happens if we go over 8?

Artix: The NES simply won't draw them. They will be invisible. (Unless we make them flicker)

Pixel Artist: Ok, so we'll just have lots of little monsters then!

Artix: Right. Just remember, the NES can only draw 64 total sprites on the entire screen. Our hero uses 6, the axe uses 4, and the hud uses a bunch too.

Pixel Artist: OK, well at least I can use any of  the colors right?

Artix: *gulps* No... we have a fixed number of palettes and we have to pre-define them. 

Pixel Artist: ...next are you going to tell me I have to draw the same monsters in different colors?

Artix: No! That is the one thing we CAN do. We can change the palettes on every screen.

Pixel Artist: At least it will be easy to have forest, snow, and fire versions of things. 

Artix: This is why there was so much of that color swapping in old NES games

Pixel Artist: So how many tiles and sprites can I fit in memory?

Artix: *gulps*.... Are you sitting down? *sends file*.

Pixel Artist: You're killing me!

Artix: This is what makes it fun!

Have an awesome weekend of games and fun

Thank you again for supporting this crazy retro video game project. I cannot wait for you to play Dungeons & DoomKnights-- especially on the real NES hardware with a controller in your hand. Until our next update post...

Battle on!

Artix

Art preview: Safiria the Vampire Queen & J6 the Bounty Hunter
over 5 years ago – Tue, May 28, 2019 at 09:47:37 PM

Art Preview! Safiria the Vampire Queen & J6 the Bounty Hunter

Greetings 8-Bit Undead Slayers,

Hope you had a fun weekend. Looks like over 77% of backers completed the Dungeons & DoomKnights survey and got their rewards already. Thank you to everyone tweeting me screenshots of your characters in game wielding the 8-bit reward items! I love seeing them. 

Have a friend who missed out on the Kickstarter? Tell them to go here for a 2nd chance to become a Late Backer. (Or, they can drink lots of coffee and become a Latte Backer :)

Safiria, the Queen of Vampires

The moon-lit Vampire Castle looms over the haunted forest of Darkovia. It's halls are filled with ghosts, bats, and the occasional slab of surprise wall meat. Safiria the Vampire Queen formally requests that you stop by to get a bite. Above is the first rare glimpse at her in full 8-bit beauty. 

The world in Dungeons & DoomKnights is home to many horrific (and pun & retro-reference filled) places. 

J6 the Bounty Hunter

5,000 years before the Dragons, when the world was ruled by giant 100 ton hulking mecha, there was J6 the bounty hunter. Some say his ship was lost in space. Others report that it crash landed somewhere on our world. It is important to note that J6 is not an android... but rather, the helmet. Simply insert human to begin. 

In real life, J6 is one of Artix Entertainments top artists. He has worked on nearly every one of our video games. Over this long holiday weekend, I lured him into the 8-bit project by saying he could add a dark cyberpunk element to Dungeons & DoomKnights. Also, I said "PRETTTTTY PLEEEEAASE."  It was super effective. Above is from his very first 8-bit sprite sheet. I asked him if he was having fun. He replied, "I mean, as fun as building a lego castle with only 12 pieces." Which sounds pretty darn fun to me! XD

BBQ Wall Meat... Mmmmm

Here in the States, it was Veterans day. We honor those who served our country and then grill anything and everything that's not moving. I used the long weekend to get ahead on Dungeons & DoomKnights work. The cart production is going faster than expected. Normally, that is not a bad thing. But in this case I thought to myself, "Maybe I should finally go make that title screen?" So, I put in more hours on just the title screen than I would like to confess. Looks like it was worth it. It was important to me that it captured the essence of the box art. Something few games did back in the day. Creating the title screen was an oddly circular process where I repeatedly processed a single image through 5 programs to finally get the look I was going for-- the spritesheet was teeny tiny to fill such a big screen. Then, I asked Dale Coop for more assembly language programming help to pull off the finishing touches. 

I finished two versions of the title screen at 2am last night. One that looks absolutely wicked, and one which features my favorite gag of all time. My heart says we need the gag in this "looks serious, but it sure isn't..." game. But the angel on my other shoulder keeps whispering that the gag only REALLY works if you are playing the physical cart-- that only people who grew up playing the original consoles will actually get it, and those same people might actually be a little mad about if their desire for an authentic retro experience dwarfs their sense of humor. Might have to consult the magic 8-Ball on this one.

Thank you

Thank you again for supporting and being a part of the AdventureQuest 8-Bit: Dungeons & DoomKnights video game project. In the next exciting update... expect a 96% chance to see the words: 8-bit, Cart, Backer, and Pixel! 

Battle on!

Artix 

Get your in-game rewards. Dungeons & DoomKnights Backer Kit is live!
over 5 years ago – Fri, May 24, 2019 at 10:38:42 PM

Go to BackerKit and start getting your rewards!

Attention 8-Bit Undead Slayers of Dungeons & DoomKnights! The survey is ready for you, and it is time to start getting your rewards :D Here is how it works. Fill out the survey, choose a name for the credits, adjust your pledge level and choose any add-ons. Once you are done, please give us up to 24-hours to manually lock down your pledge.  BackerKit will not distribute codes until your pledge is locked down. Don't worry, Stryche will be doing it super often during this holiday weekend. After that, you can use this link to go back to the Dungeons & DoomKnights BackerKit at ANY time to get your codes to unlock in-game rewards, wallpapers, and the other rewards as they become available (including ROMs, Soundtacks, etc). Keep the link below handy. But rest assured that I will be re-sending this link to you with each notification that something new is ready for you to get. Looking forward to seeing you in our other games this weekend with your shiny new 8-bit reward items! 

Get your survey & rewards at https://dnd.backerkit.com/ 

BackerKit Survey almost ready & bonus Tales from the 8-Bit Crypt
over 5 years ago – Wed, May 22, 2019 at 11:53:11 PM

Dungeons & DoomKnights BackerKit Surveys almost ready

Greetings 8-Bit Undead Slayer,

We are almost ready to send you the Dungeons & DoomKnights survey through BackerKit. This is where you will fill out information needed to fulfill your rewards and obtain codes for your cross-game digital items as they become available. 

Actually, "as they become available part" is going to be... immediately! Originally, we were going to send the surveys last week and then notify you when the codes were ready. Instead, we generated all the codes and set up the shops/badges/etc where you can access the items in AdventureQuest 3D and AdventureQuest Worlds. 

We also added one new badge / code for all backers called "8-Bit Backer".  This is for every backer of Dungeons & DoomKnights who pledged $1 or more. Learning from our Moglins Kickstarter, it solves the problems of delivering stretch rewards that say "For all backers." Here is the fancy 8-bit badge:

Tales from the 8-Bit Crypt

I just like the way that sounds. Also the implicit reference to the late 80's HBO series. Also because there are A LOT of undead in Dungeons & DoomKnights. Also, Flying Eyeballs, Frogzards, ChickenCows, and the occasional box-obsessed Sneevil. 

Here are a few things that are going on that you may be interested to hear about.

Jongaar has been making the music for Dungeons & DoomKnights. Last week he and an equally talented friend came over to my house for a caffeine-fueled late night of famitracker chip-tune crafting. Now, we COULD have done this at the office. But there is something sacred about doing this in the same conditions I used to play NES games when I was little. That is... late at night, with friends, intensely staring at glowing screen, eating junk food and trying to restrain our hysterical laughter from waking my 3 sleeping children... which would invoke the fury of my wife upon us.  I love working on this game so much.

The Gold Cartridges, as predicted in my last update post, ran into a snag. (+100xp for successful anticipation skill check) No worries. That is why we had a plan B ready. I have already taken action. Normally, Stryche (who runs our online shop www.HeroMart.com) would do the sourcing and negotiation. But, somehow I ended up doing it for this project-- and it has been a fun challenge. Sorta like putting a puzzle together. You get the gray carts and boards from there, get the packaging and labels and manuals from there, and then... well, you assemble the team to put them together and voila! Ordering in bulk helps a lot. That is, trying to make a small number of NES carts is very expensive. Our Kickstarter was the perfect size. We are producing 1,000 copies of Dungeons & DoomKnights. Which just barely pushed us up into the "good place to be."

Clarion is our pixel artist. With the extra graphics space we have, I sent him an impressive grocery list of delicious new monsters to draw and animate. Like the artists I work with on our other video games, he never flinches. In fact, I think he gets hungrier. There is something special (or maybe a little crazy) about those who really have a passion for creating. Our other video games are online and updated weekly, and are constantly growing. One big difference for the Dungeons & DoomKnights project, is the final product is a stand alone cartridge. Which cannot be updated (outside of you mailing me back the cart to update... which is so funny, we might actually have to do it.) But for this project there will be a definitive "pens down" moment. Thankfully, that moment will not be until the carts arrive and are assembled... XD Until then, MORE! MORE! MORE! (It is... the Artix Entertainment way)

Thank you for being a part of the craziest thing we have ever done. The next update post will be the announcement that that BackerKit surveys are ready for you.

Battle on!

Artix 

P.S. For even more adventures, follow me on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram

Payments processed, Carts ordered, AQWorlds rewards preview!
over 5 years ago – Fri, May 17, 2019 at 12:09:53 AM

Greetings 8-Bit Undead Slayers!

Artix here, with a bag full of good news for you about Dungeons & DoomKnights. It has been 14 days since the Kickstarter successfully completed (Thank you once again). Last night, at long last, Kickstarter completed processing the payments. Which means....

Cartridge Ordered and Production begun!

Today, I am pleased to inform you we have already sent the down payment on the Gray Cartridges and PCB Boards (The circuit boards that go in the carts) and production has begun! Because we are going through Infinite NES Lives for production, this part has been really smooth. They also provided us with a backup plan should we run into any issues with the collector's Gold Carts. 

Gold Cartridges

As I write this, we are waiting on an invoice for the Gold Carts, so they can begin production too. We are ordering all of the parts, including the boxes, instruction manuals, and sleeves... and will be assembling all ~1,000 Dungeons & DoomKnights Cartridges here at our lab. 

Mmmmm... Assembly Language Programming

Side story! So, I found a rare copy of this book and got it as a gift for a friend from the NESMaker community who has contributed greatly to this video game project-- and still is. This book is sorta the ultimate wizard spell book for NES programming. I can not even count the number of bugs, speed, and gameplay issues that Dale Coop fixed in the core game. While not an originally planned feature, the carts we ordered have a flash save feature-- yup, it looks like we will be able to save. This essential feature will allow us to restructure the game as it was originally intended... as an open, explorable world-puzzle to conquer. 

AdventureQuest Worlds Rewards Sneak Peak

Your pledge likely includes in-game rewards in two of our other games. The AQWorlds (the 2D MMORPG) team sent me some photos to share with you. 

I liked the gleam animations, but I felt the axe needed something more...

At first, we faithfully recreated the axe from Dungeons & DoomKnights into vector graphics as seen above. But it needed more of a punch. So, like what we did in the other game, we took some liberties.

Better!

The gleam animation will be added to this one as well. If you were *REALLY* in love with the ultra faithful one, please let us know. We can simply add it in for you too. 

Arf! Arf!

Soooooooooooo cute! 

"Badges? We don't..... oh, yes. Yes we do!" 

To deliver your cross-game rewards we set up the badges, shops, and are currently generating the codes. Above are the badges I put together for your AdventureQuest 3D character page. 

Thank you... and BackerKit is almost ready

Hope you enjoy this post. Last night, I was (still) re-arranging the texture atlases for Dungeons & DoomKnights to make them more efficient and modular. (The screenshot in the TV was a test image from it) Turns out, we have A LOT MORE ROOM that I thought. So, hope you do not mind if we just make the game as big as possible. My schedule the past months has been pretty consistent. If you see me in our official Artix Entertainment discord channel with Asesprite or FCEUX running, you know I am working on Dungeons & DoomKnights. 

BackerKit is coming up next. This is where you will get your codes, download wallpapers, ROMs, and digital goodies as they become available.... and also enter any shipping information needed to fulfill your order. If you had problems processing your payment, this will let you fix it. It will also allow you to bump up your pledge or get an additional cart (like a gray one) if you wanted more. We just need to finish getting the codes together, setting it up, and submit it (we already paid the fee today.) 

Battle on!

Artix & the Dungeons & DoomKnights Team

www.Artix.com