Update: a Big Step Forward

I’m sorry we haven’t published an update in a while… unfortunately, life got in the way and kept me busy.

While this means that BioSynth’s progresses slowed down a bit, we have some good news to share too 🙂

If you can remember, we closed the 2022 talking about a huge rework of an area in BioSynth – the slums of the city where you start the game.

The map we’re talking about is BIG. Here’s a screenshot of the old map, so that you can get an idea – no spoilers, since the level changed a lot.

Redesigning it seemed a crazy idea at first, but now we can say it was a great decision. Let me explain.

How did we come up with the redesign idea?

During our tests, we noticed that the map presented some playbility problems.

Many buildings and pipes were in the way of the camera. One of the reasons why this was happening was because, when we first created the map, we intended to make the player switch between isometric and third person views when playing. But then, for a variety of reasons, we cut the third person view.

Sure, a person who played the map countless times (like us devs) could navigate it without any problem. Also, we feel like someone who played rpgs like Divinity Original Sin, Pathfinder, Solasta or Wasteland (games where you tend to move your camera quite a lot) wouldn’t have problems wandering around the area. But preferred to improve the navigability.

Also, there was something that was bugging me quite a lot: I wanted the area to be more cohesive.

Redesigning the area also meant rewriting the lore about the district.

We completed the first draft for this redesign and everything went surprisingly well: the area looks more cohesive, is WAAAY more navigable and the overall look feels more appealing.

But that’s our opinion, it’s better if we show you the results and you tell us what you think about it 🙂

Consider that this is a first draft: we still have to add VFXs, NPCs, better lighting and more details.

Now that this first draft is completed, while we refine the level we’ll have the time to work on a variety of game aspects.

Let’s update soon about more progresses.