Events, events, EVENTS!

oHHHHhhh yes.
We have been uper busy being at events. Also super tired.
We were at Games LX Week... wait, or was that XL Games Lisboa? XXL Games Weekend? Mannn, it's complicated, OK!? These things can suck the life out of anybody, if they are not careful.

XL Games World

So, this one event takes place BEFORE Lisboa Games Week* and it's sponsored by some mobile carrier brand that we will not mention here. It ran from 14 to the 17th of November in Pavilhão Atlântico** and it hosted the cool Indie XL for indie gamers! Which also includes the PlayStation Talents section where Out of Line and Nerd Monkeys were included.

We got to hang out with other talented indie developers and play their games as well.
Meanwhile, our latest build was shown and attendees got to playtest our current build.

A PlayStation branded stage greets this simple man and complex woman

"Dad, can we try other games, now?" - "Shut up and play Out of Line, son."

The Indie XL area. All full of Out of Line fans.

The best game in the show.

At some point, Francisco was called on stage to talk about Out of Line by PlayStation Portugal, which was super cool! He was on stage with Marco and some other 2 random cool guys.

Marco from KEO talked about how Out of Line and San changed his life.

*Yeap, it's Lisboa and not Lisbon even though they like to use the fancy English names. Go figure.
** As if we were also going to write that ugly name that they use to call Pavilhão Atlântico

Lisboa Games Week

So, this one took place AFTER XL Games World* but at least it is not sponsored by some silly brand. Still a bit strange that it has the Portuguese word for Lisbon in it's fancy English name... oh well.
Again, Out of Line was present in the indie section called "Loading Zone" in this event that took place inside FIL (Feira Internacional de Lisboa) and ran from the 21st to the 24th.

We got to hang out with even MORE indie developers and were thrilled to get even more people to play our latest build!

Yes, that's a stand on the left with some other game from Nerd Monkeys. Nobody cares.

Another event! Weeeeeeeee!

*XL? Not LX as in Lisbon? Does it mean it's an Extra Large event? What does THAT even mean?

Anyway

Everyone was tired by the end of it!
Both events lasted each 4 grueling days and they tended to finish around 10pm!!! WAT!

Diogo pretending to be tired, HAHAHA, HE IS ALWAYS TIRED!

At the end of the events Diogo and Genebra broke the chairs with "cheer boredom".

Going to events is important and... well... are they? ...we are SOOOO tired... see you next post...
Bla bla bla zzzzzz....

It's the little things

Here's a secret,
Inside the world of Out of Line, there are little bugs that roam around the factory. These bugs live their own happy lives doing the things they like to do more, like eat, sleep and play.
But when San comes along, they see in him someone who they can play with, someone they can have fun and maybe even help.

Bugs in Spine, from Esoteric Software

 "And there they were, in a pack of three, strutting along the grass and moss that grew over the years on top of all the machinery. As San watched them move out of the cave in the ground they were hiding in, they stopped and watched back. Silence. Both the creatures and San stood still for a moment, like two cats trying to predict each others movements. San took the first step and they did the same, even if was not just one step as their tiny feet and legs needed to take 4 or 5 steps to match him. A few more steps and some more mimicking and, after a while, San and the little things were hoping and moving about as if they had been friends for a very long time.
For a moment, San forgot where he was and the danger he was in and happiness filled the air."

Simulating AI and cooperative gameplay

For the bugs to work properly, it was first necessary to design around them. Artificial Intelligence is still a long way to become what people think it will become, so every videogame uses just a rudimentary form of AI for basic actions, functions or sometime just even simple scripts that make it look like the character has real life.

A section of one of Out of Line's level

The little bugs following San around

In Out of Line our AI is just that, chained scripts that perform counter to what the player does. They wait for triggers, delays, changes and other small things that the player does and then react accordingly. This allows us to design some cool and interesting puzzles based around the "intelligent" bugs that help out San.

Until next time,
Snug as a bug in a rug with a mug!