Getting back on track

I've been spending way, way too much time on the game >_> I really wanted to have some demo/vertical slice thing done by now but there's just too much stuff that needs to be done in one big push for it to be ready. Like a lot *is* done but there's still a lot left (like finishing up monster behavior, making field sprites/animations for the other monster types, modeling two other characters for some FMV sequences...)

I did (mostly) finish modeling and rigging an important character- Fregus! He works somewhere in the castle and was sent to Gyra's world to retrieve Gyra and bring him back to his world so he can start doing adventure things to fix whatever the conflict is. He's a shy, reserved guy who's bisexual (but mostly male leaning) and might have a crush on Gyra...

(this was a WIP render and the texture stretching is strange)

Here's a test with Gyra! Gyra would be saying something like "You can stick it in but I'm pretty loose. I put a lot of big things in my gussy on my webcam sessions!" (gussy = gamer b_ssy) (Fregus is on the small side :c however... Gyra does have a slit where his enormous meat resides when not erect... that might be the perfect size for him to use...)

Fregus and the other rabbit people would wear clothes most of the time but the unclothed version of the body arguably the most important version! So that's the one I was working on. I did draw some clothes on him to test out what fashion he might wear, don't get too attached to this because I probably can't make it look this cool in 3d... plus it's waaaay too obviously inspired by Serge's clothes in Chrono Cross >_>

Anyway I used the body of this wonderful rabbit model by galileogb as a base:
https://galileo-green-boi.itch.io/rabbit-vrchat-avatar
https://bsky.app/profile/galileogb.bsky.social

(I highly recommend checking out their models if you're looking for a character to use as a base! They make some high quality stuff!)

It was a real pleasure to work with! Topology was great, it was easy to redo-areas for NSFW geometry (I remodeled the butt, added a tailhole, genitals). I replaced the head with an original one I was working on now and again, tweaking it every so often, trying to make a good cute rabbit guy.

I was a bit unsure about what to do for his hair but I went with polygon-based hair since it's simultaneously cheaper to render than strand-based hair and more appropriate for 90s/00s FMV.

(Left- Parasite Eve 2, mid- Tekken 3, right- Chrono Cross)
I'm not 100% certain but I'm pretty sure these are all using polygon based hair with clever transparency/reflection mapped shiny texture+specular map trickery to fake anisotropic stuff.

Still needs some more work on stuff but I think I've done a good job of blending the shading aesthetic of this era and the design sensibilities of modern, cute/appealing furry characters.

(you can sort of see the hair clipping a bit into the ear but meh... they had clipping in FMVs sometimes back in the day too!)

Also idk where to put these but here's a few test renders I did with Gyra, sort of like promo renders you'd see back in the day showing how "awesome" and cutting edge the 3d graphics during cutscenes are for their game:

I've attached a gameplay video with a very, very, very rough/early layout of the intro cutscene and how the Honey Pot Ant(aka Lactant) FMV would be integrated into the game. It's still a lot of place holder art/unfinished stuff! So it's very ugly in a lot of spots for now. In that video, around 2:26 you'll see a weird white blobby thing moving around, that will eventually be something like this:

They would run around, charge at you with their stingers out! Haven't started modeling this yet though... so for now this monster is just a weird blobby place holder sprite.

Also attached just the Lactant FMV as it is now (sorry it's in 480x270! That's the game resolution but when it's ready for final renders I'll render it at 960x540 or 1080p)

So yeah, really sorry about this... I was trying to have something polished, ready to play and experience, get some feedback, but it's just been taking too long, it's taken over my life more than it should (been skipping out on sleep, just sleeping whenever, days sort of blend together and it's messing me up >_>) and I need to be focusing on like... animation stuff. So this is the last major update on the game for a bit, I've been focusing on the gator/mitch animation the last couple of days and I'll be writing a post about that soon!

(working on getting the inflation shot polished up + testing the squirt fluids)