15th March '06

The character of Jonathan Danter (3D real-time version) is almost finished, as well as the character of Kath, which has changed from the first version (we were not yet totally convinced of the chromatic aspect of her clothes, but Cunix's intervention, as usual, has been decisive).

There has also been a lot of agitation for the game presentation, so we have started working on the teaser, which is about 80% of his development. The teaser, conceived mainly to arouse curiosity and expectations, will be presented on the occasion of the next E3.

Just now, Sergio and Andrea V. had a meeting to better define the already clear guidelines of the accompaniment. Everything concerning musical patterns, accents and the "Main Theme" has been successfully faced according to a re-examination of the first prototype tracks suggested by Andrea. Our ears can't wait to hear the results that are certainly coming in the coming months.

Soon we will begin carrying out the first part of the Full Motion Video in render, and in a short time we will also insert all the dialogues and a check of the environments. Jonathan will implement all the cues with the instruments created by Andrea B. The first experimentation of the above-mentioned tools has given excellent results and this makes us optimistic about the assembling that we expect to achieve by the end of May.

27th March '06

Sergio is a machine; his work pace is impressive and, while involving and fascinating his colleagues, he is able at the same time to maintain his work pace and to meet the production calendar.

In the pasts days, a first musical theme prototype of the game has arrived and we are trying to work it out so that it will be the most suitable for the game environment.

Ale has just finished the first animated cut scene in real time doing excellent work. We are all eager to try it.

Today Paolo Infusini has joined us. Sergio and Andrea B. provided him with specifications about the work to be done. He will engage in export and assemble the locations.


31st May '06

Work on Belief & Betrayal continues without a stop. You can already see a lot of progress in all of the game characteristics. We have developed tons of material in the last two months!

Alessio has been working nearly full-time on the development of the full motion videos, as during the last few days he started to encounter some little problems caused by the incredibly high amount of polygons and shadings. His computer simply ran out of memory each time he tried to work on these scenes. The problem was easily solved by giving him a new and more powerful computer that manages to render those scenes nearly 8 times faster than the older PC.

Sergio and Jonathan have been working on some little changes to the storyboard to improve the coherence of the plot.

Sergio's, Allessio's and my computers have been really working hard (especially during the night) at the rendering of the FMV scenes. Using some cuts from the first part of the FMV renders, Sergio created a very exciting teaser that made a really good impression at the E3 in Los Angeles.



Just back from the E3, Riccardo has reported that the press and the editors were really interested in the presentations of Belief & Betrayal. He was also astonished to see how miserable and poor many people were, and the homeless living in the degraded area around the rich and famous downtown, full of hotels and glass skyscrapers. He said that even though he was near to the rich and beating heart of Los Angeles, it was almost like being in the 'favelas' of Rio de Janeiro or Mexico City.

Andrea has been working really hard on the coding. The editing and the logics of the main menu have been developed using level parallaxes. This creates a really good-looking result. The saving dynamics have been studied, and now it will be possible to save an infinite number of times in an infinite number of slots (this was requested by different reviewers and players). The loading procedure was also changed.

In consequence of all these improvements, Andrea has also upgraded the 2D frame tool (that has nearly reached the 1.0 version). The only missing option is that of re-importing the settings that were formerly exported. Andrea will also finish developing a very important tool used for the assembling and editing of the game. Another interesting upgrade to the code is the introduction of a basic AI that controls the movement of cars and people that follow some pre-arranged trajectories (spline) without colliding against the interactive characters.

In the current release, we have noticed some problems with the shading not being where it should. Strangely, the problem is not to be found in the editing tool, so we think the problem is maybe connected with the way the locations are loaded. (For those not aware: underneath the 2D locations, we always have a 3D structure that controls collisions, the 3D characters and the shading.)



We have made a very important upgrade in the engine. We have started using the 3.5 version of Virtools. Obviously this implies (as usual) different changes in the coding.

Other upgrades have been made on the interactive character. Now he has:

— A further set of animations for "running" and "picking up objects"
— A more precise and developed pathfinding system calculated on the
trajectory (that was previously calculated on the animation movement)

Meanwhile, Paolo has assembled a lot of game locations. This allows us to implement:

— Puzzles
— Look , Use and Pick
— Full Motion Video (FMV) animations

Last but not least, we have started to implement the first puzzles and their solutions.

Franz

The Belief & Betrayal developer diaries originally appeared in Italian on the Artematica website. The articles have been translated and reprinted here with permission. Stay tuned to Adventure Gamers for updated entries in the near future.