- Soundtrack Instruments Reveal Part I - 19 March 2025
Hello Everyone! Filip, a Paragrowth developer here. It's been a while since the last dev log! A lot has happened—some good, some bad—but the important thing is that I can now fully focus on the game. We’re back to working on Paragrowth every single day, and soon, I’ll reveal more details. But that’s a topic for another time. Today, I came with a boss combat theme to listen and watch. I’ve showcased all the instruments used in its production, so I highly recommend both listening and watching. I always strive to create something unique, which is why I’ve used such unusual instruments in this track. Some are ancient, while others are more typical for time placement of Paragrowth story. Disclaimer: Video's audio differs from original song - volume of instruments visible on screen are boosted to indenticate it easier and feel it. You can hear original track here on Newgrounds. How do you lik…
- Dev Info : January 2024 - 31 January 2024
Hello Everyone! Filip, a Paragrowth developer here. I am moving dev log for the next month, but here short update. This month was filled with nice progress, but unfortunately also with computer malfunctions and health problems, which slowed down my work on the project. I ordered new gear which just arrived, and today I will complete preparing it for work! My previous notebook was malfunctioning too often already, so it's good change. The tasks completed in January will be mentioned in the February dev log. Thank you for checking out this update, and I'll see you next month!
- Dev Log #11 - 31 December 2023
Hello Everyone! Filip, a Paragrowth developer here. Here's another report on the latest developments in the game. Last month I started moving to the new home, which is taking a lot of time, so I moved report of some jobs done in november, to be included in this dev log. I also prepared a short summary of 2023 on the bottom of this dev log, so don't miss it! Over the last two months, I've focused on planning and creating game template. This template sets the direction for implementing various mechanics in the game. It offers a clear understanding/debugging/controlling of what is happening with characters in game, simplifies testing new features, and makes debugging more straightforward. Until now, I was preparing different mechanics in somewhat isolated environment, which posed challenges in integrating these elements with other game components. The new template has made this process muc…
- Dev Info : November 2023 - 30 November 2023
Hello Everyone! Filip, a Paragrowth developer here. This month, I started moving into a new home. It is taking a lot of time and energy, and I wasn't able to do as much work on the project as I had planned. So this is just dev info update : I am moving the dev log update to next month. Some of the tasks completed in November will be mentioned in the December dev log. Since this announcement is not related to in-game content, I will share a few new facts here. I moved to countryside, with a lot of forests. Until now, I had a chance to go out to the areas around just a few times, but I have already found very interesting places. One of the surprising locations I found is a forest pond without water, which will soon be recreated in the game. Found another small pond, but now filled with water. Abandoned overgrown graveyards. Few other areas: And there is much more to explore, which I will…
- Dev Log #10 - 31 October 2023
Hello Everyone! Filip, a Paragrowth developer here. Here's another report on the latest developments in the game. During October, I spent most of my time working on numerous technical aspects. Unfortunately, they aren't visually appealing enough to showcase, but the next devlog will feature bigger scale results of this work. However, part of the month was dedicated to area generation, so I can at least share some images of that. I utilized tools I developed in the previous months, improved them, and added a few new features. For instance, I can now quickly generate elements that will be a significant part of the walls or ceiling across the entire area, instead of just single growing vines. As you can see in the gifs below, I can generate entire underground root biomes now. With a few sliders, I can design shapes that will be fully randomized and placed across the desired area. Now, I si…
- Dev Log #9 - 29 September 2023
Hello Everyone! Filip, a Paragrowth developer here. Here's another report on the latest developments in the game. September's work resulted in progress for different parts of the project. In first half of September: I continued my work on mesh generators. I've developed scripts that generate randomly shaped holes in walls and surround them with bricks. It also can be used on wall/plate destruction sequences which will have valuable applications later on. This method will be especially useful for creating unique destroyed buildings. In many games, hole models are pre-designed, but my approach offers a unique outcome for each wall, and it's faster, since I don't have to spend time modeling multiple wall-with-hole variations for every type of wall in the game. Pre-designed wall holes have benefit for polishing it's model much more, but well... I don't need it for alpha/beta version of the…
- Dev Log #8 - 30 August 2023
Hello Everyone! Filip, a Paragrowth developer here. Here's another report on the latest developments in the game. August's work resulted in new tools for procedural generation of environments. I have finally gotten my hands on scripting custom 3D mesh generators. It took some time, but now I can generate precise enviro objects and atmospheric buildings decorations. These tools will be used by procedural generation algorithms, making it possible to generate much more detailed structures. I couldn't achieve the roads look I wanted with the available paid solutions, so I created my own system to generate roads, rails, and bridges. Here are some examples of how it works: There are going to be numerous systems for generating complex elements, such as spawning different electricity poles along the road path, generating random cables connections for each pole (and generating quality-reduced mo…
- Dev Log #7 - 28 July 2023
Hello Everyone! Filip, a Paragrowth developer here. Here's another report on the latest developments in the game. Time in July was fully taken by completing my Leg Animator system. I'm proud that it's finally finished. I started working on this algorithm about 4 years ago and I did multiple re-writes from scratch. If you're curious, you can check the release video here. Working on this system was part of my full time job, but it also gives a lot benefits for the Paragrowth. Almost every character in the game will use this plugin. It makes the animations look much better and saves a lot time required for animating. This system is a fundamental part for my another system, which handles full body animation. I will complete it too, in some of the next months. It's Must-Have for the night creatures, which will break through barricades with precise legs and arms-catch animations. Walking into…
- Dev Log #6 - 27 June 2023
Hello Everyone! Filip, a Paragrowth developer here. Here's another report on the latest developments in the game. (*picking up animations will be implemented later) June resulted in progress for exploration mechanics, such as inventory system and buildings generating. In half of june I had tonsillectomy operation and I am recovering better than I expected, so there is a bit more to talk about for this month, than I though there will be. After Dev Log 5 I focused on my procedural generation system and I implemented a lot of important features, which now can be used for generating many different types of layouts, for explorable buildings and for generating different looks. Interior layout generating, to make each building fully unique. *The procedural interior objects/furniture placement will be done in the next months What's more, I moved my inventory system to the main project. I starte…
- Dev Log #5 - 18 May 2023
Hello Everyone! Filip, a Paragrowth developer here. Here's another report on the latest developments in the game. May resulted in big progress for the game world procedural generating systems. For the pre-alpha stage of the game, I had initially planned to create one large area with defined locations to test the game. However, the plans changed, and when I moved the character systems to the game environment project, I opted to make it procedurally generated from the start. Right now it generates simple terrain of any scale basing on random seed. It's defining lakes, rivers, railway, big electricity lines, then planning areas for game exploration (reserving place for buildings, villages etc.) and creating roads between most important locations. When planning the world I though I generated small map with very small lakes but it turned out to be huge. The world size is more than enough alr…
- Dev Log #4 - 21 April 2023
Hello Everyone! Filip, a Paragrowth developer here. Here's another report on the latest developments in the game. April resulted in big progress for the combat system and combat AI. In the prototype stage of the combat system, it was a nightmare to implement new types of weapons with different animations and actions. Right now, it's just matter of few minutes and then I have a lot more time for polishing animations and mechanics. The combat in Paragrowth will be connected with physics. The weight and type of the weapon will affect push power, which can make character fall on the ground. You also will be able to do push moves that you can see on the gifs below. "When push x100 does nothing, so you set push x10000 to see any result" In the prototype stage it was also hard to create clear combat AI algorithms. Now, it's not so hard and implementing new enemies is also many times faster tha…
- Dev Log #3 - 21 March 2023
Hello Everyone! Filip, a Paragrowth developer here. Here's another report on the latest developments in the game. Last month, I was a bit too busy in my life to do big progress in the project, but I still managed to take some important steps forward! I started moving the rewritten mechanics to the new, clear environment project. I began to stick all the character/inventory/AI mechanics together, and during the process, I noticed an important thing to decide: Rendering a good-looking forest is still a big challenge for computers. I want to avoid problems with low framerate in the future, so I decided to test such an environment using different rendering techniques. Another important thing for me is to make the game run smoothly enough on average computers. It seems URP will give me a boost of around +55 FPS, which sounds promising. With faster rendering, it will be easier to add more det…
- Dev Log #2 - 20 February 2023
Hello Everyone! Filip Paragrowth developer here, Here's another report from latest works over the game. Previous month was focusing on developing technology for animating legs. It was doing job already in the trailer, but it had many flaws. I decided to do complete rewrite from scratch (actually it was about 4th time I redone this mechanic) and it finally works flawlessly, it's about 2x times faster and gives much more possibilities. I want animations in Paragrowth to be something unique, this system brings me closer to achieve it. (the models you see on the gifs are prototypes) This technology will apply to humanoid characters, to the monsters and insecticides. Besides new possibilities, it will automatically solve some time consuming animation jobs to handle. Legs Animating technology consumed most of the time but I also completed many new important tasks over the architecture generat…
- Dev Log #1 : Let's start sharing some dev work! - 21 January 2023
Hello Everyone! Filip Paragrowth developer here, I decided to start writing some updates here because I feel it should be done long time ago already! The game mechanics you see in the trailer and gameplay video, turned out to be too much of prototype state and it requires rewrite to make it much more development friendly. Last months I completed full rewrite for the systems like: combat damage handling, characters animating and physical movement system. Now these elements works faster, reliably and I can easily implement new features for more specific enemies / character skills. In addition I created new system for handling characters/monsters ragdolls which adds physics to played animation. Besides the code rewrite, I started working on the global AI Eco-System for the animals and monsters life-cycle, but many new tasks took in the way and just initial works for the eco-system was comp…
