Expanding the open world for my indie game [DEVLOG]

[@LorsiDev]

"I'm not the most talented artist" (5:28). That’s nonsense, your game looks absolutely gorgeous! The pixel art in the thumbnail was the main reason I started watching your devlogs in the first place.

[@rahul9704]

Exactly

[@TheFerretmancer]

I agree.

[@jean-sebastiengauthier4967]

I been entirely drawn to this video on the look of the game alone !!

[@brokendoop]

Lol, every dev that says this proceeds to immediately show why they are one.

[@jamono]

real!!!

[@TheReturnOfStormheart]

I think, for biomes being right next to eachother in the world vs going through portals: You should do both!! It will make some feel like natural exploration, and then the one or two you find through a portal would feel like a wonderful achievement. This is an awesome project, I look forward to seeing it complete and playing it!

[@BankoIsMe]

Honestly, I really like devlogs and I don’t know why they have to fall off. It’s very refreshing to see a new dev enter the KZbin world.

[@benjaminsipe9217]

I like having biomes next too each other. . . perhaps you can make equipment like a snow-suit, or a dessert turban that you need to go to the biome, otherwise you start to burn/freeze? This keeps the realism of having the biomes next to eachother while providing the player with the achievement of reaching them.

[@contextfree]

5:10 What a desert doesn't look like. But common in video games, so don't take the comment as overly negative. Fun video and project overall!

[@John-Brx]

In know, But my game is also about enchantment and portals, so I'm not trying to make a realistic game. Just a game that feels nice to play. Thx glad you like it :)

[@rileysikes9285]

KZbin algorithm is doing its job, this looks awesome! I think just walking between biomes would be the best, reserving the use of a portal mechanic for very special areas. When you were hitting things in the video, the entire screen/world shake felt a bit jarring. It could just be me though. Wishlisted!

[@DoubleTTize]

I'd have to agree on the screen shake, it is a bit too much. Otherwise absolutely stunning game! Great job.

[@RohanRoy11]

when a mathematician becomes a game developer

[@SealWithoutHat]

Technically majority of game developers

[@Createsaur]

I think you should do a mix of both biomes spawning next to each other and have unique (otherworldly) biomes that need to a portal of some sort to reach. Otherworldly biomes and portals give the player goals to work toward, while having biomes spawn around each other gives players more reason to explore those biomes.

[@tokeringmann]

Looks lovely! I think it could be cool if you could just walk into the biomes, and then maybe have special ones like a 'floating island biome' (I don't know, just an example - something cool). That could be a place where you need special equipment or something to get there. Just a thought - it looks really nice:D

[@tokeringmann]

I just realized what I said is basically Minecraft, haha::

[@that_one_guy8630]

Biome idea: some sort of swamp / marsh that has a lot more water than land and maybe very dense vegetation, so it's harder to move around in

[@John-Brx]

I like it!

[@Gandalf_the_Black_]

The emphatic "every" along with the beat drop at 2:45 is very satisfying. As someone who dabbles in game dev, it's always interesting to see different approaches to procedural generation. Also, your art is great!

[@HIDDEN_ORIGIN_DnB]

I honestly think putting the biomes behind a portal will kinda introduce repetitiveness back into them. It sounds like the purpose for biomes is to break up the repetitiveness of the world, so i think i would put them inside the actual world without portals. Just make sure to not have hard cuts like Minecraft but to introduce them gradually. So having few cells be another biome and then more and more as you get closer and at some point it's just a few cells that are the old biome. Regarding biomes i would like to see: i'm a weeb lol so i think having a japanese style biome would be awesome. A dark green forest with red torii gates here and there and some cherry blossoms would honestly look so nice, especially in your awesome pixelart style :) I also like snow so my favorite biome is already there, looking gorgeous and cozy.

[@John-Brx]

Yea I think you’re right. Thx for the feedback :)

[@ethanosterhout8204]

Bro i seriously cant wait for this game

[@marcp7689]

Cool video! If I can give a few suggestions: for one, I'd recommend reducing the screen shake when breaking things, or at least giving the player the option to do so themselves. Right now, it's too strong for my tastes. Also, on the topic of biomes - have you considered adding an underground 'biome' / dimension? You could even add different cave biomes, such as one with stalagmites and another with lava. I understand if this is outside of your vision or the scope of the game.

[@raphcrafter]

I wouldn't complain seeing a cherry blossom forest, also an autumn themed forest would look gorgious !

[@vycdev]

Beautiful game and beautiful new biomes

[@404PipesNotFound]

your art is outstanding, the style and feel is so cozy and im so glad i found your channel i cant wait to see how this turn out and hopefully get to play on day!

[@keraunos_sama]

I love that you explain the math side of things that's what actually attracts someone like myself trying to learn how to be a better dev although most people don't like that side

[@drlamantin]

The pixel art and esthetic of the whole game is beautiful

[@NerdGlasses256]

I'd love to see a jungle, but for that to be as good as I imagine, you would need very diverse flora in there, and you said you have a hardtime making your (very awesome looking btw) sprites, so I'd reserve that for later.

[@immaxno.1158]

This is the most underrated game dev channel I've seen. You'll get big one day!

[@noahrice3362]

This looks really cool! I'll have to go back through the devlog and see some of the other stuff for this sometime. If I were to suggest a few more biomes, I would say a Volcano, Savanah (which I would imagine working well as a transition biome), and maybe an Ocean with islands scattered about? I don't quite know how you're handling all of this yet, but this project definitely has my eye on it now. Can't wait to see more!

[@FactsNoCare]

A) love the look of this game B) I think having a world you explore and find new biomes would be best but would be cool having portals that send you to rare biomes with higher amounts of certain resources.

[@Emerald392]

Add fog to the snow forest and sandstorms in the desert

[@Keawydev]

This is a gorgeous game! I really like the fact that you break down the technique of doing things in your project, thanks for the insights, really helpful!

[@skylordgamin]

As someone who plays a lot of Dark Souls and stuff like Don't Starve. I would suggest adding a daylight/Night Cycle and I'm on my way to check if you've made other videos on this game but from this video I didn't see too many monsters. As someone who likes a lot of challenge and many others who could get into that, some more monsters and mobs would definitely make the game feel alive and fun. Love what you've made so far, great game can't wait to play.

[@warmishcarp5418]

I think portals to the other biomes would be neat! Like finding the portal to that biome unlocks a desert world that you can freely travel to and from

[@Lochyisapotatofarmer]

i can definitely see the potential in this game maybe to add visual diversity adding things like flower patches could work well, another suggestion is maybe adding flowing rivers to add interest and make them barriers to overcome same with ravines

[@matthewperiut7508]

i literally subbed yesterday wondering if the game was dead due to you uploading 8 months ago! glad to see ya around

[@D35_AG]

Bro this is amazing, like

[@justanicemelon9963]

I'm a sucker for cute and artsy games! Glad KZbin recommended this to me :D

[@man-o-valor]

Your pixel art style is so good looking! I lived the nerdy description of octaves and noise :D

[@Podcast4510]

im loving the look of these biomes!!! id say the desert is my favourite, but maybe replace the little tuffs of grass with something that suits the desert more? maybe like more rocks or even dead vegetation? Still loving it though!! i cant wait to see what you do in future :D

[@cocorobot3949]

Just stumbled across your channel and your art style has me hooked. I would love to see a biome that's mostly water, like a coral reef biome that's only accessible via boat or something. Excited to see more of this series :)

[@Rugjoint]

bro your game has so much more potential that you can image, im pretty sure that if you dont disregard the PvE and PvP side (yes, some sort of "competitive" multiplayer could be actual fire) this is gonna blow up fr

[@pwyounggamedev]

Your game is looking amazing. I had a similar concept a few years back but never got far into it and abandoned it. I'm glad to see someone pursuing this idea with success. (Also, I love that your devlogs are completely focused on game updates and not tedious bugs. It's great to see devlogs like this.)

[@John-Brx]

thx glad you like it :)

[@pwyounggamedev]

@@John-Brx You're welcome. I look forward to playing it someday. Curiosity question - what engine/software do you use?

[@John-Brx]

@@pwyounggamedev im using unity

[@KaryoSentiko]

Wishlisted! I really hope you have a Playtest or some form of early access. This looks awesome! It's exactly the type of game I aspire to making...

[@mikolamy2677]

Hi! Your game looks awesome, I've added it to my wishlist immediately! I would defenetivly prefer if all the biomes were connected to each other in one big world, it would feel more like a real open world adventure rather than just connected areas, but that's just my opinion! Good luck with your development in the future!

[@fafafafafafafa]

The game looks absolutely gorgeous! Just a thought on the shrubbery: The forest ground might come off as a little noisy. Perhaps the bulk of ground scattering could be made up of low contrast 'flat' textures and the taller shrubbery could be more sparse or lumped together, similar to the trees? A little white space in between would make it easier on the eye and could add to visual interest from a composition standpoint. Plus it would section areas into separate meadows, if you will. Looks amazing as is! Just a thought.

[@John-Brx]

thx, yea i think you have a point there!

[@betweentherainsmusic]

Following this project has been fun! It's looking better every time. A lot of that technical stuff was way over my head, but I learned a lot. :) I sent you an email back in June and just sent a followup in case you missed it. Hope to hear back from you soon. Also, I agree with the previous commenter that your art is gorgeous!

[@kingbrodan]

Great work, your game looks awesome +1 wishlist In terms of biomes that may be interesting to implement, I feel a bog or swamp like biome would be cool. Keep up the great work, a lot of the math generally went over my head but I found it very interesting.

[@Kubix_cube]

I LOOOOVE THE STYLE of this game but it would be cool to have option for the graphism, with or without the grid, the camera effect, the way things render and everything

[@calebmichael6433]

Biome placement wise, I think you should have both! Require portals to reach other biomes so it feels like a large achievement, but let each biome have sub-biomes (biomes of similar climate) so that each world still feels varied!

[@SPxxxxx]

I’d imagine the dessert and snow biomes can be borderd by the forest but dessert and snow cannot border each other thus making the forest more abundant but also making the dessert and snow biomes slightly more rare. Villages in Minecraft aren’t particularly amazing in anyway but finding one makes u instantly go to it for that little boost. Little sense of excitement specially when you spawn into the world. Structures are a must they don’t have to be villages

[@Bylocz]

5:43 Honestly getting to the biomes through a portal would be kinda weird, i would prefer them being just randomly generated around the world and save the portal for a more fictional biome, maybe a crystal world or something. Also i would love to see the "boring" stuff in videos (6:25), i think it would help a lot of people! Anyways can't wait for more videos!

[@Reeeekid]

Commenting for the algorithm 🫂🫂

[@MrJotaFelipe]

I like the first open for biomes positions, because it feels to me more cohesive. Portal idea is good too, as minecraft does with the nether. Challenge would be find a way to make unique to your game so it doesn't feel like a copy of that. Keep up the good work!

[@The.Sponge]

More tree variants would help tons with the repetitiveness imo. Absolutely stunning game btw

[@sziklamester1244]

Technically I am not a dev but a person who tries to make games and now learning from different sources. I just found your channel but seems interesting what you make but I am not a coder myself. If I could suggest some biomes then I would add : - swamp - tundra - tropical In my opinion the assets looks good and the isometric view adds a lot to this game.

[@philguer4802]

I think seamless transition are better than portals.

[@BladesOfWarOfficial]

I Think Jungle/Tropical Biome Could Be really Cool, maybe they can generate in oceans, like an island. and To get there you have to craft a special type of boat (Kinda What You Where talking about with Portals).

[@TristanOneal-j2c]

Love the game man. have a good day

[@naturalbrother4956]

5:35 your sprites are beautiful

[@destructiod6728]

The game looks very nice, I like the concept. There is a game called Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri that has the same isometric rendering style for the map. Your map looks a bit flat whereas the example has hills and mountains that fit your same map style. Just a thought but regardless, your game is amazing and I'm excited to see where it goes.

[@Mhrn.Bzrafkn]

How beautiful is this gaaame!!

[@The.Sponge]

I believe making the pickup range larger (if possible) like in stardew would make farming more satisfying. Along with "queuing" the block you interact with so that you can for example click on two stones making it farm the first and as soon as it is done begin with the next one. (If you have not already done it)

[@bluesam2717]

I would like to see a mountain and make the time of year effect the forests, also to add a sense of achievement, you should implement some techtrees for different things so it gives players something to work for!

[@Mertiven]

I'd definitely want to see a mushroom biome and a mushroom hat on that little guy

[@VentuureFR]

Finallyyy! The game looks so goood! (Also, first one here!)

[@John-Brx]

@@VentuureFR thx, glad you like it :)

[@VentuureFR]

@ no problem! super excited for when it comes out :)

[@Cymock1]

Variety in height would help alot. It wouldn't have to have any effect on the gameplay itself, but it could make it feel a lil less stale... It could be quite subtle, aslong as it adds something to the visual aspect

[@neonDever]

5:47 i think first variant. Cool game btw)

[@L64R]

Depending on if you do seasons, you can either have special seasonal biomes that are always a season, or just have the biomes cycle through seasonal variants.

[@stars_and_lattes3078]

I think biomes could be accessible through portal AND being able to travel to them on foot, only the biomes solely accessible through portals could be more fantastical in theme, while the regular biomes are more based on real world natural biomes. Examples could be a biome that, instead of pools of water, they are sky islands, while another one could be a more subterranean biome like a crystal cave (you wouldn't have to program an entire underground level to your world or anything since that area would only be accessible through portal!)

[@mmgmismas]

This game me flashbacks to some basic work I've done on my open world game. Man I have to get back to gamedev.

[@usonellnaw]

maybe so that the game isn't associated with other pixel sandbox-games, it would be nice to add perhaps something magical, or animals? There are also very good animations and nice pixel art

[@loren4u468]

Should the biomes touch or be independed worlds, i think the worlds idea is more interesting but it depends on what the goal of the game is, love the project and its a huge inspiration

[@e_ighth]

Hi, I think you should experiment with making the terrain block borders less visible. Also, I definitely think you should seperate the grass and rock from the terrain block and give it a slight random offset from the center of the terrain block. This would greatly help with making the "ground look as random as possible", through the use of white noise you could both generate the grass and rocks, as well as give it a random offset.

[@e_ighth]

Ah, and your assets are great, be proud of your pixel art skills!

[@John-Brx]

I am going to add an option to disable the grid. I will try to give your idea a try if i find the time :)

[@philguer4802]

Very nice graphism.

[@pokepoke1889]

i feel like your voice got deeper wishlisted the game

[@John-Brx]

Possible haha Thx for the wish list :)

[@AngortaV]

Hi! I love your videos, it's really interesting to watch the development process! (Oh great KZbin algorithm, please be kind to this man and his channel) Regarding the location of biomes: I never liked how games can have completely opposite biomes nearby (like a snowy forest and a desert). At the same time, I would like to see some variety of landscape in the immediately accessible area So, it seems to me, you can use both options for the placement of biomes - put similar ones in climate (forest, hills, swamps, etc.) next to each other, and hide more contrasting ones behind portals (desert, snow). I think this would add realism to the game

[@Zynei983]

ye totally

[@redshepard5306]

your awesome keep this up!

[@sevenrings1]

a nice feature could be to create a setting to remove the shaking animations after destroying an object 😊😊 i personally love your project but i think i would find that shaking annoying when i get to play the game

[@davidaugustofc2574]

I believe the grid lines are more of a nuisance than helpful, especially if you're trying to make it seem less repetitive, because the tiles cannot be seamless if they all have a visible outline. I hope there'll be an option to remove the grid in-game and highlight the selected tiles only.

[@John-Brx]

Yes there will definitely be an option to disable de grid!

[@blackwolf528]

I think it would be interesting to add height to the terrain. I know it would be hard with the style but I think if you made it work it make the game more interesting.

[@Firegraze_]

Maybe make the biome generation like Minecraft, I think it would fit better. Another idea is that you could add a daylight cycle for beautiful sunset lighting.

[@Nicki1202]

Definitely consider varying heights for trees for some more variety

[@dyzqy]

Finally alive again

[@mirogamesstudio8208]

please just make the music lower (better remove rhem) the game looks astonishing btw !

[@dimitargeorgiev6216]

Idea: Remove the grid on the floor and make it visible only near the player

[@TheLateAdopter]

When hitting trees, I think you should remove the white flash. Its annoying and not needed. Just make the tree shake and add a hitting sound to it and it should be more enjoyable. You can use white flash (less expressed) when hitting mobs and such. Biomes looks nice

[@TheLateAdopter]

Also haveing camera trailing after the character feels kinda dizzy. Atleast when looking at the video. Maybe try making trailing less obvious.

[@TheLateAdopter]

Also the camera shake when breaking rocks? It just gets too much I think. Game looks like a cozy building game, but you are adding ADHD shooter effects all over the place. :) Just my 5 cents. Subbed, will follow the dev life :)

[@enarior7938]

Cool devlog, and a promising game ! If I may though, I think the background music was slightly too loud and made it hard to focus. Maybe that's just me !

[@John-Brx]

Yea a lot of people are saying that and you are absolutely right. I’m going to avoid that in the next video:)

[@nnomis9349]

if this is multiplayer that would be really sick

[@GordonSeal]

The terrain would look a lot better without the grid lines on the floor. Instead just keep highlighting the active tile under the cursor.

[@sevenrings1]

also i would prefer to reach the biomes just by walking and exploring the map, just like in minecraft! a cool one-time-use item that teleports you to the nearest biome of a kind would b cool too

[@connormarks5584]

It looks great but the world looks quite flat I think adding an extra height layer might be cool!

[@papernim]

i think implement two world types, the open world and the first world generation you did. make the biomes border each other on the open world and use portals for the old world generation

[@cd2028]

Should i just give up at game dev? There's no chance i could understand the math you did a 3:32 if i needed to do it on my own. If that's the kind of stuff needed to make games I'm screwed lololo. Your game looks great btw😁

[@John-Brx]

Hahaha absolutely not. You can make incredible games without any math. Also the math that I showed in the video is not complex at all. It just looks intimidating when you never worked with something like that before.

[@anubhavmondal840]

Seasons and thunder Strome weather would be great

[@Zynei983]

i can't wait for this game, this shi gonna be fire. also... 3 small little things i really want to see added if possible. 1 character customization. if this be cosmetics and or armor and other things found within the game or before the start of the game. 2 some form of caves. weather this be a structure or randomly generated i think this would add a really cool aspect to the game. 3 tools. ur probably already going to ad this already but ji just want to make sure, cuz the punching ore is lowkey dry. thx for reading my input. :)

[@pixellor2647]

Finally new video

[@JoeTheis]

Nice work. All this perlin noise terrain generation is very familiar to me, as I have a similar implementation in my own game (though our genres are otherwise about as far apart as we can get!) are you planning to add terrain height to your game?

[@fredxvi]

Why not blend the two, make them over-world traversal-able. However, in order to get there you need to have "Heat protective gear" for the desert or "Cold protective gear" for the snow forest?

[@hinoki.mp4]

Very cool! I've watched all your videos and I'm really interested in your work. I would like to ask you how are you programming this. Are you using a specific engine to help you out or are you coding all on your own? Thank you very much if you respond. Ps: already wishlisted👌

[@John-Brx]

Im am using unity. I could not make a project this big in my free time without an engine. Thx for the wish list and glad you like the game :)

[@R1po]

+1 sub - game looks beautiful. gl hf

[@ThatsCk]

I think your normal overworld biomes should flow into each other like in Minecraft or (a bit more abrupt like in) Terraria. A personal request: please add teleporters to be able to cross great distances in an instant. In Minecraft i always felt like i was just wasting time running from my base in biome A to my base in biome B. I think Terraria has a great approach for that with its pylons that have certain requirements before you can obtain them forcing you to engage with the world first before you unlock fast travel. I also like the idea of biome portals. But they should only be used for biomes that you would not find on the overworld. I saw someone mentioning flying islands. But it doesn't even have to be that special. Maybe having a structure like an entrance to a mine act as a portal to the underground would also be cool. Of course you would then need multiple underground biomes to keep it from getting stale fast. You could maybe even add something like underwater biomes which you can only access in diving gear :D (i want to walk through colourful coral reefs) For biome ideas i think Terraria has some really great ones you could use as inspiration (not just for the overworld but also underground). Since magic is part of your world why not add magically altered areas, where for example everything has been turned into stone and you can find special magic stones. Or maybe a biome like Mordor from lotr where more and stronger enemies live (if fighting is part of your game). I am also a big fan of islands, so maybe an archipelago biome which you can only access using a boat or by building bridges. Should you follow the biome portal idea then you basically have endless possibilities. Create a magic space like biome or something akin to the feywild from dnd. Have a dimension where the souls of the dead go to. Maybe have ancient derelict space ships that crashed onto the planet and when you enter them the game acts as if it was a biome portal but to a dimension with a fixed size. So when one space ship doesn't have all the content you want you need to find a new one. Also a way to find special biomes / biome portals would be greatly appreciated.

[@John-Brx]

Yes, i have have also noticed that issue when playing my game. So some form of fast travel will definitely be implemented :) thx for the awesome feedback! Definitely going to take a look at some of your ideas.

[@backwardsboys7732]

A mountain and cave biome would be cool but also redwood ocean

[@MayMoodArabia]

the background music is a bit loud

[@sebnorsan]

brother if you want to really add some more variety to your game, add elevation. I think it could help a lot with the flat look :3

[@John-Brx]

I know but it is not that easy. I tried one approach wehen I startet the project, but it didn’t really work. Im probably going to try a different approach to add elevation in the future tho.

[@JohnWarosa999]

PLEASSE RELEASE BEFORE 2026 I CANT WAIT THAT LONGG AHHHHHHHH

[@John-Brx]

Hahahahah Il try mi best ;)

[@JohnWarosa999]

@@John-Brx

[@GeaeStudios]

I would say, no portals 1 world. And I thougt maybe make an compass so you now where you live. Maybe make an monolight in your base to find the location. Maybe give them names so you can find difrent places more easy.