Koji Igarashi’s newest foray into the gaming world brings a beautiful world to life, and a slightly ill Koji has given an update on the process of making the world of Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night on the Kickstarter page.
Igarashi explains in his post that the main complaint with the demo was the inability to tell the foreground and background apart, and the first change to the game includes fixing that up with proper highlights and shadows, along with some cool changes to the texture system.
In order to combat the issue of rooms looking very similar, the team has decided to switch from pre-drawn texture maps, which was hard on the art team if they were to make every single area different, to procedurally generated texture maps. As Igarashi explains, “In this case, we’re merging procedurally generated dirt marks and surface textures. As a result, we can produce an asymmetrical visual output easily and efficiently.”
Basically, Bloodstained will offer a greater variety of textures in its environments by mixing up scratches, broken pillars, and dirt among background objects. This way, they can set an environment up to generate its own wear and tear, making everything unique without forcing someone to draw in differences to every area. They’ve included before and after images to show how the new system makes the areas more dynamic.
Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night is looking to be a beautiful game that’s worth the wait. The release date is 2018, and it will be available for PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Wii U, PlayStation Vita, and PC.