This week I focused on internal engine technology again, and was planning to make a video anyway, but ended up programming all day instead. There will definitely be a video next week though!

Here are the changes for Alpha 179:

• Level pre-loading
  
• Background texture conversion
  
• Image sampler and heightmap caches
  
• New animation cache system
  
• Fix for strange particle colors on Red Shards
  

Don't forget that you can help support us, try out our weekly alphas, and chat with other preorderers in the Secret Preorder Forum by preordering Overgrowth. If you'd like to see real-time news about Overgrowth, you can follow me on Twitter at @wolfire.

I'm thinking that blog posts might be more appropriate than videos when I'm doing tech work -- would you be interested in blog posts about game file systems? It's not as flashy as graphics or physics, but arguably more important.

This week I focused on internal features, such as .zip file archive support, texture compression on background threads, and preparations for the upcoming Linux build! These features are all still in progress, though, and difficult to show in their current form, so I thought I should save them for an upcoming video.

This video shows off a new level I'm working on while attempting to refine the visuals. I would like to achieve finished-looking levels in the next few weeks so that I can focus more on level design and less on art assets.

I spent some time on new terrain textures and more experimentation with the detail objects system. I was trying to make the wooded area on this new map look more like a real forest floor with various debris and different plants. I also tried grouping a lot of smaller objects to a rock, and then copying out the group rather than spending a lot of time adding tiny unique details to each rock I place.

Getting the details right for each environment takes a lot of work, and each area seems a lot bigger once it is full of stuff, so I have been contemplating the idea of doing a few different missions on each environment for the final story mode. One way to keep that from becoming stale would be to change it a bit every time you visit, like having the mission take place at a different time of day or under different weather conditions.

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Here is the new weekly Overgrowth alpha video!

Don't forget that you can help support us, try out our weekly alphas (such as the one in the video), and chat with other preorderers in the Secret Preorder Forum by preordering Overgrowth. If you'd like to see real-time news about Overgrowth, you can follow me on Twitter at @wolfire.

The features highlighted in the above video are as follows (as well as some that didn't make it into the video):

• Animated debug text using webkit
• Set up proper animatable wolf rig
• Started to overhaul level load system
• Updated angelscript to 2.22.1
• Fixed memory leak when saving shadow textures
• Fixed occasional crash on quit in angelscript destructor

Thanks as always for all the support! See you guys in IRC and the forums.

If you liked this video, be sure to subscribe to our YouTube channel.

Also, feel free to support us by preordering Overgrowth!

Here is the new weekly Overgrowth alpha video!

Don't forget that you can help support us, try out our weekly alphas (such as the one in the video), and chat with other preorderers in the Secret Preorder Forum by preordering Overgrowth. If you'd like to see real-time news about Overgrowth, you can follow me on Twitter at @wolfire.

The features highlighted in the above video are as follows (as well as some that didn't make it into the video):

• Added left-handed parameter
• Added DebugText system
• Added same-side sheathing animation
• Added animation for swapping weapons from one hand to the other
• Changed weapon system to array of 'slots'
• Scripts can query each others' array values
• Fixed problem with throwing weapons
• Hooked up the cat scabbard as a weapon
• Added per-animation weapon ids

Thanks as always for all the support! See you guys in IRC and the forums.

If you liked this video, be sure to subscribe to our YouTube channel.

Also, feel free to support us by preordering Overgrowth!