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mythaura-blog · 23 days

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Development Update - March 2024

Hi folks! Miyazaki here with the development update for the month of March 2024.

We've got the release of Prismatic, a sparkly new Super to apply to your Beasts, some Ko-fi reward concepts for Spring 2024, a reveal of our final starter Class with the Sorcerer, an overview for the astrological symbols for the month of April, and more!

New Super: Prismatic

Rainbow sheen and shifting hues abound in our most recent Super addition: Prismatic!

Prismatic randomly occurs when one parent has the Top Fade Special and the other has Galaxy. Prismatic is now live in our Beast Creator--we're excited to see what you all create with it!

Below are some of our favorite examples we've created so far:

Mythauran Astrology: April

The month of April is referred to as Barrow's Thaw, representing the time of year where the frost over the Dragon burial mounds at the foot of the mountain range begin to melt, giving way for spring flowers to bloom. This month is also associated with the constellation of the Gaoler and the black tourmaline stone.

Those born under the sign of the Gaoler are wardens of order and stability. These individuals are defined by their sense of discipline, loyalty, and fairness, as well as unfaltering self-control.

At their best, Gaolers are responsible, unbiased, and champions of equality. At their worst, they can be inflexible, vindictive, and abrasive.

Featured Class: Sorcerer

Sorcerers channel the Elemental energies that make up the Mythauran system of magic to power their spells. There is no one Element that boasts more Sorcerers than any other, but they are especially common among single-Element Beasts.

The first Beasts to truly try and understand the nature of the Elemental magic that powers Mythaura were Sorcerers studying at universities in the Spine of Ere. These Dragon scholars were the first to make the connection between the twelve Elements being fragments of the force known as Aura, which powered the Eldrithian society that predates modern Mythaura's.

In the present day, there are several universities all across the continent that turn out magical scholars. Particularly lauded graduates easily find work serving in governmental or academic positions. Not all Sorcerers are formally trained, though: magic is accessible to any Mythauran, and those who are self-taught are just as capable of those with a formal education.

Starting Equipment: Sorcerer's Staff

A Sorcerer's casting abilities come from using some sort of magical focus, and a Sorcerer's Staff is a common focus for magic initiates. They're given out to newcomers for a reason: they are durable (a must for those dealing with an unfamiliar and powerful force) and do not demand a high level of skill to wield.

This is not to say that the Sorcerer's Staff is left behind once a Sorcerer develops their magical abilities: if treated with care and wielded by a capable Sorcerer, it will grow alongside its owner.

Companion Concepts

Along with the Sorcerer's Staff starting equipment, choosing a Sorcerer for your custom starter Beast will also grant you a Class-unique Companion.

Ko-fi Sponsors of Bronze level or higher will have a say in which companion they would like to see as the starter Companion for the Sorcerer Class. Please vote on this post by Saturday, April 27, 2024 at 11:59pm PST in order for your vote to be considered!

Spring Quarter (2024) Concepts

It’s the first day of Spring Quarter 2024, which means we’ve got new Quarterly Rewards for Sponsors to vote on on our Ko-fi page!

Which concepts would you like to see made into official site items? Sponsors of Bronze level or higher have a vote in deciding. Please check out the Companion post and the Glamour post on Ko-fi to cast your vote for the winning concepts!

Votes must be posted by April 27, 2024 at 11:59pm PST in order to be considered.

All Winter 2024 Rewards are now listed in our Ko-fi Shop for individual purchase for all Sponsor levels at $5 USD flat rate per unit. As a reminder, please remember that no more than 3 units of any given item can be purchased. If you purchase more than 3 units of any given item, your entire purchase will be refunded and you will need to place your order again, this time with no more than 3 units of any given item.

Winter 2024 Glamour: Knitted Sweater

Winter 2024 Companion: Snowdrift Furline

Winter 2024 Solid Gold Glamour: Dragon (Young)

Mythaura 0.27

This month we continued to work on map & town prototypes. We've also designed and built the UI for Skill Trees, which is what determines the abilities that Beasts can use in battle, and grow more powerful the more levels are invested in a particular Skill.

Skill Trees are based on a Beast's Elements and Class, meaning most Beasts will have three Skill Trees to choose from. In the instance that a Beast has the same Element twice, they gain an additional branch to their Element's Skill Tree demonstrating their Mastery over their Element.

While the details of the mechanics are still being worked out, the general idea is that you'll get a specific amount of points to allocate toward your Skill Trees as you see fit, allowing for you to truly customize your Beast's utility in the Wild Area and PvP.

The example below is for the Fire element, represented by the constellation of the Glassblower.

We also have the general layout for our dialogue screens. Looks like Polis has something that he'd like to ask you!

Thank You!

Thanks for sticking through to the end of the post, we always look forward to sharing our month's work with all of you--thank you for taking the time to read. We'll see you around the Discord!

#mythaura #indie game dev #game development #development update #unicorn #dragon #griffin #peryton #ryu #basilisk #quetzal #hippogriff #kirin #petsite #pet site #virtual pet site

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mythaura-blog · 2 months

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Development Update - February 2024

Hi folks, Miyazaki checking in with our development update for the month of February 2024.

It was a tough month for the team: one of us moved, one of us had surgery, and three of us were laid out sick for a while. Everyone's stable and on the mend, though, and with some recovery under our belts we're looking forward to picking up the pace in March!

In spite of everything we've still got some new content to cover. Let's hop in!

Under the cut:

Mythauran Astrological Calendar

Winter Quarter 2024 Art Reveal

Rogue starter Class Companion

Astrological Calendar

The Mythauran calendar is divided into twelve months of roughly equal length. The earliest Beast species--Dragons, Unicorns, and Griffins--have each left their cultural markers on the Mythauran calendar.

Dragons, being the first species to develop a written language (and one that's rather flowery and verbose), were the first to give names to each of the months of the year. These names were meant to conjure images, feelings, and sensations associated with the different times of the year.

Unicorn culture, being nomadic for a significant part of the year as they chase the path of storms on the Southern Plains, used the position of constellations in the sky to guide their paths. These were named after significant cultural figures both fictional and real, who featured prominently in their rich verbal storytelling tradition.

Griffins were the first to master the craft of creating palm stones, which have been used for centuries to manipulate a Beast's secondary Element prior to birth. The Element associated with each stone came from Griffin astronomers, who picked a stone that best symbolized the constellation that spent the most time over their capital city for the month.

March

The month of March is referred to as Chasm's Roar in Dragon culture, representing the peals of thunder ringing through the canyons in the Spine of Ere. This month is also associated with the constellation of the Tempest and the labradorite stone.

Mythauran astrologers say those born under the sign of the Tempest are strong-willed, decisive individuals who believe strongly in their own moral code. Their well-defined sense of self makes them capable leaders, whose confidence inspires those who look to them for guidance.

At their best, Tempests are inspiring, self-assured, and magnanimous. At their worst, they can be belligerent, intolerant of others' beliefs, and arrogant.

Winter 2024 Rewards Reveal

Our Winter 2023 rewards have been completed and are ready for their public debut! Thank you to the Ko-fi Sponsors who voted on the different Glamour and Companion concepts, we appreciate your support and feedback.

Winter 2024 Glamour: Knitted Sweater

Winter 2024 Companion: Snowdrift Furline

Winter 2024 Solid Gold Glamour: Young Dragon

Rogue Class Companion Winner

What's better than two pairs of eyes to help you keep watch? Three pairs of eyes! The Dire Corvus will be the starting Companion for the Rogue Class. Thanks to all who voted in the Ko-fi poll to help decide the winner!

We'll be back in a near update with more information on our final starter Class; with that comes voting for its Companion and starter Gear as well. Keep your eyes peeled!

Mythaura v0.x

While there are no new feature releases this month, Koa and Sark have been hard at work on the player menu, specifically the party screen and the way a player's Beasts are housed. There's also been a lot of work put toward a prototype of the interactive world map--and that's for both the world overall and the starter town of Talon's Rest that players will find themselves in when the game launches!

Thank You!

Thanks for sticking through to the end of the post, we always look forward to sharing our month's work with all of you--thank you for taking the time to read. We'll see you around the Discord!

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mythaura-blog · 3 months

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January 2024 - Development Update

Hello folks, Miyazaki here! Hoping that your 2024 is off to a great start.

Like we mentioned in our December 2023/year in review development update, Mythaura has officially reached a new stage in development: active content creation. As a heads up, this means that there will be a reduction in the amount of big, shiny new content—we won't be rolling out any systems close to the scale of the demo.

From here on out it will primarily be updates on sponsored Ko-fi content, keeping up with the Ko-fi Quarterly Rewards system, art (including more Beast expressions!), and occasionally some written content/worldbuilding.

We will always post on the first of every month, rain or shine, but we just wanted to call out that if the news posts seem a little lighter in comparison that it's not because we're not hard at work. It's the opposite!

Under the cut:

Rogue starter Class

Ko-fi Winter Quarter 2024 winners

Ko-fi sponosored Companions

Dragon expressions

Featured Class: Rogue

Rogues cherish skill and versatility above all. Their fighting style focuses on evasion, speed, and bolstering their own attacks to score high-damage hits against their opponents.

The Thieves Guild has its roots in the Southern Plain. Unicorn herds generally don't lay claim to any one territory, instead following the seasonal paths of the storms that batter the region, so inter-herd communication became crucial for the economies of these nomadic groups. A particularly savvy band of merchants found that there was more money to be had acting as in-betweens for these herds than marketing their own goods, so they established a network of contacts across the whole of the Southern Plain.

Not all contacts were willing to handle the more illicit asks—the movement of illegal goods, sabotaging competing herds, and even discreet assassinations, in more extreme cases. A splinter group of like-minded individuals banded together to form the first Thieves Guild, a business operation that was—in most cases—willing to take on whatever work was asked, given the price was right.

Today, the Thieves Guild has spread to all corners of the continent, but are especially prominent in densely-populated cities and towns. Their mere presence has left an indelible mark on Mythauran society, and nothing escapes their notice.

Starting Equipment: Thief's Claw

Small, subtle, and easily tucked in the folds of a Beast's apparel—the Thief's Claw is the quintessential tool for any Rogue. What it lacks in decoration it more than makes up for in functionality—its deceptively sharp edge can be used to cut through rope, aid with picking a lock, or quietly encourage someone to comply with a Rogue's request.

Companion Concepts

Along with the Thief's Claw starting equipment, choosing a Rogue for your custom starter Beast will also grant you a Class-unique Companion.

Ko-fi Sponsors of Bronze level or higher will have a say in which companion they would like to see as the starter Companion for the RogueClass. Please vote on this post by Monday, February 26, 2024 at 11:59pm PST in order for your vote to be considered!

Ko-fi Winter Quarter 2024 Winners

Thank you to all the Ko-fi sponsors who voted for the Winter Quarter 2024 rewards. Next month we will show the finalized artwork for the Snowdrift Furline Companion and the Knitted Sweater Glamour. Stay tuned!

Expressions: Dragon

Koa, Luci, and Kymara have all been working hard on the Beast expressions project, and we've made enought progress to be able to show you the finalized artwork for both the young and adult Dragons.

Crafting the expressions has been an enormous undertaking. Along with the linework, shading, and highlights, every Special and Super requires manual illustration on the base. Following this, we run each expression through a PSD plugin to build every color. We have almost completed every species' base layers on all colors (top, bottom, base, & eye) and are excited to share them with you in the following months as we complete their Specials.

Sponsored by: Maevely

Mythaura v0.26

Battle state has been refactored to add stability and solve problems with between-state retention

Removed unneeded collision objects, reducing overall physics calculations.

Implemented instancing for all meshes to re-use similar objects instead of duplicating them.

Disabled swaying vegetation by default, which heavily impacts performance. This can be toggled in the graphics settings.

Fixes pixelation/blurring that occurs when zoomed on a beast or companion in Safari and Firefox.

Large companions, such as the Dale Wanderer, no longer zoom out when toggling the zoom-in option.

The touch screen joystick can now be set to on, off, or auto from the "Gamepad" settings.

The time you wait in queue before being brought into an AI practice Arena match has been reduced to one minute.

Locations have had infrastructure added.

NPCs have had infrastructure added.

Began initial work on a dialog query builder for robust dialog trees.

Support for elevation has been added to the map builder.

The map builder now supports different colored dynamic lighting.

Map design has begun for Talon's Rest.

Thank You!

Thanks for sticking through to the end of the post, we always look forward to sharing our month's work with all of you--thank you for taking the time to read. We'll see you around the Discord!

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mythaura-blog · 4 months

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Development Update - December 2023

Hi folks, a very Happy New Year to you!

In the spirit of new beginnings, Mythaura has entered a new chapter in its development, which we detail in our December development update. We also take time to review what was accomplished in 2023 (our first full calendar year with Mythaura!).

We've also got our color contest winners, the winning Fighter companion, and much, much more. And of course: our demo is now live! We're so excited for you to traverse the Wild Area, a procedurally generated map with monsters for your team of three Beasts to defeat.

Demo Trailer

youtube

Message From The Developers

We're thrilled to share this pivotal update about Mythaura’s development journey, which showcases many of the core features we have planned for this game. Today marks a significant transition: we're shifting from the intricate and challenging phase of game engine development to the exciting realm of feature development.

Since beginning this project, our focus has been on scoping and then crafting robust and core components. Features such as wild areas, battle, and multiplayer systems, not to mention the complex breeding system, passive effect management, player inventory system, and the beast image engine. We've also been diligently integrating these elements with complex user interfaces and ensuring they will work on most devices (an ever ongoing battle). It's been a journey of overcoming unknowns and technical challenges, and we're proud of what we've achieved.

Now, we're entering a new chapter. Our attention turns to fleshing out the game's features, with a special focus on developing an immersive questing and dialogue system, towns & shops, skill trees & progression, and tools for content development among other needed feature development. The hardest challenges have by and large been solved at this stage and our focus can now be how to best deliver an amazing gaming experience by bringing them together. This shift doesn't mean the work is done—far from it. But it's a major milestone that brings us closer to realizing our vision for the game.

We want to express our heartfelt gratitude for your unwavering support and enthusiasm, and look forward to a jam packed 2024.

Year In Review

This year has been marked by numerous milestones. Below is a recap of our key accomplishments, excluding the latest updates which have been a major focus of our efforts for the past several months.

1. Introduction of 'Supers': Enhanced breeding complexity by introducing 'Supers' as a new mechanic, making well-structured breeding projects more valuable. We started with the debut of our first Super: Tegu.

2. Special Additions: Welcomed the special Panda to our list of Specials.

3. Expressions for Beasts: Implemented expressions for beasts, a significant and ongoing undertaking that gives life to your beasts as they interact with NPCs.

4. Elements System: Introduced the Elements system, assigning each beast a pair of inherent elements. An element page was added that delves into the lore of each element.

5. Beast Sizes: Standardized beast sizes, assigning each beast a unique size within its species' range.

6. Beast Classes: Initial build of beast classes, providing each beast with a class-based playstyle and initial items.

7: Radiant Companions: Unveiled Radiant companions, rare alternate colorations for companions that are bound to be highly sought-after.

8: Deep Dive into Seasons: Explored the planned feature 'Seasons', designed to reward ongoing gameplay.

9: The Weekend Traveler: Designed the Kobold NPC known as the Weekend Traveler, who deals in ultra-rare goods, along with the Kobold non-player species.

10. New Colors on the Wheel: Established a sustainable method to introduce new colors to our color palette, allowing us to add 16 new colors this year (including the 3 contest winners).

11. Ephemeral Inks: Introduced Ephemeral Inks, a way to alter the colors of a beast.

12. Color Wheel Page: Created a dedicated page listing colors and corresponding inks.

13. PvP Battle Demo: Rolled out a demo showcasing our multiplayer technology in PvP battles.

14. Mutations Feature: Added Mutations as a rare breeding-only feature, beginning with our first Mutation: Piebald.

15. Items By You: Crafted 11 sponsored companions (excluding recolors), 5 sponsored apparel pieces, and 2 sponsored items.

16. New Game Engine: Designed a render pipeline that can create the 2.5D effects used in Wild Areas during exploration. Including, but not limited to, dynamic shadows, volumetric fog, real-time lighting, collision detection, special & particle effects, and gravity simulation, all accelerated by your GPU.

17. Granular Settings: Created a UI to manage game settings, graphics settings, audio settings, etc as well as added gamepad support with keybind remapping to Wild Areas.

18. Procedural Map Generation: Developed technology to procedurally generate bespoke Wild Areas.

19. Ongoing Production: Work on ongoing behind-the-scenes features such as worldbuilding, map design, systems design, and the exploration features we showcased on this update!

UI Update

You may notice the UI has received an update. This redesign focuses on being accessible for players using controllers, which is something we are working towards supporting on all screens and not just the Wild Area demo. The about page has also been updated. All the links to informational pages you would have found in the left-side menu of the previous design can be found on the about page with the exception of the /species page, whose contents has been moved to the about page.

We have also added an install button to the homepage that will display for users who have browsers which support Progressive Web Apps. This will add Mythaura to your taskbar/home screen for easy full-screen access.

Mobile and tablet users may enable gyroscope to interact with the parallax graphics if they would like.

Feature Spotlight: Wild Area

Wild Areas are a key pillar of Mythaura’s gameplay, and will be where you can expect to spend a lot of your time.

At A Glance

Procedurally Generated Levels

Traverse through uniquely generated levels with your trio of beasts. Control your adventure with WASD for movement and Space for jumps and shift for sprint. This can be remapped in the settings.

Each Wild Area boasts a series of floors. Your goal? Reach the top (or bottom)!

Your Safe Havens: Checkpoint Floors

Leave the Wild Area without any penalties

Choose to start from any previously reached checkpoint.

Encounter formidable bosses or minibosses at many of these checkpoints.

Prepare for the Journey: The Adventure Bag

Your Adventure Bag is your lifeline. Pack it with essential items for survival and success.

Provision Wisely: Stock up and get ready to face the unknown.

Limited inventory space for both what you bring with you and what you find along the way.

Keep Your Energy Up

Your team's energy is key. Keep it replenished with food from your Adventure Bag or found on your journey.

Running out of energy or facing defeat? You’ll black out, dropping your Adventure Bag's contents. But don't worry, you can retrieve them by returning to your last stand.

Encounter the Unexpected

From unlocking treasure chests with lockpicks to aiding NPCs, each exploration offers unique surprises.

Day and Night Dynamics: Encounter different enemies and events. A full day/night cycle completes every 12 real hours.

Wild Areas have natural water bodies, perfect for a fishing escapade.

Escalating Challenges

Increase difficulty with each New Game+ cycle and encounter new enemies and challenging secret bosses.

Multiplayer Co-Op

Up to 3 players can group up to take on a Wild Area together.

Take on enemies as a group with co-op battles.

See your friends jump and move in realtime, split up to make the most of your exploration while keeping tabs on your team-mates through the text chat and the minimap.

Fledgeling’s Forest Demo

The demo features a single floor of the Fledgeling's Forest Wild Area, with unlimited energy.

Day/Night Slider: Experience any time of day at your convenience. (Note: Creatures that spawn remain the same in the demo)

Currently Disabled: Fishing, lockpicking, loot & foraging, multiplayer, and other events are not available in this demo.

NG+ Cycle Update

In last month's update we revealed our plans for Mythaura's New Game+ system. Originally, our plan allowed players from NG+2 and beyond to create any Tier 1-Tier 3 Beast.

We have since changed it so that at the beginning of a player's NG+2 cycle they may make a Tier 1-Tier 3 Beast with up to three Specials, but NG+3 and beyond will not feature any custom Beast creation. The player will instead have access to a pool of NG+3-exclusive items that they will receive items from.

Thank you to our Discord members for all their input, it provided us with a much better direction to move forward with!

Winter Quarter (2024) Concepts

It’s the first day of Winter Quarter 2024, which means we’ve got new Quarterly Rewards for Sponsors to vote on on our Ko-fi page!

Votes must be posted by January 29, 2024 at 11:59pm PDT in order to be considered.

All Fall 2023 Rewards are now listed in our Ko-fi Shop for individual purchase for all Sponsor levels at $5 USD flat rate per unit. As a reminder, please remember that no more than 3 units of any given item can be purchased. If you purchase more than 3 units of any given item, your entire purchase will be refunded and you will need to place your order again, this time with no more than 3 units of any given item.

Fall 2023 Glamour: Ghastly Grin

Fall 2023 Companion: Saddleback Rattlecat

Fall 2023 Solid Gold Glamour: Ryu

Custom Color Contest Winners

Last month we revealed the names of the winning colors of our first ever Custom Color Contest--now they've made their official debut in the Beast Creator!

Congratulations again to:

Xander's "Moonstone"

Rhahatl's "Wintergrass"

Andydrarch's "Trench"

We were so impressed by all the amazing entries you all submitted. We'll definitely be running more contests like this in the future, so please stay tuned for them in future updates. Thank you all for participating!

Fighter Class Companion Winner

The brutish Domestic Wolverine will be the starting Companion for the Fighter Class! These brave and hardy creatures are perfectly suited to aiding new Fighters. Next month, we will vote on the next class companion: Rogue.

Meet the Team

We've gotten to learn so much about our supporters over the past year and a half, we thought it was time to share a little bit about ourselves as well! On our About page you can find short bios on each of the devs, including their favorite Mythaura species, color from our color wheel, and other fun and (very miscellaneous) facts.

Safari & iOS Problems

At this time, iOS devices like iPad and iPhone are only partially supported. These are the issues that the dev team is aware of and actively working on:

On iOs, Safari forces a refresh if the memory usage spikes, forcing you back to the demo start page. This happens at different times on different devices dependent on its RAM usage.

Sometimes when starting a battle, battlers start shifted down, then snap to the correct position after interacting with a button.

The zoom in on a beast image is pixelated (Safari bug: https://bugs.webkit.org/show_bug.cgi?id=27684).

On Mac Safari, battle animations showing with a black background. iOS is fine. Solution is to disable battle animations in the settings.

You will need to be running at least iOS 15 and Safari version 15 or greater in order to use Mythaura.

Mythaura v0.25.1

Improvements to AI Behavior: Improved target selection and behavior profiles for AI enemies.

Class Infrastructure Addition: Added new class infrastructure.

Stat Effects from Classes: Implemented functionality where classes affect stats.

Glamour CMS Process and Fixes: Updated and fixed issues related to the glamour content management system process.

Ability Usage Tracking: Implemented increments in the 'ability times used' counter, enhancing tracking of abilities' usage.

Policy Code Refactor: Conducted a significant refactor of policy-related code, improving efficiency and maintainability.

Item Actions Refactoring and Rename Feature: Refactored item actions and added a new feature to rename items, allowing users to name their companions.

Book Item Type Addition: Introduced a new item type - books, adding to the game's content.

Encounter and Description Fixes: Fixed issues with encounter metadata and corrected miss descriptions.

Shadow Maps Generation: Added tools that allow the system to generate shadow assets.

PHP 8.3 Compatibility Updates: Made updates to ensure compatibility with PHP 8.3.

Queue Configuration and Fixes: Improved the configuration of job queues and fixed related issues.

Fixes and Updates for Battler State: Addressed issues in practical testing and refined the battler state management.

Refactor of Current Effects: Refactored how current effects are stored and managed. Moved current effects to state and resolved turn resolution issues.

Map Generation and Space Management: Improved the map generator to add empty spaces when out of view.

Behavior Selection and Shadow Rendering Fixes: Fixed issues with behavior selection and shadow rendering in battle states.

Party Leader Management Updates: Implemented changes for setting new party leaders upon defeat.

Stat Resolution Enhancements: Updated the resolution of stats, improving the mechanics of stat calculations.

PvP and Demo Battle Fixes: Made fixes specifically for arena PvP and demo battles.

State Management and Pruning: Improved state management, including pruning data when no longer needed by the system.

Species Data Addition: Added species data to the about page.

Rest & Defend Action Health Gain: Resting no longer increases health but does recover more stamina. Defending no longer recovers stamina.

Remade Companion Page: Used the new scene component to improve usability and performance of companion page.

Adjusted Radiant Overlay: This fixes an issue Firefox users had with viewing radiant companions.

Updated Tooltips: Tooltips have been replaced with a more modern library.

Gyroscope Support: The game can use a devices gyroscope to move parallax scenes around.

Websocket Connection Updates: Ensures websockets get cleanly disconnected at the end of every battle.

Improved Hitboxes and Rendering: Objects no longer appear to "float" regardless of their size and their hitboxes have been refined.

Added Global Sound - App can now maintain music across different pages and the settings control master, sound effects, and music seperately.

Enhanced Settings - Greatly improved the number of modular settings a user can use in both graphics and gamepad.

Wild Area Game Pad Support - Wild areas now support game pag usage. Full game pad support is in progress.

Virtual Joystick - Touch screen devices can control movement with a virtual joystick.

General Cleanups and Tweaks: Conducted cleanups and minor tweaks across various parts of the system.

Thank You!

Our first full calendar year with Mythaura has been one primarily focused on foundation-building. We're so excited to use these systems that we have built to create the content that players will engage with as they travel throughout Mythaura. Again, a heartfelt thanks to those who have supported us through all of this--we really couldn't have done it without you. We hope to deliver an experience that you'll want to revisit again and again.

As always: we'll see you around the Discord!

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mythaura-blog · 6 months

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Development Update - October 2023

Hi folks, Miyazaki here! We've got two exciting gameplay features to share in this month's update: the addition of Character Classes and actual screenshots of Wild Area exploration gameplay, which we are so excited to announce will be live for players to explore on January 1, 2024!

Read on to learn more about these key Mythaura gameplay elements as well as the Quarter 2 (2023) Ko-fi Rewards results and a Class-specific Companion vote for Bronze Ko-fi Sponsors and above.

Explore Demo: Sneak Peek

On January 1, 2024, we will deploy a key Mythaura gameplay feature for your exploration: a playable Wild Area, where you will lead a team of three Beasts through procedurally-generated Wild Area levels. In the Fledgling Forest you will encounter and fight Monsters—if you're lucky, you might even spot a Radiant Monster during your travels!

We'll have some more information to share about this Wild Area release in the November dev update.

These images are all WIP screenshots of actual in-game play being developed, not renderings. Final lighting effects, assets, and UI might change between now and the January 1, 2024 launch.

Beast Creator

The Beast Creator will have not only a visual overhaul, but will also introduce the Beast size mechanic. A Beast's size will directly impact its Health and Speed stats, so it's worth exploring that as you build your team!

You will also be able to choose a Beast's secondary element prior to their entry into the Wild Area. Its first element will always be the one that is inherent to its species.

Classes

There are many factors that may determine which Beasts you bring along with you for the narrative questlines or Wild Area exploration, and the newest facet of a Beast's identity lies with its Character Class.

Adventurers throughout Mythaura will find themselves as a Rogue, Healer, Fighter, or Sorcerer.

In-Game Functions

A Beast's Class will provide several narrative in-game functions, including some Class-specific dialogue options with NPCs and additional/unique options for narrative quests.

Class will also determine one of the Beast's Skill Trees, which will be the focus of a future development update. This will grant them abilities that are unique to their Class, with progressively more powerful skills unlocked with investment into that particular skill tree.

Mechanics

Players will get to choose their custom starter Beast's Class, which will grant one piece of starter gear and one Class-specific Companion. Players are able to gain additional pieces of starter gear by doing additional New Game (NG) cycles, where the player will be able to choose their new custom Beast's Class.

A young Beast will not be able to choose a Class; when they age up to an adult, they will be prompted with the option to choose. Beasts contracted via the Recruiter will already have a Class randomly assigned to them.

A Beast's Class can be changed at any time—all Skill Points that were assigned to that Class's Skill Tree will need to be reallocated to either the Beast's new Class or one of its Elemental Skill Trees.

Featured Class: Healer

Healers can derive their powers from any Element, but are especially common among Light- and Nature-aligned Beasts, as those Elements innately have healing abilities. Those who heed the calling to become Healers often feel a strong sense of duty to provide medical aid to those in need. This Class provides a robust selection of support-focused Skills, with some supplementary offensive Skills.

Some of the earliest medical schools in Mythaura were founded in the Central Plateau in the wake of the countless generations' worth of Griffin wars—the wounded left in the wake of these battles would overwhelm informal medical providers, and thus a generation of formally-trained Healers were born.

They can be found as folk practitioners or surgeons, herbalists or battlefield medics, snake oil salespeople or scientists. The unifying trait of all Healers is their power to do good with their powerful healing magics—though what they do with that power is up to the individual.

Starting Equipment: Serpent's Staff

Winged Serpent iconography is inextricably linked to Healers, as the Serpent's potent Nature-aligned healing abilities were the foundation of one of the earliest schools of medicine in Mythaura.

Healers at the beginning of their journey are often given a Serpent's Staff as a reminder of their highest duty: the care and protection of any Beast in need.

Companion Concepts

Along with the Serpent's Staff starting equipment, choosing a Healer for your custom starter Beast will also grant you a Class-unique Companion.

Ko-fi Sponsors of Bronze level or higher will have a say in which companion they would like to see as the starter Companion for the Healer Class. Please vote on this post by Wednesday, November 29, 2023 at 11:59pm PST in order for your vote to be considered!

We will have another Class to feature in the November update, and with it a new post to vote on, so be sure to check back next month!

Ko-fi Q2 (2023) Results

Thanks to all who voted on which Glamour and Companion we're moving forward with for Quater 2 (2023)!) The rattlesnake-dog Companion and Grinning Faces Glamour for adult Quetzals will be this quarter's rewards.

We'll be back with the completed artwork for these two in the November dev update!

Reminder: Custom Color Contest

As a reminder: to celebrate the cooperative nature of the color wheel that we're making with you, we're opening a Custom Color Contest. We want to offer the opportunity for you to make a permanent impact on Mythaura's color wheel!

This contest is free to enter, and only has the following parameters:

Only one entry allowed

Fill out Google Form by Saturday, November 25, 2023 at 11:59pm PST

We've included a PSD file for you to use, if you'd like!

The dev team will reach out to the winner on December 1 to begin the color design process. Winner will have until December 22, 2023 to complete their color design.

Winner will also receive 3x copies of the Empemeral Ink that matches their color's base hue (Red, Orange, Yellow, Blue, Green, or Violet).

We're so excited to see what you come up with!!

Mythaura v0.24

Adds size support in breeding and stats

Creates infrastructure for battle ailments

Streamlines pipeline for demo party creation

Creates explore end summary

Adds state persistence between explore encounters

Establishes a hook engine for use to manage buffs and passive effects.

Refactors front end in a major way in prep for demo release.

Adds 3D physics, lighting, and canvas rendering for more performant rendering utilizing webGL

Thank You!

Thanks for sticking through to the end of the post, we always look forward to sharing our month's work with all of you--thank you for taking the time to read. We'll see you around the Discord!

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mythaura-blog · 7 months

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Development Update - September 2023

Hello hello everyone, Miyazaki here with another development update!

This month we cover:

Mutations

Kobolds

Weekend Traveler design

Beast Design Contest winners

Ko-fi Quarterly Rewards concepts

All that and more under the cut!

Mutations

On very rare occasions, a Beast may be born with a striking visual abonormality. These are Mutations.

Mutations are obtained primarily through breeding two Beasts together. Mutations are not passed down to offspring, meaning that parents who have Mutations are not any more likely to pass it down to their offspring than parents without Mutations. There will be methods available to increase the likelihood of a Beast being born with a Mutation.

Mutations will layer on top of all base colors and specials. They do not recolor. There will be methods to remove a Beast's Mutation, if the player does not want it on their Beast. A Beast can only ever have one Mutation at any given time.

There will be a difficult end-game method of adding Mutations to preexisting Beasts, but breeding will provide a higher odds.

Mythaura will launch with 3 Mutations, the first of which is Piebald.

Piebald

Piebaldism is a genetic mutation that has a pattern of unpigmented white spots on a pigmented background of hair, feathers, or scales. The Beast's skin under the white background is not pigmented.

Piebald is now live in the Beast Creator for you to experiment with.

Quarter 2 (2023) Ko-fi Concepts

It’s the first day of Quarter 2 (2023), which means we’ve got new Quarterly Rewards for Sponsors to vote on on our Ko-fi page!

Votes must be posted by October 29, 2023 at 11:59pm PDT in order to be considered.

All Quarter 1 (2023) Rewards are now listed in our Ko-fi Shop for individual purchase for all Sponsor levels at $5 USD flat rate per unit. As a reminder, please remember that no more than 3 units of any given item can be purchased. If you purchase more than 3 units of any given item, your entire purchase will be refunded and you will need to place your order again, this time with no more than 3 units of any given item.

Hopefully in the future Ko-fi will offer the functionality to limit purchases per user, but for the time being we will be reviewing orders manually and reaching out to those who disregard these instructions.

Quarter 1 (2023) Companion: Filigree Moth

Quarter 1 (2023) Glamour: Twilight Dreamscape

Quarter 1 (2023) Solid Gold Glamour: Peryton

Kobolds

Kobolds are a non-playable species. They will show up around Mythaura as shopkeepers and other NPCs, along with other sapient species like Harpies, Fauns, and Vitterfolk.

They are masters of magical spatial manipulation—they are itinerant by nature and insatiably curious collectors, so they developed the means to distort space to carry large amounts of items in a small space. These satchels are highly sought-after items for adventurers. While many of these satchels are created purely for function and are minimalist in design, some Kobold artisans specialize in making beautiful, exquisitely detailed bags. These are often sold for exorbitant prices. (Buyers beware that there is a thriving market for fraudulent satchels, especially in the larger cities!)

Kobolds showcase a wide variety of physical traits, often influenced by where they were born. Although their ancestral home is the desert of the Sun Path, Kobolds have long since spread to all corners Mythaura. Their design takes inspiration from alligators, lizards, jackals, and coati.

Weekend Traveler

We originally mentioned the Weekend Traveler in the June 2023 update. This Kobold will bring their rare, luxury wares into town every Friday through Sunday to sell to the player—so be sure to save up your gold and shards for their weekly visits!

Beast Design Contest Winners

Thank you for all the great submissions to the Beast Design Contest! You all never cease to impress us with your creativity. For the September 2023 Beast Creator Contest we’ve got our three winners: Hidranea, Zillychu, and Despot!

Our three winners will each have the rewards automatically applied to their accounts, and these three beasts will be featured on the homepage for Quarter 2 (October through December).

Keep an eye out for our next Beast Creator Contest–we’ll be gathering entries in December to display on our site for Quarter 3 (January through March).

Reminder: Custom Color Contest

This contest is free to enter, and only has the following parameters:

Only one entry allowed

Fill out Google Form by Saturday, November 25, 2023 at 11:59pm PST

We've included a PSD file for you to use, if you'd like!

The dev team will reach out to the winner on December 1 to begin the color design process. Winner will have until December 22, 2023 to complete their color design.

Winner will also receive 3x copies of the Empemeral Ink that matches their color's base hue (Red, Orange, Yellow, Blue, Green, or Violet).

We're so excited to see what you come up with!!

Mythaura v0.23

Laid the groundwork for in-game encounters with functioning decision engine with basic weighting for behaviors.

Added base threads and posts functionality for forums.

Implemented an index for the forum index.

Added the ability to create a thread in the forum.

Prevented non-staff members from posting in the staff category of the forum.

Added enhanced guest user functionality.

Refactored the demo battle to use guest users.

Refactored various map generation functions for guest users.

Created and implemented guest sessions & encounters in the wild area.

Refactored walkable tiles in the wild area and added support for sound effects.

Various schema and database updates.

Added a loading screen to the CMS and related endpoint.

Added parallax backgrounds and refactored existing code.

Added mutations to creator dropdown.

Fixed issue with button widths in battle demo.

Began behind-the-scenes implementation of production layout.

Thank You!

Thanks for sticking through to the end of the post, we always look forward to sharing our month's work with all of you--thank you for taking the time to read. We'll see you around the Discord!

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mythaura-blog · 8 months

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Development Update - August 2023

Hi folks, Miyazaki here with quite the colorful update for you all!

In this update we're going to cover all things color, including:

New additions to the wheel

Magical color-shifting items

A shiny new page displaying the full wheel

Ways that you can design your own color via Ko-fi

A contest for you to design your very own color

We'll also cover the Quarter 1 (2023) Ko-fi sponsor rewards, two new sponsored companions, and our annual Beast Creator Contest.

More info available under the cut!

New Colors

We've been asked frequently if we'll be adding any additional colors to Mythaura's color wheel. We can now say with confidence: yes we will!

Koa found a sustainable way to add these new colors for Beasts, meaning that we have the ability to add in new colors even post-launch.

In the update where we talked about Seasons, we mentioned each Mythaura Season will have its own unique theme. This theme will determine the unique Seasonal items that are available for players to earn. We are planning to add one new color to the site per Season, which will be thematically appropriate as well!

To kickstart our color wheel expansion, each member of the dev team came up with a new color:

Fossil by MunkeKing

Pidgeon by Kymara

Racecar by Sark

Periwinkle by Luciellia

Sunset by Koa

Padparadscha by Sashie

Sunrise as a partner color to Sunset

Patina by Miyazaki

Color Wheel Page

Earlier this month we added a color wheel page so that the entire color wheel could be viewed at a glance. We've also got a handy Beast previewer in the middle, so that you can see what the selected color looks like for a Beast's base, top, bottom, and eyes. The wheel can be organized by either Hue or by its Standard order, which is the order the site uses when calculating colors during breeding.

This page also shows the relevant Ephemeral Inks that the selected color may be included within.

Ephemeral Inks

Magical brews of shifting hues...Ephemeral Inks and Ephemeral Eyedrops are Harpy-crafted products that shift a Beast's colors.

Ephemeral Inks will shift a Beast's:

Base color

Top color

Bottom color

Any Specials colors

Any Supers colors

Ephemeral Eyedrops will shift a Beast's:

Eye color

There is a wide variety of Ephemeral items. Each one corresponds to a pool of colors. For example, Ephemeral Blue Ink contains all colors in the "Blue" category based on its hue while Ephemeral Dark Ink contains all colors with a lightness value below 50%. The Ephemeral Dark Blue Ink is the intersection of those, containing colors in the "Blue" category that are also dark.

In addition there are three Ephemeral Inks which contain all colors...

Ephemeral Prismatic Ink - Completely randomizes the beast it used on

Ephemeral Analogous Ink - Shuffles to colors that are analogous to one another (e.g. yellow, red, and orange)

Ephemeral Complementary Ink - Shuffles to colors that are complementary to one another (e.g. orange and blue or purple and yellow)

Ko-fi Custom Color Sponsorship

Are you interested in sponsoring your own color to be part of Mythaura's color wheel? We are now offering this as a service in our Ko-fi shop!

Work with our art team to bring your custom color to life! After providing input and direction to our art team, we will come back to you with a proposal for your color. Up to two rounds of changes beyond the initial design will be offered.

Name suggestions are welcomed, but the final name will be left to the discretion of the dev team.

Turnaround time will vary based on the current workload of our artists. An ETA will be provided upon purchase.

NOTE: custom color sponsorshp will not be available post-launch. This is exclusively a pre-launch service.

Custom Color Contest

To celebrate the cooperative nature of the color wheel that we're making with you, we're opening a Custom Color Contest. We want to offer the opportunity for you to make a permanent impact on Mythaura's color wheel!

This contest is free to enter, and only has the following parameters:

Only one entry allowed

Fill out Google Form by Saturday, November 25, 2023 at 11:59pm PST

The dev team will reach out to the winner on December 1 to begin the color design process. Winner will have until December 22, 2023 to complete their color design.

Winner will also receive 3x copies of the Empemeral Ink that matches their color's base hue (Red, Orange, Yellow, Blue, Green, or Violet).

We're so excited to see what you come up with!!

Quarter 1 (2023) Rewards Reveal

Our Quarter 1 rewards have been completed and are ready for their public debut! Thank you to the Ko-fi Sponsors who voted on the different Glamour and Companion concepts, we appreciate your support and feedback.

Q1 (2023) Glamour: Twilight Dreamscape

Q1 (2023) Companion: Filigree Moth

Q1 (2023) Solid Gold Glamour: Adult Peryton

Ko-fi Sponsored Items

Pygmy Tunneler

Sponsored by: Sark

Beast Creator Contest

We're back with another Beast Design Contest! We're looking forward to all the fantastic creations that this community comes up with.

Here are the parameters:

Each individual can submit one (1) Beast option for consideration

Any species fine (babies included)

Fill out Google form; provide both a picture and the preview code

We’ll pick three winners to have their Beasts featured on the front page for Quarter 2 (October 1 - December 31). Winners will also receive:

1x Beta Key

1x Quarter 1 (2023) Glamour: Twilight Dreamscape

1x Quarter 1 (2023) Companion: Filigree Moth

These rewards will be applied directly to your account.

Submissions for the Beast Design Contest are due by September 29, 2023. The form will close at 11:59pm PST. Winners will be announced in the October 1, 2023 Development Update.

Mythaura v0.22

Color wheel added

Color changing items created

Sustainable pipeline for new color creation added

Tile and floor refactor to support map builder

Adds integer ordering to colors and refactors ordering to use new integer

Forum categories and group structure created

Refactored tooltip and select dropdowns

Initial buildout of beast party selection and abode

Asset Updates

New icons for Dale Wanderer, Stonecrop Queen, and Gruffalow

Bogbint radiant alignment updated

Boreal & Umbral Vigilhound elemental effects adjusted

Breezetail lines darkened

Thank You!

Thanks for sticking through to the end of the post, we always look forward to sharing our month's work with all of you--thank you for taking the time to read. We'll see you around the Discord!

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mythaura-blog · 9 months

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Development Update - July 2023

Hi everyone, Miyazaki here! We've got some new things to roll out to you this month.

Topics covered:

Companion Codex

Beast expressions

Q1 (2023) Ko-fi Glamour and Companion results

Breeding Demo improvements

More under the cut!

Beast Expressions

Mythaura's quests--both main story quests as well as side quests--will feature interactions with NPCs. Your lead beast (which you can change at any time) will be engaging with these NPCs in every interaction, and both your beast and the NPC will show up on the screen during dialogue. Their expressions will change depending on choices made during dialogue selection.

These expressions are generated based the code from the Beast Creator. They will not show a beast's Gear, Apparel, or Glamours.

As of now the art team has completed all Specials and Supers for the adult and young Griffin bases!

At a future point, we plan on adding the expressions to the Beast Creator demo. We will announce this feature at a later date.

Companion Codex

As we've started to accumulate a good number of Companions for Mythaura, including many created thanks to generous Ko-fi and Patreon sponsors, we thought it'd be a good idea to put them all in one place for people to look at. To that end, we've created a Companion Codex page!

Each Companion will have its key information available for viewing, including:

Element

Standard and Radiant colorations

Size (with an average-sized adult Ryu for reference)

Description

Ability to zoom into image

We will be gradually adding more Companions as we finalize their sizes in the back end. When we add them, we'll share them in the #mini-updates channel in the Discord server.

NOTE: We are aware of a visual bug in Firefox when viewing companions. This is a bug in Firefox itself, and we will attempt to find a workaround for Firefox users. In the meantime, we recommend using Google Chrome or Safari to view the Companion Codex page.

Ko-fi Q1 (2023) Results

Thanks to all who voted on which Glamour and Companion we're moving forward with for Quater 1 (2023)!) The Filigree Moth Companion and Twilight Glamour for adult Hippogriffs will be this quarter's rewards.

We'll be back with the completed artwork for these two in the August dev update!

Breeding Predictor Improvements

We've made a lot of improvements to the Breeding Predictor this past month!

Speed majorly improved

Specials not layering correctly fixed

Supers are now only inherited when both parents have part of the Specials combo

Added ability to toggle between age when predicting

Made beast code boxes more intuitive to use, such as allowing pasting in place.

Mythaura v0.19

Creates companion endpoint and page

Adds sizes and default stats to companions

Creates concept of objects & floors in Wild Area

Began tile map editor project, allowing staff to create bespoke floors

Builds out encounter spawn logic and infrastructure

Adds concept of "timeslots" to control when specific encounters can spawn

Refactors back end tools to make changes more safe and clean up code

Fixes issue where battles could not run on Redis queue

Refactors front end dependency injection

Updates the breeding predictor to dramatically increase speed from several seconds to less than a second

Thank You!

Thanks for sticking through to the end of the post, we always look forward to sharing our month's work with all of you--thank you for taking the time to read. We'll see you around the Discord!

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mythaura-blog · 10 months

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Development Update - June 2023

Hi everyone, Miyazaki here! This month’s dev update will focus on a feature we’re planning, Seasons. We’ve also got our Quarter 1 (2023) companion and glamour concepts up for our sponsors to vote on as well as the winners of the Beast Design Contest!

Topics covered:

Mythaura Seasonal progression

Q1 (2023) Ko-fi Concepts

Beast Design Contest winners

And more under the cut!

Seasons

Mythaura Seasons are designed to reward the player for gaining experience around the site, with the idea being that players of all activity level will be able to acquire useful base site items (stones that determine beast's birth element, beast change items, healing items, Coins, etc.) as well as Season-unique rewards.

Duration & Theme

Each Season runs for 3 months, recurring. Seasons are grouped by the following months:

January, February, March

April, May, June

July, August, September

October, November, December

Each Season will have a specific theme that the Season-specific rewards will follow, such as: a specific color, love, cooking, sorcery, reptiles, etc.

Progression & Rewards

Seasons will be split into two categories: the standard Season, which is all-inclusive of all ways to earn experience on the site, and a purely PVP-focused Season. Participation will not require purchasing a "season pass" or require any kind of purchase (neither Shards nor Coins) to gain any of the Season's rewards.

All players have the same objectives to accomplish during the Season. The Season's rewards are unlocked sequentially, meaning you have to start at Level 1 and end at Level X (exact number of levels still being determined; pending since we’re still doing balance testing!). There will be an exponential amount of experience required to progress to the next level.

All the following activities grant experience toward the standard Season progression:

Completing main story quests

Completing side quests

Completing radiant quests

Boosting NPC reputation

Breeding beasts

Releasing beasts

Wild Area exploration

Co-op help to other players for bosses and Wild Areas

PVP

The PVP Season happens in tandem with the standard Season, and only PVP experience counts. While PVP experience does count toward the standard Season's level progression, the PVP Season will exclusively be based on PVP participation.

In order to unlock the PVP Season's rewards, players will need to participate in a flat amount of PVP matches per level to gain the rewards. Players do not need to win these matches, just play it through to completion. Dropping out/forfeiting will not count toward the level progression.

Completion Rewards

If a player completes all the levels of the standard Season, they will be rewarded with a completion reward, which will be hard retired at the end of the Season. These completion rewards will be “hard-retired,” meaning they will not be found in shops or site events after that Season is done.

Seasonal Currency

There will be a Seasonal Shop NPC that allows for purchases of unlocked Season-exclusive items with Seasonal currency. Every level in the standard Season, players will receive a specific amount of Seasonal currency, which can then be used in the shop to purchase Seasonal items that the player has already unlocked over the course of their gameplay.

The currency will be the same every Season. Currency will not roll over between Seasons, meaning if a player doesn't use it by the time the Season is over, they have missed out on the opportunity to purchase additional rewards for that Season. This deadline will be amply called out on the site so that players have every chance to redeem their Currency before it expires.

"Soft Retirement" & Weekend Traveler

Seasonal items will never be found as loot drops, for purchase through miscellaneous shop NPCs, available through quests, etc. Seasonal rewards are "soft retired" at the end of the Season (with the exception of the final Completion Reward, which is hard-retired). The only way to acquire these rewards after the Season has completed would be via the Weekend Traveler NPC.

From Friday through Sunday, the Weekend Traveler will show up to the starter town and sell their wares to the player. The Weekend Traveler will have two distinct inventories: one for regular base game items, and a "secret" inventory for all non-Ko-fi/non-exclusive retired items.

The base game inventory will be the same for all players, and will feature both regular site items (companions, healing items, site glamours, etc) and/or items that are Weekend Traveler-exclusive, like tier 3 beast breed change items.

The "secret" inventory will be unique to each player per weekend, and will only stock 1x of each of these items. These rewards will be randomly pulled from a database of applicable retired items. Each item has its own cost, and its own likelihood of showing up in the shop--items that were more time and resource intensive (in the example of Seasons: rewards that were given at higher levels of progression) should show up much, much less frequently and be much more expensive.

Beast Design Contest Winners

Thank you for all the great submissions to the Beast Design Contest! You all never cease to impress us with your creativity. For the June 2023 Beast Creator Contest we’ve got our three winners: Ceramic, Jenny, and Valen!

Our three winners will each have the rewards automatically applied to their accounts, and these three beasts will be featured on the homepage for Quarter 1 (July through September).

Keep an eye out for our next Beast Creator Contest–we’ll be gathering entries in June to display on our site for Quarter 2 (October through December).

Quarter 1 (2023) Ko-fi Concepts

Votes must be posted by July 31, 2023 at 11:59pm PDT in order to be considered.

All Quarter 4 (2023) Rewards are now listed in our Ko-fi Shop for individual purchase for all Sponsor levels at $5 USD flat rate per unit. As a reminder, please remember that no more than 3 units of any given item can be purchased. If you purchase more than 3 units of any given item, your entire purchase will be refunded and you will need to place your order again, this time with no more than 3 units of any given item.

Quarter 4 (2023) Companion: Blooming Jackalope

Quarter 4 (2023) Glamour: Koi Pond

Quarter 4 (2023) Solid Gold Glamour: Basilisk

Mythaura v0.18

Wild Area Minimap generation built

AI behavior profile infrastructure started

Broadcasting auth adjusted

Adds user group invite functionality

Adds beast party functionality

Fleshes out wild area session and initial state building

Fishing and lockpicking added to exploration

Added multiplayer real time movement in wild areas

Thank You!

Thanks for sticking through to the end of the post! In the near future we'll share additional recurring gameplay loops: there will be monthly and weekly goals to achieve on the site, each offering their own helpful rewards around the site!

See you around the Discord!

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mythaura-blog · 11 months

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Development Update - May 2023

Hello hello folks, Miyazaki here! We've got a big update for this month--we've rolled out Mythaura's battle demo and are so excited for you to give it a try!

Topics covered include:

Battle Demo & Guide

Quarter 4 (2023) Rewards Reveal

Beast Creator Contest

New Homepage Splash Screen

More info available under the cut!

Battle Demo Guide

Welcome to Mythaura's battle demo! Here's a concise guide to help you navigate the 3v3 battles and make strategic decisions:

1. Battle Setup

The battle takes place between your beasts (on the left) and the enemy beasts (on the right) and ends when one side is defeated. For this demo, all beasts in this demo are level 1 and have average size for their species.

2. Beast Details

Click on the info icon in the corner of your beast's avatar to view its details. From here, you can read their abilities and see a breakdown of their stats.

3. Elements

Each beast has 2 elements, including a species element that is always shown. You won't know your opponent's secondary element.

For this demo, a beast's secondary element is currently randomized.

Check the elements page for more information on elements and for a breakdown of type effectiveness.

4. Turn Actions

Each turn, your beasts can perform one of the following actions:

Use an ability or surge ability.

Defend themselves or an ally.

Rest to regain stamina.

Once all players have submitted their actions, the round is resolved with the following priority:

Resting beasts rest first.

Defending beasts defend next.

Abilities are resolved.

Within each action type, the order is determined by ability priority, beast speed, weight (with lightest going first), and then randomly if all those values are the same.

5. Abilities

Beasts start with 4 abilities: one surge ability (species-based), one neutral ability, and one ability for each element. If a beast's species and individual element match, they will have 3 abilities.

Abilities with elements can be super effective or resisted, affecting the damage dealt. Pay attention to moves' effectiveness and your foes' abilities for better results.

Abilities incur fatigue and the fatigue cost is shown on the ability button.

Abilities will generally have a small chance to miss or be a critical hit. The chances of these can vary per ability.

Abilities have 3 types: Combat, Projection, and Support.

Combat: Attack vs Defense

Projection: Focus vs Barrier

Support: Non-damage dealing abilities

6. Surge Abilities

When a beast's surge meter is full, they can use their surge ability for a powerful effect. Surge abilities don't incur fatigue and never miss. After using a surge ability, the surge meter goes back to 0%. Please note that the surge abilities in this demo may be changed before the game’s official launch.

7. Defending

Beasts can defend themselves or allies, reducing incoming damage by 75% for that turn. This effect does not stack. Defending slightly charges the defender's surge meter and recovers a small amount of stamina.

8. Resting

Resting recovers a substantial amount of stamina and a small amount of health.

Remember, understanding abilities, elements, defending, and resting will help you make the best decisions during battles. We have provided an in-app form you can use to report bugs and provide feedback. Good luck and enjoy the demo!

Planned battle demo updates for the future:

A "quick queue" button that queues with the first available other quick-queue person and does not require a PIN

PvE Mode versus an ai battler

Timeout for move submission

Controller support

Weather effects

Ailments

Ability to set desired element from the queue screen

Better reporting and improvements to history, such as remembering when you discover a super effective element on a specific opponent

Quarter 4 (2023) Rewards Reveal

Our Quarter 4 rewards have been completed and are ready for their public debut! Thank you to the Ko-fi Sponsors who voted on the different Glamour and Companion concepts, we appreciate your support and feedback.

Q4 (2023) Glamour: Koi Pond

Q4 (2023) Companion: Blooming Jackalope

Q4 (2023) Solid Gold Glamour: Adult Basilisk

Special One-Time Companion: Radiant Golden Ossiflage

1x copy will be awarded to all previous and/or current Bronze, Silver, and Gold Sponsors

Sponsors of all levels may purchase one (1) additional copy of the Radiant Golden Ossiflage in our Ko-fi Shop.

Beast Creator Contest

We're back with another Beast Design Contest! We're looking forward to all the fantastic creations that this community comes up with.

Here are the parameters:

Each individual can submit one (1) Beast option for consideration

Any species fine (babies included)

Fill out Google form; provide both a picture and the preview code

We’ll pick three winners to have their Beasts featured on the front page for Quarter 1 (July 1 - September 30). Winners will also receive:

1x Beta Key

1x Quarter 4 (2023) Skin: Koi Pond

1x Quarter 4 (2023) Companion: Blooming Jackalope

These rewards will be applied directly to your account.

Submissions for the Beast Design Contest are due by June 15, 2023. The form will close at 11:59pm PST. Winners will be announced in the July 1, 2023 Development Update.

Homepage Splash Screen

Our wonderfully talented senior artist, Luci, created a scene detailing an early stage in a group of adventurers' journey in Mythaura. This perfectly captures the vibe of the opening series of introductory quests that players will undertake at the start of the game. We hope you enjoy the art, and hope that you look forward to playing through Mythaura's single-player story when we launch!

Mythaura v0.17

Updated homepage layout

Merged and finalized battle demo, fixing several bugs found along the way

Thank You!

Thanks for sticking through to the end of the post! We hope you love the battle demo and are looking forward to your feedback, which will help shape the nature of the game while still in its early development--leading to a lasting impact when Mythaura launches. Your help here is invaluable!

See you around the Discord!

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mythaura-blog · 1 year

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ryu

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mythaura-blog · 1 year

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One Mythaura unicorn!

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mythaura-blog · 1 year

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it will actually take a billion years to figure out the breeding for this fella, but starting early didn't hurt anyone eh? here's vetula :D

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mythaura-blog · 1 year

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Development Update - April 2023

It's time for Mythaura's April Development Update!

Topics covered include:

Battle Demo Preview

Feature Spotlight: Radiant Companions

Year in Review & Special Giveaway

Beast Species Descriptions

Q4 (2023) Voting Results

More info available under the cut!

Koa and Sark here,

We would like to express our heartfelt gratitude to all of you for your unwavering support and enthusiasm towards Mythaura over the past year. It has been an incredible journey, and we could not have made it this far without your constant encouragement and feedback.

We are so grateful to have such an amazing community that is passionate about our game and genuinely cares about its development. Your feedback and suggestions have helped us shape Mythaura into something truly special and it has been an absolute joy to work on this project with our incredible team and community. We look forward to sharing our progress with you again next month!

Over the past year, our team has accomplished a lot. Here are some of the highlights:

Welcomed back Luci and introduced new team members Miyazaki, Kymara, Munkeking, and Sashie.

Created a new UI from scratch and upgraded to the latest web tools for an improved user experience.

Rebuilt the creator to be faster and more intuitive than before, and added a breeding predictor compatible with creator import codes.

Added 50 new colors to the color wheel.

Introduced Tint and Panda as new Specials.

Introduced the Supers feature, along with the Tegu Super.

Completed assets for 3 NPCS: Reine, Esris, and Jaq, with several more in the works.

Created a battle system capable of multiplayer matchmaking and 3v3 beast battles.

Introduced cosmetic skins called Glamours and formalized the distinction between Gear and Apparel.

Developed our Elemental astrology system, along with beast sizes & descriptions.

Added 30 new companions and another 30 non-companion items.

Built out critical behind-the-scenes infrastructure, and prototyped important features such as real-time chat, breeding, battling, inventory, companions, and even procedural level generation (more on that in a future update!).

Battle Demo Preview

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We're so excited to share actual Mythaura gameplay footage with you all--the PVP Battle Demo will be rolling out on June 1. Catch a sneak peek of what you can expect to see on launch day in the video above.

We look forward to your feedback on the system next month!

Radiant Companions

What’s that strange coloration and sparkle we see on that Flamebrush Boar?

Radiant companions are extremely rare color deviations from the species’s standard colors. Radiant companions differ from their standard counterparts in appearance only–they have access to the same attributes as the standard coloration.

You’ll know when you’ve encountered a radiant companion in the Wild Area: at the start of the fight there will be an animation and sound indicator to let you know you’ve found something special. There will be several in-game methods of increasing your odds of encountering a radiant companion!

Almost all companions will have a radiant version. However, Ko-fi exclusive companions (with the exception of the Golden Ossiflage; see below) will NOT have radiant versions, nor will account-locked companions that fall into our “sapient companion” category, such as Vitterfolk, Harpies, and Fauns.

Giveaway: Radiant Golden Ossiflage

As a thank you to one year’s worth of your support, we will be giving one free Radiant Golden Ossiflage to previous or current Bronze, Silver, and/or Gold Sponsors through the end of May (May 31st, 2023 @ 11:59pm PST). This companion will automatically be applied to your associated Ko-fi email on June 1st for all sponsors who sponsored (or previously held sponsorships) before the deadline.

If you previously held a sponsorship and don’t presently have one–don’t worry! This companion will still be granted to you automatically.

Sponsors of any level may purchase one (1) copy of the Radiant Golden Ossiflage in the Ko-fi shop starting on June 1, 2023. The listing will remain in the Ko-fi shop for the lifetime of our Ko-fi shop for $5. Copies bought in the store will be awarded within a few minutes of purchase.

Thank you so much for all your support over the past year–it means the world to us!

Beast Descriptions

We're excited to share some key features for each of the nine available beast species currently available in Mythaura! Expanded entries on each beast species will be shared later this year. These descriptions can be found on the beast creator page by clicking the "?" icon next to the beast's species.

Basilisk: The Basilisk's manual dexterity made them the first master alchemists, where their quick movements and precise control of Fire allowed them to safely transmute materials. When a Basilisk is threatened, it can shoot smoldering quills to buy time to flee.

Dragon: Dragons were the first species to develop a written language, and consider themselves preeminent chroniclers of Mythauran history. Their homes are icy, labyrinthine tunnels carved into the Spine of Ere, with miles' worth of stories etched into the walls.

Griffin: Griffin drifts fought one another for conquest of the central plateau during the Hundred Generations War before Atticus the Reformer brokered an uneasy peace. He built the Arena as a forum for warlike Griffins to connect through healthy competition.

Hippogriff: A Hippogriff's highly sensitive brow feathers detect the slightest changes in barometric pressure, alerting them to oncoming gales and storms. They can navigate any storm on their powerful wings, silhouettes lit from behind by bright bolts of lightning.

Kirin: Kirins innately have a strong sense of intuition, and those in touch with their Arcane element are often granted the gift of foresight. They are revered soothsayers and advisors, whose prophetic abilities have shaped the course of Mythauran history.

Peryton: A Peryton can perfectly mimic the sound of any creature that it has heard before. Though a Peryton can will its shadow to take any shape, without focus it naturally takes the form of the creature whose heart the Peryton last consumed.

Quetzal: Quetzals can bend sunlight to create a Solar Aegis, shielding others from harm. Their inherent Light element makes them adept healers; Mythauran townships have their own local pantheons of patron saints, almost all of which feature a Quetzal healer.

Ryu: Ryus use ribbon-like movements to propel themselves through water and air with equal ease. Some Ryu families leave the mainland altogether to build undersea homes for themselves; several sprawling Ryu cities exist in the dark, abyssal ocean depths.

Unicorn: Unicorns hail from the tempestuous Southern Plains, where their affinity for Lightning made them at home in the storms that constantly batter the area. They typically live in large herds of connected families and don't maintain established territory.

Ko-fi Sponsored Items

Bonds of Friendship

Sponsored by: Bug

These creatures follow familial migration patterns across the Great Southern Plains for its entire centuries-long lifespan. Family groups can be identified by similar types of flora growing from their shells.

Virulent Vespula

Sponsored by: Bug

This territorial, aggressive wasp's potent venom is a key ingredient in many pain-relieving medicines. Acquiring it without injury is considered quite the accomplishment.

Flintclaw Scorpion

Sponsored by: Bug

It clacks its heavy black claws together to shoot forth sparks. Then, while its prey is stunned, it strikes with its stinger and injects a venom that begins to boil the victim’s blood.

Hermetic Wings

Sponsored by: Bug

A fragrant, grassy cup of hot green tea. Steam fogs the walls of the thick glass mug.

Cheddar Chive Pierogi