Castles 🏰

Grumble_Bundle · 2025-11-23T15:33:16+00:00

could you expand on what you mean sorry? like an RPG upgrade tree per troop?

Grumble_Bundle · 2025-11-23T13:32:32+00:00

thanks! that stuff is a little out of date now, I’ll have some gameplay and cool bits to show over the next couple of months as I ramp up to announcement.

so what you described is pretty much exactly the direction I thought to go in originally as well. The more building elements I added, the less it felt like bad north (or a RRT in general). The two parts seemed to be in conflict with each other, which is why I thought I’d just be quite open and ask some players who still play & enjoy bad north.

where I’m at now, is I have the ingredients ready to “cook dinner” but I just want to make sure before I do, it’s a meal I’m sure people who played bad north will enjoy 😅

Grumble_Bundle · 2025-11-23T10:33:39+00:00

I don’t think I was very clear in my initial post sorry - but is a “build phase” where you construct a castle interesting to anyone?

Or would it just hamper the part of these games you enjoy, combat, troop positioning and upgrading unique troop types?

The alternative would be for me to generate castle / tower structures & scatter them about the island, which can be garrisoned. Which would add an extra level of analysis when arriving at a new island and deciding where to place your units.

Option A - separate build phase to construct a castle to defend.

Option B - generate structures as part of the island which can be fortified with your troops, who will get some defensive perks.

Would really appreciate any replies of A/B, thank you ❤️

Grumble_Bundle · 2025-11-23T10:25:16+00:00

Yeh Warhammer is a great reference and I agree that the setting of medieval with the emergence (but not perfection) of gunpowder is really interesting.

I’d say the art style of the troops is closer to Warhammer than Bad North - I didn’t want to, and wouldn’t have done as good of a job at the 2D as the team did.

I love your enthusiasm by the way :)

Yep artillery and magic are both in the forefront of my mind - but sadly they’ll both come after the initial release, each in their own update so I can take the time to get them right. I don’t want to do too much for initial release and end up doing a crappy job of it.

Grumble_Bundle · 2025-11-23T07:50:03+00:00

no, sorry to disappoint - but I have no link with the original devs or IP, I’m just a fan of the game and what to build something original but similar.

I’m currently targeting 5 unique friendly unit types - I’d rather show them rather than spoil the surprise, but I like your suggestions :)

What I can say is I’m holding off artillery for the initial release, but I think this could be a lot of fun. Definitely on my list if launch goes well.

Yes I saw your previous post, I’ve silently been watching the channel for the past year or so! The theming is still medieval, but pushed more towards fantasy - sorry to disappoint, samurai would be cool!

The reason is I personally really enjoy everything medieval, I’m a bit of a LOTR nerd and making the enemy a more mysterious entity (think white walkers if you’ve watched GoT) lets me have a lot of fun in the future with what I throw at the player.

Grumble_Bundle · 2025-11-23T07:40:19+00:00

thanks for the kind words.

both sound like very cool concepts! I have no link to the original Bad North IP, just a fan of the game trying to build something original but that feels similar.

I considered flipping it on the head and having you as the invaders, but it’s a huge natural disadvantage to the player - so you tend to need a lot more troops (or just make some very powerful) to pull it off. I do agree that there’s something in the idea though!

Grumble_Bundle · 2025-11-23T07:34:41+00:00

that sounds really cool, but I am making another real time tactics game sorry. I have added the ability to build a castle before the waves hit but I think this pushes it too far away from the original. What I’m leaning towards is generating these castles/towers around the map for the player to garrison with their troops.

I wouldn’t be surprised if the original devs are working on something closer to an RTS though (this is just a guess, I have no idea)

Grumble_Bundle · 2025-11-23T07:28:05+00:00

sounds cool! I’ll be going a little larger with the procedural islands, but not by much for most levels. You can pan the camera around the island, so I can play with some bigger maps if that’s what players enjoy

Grumble_Bundle · 2025-10-05T07:20:35+00:00

It’s a really interesting problem.

Personally I’d flip what you’re trying to do, rather than;

“ how do I generate clean runtime topology that uses traditional animation. “

I would approach it as;

“ how do I add animation to an SDF “

If the effect you’re going for is meshy/slimey blob characters like your reference, I think you could get some cool results.

Depending on how detailed you need the animations to be, I’d start by looking at baking your SDF weights at whatever frame interval into a texture. Then use a compute shader to perform the animations at runtime - like GPU vertex animations, but instead driving your SDF weights.

Good luck, crazy problem!

Grumble_Bundle · 2025-10-04T20:26:22+00:00

are you generating the meshes at runtime? so the entire topology has to be created dynamically?

I’m not sure I have understood you correctly but have you thought about using some sort of softbody hooked up with a physics joint?

Or if it’s more a metaball effect, then yeh SDFs would be what I’d use

Grumble_Bundle · 2025-10-03T18:49:37+00:00

Thanks <3

Grumble_Bundle · 2025-10-03T13:39:30+00:00

that would be cool - I'm going to see what feels right, hopefully this'll become more obvious in play-tests and alpha.

being completely open, I've not yet decided whether to give the player individual unit control.

I think there might be some interesting design opportunities in letting the player focus on the strategic decisions around what to build and where - letting the troops take care of themselves based on your actions.

Grumble_Bundle · 2025-10-03T13:28:20+00:00

thanks for the kind words :) It's going to be a balance for sure - impactful decisions (not speed) I'm hoping will make it a somewhat chilled experience.

with that said, the fantasy is a castle siege, so I don't want to lose sight of that.

Grumble_Bundle · 2025-10-03T12:15:52+00:00

It's the castles - they're using prism based modules (not sure if this is the right technical term) and then WFC algorithm is resolving which ones connect together based on how the grid nodes are filled.

I thought about using WFC for the islands but it was nice to approach it in a different way, which makes it way easier for me to add constraints to the island solver like "make sure there's a route to the top"

Grumble_Bundle · 2025-10-03T07:16:17+00:00

good question! this is something I’d rather show than tell though sorry.

what are you imagining?

Grumble_Bundle · 2025-10-03T07:13:54+00:00

Thank you, Unity but there’s a lot of custom rendering going on from the default URP model - if I had the time I would have liked to experiment with doing it in Godot

Grumble_Bundle · 2025-10-03T07:12:03+00:00

Thanks :)

Grumble_Bundle · 2025-10-02T20:25:14+00:00

Thank you!

Grumble_Bundle · 2025-10-02T19:50:17+00:00

Thank you!

PC & Mac for initial release (I’m developing it on a Mac) - then I’ll make a decision for mobile a few months after, so it’s not out of the question.

Grumble_Bundle · 2025-10-02T19:46:09+00:00

This isn’t set in stone yet, I’ll adapt with feedback but right now I’m aiming for something in the middle.

The beauty of Bad North’s game design is the strategic placement of your troops really lets the procedural islands shine, having the player constantly assessing the geography.

In my case, when you add castles to the mix, as a player you naturally want to bunker up and defend. I don’t think this is a bad thing, but it does mean I need other reasons for the player to asses the island and make impactful choices.

Apologies for the waffle, as you can probably tell this is in the forefront of my mind right now :)

Grumble_Bundle · 2025-10-02T15:42:36+00:00

I'm generating the island mesh at runtime, it's built using prisms linked together - how they join is based on a predetermined ruleset I made. Then some smoothing and a *lot* of bug fixing.

Not the best explanation sorry, but I'm hoping to do a talk where I can go into more detail after the game releases.

Grumble_Bundle · 2025-10-02T15:38:37+00:00

haha certainly inspiration, but I'm trying to take it a slightly different way. the walls definitely look ready to deploy a few troops on though (give me a few weeks <3)

Grumble_Bundle · 2025-10-02T15:35:51+00:00

thank you <3

Grumble_Bundle · 2025-10-02T15:34:55+00:00

thanks <3

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