We're getting as much non-content set up in advance as possible.

We've got a bit of planning under our belt at our project wiki, though there's a lot to flesh out still, and a lot to change once we've considered the themes.

It'll be interesting to see how multiple programmers affects our productivity.

We've got a nice blank svn repository.  Last time, I'd say our best quality was our organization; this time we're going to try and keep that organized within our team, but also be more inventive with our game.

We welcome comments from other pyweek teams, and good luck everyone.

Members this time

• Blake O'Hare - our project lead, main designer, engine programmer
• BrettS - Level Designer
• dmcginty23 - May be contributing music
• Falun - Other coding and level design
• fixception - character artist
• ikanreed - Music, SFX, some level design, and menu programming.
• Spears Dracona - background art and SFX

I'm not much of a musician, but I'm trying to reflect on some musical themes for this competition.  A lot of it will depend on the game themes when voting comes around.  Finding inspiration is not easy, and I have no idea how professional composers do it.  Hopefully when pyweek starts I won't find myself so lost for ideas.

We've also got some ideas working for Sound Effects and some decent equipment to record it.  Last pyweek we had no SFX and it hurt our game.  This time one of our goals is to have SFX for all major actions.   If anyone knows of something good to sample for cartoony lightning or hissing steam, those are major missing areas for us.

Physics is apparently coming along nicely, we've got some music and sound effects and our tile and sprite image library for pyweek 11 has ballooned to several hundred entries(I'm still stunned by this).

Additionally, the level editor looks nice this time.

I really want to talk about dev progress and art and story and plot because there are interesting things happening in our game all of those places...

But mostly I'm just exhausted -- between work all day and PyWeek all night I don't have much left for the diary. Suffice it to say that I'm a lot happier doing development work than the last game where my primary role was art.

Anyway, we're still having a blast, hope everybody else is learning stuff and making progress. Looking forward to some of the entries I've been hearing about here and over in #pyweek.

So before the final zip is deployed, I thought i'd add up how much was in our project, because it's been a crazy week.  Keep in mind every single item here was done during pyweek by our team.  

• 22 cut-scenes
• 28 dialogs
• 880 different tile images
• 20 character portraits
• 38 animated sprites 
• 32 UI element graphics
• 19 miscellaneous images
• 5500 lines of python code
• 168 maps
• 15 musical pieces
• 22 sound effects
• 3 utility programs to help create content

Hopefully we'll have a totally finished upload ready in the next hour and forty minutes.  Lots of last minute bug fixes and map area verifications to do.

 Edit: fontsets were apparently CC.

Hi, I'm Fixception, Team Nerd Paradise's character artist.

Ah, in case you didn't see, our member list before is outdated.

• blakeohare -- Project lead, main game designer, engine programmer, day saver
• BrettS -- Level designer
• Christine -- Level designer
• Falun -- UI programmer, artist, dialogue writer, moral support (read: cheerleader)
• fixception -- Character artist, dialogue writer
• ikanreed -- Menu programmer, composer
• Spears Dracona -- Pixel artist (sprites, tiles, backgrounds, everything)
• yanyan -- Level Designer

I hope you enjoy (or will soon enjoy) Shackled Stones.

~ Fixception

We realized people might get stuck in our game, whether because of bugs, a couple of confusing puzzles, and a few spots the dialog might be unclear about what to do next.

DO NOT READ ON IF YOU DO NOT WANT SPOILERS.

You have been warned.


---------------------------------------

There is a spiffy intro and cutscne to introduce you to the characters and let you know what is going on.  Basically, you are part of a band of master theives, and you just took the water stone, a stone containing one of the six elemental gods.  Hanlon explains that the government caught most of the stones and since then, they've been ruling the world.  He convinces everyone to bring it back to the water temple.

You land at the water temple.

There is a save point, it is a swirly white ball to the right of the entrance.  It's a good idea to save now.

Go into the water temple.

Go to the north.

Avoid the slimes and go into the room north and to the right.

Get the sabre.

Pierce explains how to use it.  Hit enter (or start on a gamepad) and then choose your sword, and hit space, a, s, or d (or a, b, x or y) on a gamepad to assign it to one of those buttons.  Then hit enter again to get out of the menu, and you can use whatever button you picked to get the sabre.  You equip other items you find later on in the same way.

Now go out.  Kill slimes if you feel like it, for money and life.

Go back south, to the room where you came in.  Kill the bushes on the left with your newly aqcuired sabre and go in the door.

Kill all the slimes in this room, and a key will appear in the upper left part of the room.  Take it.

You can see what keys you currently have in the lower left portion of the screen.

Go back out of this room, and back to the big room north.

This time, head to the left, and go through the blue locked door.

Kill all the enemies in this room.  Aim for the head on the robot guy.

The door in the north opens.  Go through it.

Ignore the switch in the upper left.  It does absolutely nothing.  Don't ask why, I have no idea why it's even there.

You don't have to kill all the enemies in this room.  Just head to the door on the right.

Then head through to the north door.

You're in a room with a cool bridge and a couple of eyes.  You kill the eyes, and oh no, you're stuck!  Not really.  Just kill the leftmost bush, and there's a red key!  The doors open.  Head right.

Head on through that room to the other door.

You're back in the big room.  Go through the red door on the bottom right.

Remember, aim for the head on the robots.  Get the green key, head back out.

Go to the leftmost door again (the one we unlocked with the blue key earlier).

You don't have to kill the enemies this time.  Just head on north, and continue north through the green door.

Go north through the room with the water in the middle, then place the water stone on the altar in the next room. (just walk up to it)

The water spirit asks you to save his brother Light and teleports you back outside of the temple.

Head onto the ship, and you fly to a forest somewhere.  Note the save point.

Hanlon tells you to go to the capital city where the stones are being kept.

I recommend collecting at least 30 gold pieces from killing enemies before you go to the capital.

Head south from your ship.  Go ahead and kill slimes on the way if you need more money.  Head left.

Go south in the next area.

Go south again.

If you don't have 30 gold at this point, go kill more enemies until you do.

So, now you should be north of the capital with 30 gold pieces.  Head on in.

You talk to pierce and Hanlon, they tell you to go to the west end of the capital.  Don't go there quite yet.  Head down to the shop.  It is just north of the lower right corner of town.  It has a sign that says shop on it.  Go in, buy the Fire Cannon.

Equip it.  It does double damage to enemies.

Now head to the west side of town and through to the next area.  The sign says no trespassing.  Disobey it and enter the place.

Automatons appear.  Kill them.  Your handy new fire cannon should make it easier.

Go up on the grates and grab the stones (just walk up there).

Head back out to the capital, and go east.  You'll want to collect 35 gold pieces before you go to the next town, to get the shovel and compass.  At least this time you have a Fire Cannon.

Head east again, and then again.  Head south at the beach.

You'll be in a large area, and there are three exits on the right side.  Choose the middle one (if you go through the south one you can just go north from there, or if you go through the north one, you can just go south from there).

You should be in a town, and you should have at least 35 gold pieces.  Go ahead and save if you want to.  Then go into the shop.

Buy the compass and the shovel.  Head back out.  We're going to the desert now.  There is no need to gather gold pieces anymore, you've bought everything you will need at this point, unless you really want the ice cannon for some reason.  It just freezes enemies.  Not too terribly useful, I'm afraid, when you can just kill them with fire.

So from town.  Head to the east, and then head to the southeast.

Equip your compass and your shovel.  Use the compass.  Follow the red arrow.

When you get to the spot where it spins, use your shovel.  Dig up some stairs!  Head on down.

Welcome to the light temple

This is the most complicated temple, but there are no enemies.

Head on north to the big room with a save point.

Go to the right.  Lights and mirrors!  Shiny.  Hit the switch to turn on the light. (just walk over it)

These next few steps are optional, unless you didn't get the fire cannon like I told you to.  This is to get the basic cannon, which does less damage.
-point the light at the red door
-head back out of the mirror room, and through to the leftmost door in the main room
-head down the stairs
-go through the door on the right
-head through the red doorway in the north
-grab the cannon
-go back to the mirror room

End of optional directions

Point the beam of light at the blue door

head back out of the mirror room, through the left door, down the stairs, through the door on the right, to the right again

shoot the switch

go north

grab the white key, head south, then south again through the blue door

hit the switch, head back to the main room upstairs

open one of the white doors, and shoot the switch in the room

go to the mirror room

point the light at the yellow door

head back left, down the stairs, right, and south

shoot the switch

go south through the door the switch opened

shoot both switches

grab the key, and head back up to the main room

go through the other locked door, and shoot the switch

the middle door in the main room is now open.  Go through it and go north.

place the light stone on the altar, have a lovely conversation telling you to go replace the dark stone.

Go west, north, west, north, west, north, shoot the switch to make the bridge appear, and go north

Now for the part of the game most likely to make one consult a walktrhough.  The torch puzzle.

1. Bottom left
2. top left
3. The one down and slightly left of that one
4. Where there are two diagonal to each other near the middle, it's the one to the bottom right
5. then the bottom most one
6. then the top most one
7. The one just to the left of that one
8. the one all the way to the right
9. The last one left

Go into the dark temple

This one's pretty straightforward

Go up the stairs on the left

straight path to the blue key

Go up the right stairs, straight path to the red key

go through the blue door, straight path to the green key

Go through the green door, grab the magnetic grappling hook

assign it to a key

Go through the red door, a metal pillar on the other side with the magnet to get across

Put the dark stone on the altar.  OMG it's Hanlon!

He tells you to head to mesembria power plant in the south mountains. So that's where we go.

back south out of the dark temple, south out of the swamp, hit the switch to go back across the bridge and go south

Go east, south, east, then keep going south, and go through the mountains and the town, south some more, and then through some more mountains and around a lava river to get to Mesembria / The Fire Temple.

Go in.  Go through the blue locked door on the right.  You don't need a key, this temple is just weird.  Go through, grab the hammer.  Equip the hammer.


Head back to the main room, smash a boulder at the top, and go through the left door.  Head up to the altar.

Hey, Meyer's not so bad.  You gotta go to the Life Temple in the forest.

Go back through the mountains, through the town, through the mountains some more.

go northwest, northwest again, and now you're in the forest maze.  In the first part, you're trying to get to the southwest part.  Then in the next tiny part you just go through, and in the next bit, you're trying to get to a place on the right side.

And hey, you're in the life temple!

left door, north door, left door, grab the key

head back, go through the locked door, head south

grab the red key, head back up and through the red door

Get the drill.  Equip the drill.

Go back to the main room, drill the cracked wall.

It's a pretty linear path up to a room with two black doors, and a door on each side.

Simple enough.  Go through left door.  grab key.  Unlock first black door.  Go through right door.  Unlock second door.  You're in the altar room.  Head on up.

Oh noes.  The death stone is being activated!  You get teleported back to the forest.  Find your way back out.

Once you exit the forest maze, Head north to the beach, east, then north some more to the caves.

Go north through the caves.  You'll eventually get to an indigo wall, with two torches and a cracked bit of wall.  Drill it.  Go in.

DEAAAAAATH!!!  Kill it!  Just shoot it with your fire cannon.  The end.