About
Hero of Allacrost is a single player 2D role-playing game inspired by classic console RPGs. In Hero of Allacrost, the player will explore rich environments, solve challenging dungeon puzzles, and fight strategic battles in an active-time based system. The game is free open-source software and is currently available across several platforms including Windows, OS X, Linux, and FreeBSD. In addition to the game, we also develop and release a custom map editor for the game.

The three major design goals we are striving to meet with this title are listed below.

• Prioritize efforts on developing engaging gameplay and a compelling narrative
• Eliminate tedious and micromanagement mechanics that are commonly found in RPGs.
• Make battles interesting, challenging, and requiring of a high level of strategy from the player

The About page on our website describes several of the game's core features and how they enable us to meet these goals.


Activity
Our latest release was in June 2015. This was a development release, which is essentially a snapshot of our work in  progress. Below is a link to download it as well as a walkthrough video of this release with commentary.

• Release Files: http://www.allacrost.org/download
• Release Video:

The next milestone we're working toward is another development release that continues where our previous release left off, which will finish out the current "chapter" of the game. The major requirements for this release include map design, scripting, and creation of some additional artwork (map tilesets and around a dozen sprites). The anticipated date of this next release is sometime in September 2015. This is what our team will be working on for the next couple of months.

By the end of this year, we will be making an official release. This will be a fully designed, balanced, and polished product. It will be an iterative improvement of the September 2015 development release with some amount of additional content and improved event scripting, dialogue, and several noticeable improvements in the UI and other areas of the code. This is the team's current long-term goal. More information about our upcoming releases can be found on the Roadmap page on our wiki. This includes a list of all the major tasks that must be done along with their current status.


Compensation
Allacrost is created and distributed for free. Because of this we cannot offer financial compensation to those who work on the project. Our team members are quite content with putting forth their efforts into what we believe will someday be a great game to share. We learn a lot from each other on the Allacrost team and you will absolutely learn new techniques and skills from those whom you work aside with. Having this experience will also make you a much more attractive candidate if you are seeking to enter into the gaming industry. Some of our team members have been solicited by recruiters for well-known game development companies. Your full name will appear in the game credits.


Talent Needed
This project took a long hiatus and as a result has a very small team at the moment. We would really like to rebuild a team of dedicated, passionate individuals who share the vision of what Allacrost is to become and want to be a part of making it happen. Becoming a member of this team means more than simply getting told what to create. We strongly encourage people to participate in design discussions and offer their own ideas to improve the game and the project itself. Although the core design of Allacrost is pretty well-defined at this point, there's still a lot of unanswered design questions and features we have not yet implemented. There's still plenty of room for you to influence this title should you be interested in doing so. While we are seeking core team members, we're also happy to welcome contributors who prefer to help out here and there with adding a new feature or creating new art or music, but aren't as invested in this project.

You can read more about what it's like on the Allacrost team and our philosophies by reading about our team policies on our wiki. Listed below are the specific needs that we are seeking to fill and what people who fill those roles can expect to be working on for the next couple of months.


Pixel Artist
Pixel artists create the majority of the game's graphical assets. This includes map tilesets, sprites, and various other in-game artwork. Pixel artists have a large amount of freedom and those in the past have gifted us with some quite brilliant pieces. Below are some examples of our current pixel artwork so you can get an idea of our style. If you feel this above your skill level, please don't be intimidated. Even programmers create some of the art occasionally, and they are certainly not this skilled. The most immediate needs for pixel art include: a castle interior tileset, various demon sprites, and a few more sprites that represent townspeople.

Links:
(1) - Information on rights to an artist's work and how to get started
(2) - Lists the types of artwork found in Allacrost. The Maps, Sprites, and Icons sections cover pixel art
(3) - Explanation of our artistic styles, influences, and design



Traditional Artist
In addition to pixel art, Allacrost integrates usage of some more traditional artwork styles as well. These commonly come in the form of portraits and landscapes. See below for examples of this type of artwork. The most immediate needs for our traditional art include: face portraits for some major NPC characters, a body portrait of a generic soldier, and a landscape representing a desert castle-town.

Links:
(1) - Information on rights to an artist's work and how to get started
(2) - Lists the types of artwork found in Allacrost. The Backdrops and Portraits sections cover traditional art
(3) - Explanation of our artistic styles, influences, and design




Joining
Follow this link for information on how to join our team and what you can expect from working on this project. If you have questions or wish to give feedback, feel free to either post a reply in this thread or contact me directly if you wish to inquire in private.

I like Chris2balls' knee edit. I thought the original right knee was a sore point as well. I like the original pallete better though. The new one does make it look a bit more "scalely", but that's about the only clear benefit I see. The violet shades look a little weird to me...

I love the shading you did on the top of the mushroom, but the bottom looks incredibly bleak in comparison. I'd try throwing in another shade or two to give the stem more texture. Also that splotch of light grey on the very bottom doesn't make any sense to me. If its there to be showing detail of some feature of the stem, its not coming through. But you otherwise did an excellent job here. Just improve the shading on the stem and I think it'll look fantastic. You might also want to play around with adjusting the size/shape of the eyes as well.

I started from scratch tonight following that little tutorial and here's the result.




I must say it looks much better. The only thing that bothers me is that now I've made what seems more like a stone wall than a brick wall. Which is fine, as I guess it makes more sense for a castle to be build from walls of this type. But if I wanted to make a brick wall, where the bricks were, in fact, all the same size, I'm not sure how it would come out looking. I could color the bricks differently to introduce variation, but it seems like I would be restricted from making bricks of different sizes (which is what my last wall tiles did). Any thoughts on that, or on this new wall I put together?