Sorry for the delay with this update, I ran into a lot of issues along the way, but I’m happy that I finally feel ready to share what I’ve been working on. The majority of my time has been spent on completing the character model I’ve been working on, rigging her, animating her, and finally getting her into the game. Getting this character into the game has raised some further issues though. Continuing what I mentioned a while back, performance regarding skeletally animated character is particularly poor in the engine right now, but I’m hoping this will be improved soon, and there are also various parts of the import process concerning animated character which are downright broken and will need to be addressed. Still, at least now you can see her in motion, and this should give you some insight into whats coming in the next major update.
A lot of the delays on this character came from feedback I got from a select few people who suggested a lot of improvements. I’m still not entirely happy with it, and will likely continue to improve it further, but I would really appreciate your feedback on seeing this character since this is actually my first attempt at character modelling, rigging, and animating. I am aware of some issues already like a slightly unconvincing run animation and the fact that the hair intersects with the body, but this will hopefully be solved with the introduction of physics simulations for the hair model.
Incidentally, if you’re an artist who thinks they can step in and improve this character, either via modelling, animation, or texturing, please consider contacting me.
Quick Localization-related ammendment
A few people have contacted me about wanting to translate Galatea into their own language. While there isn’t all that much to translate, I’ve decided to host the strings .csv file on a Github repository so people, if they want, can contribute translations of Galatea into their own language and I’ll include them whenever I update the game. Now, this won’t encompass all the strings in the game, and there are two types of strings which would both need to be translated for a full localization: generic system strings contained in csv files, and visual novel scripts written in a custom scripting language. While I will start to include some of script files, there is likely to be a LOT of narrative planned for the final game, and I don’t want to make everything public for the sake of story spoilers, and would generally prefer to work on this aspect with more professional localization people/teams. However, if you just want to have the base game available into your own language, feel free to translate what I have made available. The engine is unicode, so it should be possible to translate into any language, but there might still be some font issues related to CJK and right-to-left languages which I don’t yet know about.
Now, about git. I understand that git is very complicated for non-programmers (and even quite a few programmers), but since the strings in the game will be subject to very frequent change, I want a system which instantly allows me to update and revise data in the same way I work on code. This of course means that translations will become obsolete very quickly, so you will be responsible for making sure your translation remains in sync with the rest of the game. If git is too complicated for you to deal with but you still want to translate the game, just click the ‘Download Zip’ button on the Github page, and send me the updated file via email and I’ll commit them for you. Either way, you can find the first .csv file in the game here (https://github.com/SaracenOne/galatea_localizations).
Galatea Project Development Blog 
Great, so the game is taking some step forward. Unfortunately I don’t have any 3D animation skills to help you but I’m looking forward of the game.
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Thank you. I did actually quite enjoy my first foray into animation, and could still see myself doing a lot more of it, but it is very time-consuming, so I hope someone else does eventually feel like stepping in with this part.
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It joins the bones of hair with the column will give you a good buzz of walking and jumping
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If you mean using weights from the body on the hair, yes, that would help, but I still want to use physics in the long term with their own independant set of bones using attached rigid bodies and joints.
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I’m enjoying these updates so far. I really have high hopes for this game, and really looking forward to the next playable build.
As for this update, so far, seems like the characters have potential. Can’t wait to meet my waifus lol
Nice work, and good luck 😀
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Thank you. Hopefully you won’t have to wait as long for the rest of the cast, since I intend to build them all off the same base mesh with body, hair, and facial variations applied as needed.
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Dude,it seems like you can do everything.Programming,rigging, animating,texturing.
Are you a professional in everything?
Anyway,keep up the great work.
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Well, I know next to nothing about sound design and music. Technically speaking, I’ve only ever worked professionally as a programmer, but I have a pretty long background as game modder, and a lot of these projects were done largely solo, which forces you to learn a pretty diverse skillset, but this is still actually my first attempt at character modelling and animation.
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Dear Saracen, I started a Swedish translation (I have not finished it yet), but I am not sure I did it in the right way. Here is a link to what I have started:
https://github.com/VulpesVulpes42/galatea_localizations/blob/patch-1/generic_strings.csv
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Thank you very much. I few people have started sending me translations, so I’ll start merging them later today.
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looking forward to the next update.
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Thank you, there’s a broken stuff I have to fix first though.
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Saracen-san,
Are you doing all the animation, models, programming, textures all yourself ? If so will you consider gaining help from volunteers, like Yanderedev ?
By the way, good job, Saracen-san! Keep it up!
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I do all the programming for the game yes, although I do use a third-party engine called Godot while also attempting to extend it with new features. The character model and animations were done entirely by me. The basic geometry for the school and several of the props were also done by me, but we have at least two other people contributing props, as well as vast texture improvements to my older props. Some of the textures were made by me via photosourcing, but a lot of them were taken from sites like CGTextures.
I would be happy to talk to potential volunteers, but unfortunately, at the time of starting this character model, no one had stepped forward, but now that it’s up and running, maybe people will be interested in doing things with it. I’m also happy to accept volunteers in other areas too.
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It looks pretty good so far.
I did a french translation of your thing, i send it to you by Email.
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Thank you very much. I’ll check them out and merge them later today.
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Good Job i kinda like the Artstyle it looks great so far, just the Hair are a bit to “spiky” in my opinion but i know its not a finished model :).
You really doing a great Job cant wait for the next build!
Oh and i saw that you uploaded the .csv for the translation i will send it to you soon with german translation if not someone else did it already :P.
Keep up the Good Work i really enjoy your updates!
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Thank you, I’ll be happy to accept your localizations.
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Alright, I will try to give my feedback on the character here. My first reaction was kind of like “What is that?…” I saw it and I was immediately expecting something like the characters in Yandere Simulator. Upon first glance, I was didn’t think it was really good. It took me watching the whole video, than starting it over again before I was able to get a solid opinion however. I remember the first visual novel I played was Da Capo. Then the second one I played was Everlasting Summer. Everlasting Summer’s art style had me completely taken aback at first, it was familiar, yet weird at the same time. But I found as I played the game that I got used to it really fast and actually began to like it. That is pretty much what happened here. After the intial; well thats different: I pretty well came to appreciate the model you made. Especially sense it is your first try at modeling, rigging, and animating a character. It actually seems extremely good quality for what you have done so far.
The girl looks a little weird. For a second I thought she might be the protagonist (I think the protagonist should always be in first person view like standard visual novels so you can kind of reflect yourself onto them.) but that was just a derp moment and I realized she was not your average girl, but one of the heroines you showed off in a previous post. And then everything was fine, her appearance makes sense and it is well done. The only thing I can say is that face needs emotion. The eyes look dull and robotic, and of course she is stuck in that constant blank expression. its spooky. lol.
You are doing amazing work and remember that I look forward to your every update!
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It’s a tricky situation, and this update was actually delayed a bunch based on feedback I got internally, the feeling that there was something ‘off’ about the character but couldn’t quite nail what was wrong with it, since it seemed fairly detailed and seemed to follow the concept art fairly well. I would do more with it, but I didn’t want to delay showing it any further. Your reaction of ‘delayed appreciation’ is quite telling, but the fact that it doesn’t appeal at first glance is a problem and I’m concerned it’ll have the opposite effect and just turn people off the project.
Yes, you’re quite right, she’s actually one of the heronies planned for the game, but since AI is not fully implemented yet, I just used her model to test out the experimental third-person camera. The AI characters will use similar code to the player, so it made sense to me. The face is something I would have shown off here, but the morph controllers broke for some reason. If you look way back on one of my earlier posts, there’s a video which should show off what facial animation will look like.
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I am 90% adamant that the reason behind a lot of this “Not quite right” look is two things.
1.) The face, lack of emotion, and the eyes. The eyes are just one dull color, and its a dark color too. They are big like anime, but it looks like something you would expect from a mindless broken character. Eyes can be difficult to do right in anime format, especially in 3D. But for instance go to YandereDev’s recent video on Torture, Mind Breaking, and Murder-suicide and skip to 2:10, the scene where it zooms in on the girls face. You will kind of get an idea on how Anime eyes are supposed to be.
2.) Just overall poor animation to begin with. I don’t think your animation is really all that bad. But on the specific character that you showed, the lack of moving hair and dull face, (Alongside the detail displayed as well from a main heroine) it just seemed really lackluster. She moves around pretty generically and she looks like a fairly energetic person. So I feel like a lot of things would click if she looked more active, more cheerful, less dead inside (#eyes and face) I wonder if the Offness we are seeing is not so much your model, but the aura we expect her to put off from first impressions of her appearance, and the fact it doesn’t match how we would expect a wild girl like that to look.
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TL;DR
1.) Eyes need brightening
2.) The body language doesn’t match the facial expression and the hair needs to move more, at least to match the characters movements.
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Wow Saracen, this is really cool!!! You did an amazing job filling all the necessary roles to model and animate this first heroine. I think a little more texturing and details, just the normal refinement that’ll happen as you keep working, will make this model into something more likeable for you, because the base shapes that are here are actually pretty appealing (I love that you preserved the spikiness of her hair despite the challenge).
For feedback, I suggest that the default expressionless look have lowered eyebrows and possibly slightly lowered eyelids. The raised eyebrows and fully open eyes make her look a bit uncanny and vacant. A relaxed expression will make for a nicer and more natural first impression.
I also think that the running animation would look more natural if her shoulders and torso swayed from side to side along with her arms.
All in all this is really great and I know you’ll take it even further! Seeing you learn all this stuff makes me a little excited to learn as well. Would you accept not-so-great volunteers to contribute once in a while, or would that be more of a burden? I’ve taken a beginner Maya class at my college so I do know basic modeling and texturing, but nothing about exporting or making these models for game use (example untextured model I’ve done http://imgur.com/a/CLraK). It’d be cool to learn but I’d potentially be asking you a lot of questions and using up your time.
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Thank you very much, I do hope to improve the model more as I go on. The texturing is actually quite bland because there is very little hand-painted detail right now, most of it is procedurally-generated. I knew I was going to be coming back to this model, so I didn’t want to spend a bunch of time texturing it just yet when I knew I would have to throw it out later.
Sure thing, I’d be happy to accept your help. Just contact me by email.
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The video was actually really am glad that this game has gameplay in third person!
Well, as the character who controls the video it is not the protagonist.
You have an image of the protagonist?
PS: I know I’ve said it has no plans to go out with a male character, but still, dream the day that this is possible. But even if you can not date guys, I will play the game anyway! 🙂
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Right now, we don’t have an image for the protaganist because I treat them as kind of blank slate; my intention is to actually allow you to customize the look the protaganist. Datable male character as I said isn’t part of the current plan, but it may yet happen someday.
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