Catching up with Vespers

Although The Monk's Brew is a new blog, I've been blogging for some time on my progress with Vespers over at GarageGames.com, the makers of the 3D engine I am using (Torque Game Engine). I thought the beginning of this blog would be a good place to collect those initial reports, in case anyone would ever care to go back and review my development process and progress. All new blogs from this point will be posted here on TMB. Here are the links to the blogs, in chronological order:

Chasing Windmills?
11/8/05
In which I first discuss my decision to pursue a hybrid of interactive fiction and a first-person 3D engine.

"Vespers3D"
12/30/05
In which I discuss my initial attempts at creating a text parser within the Torque Game Engine, and my enlistment of Jason Devlin and "Vespers" as the experimental game.

Vespers3D: The Adventure of Text Parsing
3/9/06
I which I discuss some of the challenges of implementing a text parser within a 3D world, partcularly how to deal with objects that don't have physical representation in the 3D environment.

Vespers3D: The Adventure Continues
5/31/06
In which I discuss the implementation of the visual inventory, visual object higlighting, and the horrors of text parsing such as disambiguation and multiple objects.

Vespers3D: Living the Adventure
10/16/06
In which I discuss our choice of company name (Orange River Studio), customizing command inputs, a new opening intro sequence, and the implementation of purely informational verbs such as LOOK, LISTEN, and EXAMINE within a 3D environment.

Vespers3D: Adventuring Along
1/22/07
In which I discuss implementing command completion within the text parser, the introduction of our first NPC (Matteo), and the auditions for our voiceovers.

Vespers3D: Adventures in Cinematics, Part I
4/26/07
In which I discuss how I implemented the cinematic animations in the game using a sequence manager and triggers.

Vespers3D: Adventures in Cinematics, Part II
6/17/07
In which I continue to discuss the implementation of the sequence manager and animation states.

Vespers3D: Adventures with NPCs, Part I
6/30/07
In which I discuss the development of our first NPC, Matteo, from text to concept to animated and voice-acted 3D model.

Vespers3D: Adventures with NPCs, Part II
7/25/07
In which I discuss the development of our second NPC, Constantin, from text to concept to animated and voice-acted 3D model.

Vespers3D: Visibility Issues in 3D
8/6/07
In which I discuss some of the real problems with referencing objects in a 3D world due to complex collisions and collision checking.

Vespers3D: Adventures with NPCs, Part III
9/3/07
In which I discuss the development of our third NPC, Lucca, from text to concept to animated and voice-acted 3D model.

Vespers3D: Adventuring Onward
12/28/07
In which I discuss ongoing issues with animation, the new opening intro sequence and music, and the implementation of the objects in the church.