Today we thought to keep you updated about the ongoing bugfixes and improvements.

• First of all we have extended the time limit from 99 seconds per level to 120 seconds. A bunch of people who were able to play a preview complained about “lack of time” as they prefer exploring levels and collecting as many items as possible. Those 120 seconds should be now really more than enough for everyone, even for “explorers” and “diamond collectors”.
• We have two types of wall bricking now. As you know if Giana has her curly hairstyle she can destroy bricks – depending on her power there are two ways the brick disappears. If you have the energy-ball and you are bricking a wall, the brick get’s dissolved. As soon as you get stronger and have shooting ability, your “energy” level raises too and if you destroy a brick it splits into 4 parts as you know it from the preview videos. This is more like an eye candy and grant at least a little bit of difference during gameplay.
• Here comes something we have shameless stolen from “Super Mario” :) If you destroy a brick, you will get one extra score. This might be not a lot, but the main goal is not to destroy as many bricks as possible. Maybe as soon as the game is out some ppl might be worried about “who has the highest” score, so adding this ability to bricks, will be an important factor for score hunters. One point might be not a lot, but see everything in bigger dimensions. We might raise the amount of points you get from 1 to 5 or 10, but we are pretty unsure about that. After all you get 50 points just for squeezing an regular enemy ;)
• The whole intro stuff is done – Credits, a “special inspriation screen”, language selection and then it goes over to the titlescreen from where you can start the game – just finetuning left there.
• Last but not least, our coder fixed something which is of internal matter, the test mode shows everything animated now – which is a lot more comfortable when testing things ;)

Auf der deutschen Internetplattform studiVZ hat unser Beta-Tester Mulle die Gruppe Giana’s Return angelegt. studiVZ- und meinVZ-Nutzer können gern in dieser Gruppe beitreten, um aktuelle Reports vom Beta-Tester zu lesen oder auch Fragen zu stellen und Antworten zu erhalten.

(German only this time folks, sorry)

Earlier this morning (1am) [thUg] came up with a fixed tileset of World 1. It is looking a lot cleaner than the one we used before.

Some of you might think, why do you guys need to clean and detail pixel things?
It’s pretty easy to answer. The graphics are optimized for 320×200 pixel screens, this also keeps us the possibility open for a MS-DOS port. If we have “dirty” pixelgraphics and resize this to native solutions of other systems, things would look a bit rubbish. With this clean-pixel task we try to improve the quality for fullscreen stretching on any machine, while keeping the retro-style.

Due to the professional repixeling the amount of colors are also reduced a lot, which ensures we can save some RAM ;) This might not be relevant for new systems, but we want to have this game running on many beautiful (retro) systems such as GP2x, Amiga AGA, Dreamcast, Playstation Portable, etc…

Also some gossip about Giana’s Return GP32: As our music is available as .xm this willl eat lots of CPU speed, it might be a special difficult task to manage this game on a GP32, which does not mean it will not happen. We are currently discussing what to do and if it’s possible at all. Our musician op3rator took the old MOD’s and improved them and added more channels, which turned out in 8 channel .xm’s. His base music is basically available as .xm only now (specially the new composed tracks) and we wont give him more work with “backcomposing” to .mod. So either we can get Giana jumping on a GP32 or not… the chances are 50:50.

Also there are still thoughts which platform we should support first. Initially we have thought about a GP2x release, but it’s unsure at this time, if this will really happen first. There are severall reasons for this… we will just track the homebrew scene, follow comments and behaviours of users and our decision will be positive for the “most helpful and thankful” community.

With today we are one stop closer and many more steps will follow. While the tileset adjusting is not fully done, we are working on many “minor” engine improvements – specially eyecandies. Our genious french coder is working very hard to get the bugtracker empty and add improvements, which should work out really well for the final product.

Just had a talk with [thUg] 3 hours ago and he already had his hands on tileset number one. He should be done with fixing and cleaning by this weekend. We are all excited!

As soon as the sound fx are comming in and the clouds were fixed as well, we will present an updated video of World 1.

Hello dear Giana-Fans!

First of all, let us tell you that the project is not abandoned and we won’t abandon it ;)

Everyone has already read the story about the graphics artist issues severall times already and you boys and girls are probably already sick about it – which would be pretty much understandable. A pixelgraphics artist from France named [thUg] who was also active in the Amiga demoscene offered his help, which we will glady accept – things should move on soon.

So this was the status about Giana’s Retun itself… now time for something new…

We got hands on a very talented (but unfortunatly not free) graphics artist who is currently drawing sprites and tiles for a new Sci-Fi Jump’n’Shoot. We are taking essences from “Hard’n’Heavy”, “Metal Slug” and “Turrican” and mixing it up into a brandnew game, based upon the Giana’s Return engine. Of course we could have got that graphics guy also for our main project, but the background of this story is a bit more difficult and would probably fill a few pages to explain.

We have the main sprite “Little Bastard” ready and animated, white a nice and proper gun in his hands. Within the next three to four weeks, we should have everything ready to start. The game itself will be less complex than Giana’s Return as we want to head towards “Hard’n’Heavy” which was dealt as “The Great Giana Sisters II”.

We don’t have a music artist for this, as Operator is still busy with the Giana’s Return music and sound FX. Our organizer is already having some artists in mind, who could provide proper chipmusic. This time it might not be “exclusive” tracks as for Giana’s Return, but be sure that the music will rock the house – or better said “chip” the house.

Kudos!
Your’s Giana’s Return Team

PS: We answered most of the people who offered help, but most of them didn’t reply, did you guys checked your spambox folder?

… there is time for some more news.

Thanks for the few guys who were trying to help with graphics, unfortunatly some of them did not reply to an answer, but maybe that’s comming (affected people, make sure you check your spam folder too).

We now have three potential pixel artists who want to help out, let’s see if the detail talk will scare them off or not.

Hopefully everything is moving on soon…

Dear visitors,

We want to keep it short – we need a Pixel Graphics Artist for Giana’s Return to get things finished. We can not pay anything, we can only offer you fame (aka credits) and donations shares (if there will be any). Please keep in mind that this project is HOBBY & FUN for the team, nevertheless we want to see it in good condition and fully finished the next few weeks.

Your job would be:

* Cleaning Pixel Graphics
* Drawing minor objects
* Adjusting GFX Sets to match a theme
* Able to deal with color limitations

As the engine is already done, you wont have too much freedom (but a bit).

If you want to help, please write an email to the project organizer at shahzad(DOT)sahaib(AT)web(DOT)de – preferable with some sample work, or a link with sample work.

Thanks a lot!

The organizer and the coder were catching a flu the past week. Both are almost recovered, but now the coder has gone on vacation for around one month.

In the meantime he fixed minor problems, basically details.

Something else which just came to our attention is this:

Seems someone gained the permission for an official Giana’s Sister PC sequel,
which brings up the question if the word of the trademark owner is still vaild
and we can still release Giana’s Return. In worst case, we just rename the 2 girls
and change the titlescreen musix remix.

Anyone got more info on that sequel/remake?