Hello. This is Laguna from J&L. Not so J&L at the moment as you will see in a moment. Some important news.


Joker has left J&L

With more pressing matters at hand and with a lot of stuff going on in his life, Joker decided that his contributions (mainly spriting and graphic work) weren't coming as steadily as they should and that he would leave the development group. I intend to keep its name for old time's sake, but J&L is just me at this point, unfortunately. On the other hand, edchuy and some other users offered their help so in a way this project is not something I'm taking on single-handedly.


Natura: Director's Cut is pretty much ready

Working on the revamp of Natura 1 was incredibly tough. Much harder than making things from scratch, I'd say. Working around and remaking things we had done nearly five years ago has been more time consuming than I'd expected. The results, however, are quite satisfactory. Allow me to show you some examples...

Above is BEFORE, below is AFTER:

Example 1

Example 2

The game's action goes quite differently, especially during the first half. If you tried Natura and never finished it, I recommend that you do give it a try this time. The newest version is almost ready, except...


Natura: Director's Cut could use a beta tester or two

With all these changes I am afraid I will have messed up along the way. I do test the game myself all the time, but testing from others has proved to be very effective at finding bugs I never looked for.

Are you up for the challenge? You'd be able to play a functioning and finished version of the director's cut ahead of its release. Please send me a PM if you are interested.


Natura 2 experiences some changes

Since it'll be my duty to do handle the game's progress from now on, I have decided to change a couple of features. The aim of these changes is to (sadly) reduce the huge amount of spriting some of them required and simplify systems that I realized were way too complicated. Some things get more complex and interesting, too, so it's not all bad news.

-The class system stays as it is, but animations and different sprites between passive mode and aggressive mode will be reduced. Slightly less natural, much less work to do.
-The real-time clock system is replaced for a simpler, static day-night system. Although having the day change in real time was really hard to do, I find myself forced to simplify this system because it it very difficult and time consuming to implement. I also believed that it could be a nuisance and slightly hard to understand.
-The story has had its time to become deeper. My experiences with other games have made me realize the importance of the background lore and how important it is to make the city where most of the action happens more "alive".

I hope to show you a sample of how Natura 2 is turning out soon.