iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 06/10/2026

By the way, BG2 has pirates, too.

Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

I remember playing Death Gate (1994) and loved it, but I never beat the puzzle with the end boss. What I love about adventure games is that they often feel like a mix of movie, book, and game. If done right, every solved puzzle leads into an enjoyable animation and/or dialogue.

Death Gate: A dragon's head with its throat looking inside lava, while two people (possibly wizards) on small plateaus engage the dragon. The whole scene is shown inside a cave.

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Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

I am working on the last weapon animation. In this case, it is the flail. I made a few when testing animation type 7000 in the past, so it worked smoother than expected. Here is a sample. It contains bone constraints to simulate the chain movement. It could have been done better, but it serves.

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Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 24/09/2026

Finished animations for 5 weapons. 5 more to go.

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Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 19/09/2026

Rigging&animation for the ghost are done.Now the individual weapon animation per action needs to be done.Finished the sword animation.It is fun to come up with animations on the fly. It is a lot of work,but not as much as in the past due to a lack of basic knowledge (at least not all the time).

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Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 14/09/2026

All weapons are modeled. The next step is rigging and animation.

Top: Rendered ghost with all weapons
Bottom: Ghost with all weapons in Blender without any textures

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Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 13/09/2026

I just wondered how many people are still playing PST:EE on Steam,&it seems to be ~100 people daily since ~2022.That is a consistent number,the unknown player numbers who play the game in a different place, not included. The number is surprisingly resilient. src: steamdb.info/app/466300/c...

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Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 10/09/2026

I have finished the sword, dagger, bow, and mace for the ghost model to wield so far. The full weapon set consists of 10, so there are six to go. Modeling in Blender feels like character creation on steroids.

Left: Rendered ghost and four finished weapon models
Right: Weapon models in Blender without textures
Everything is still in works.

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Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 07/09/2026

Good evening, The body is also theoretically done, as I have no clue how well the rigging and animation will turn out.That said, I am not quite sure if the arms will be kept.This will replace the E000 Ghost animation for testing IE Autospriter. But before that, all the weapons need to be done, too.

Left: Ghost without arms
Right: Ghost with arms

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Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

Imagine on the other end the doc sees this. (I am obviously joking. Please, don't get disappointed in me. If you are allowed to joke around, then we are too🌈.)

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Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

Alright, I made the eyes. It is not the absolute final version, but one I can live with and like. The creature is not a demilich. The right image is the rendered version, just to see what it would look like at a 45° camera angle and in-game. The next part will be its body.

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Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 03/09/2026

Good evening, today, I finished the jaw of the creature. Next, I will model the eyes. I think animated, maybe glowing eyes could fit as the next step. We'll see.

A human skull with spikes on its head and spikes on its jaw.

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Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 02/09/2026

Good morning, I am currently working on this right now in Blender for animation type E000. I am not yet telling what creature it will replace for testing. It follows an idea and not a concept. The fun part is everything is allowed as long as it looks cool. Super curious how it will turn out.

An unfinished "human" skull with six spikes/horns on the head. The jaw is missing.

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Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 19/08/2026

PART4/ The end result is that the model looks very much like the one in Blender in detail, especially for color swapping. This was also the case with smaller resolutions like 256×256. I think with professional skills, very satisfying results may be achieved.

Left: Tunnel worm model in Blender, which also shows the colors needed to identify the areas that need to be color swapped.

Right: In-game tunnel worm with changed colors. It has a different color than the one in the video.

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Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 19/08/2026

PART3/X Because of past experience regarding light and how significantly important it is, I set the lights in all cardinal directions. Those lights are parented to the head and are allowed to illuminate only specific body parts.

The tunnel worm model and all the lights that are used in Blender for the model.

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Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 19/08/2026

PART2/X Type A000 animation allows color swapping. To see how good the end result can be with sculpting, the head and back of the worm were sculpted using my absolute beginner sculpting skills.

Shows the sculpted head and back of the tunnel worm in Blender.

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Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 19/08/2026

PART1/X Another animation test. This time, it is the animation type A000 for IE Autospriter. The video shows a self-made tunnel worm. For testing, the player character was polymorphed into one. This is the reason why the voice set is mixed. The result is better than I expected.

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Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 14/08/2026

I am currently working on a tunnel worm in Blender to test animation type A000. It will feature color swapping, but I will share more once I am done. I wish you a good night!

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Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 02/08/2026

This is a portrait of Akun Zaran, the halfling Wizardslayer who got his equipment from Duria Almas, which he then sold much later to Erdaine near Durlag's Tower. With that money, he bought his mother's house in Gullykin.

A male halfling with brown skin looks up at a light source that illuminates his face. He has a short black beard, and short black hair that is already showing the first streaks of gray. He wears golden armor.

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Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 26/07/2026

PART6/ Here is the redmean formula (see image). Here is the source: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Color_d...

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Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 26/07/2026

PART4/ The arm received the gray values that are mapped to blue in-game (left image). This happens because the light in Blender shines too brightly onto the arm and shoes (right image). I'll share the solution in the next post.

Left Ogre ingame and right Ogre in blender

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Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 26/07/2026

PART3/ The solution was to implement a distance metric known as "redmean." It worked better than expected. That being said, caution is still needed, as the metric doesn't always perform a correct interpretation. More in the next post.

Left Ogre with fixed colors and right Ogre with color bleeding.

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Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 26/07/2026

PART2/ The issue was that Near Infinity's BAM converter didn't work as planned. The resulting colors were all over the place, as seen in the screenshot below. This was caused by how NI weights pixel colors compared to the color replacement indexing used by the game.

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Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 26/07/2026

PART1/ Here is a short test video for animation type 9000. It replaces the original ogre animation with a custom-made one. There were a few issues involved in getting this model to work, which one I will explain in the following posts.

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Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 21/07/2026

I have written more than once about color-bleeding. So, here is an example.At first, the ogre has clean colors (using a converter), but when spellcasting, the colors are a mess. The reason for the difference is that I use differently rendered sprites for testing purposes across different animations.

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Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 20/07/2026

This reminds me of the "Great Oak of Kuldahar" in Icewind Dale, which gives shelter from the unforgiving cold that the area is known for(see ALT for more information).

The image shows a road leading to the great oak of Kuldahar. There is a ravine on the left side of the road. In the distance, lights and dwellings can be seen on the roots.

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Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 19/07/2026

Currently,all of the animations for these animation types are done.Here is a walk animation example.I still need a better understanding regarding rigging & animation.I have managed so far to minimize the need for weight painting nearly to zero,but I bet this will not be the case with future models.

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Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 17/07/2026

I am currently working on a selfmade Ogre model in Blender to test animation type 9000 for the IE AutoSpriter.The toughest parts are still the hands and making things not look so "blocky".I would say this is still an improvement over the first models I have presented here so far,as I am no designer.

Compare the self-made ogre model from its rough condition to its more smooth and detailed condition.

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Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 07/07/2026

PART3/ Having the light the correct way is still a challenge. In the image, the pants are marked showing the sculpted area. My first time ever trying simple/trivial sculpting. Unfortunately, the wrinkles on the pants are not as detailed as desired. Having too much light may result in color bleeding.

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Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 07/07/2026

PART2/ It seems like the Infinity Engine handles weapon layers and character layers differently. In the image, we see that the weapon layer is in the back while the character is in the front. This is not true for all orientations regarding this animation type.

Left: Weapon sprite
Right: Ingame self-made ogre mage model

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Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 07/07/2026

PART1/ Here is a video of the test model animation type 2000 with weapon overlays and color replacements. The video shows one polymorphed player into an ogre mage and another summoned ogre mage fighting each other. I learned a lot and got some insights regarding the IE animation behavior.

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Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 05/07/2026

Testing the Ogre Mage in-game. He is definitely too big in this case, but it's fun to see him.

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Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 02/07/2026

Animations have been completed.Here is one for attack animation A1.Next,the INI file generator needs to be written so that it can create the corresponding INI file for animation type 2000.The texture colors serve as placeholders for color swapping;this is why the rendering may look somewhat unusual.

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Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 30/06/2026

Alright, here is the Ogre Mage with the bow and quiver! The next thing I need to do is the animation. After that, I will export the frames using my self-made tool, IE AutoSpriter, and then convert them into .BAM files with Near Infinity so they can finally be used in-game.

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Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 29/06/2026

I am currently working on creating a model and an animation for animation type 2000. It will be an ogre mage (or something inspired by one). The sword, scabbard, bow, and quiver are already finished in #Blender. The monster model is also complete, but I won't be showing it just yet.

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Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 27/06/2026

Haha, I hadn't expected that. Time to draft a resignation letter, lol. And yeah, I didn't have an opinion on everything either.

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Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 16/06/2026

Name: Elaya Blackfayr ----- Race: Human ----- Profession: Druid ----- Age: 22 Years ----- Primary Weapons: Quarterstaff ----- Appearance: Reddish-brown hair and freckles -----

Portrait of a human woman with shoulder-length red hair, freckles, a top with a green stripe, and leather armor.

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Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 14/06/2026

Great art. I understand what the others' poses mean, but I have no idea about this guy's.

A man holding both open hands against his head as if he had antlers.

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Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 04/06/2026

We haven't heard anything for a long time about the "Baldur's Gate 2 Rebirth TC Mod", but it seems it is still in progress. The website contains progress bars, so if you want to keep track of it occasionally, you can visit the website: www.bg2rebirthmod.com/bg2rebirthmod/

Round Progressbars show:
* Chapter 4/5
* New Areas 78/82
* Minor QUests 169/169
* Medium Quest 20/20
* Large Quests 3/10

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Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 25/05/2026

Name: Yenie Wanderfoot (Wanderfoot – Evokes travel or a lighthearted nature.) ----- Race: Halfling ----- Profession: Thief ----- Age: 20 Years ----- Primary Weapons: Shortbow and Club (Fitting due to the small size of a halfling) ----- Appearance: Short and brown hair (Practical) -----

A female halfling with short hair, looking slightly upward. She wears a cloak and a shirt. The cloak is held in place by brooches connected by one or more strips.

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Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 08/05/2026

PART 6/7: Also, I learned regarding weapons that small elements, like the chains found in a flail, are not recommended. Meaning, the larger an element can be within the model, the better the chances that the details are more visible in-game.

The flail model as shown in Blender, specifically highlighting the chains and the in-game flail representation for comparison.

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Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 08/05/2026

PART 4/7: The downside is that the converter is a bit uncomfortable to handle regarding the color palette.To prevent color bleeding in this case, the BAM file must be generated first with the appropriate palette.Then, it needs to be imported again so a 'resize' filter can be used.

Left side: Model with color errors
Left side: Corrected version

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Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 08/05/2026

PART1/7: I've finally almost finished the animation for the Type 7000 (Monster split_bams=0). Here is a short video of the model in-game. The model supports color customization and weapon overlays. Unfortunately, I recorded the video at 1280x720, so please keep that in mind while watching.

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Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 08/05/2026

Here is a first look at the model. The colors are placeholders that the Infinity Engine requires to identify which ones need to be replaced by user-defined colors.

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Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 28/04/2026

Okay,I hadn't expected animation type 7000 to present so many challenges.The sprites were exported using IE AutoSpriter.For comparison,the self-made Burning Man has 1916 sprites.This new one has 89,370–possibly not all of them needed,but most of them.This needs to be automated somewhere🤞.(read ALT)

This is an image of all the weapons when they are made visible in Blender. They were all rendered individually, so this is not the final result, although it looks funny, so I'm sharing it anyway.

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Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 25/04/2026

A really great interview with Chris Avellone about Fallout, but I'm sharing it mainly because it also contains two short pieces of information about IE games. More details in the screenshot.

While the interview focuses on the Fallout games, he also shares two interesting and very short views on the IE games.

Timestamp 1:43:11
An interview with Chris Avellone (Lead Designer of PST) reveals that he finds Imoen annoying.
[...] try and make the player care about this family member to go seek them out is always a tough job in any RPG. Like [BG] couldn't even do it effectively for me where I'm like, I don't care that she's my sister. Like for she's annoying like there's no real blood between us.[...]
This could be interesting, as these views of his may have influenced PST, which is why they have a certain historical relevance on a design level.

Timestamp 3:11:33
Chris Avellone praises the collaboration with BioWare and emphasizes the importance of technology, narrative structure, and design.
[...] And also [...] if you do the same comparison with BioWare and them giving like Black Isle Infinity Engine to do [...] you know, [IWD] and [PST] and all the other stuff [...] at no point did BioWare get frustrated at us using their. I mean actually they took code from us, too. [...] We shared that stuff, but BioWare was already great stuff on their own where [...] it wasn't even a question that [...] we were even outshining them. They were just doing a better job with it. so, like that's the best defense. [...] Your studio has to do the best job it can with your tech. And it's great that you're giving tech to other studios, but if they do a better narrative or a better design structure than you, tha's kind of on you.[...]

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Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 24/04/2026

Okay, the animations are finished, and most of the weapon models are also created and attached to the creature. This will be an IE AutoSpriter demo for animation type 7000. I'm keeping modelling deliberately super simple, as it's very time-consuming. I think I need a few days off from this.

The weapons usable in IE AutoSpriter have been activated.
Still missing: Axe, club, two maces, katana, scimitar, morning star and warhammer

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Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 23/04/2026

A beautiful, seven-year-old fan artwork by lathander1987. It depicts the final battle between Sarevok, Minsc, Jaheira, possibly Khalid, perhaps Viconia, and the protagonist. Source: www.reddit.com/r/DnD/commen...

The image shows Sarevok being attacked and surrounded by party members of Gorion's ward.
Image by:
[lathander1987] a digital and traditional painting artist X: https://x.com/lathander87 Commissions: https://vgen.co/lathander e-mail : zpffldhtm87@naver.com

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Akin C. Dev @incrementis.bsky.social · 19/04/2026

Well,when I was younger I liked art books by Luis Royo&bought a few.He created cool&often erotic fantasy images in them;a kind of heavy metal,I'd say.Nevertheless,I'm not a heavy metal fan,nor am I someone whose taste can be defined by a specific franchise.I've consumed too many things for that.

Title: "Plot 127"
A warrior reminiscent of Conan, wearing a black fur coat. The scene resembles a fantasy wasteland, but contains no science fiction elements. The warrior holds a sword in each hand, the points of which are facing the ground.

Ttile: "Diamond sword"
A person in heavy science fiction armor, holding a futuristic machine gun in one hand and a two-handed sword in the other.

Title:"Plot 155"
A woman in revealing clothing, showing a lot of skin but covering her intimate areas. She has long hair and wears very long, spiked gloves.

Title: "Shiva in steel"
Science fiction scene; in the background, space shuttles are fighting each other. In the foreground, a man and a woman in science fiction armor can be seen, both armed with scientific guns.

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