HOLLOWCUT Devlog
Devlog · updated 15 Oct 2026

Cantorite: Carriage Line — Devlog

A roguelite auto-battler in the Vesper Reach, in Godot. A short armoured train rolls through a gauntlet of stops, and the player decides the order of its carriages. This page follows it step by step: what changed, why, and what it looked like at the time.

The eras

The project is in pre-production. Each phase below is one step of the work, grouped into one era.

14 Oct – 15 Oct · 7 entries

Pre-production

Everything before the first playable build: a pitch picked from a round of ideas, concept art, the written design, asset references, a colour correction for the enemies, faction skins for the train, and the start of a vertical slice in its final style.
14 Oct – 15 Oct

Pre-production

Everything before the first playable build: a pitch picked from a round of ideas, concept art, the written design, asset references, a colour correction for the enemies, faction skins for the train, and the start of a vertical slice in its final style.

  1. a 14 Oct

    Pitch

    done

    Picked from a round of game ideas: a mobile-first roguelite auto-battler in the Vesper Reach. A short armoured train rolls through a gauntlet of stops; its carriages fire on their own, and between stops the player buys, orders and merges them. Godot 4 with GDScript; touch, mouse, keyboard and gamepad; Android and iOS first, then desktop and Steam Deck.

    Runs take about ten minutes, so a whole run fits into a short session.

    The first look from the mobile-ideas round, before the pitch was chosen. From the repo · 15 Oct
  2. b 15 Oct

    Concept art

    done

    Concept images generated with Flux 2 Klein: a first pass on the 4B model, then the 9B model for the keepers. Each batch was checked by eye and the keepers picked by hand. The key art and the conductor are the picks here.

    Key art: the train on a stone viaduct at dusk, with lightning over the Reach. From the repo · 15 Oct
    The conductor concept, the Gaffer: the first look at the character. From the repo · 15 Oct
  3. c 15 Oct

    Style guide, game design and screens

    done

    The first written design: a style guide (art direction, palette, UI rules), the game design, a technical design for Godot (deterministic simulation, platform integration, store, CI), the monetisation (a free first area, a one-time Full line unlock, no ads, no energy, no loot boxes), and every screen described with a mock-up image.

    de56ac8
    Title screen mock-up. From the repo · 15 Oct
    Route map mock-up. From the repo · 15 Oct
    Depot screen mock-up. From the repo · 15 Oct
  4. d 15 Oct

    Asset refinement

    done

    Reference sheets for the train (a locomotive turnaround and a carriage lineup) and the conductor (a turnaround sheet, with expressions and a dialogue portrait in the repo). The boss (the Viaduct Crawler) and the enemies were refined in the same round, in a first colour set that is shown in phase (e).

    Locomotive turnaround: front, side and three-quarter, with a rust boiler and a slate cab. From the repo · 15 Oct
    Four carriages in side view: cannon, gatling, flamethrower and tesla coil. From the repo · 15 Oct
    Conductor turnaround: front, side and back, in a rust coat with brass buttons. From the repo · 15 Oct
  5. e 15 Oct

    Canon colour correction

    done

    The enemies were the wrong colour. The Harrow are smoked quartz and ivory glass with glowing gold cracks; the first set was violet, which is the Umbra's colour. The mite, shard bat, beetle, worm, watcher eye and splinter were recoloured in gold. The violet set is kept only as the before.

    “Please note the harrow art.. its not in line with the other games. You're using purple which is umbra. Thst's fine.. umbra can be an enemy.. but the harrow should be gold”
    Before: mite, shard bat and beetle in violet, the Umbra's colour. From the repo · 15 Oct
    After: mite, shard bat and beetle in smoked quartz with gold cracks. From the repo · 15 Oct
    After: all six enemies from a steep top-down camera, in gold. From the repo · 15 Oct
  6. f 15 Oct

    Faction skins: Directorate and Umbra

    done

    The train and the conductor in two faction styles, as concept art. Directorate: pale steel with cyan running strips and a thin brass stripe, an armoured supply train. Umbra: a matte black locomotive with a single violet light. Not made yet: an Umbra conductor, and carriage variants for each role.

    “It Might be worth it to have several train styles.. eg this generic is fine.. but we might skin the train more as a directorate train.”
    Directorate train on rails: pale steel, cyan strips and a brass stripe. From the repo · 15 Oct
    Directorate conductor: near-white coat with cyan cuffs and brass buttons. From the repo · 15 Oct
    Umbra train in side view: matte black, with one violet light on the front. From the repo · 15 Oct
  7. g 15 Oct

    Vertical slice build

    in progress

    The vertical slice is started in its final style from day one, so nothing has to be re-skinned later. The shots are the references it is built to: the screen layout and the gold enemies. They are not screenshots of a build yet.

    Merge screen mock-up: the target layout for the slice. From the repo · 15 Oct
    The worm and the watcher eye, in gold: the final enemy look. From the repo · 15 Oct

The images are concept art and reference sheets from the game's repository, and screen mock-ups made with an image model. Nothing here is a screenshot of a build yet. Images are shown as they were made, with their remaining flaws.