HOLLOWCUT Devlog
Devlog · updated 15 Oct 2026

Cantorite: Chime Walk — Devlog

A touch-first grid puzzle in the Vesper Reach, in Godot. Each level is a board of stone tiles with a shadow hound; the player places crystal chimes and lures the hound into the pit. 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 · 6 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 hounds and chimes, 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 hounds and chimes, 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 touch-first grid puzzle in the Vesper Reach. Each level is a small board of stone tiles with a shadow hound and an exit pit. The player places crystal chimes; every chime rings, and the hound follows the loudest ring. Godot 4 with GDScript, in portrait; Android and iOS first, then Windows, Linux, macOS and Steam Deck.

    One level is one short session of one to five minutes.

    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. The chime keeper and the citadel map are the picks shown here. The first palette was violet, which phase (e) corrects.

    The chime keeper concept: a hooded wanderer with a lantern and a bundle of chimes. From the repo · 15 Oct
    The map concept: a winding path of stone bridges through fog, up to a citadel on the peak. From the repo · 15 Oct
  3. c 15 Oct

    Style guide, game design and screens

    done

    The first written design: a style guide, the game design (hound movement, chimes, tiles, the first levels), a technical design (level schema, the solver, save and sync, platform integration), the monetisation (a free first area of 15 levels, a one-time Full walk unlock, optional cosmetic packs, no ads and no energy), and every screen described with a mock-up image.

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    Title screen mock-up. From the repo · 15 Oct
    Level map mock-up. From the repo · 15 Oct
    Hound run mock-up. From the repo · 15 Oct
  4. d 15 Oct

    Asset refinement

    done

    Refined reference art for the chime keeper (a turnaround and a set of poses) and the area-1 tiles: floor variants, moss, walls, crumbling and unstable tiles, and the exit pit. The keeper's chimes were still violet in this round, and the tile sheet's violet pit is an open question for the owner. The hounds were refined in the same round, in violet, and are shown in phase (e).

    Keeper turnaround: front, side and back, with a crook, a lantern and a satchel of chimes. From the repo · 15 Oct
    Keeper poses: walking with the lantern up, kneeling to place a chime, holding one up as it rings, and looking up. From the repo · 15 Oct
    Tile sheet: stone floor variants, moss, walls, crumbling and unstable tiles, and the exit pit. From the repo · 15 Oct
  5. e 15 Oct

    Canon colour correction

    done

    The hounds and the chimes were violet, which is not part of the Harrow's palette. The Harrow hounds are now smoked quartz, ivory and gold, with gold cracks and a gold core. The chimes are pale cantorite. The violet hounds are kept only as the before.

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    Before: the hounds in violet, with purple cracks. From the repo · 15 Oct
    After: hound key poses in smoked quartz and ivory with gold cracks, including a fall into a pit. From the repo · 15 Oct
    After: the chime set in pale cantorite: shard, bell, cracked and hush cage. From the repo · 15 Oct
  6. f 15 Oct

    Vertical slice build

    in progress

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

    Level play mock-up: the target layout for the slice. From the repo · 15 Oct
    Hound turnaround in gold: the final hound 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.