Progress Post: Day 1-3
I finally decided to do some work and make some games. And that first step is done by participating in a game jam, more specifically “My First Game Jam” hosted by J and lysander (itch page)
I’ve actually been meaning to create a game for a while; but, of course, like most I lacked the motivation. But new year, new decade, first game jam. Let’s hope I make it. Of course, some of the problems I expect to face are time management, motivation, and the obvious game bugs and issues. I am a beginner at this, even though I’m currently studying game development. No means am I a professional game creator (yet).
About the game I want to develop, it’ll be a pixel space shooter. That’s all I have planned for now to minimize my scope as much as possible. But if I have time, I’d like to add some plot (as a writer, it’s an itch to write) and make a ability/upgrade system.
Anyways, let’s move on to the progress I have made.
For the 1st day, I focused on setting up and creating sprites.
And I know it’s foolish to focus on art so early on but I’m a visual person. This is probably going to happen often throughout the project. The only excuse I have is that most of the sprites are, at least, still in a draft phase. The most sprites I created are (from left to right): the player, obstacles, a “boss” character, and basic enemies.
2nd day of work is mainly on scripting the character controller. I wanted the player to move via the mouse. Or more simply, the mouse (cursor) is the player. I also worked on basic shooting and some particle systems for effect. Makes things more pretty, don’t you think?
Day 3 is a weekday, thus less time to work for me. I’m already hoping for the weekend to come faster. But I still got some work done. I went ahead and worked a bit on the boss script. Not much, just a simple follow and retreat.
But I noticed a problem, that being the boss movements are very stutter-y. I assume that’s due to the player being the mouse and the input rate would be faster than keyboard. Not to mention that these are pixels so I’m working in a decimal space. Most of the sprites are less than 1 unit in length and width.
My plan is to switch the player controller to keyboard inputs and see if that resolves the stuttering.
My next steps are to add enemies and shooting for both the boss and the basic enemies.
So far I think this is good progress, if anything I should a base game down. Whether I’ll have an actual game with a menu and beginning-to-end (levels) is the question.
ContQuest Development Blog 