Day 1 and 2 - START DESIGN PHASE

Hi all! Burnerknight Studios here (Exevalon on the CDN forums)!

For this year's Speedgame Challenge I've selected the verse of 2 Timothy 4:7 - I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith.

Yesterday I took the time put down some notes around a core game idea: giving the player a set amount of time to complete a series of tasks while also keeping to a specific goal. When the time is up, the player will be evaluated for their work.

I'm inspired by Minit and its 60 second gameplay mechanic centered around the goal of destroying a cursed sword. Another thing I find interesting with Minit is the potential for speedrunning  and for replayability, so that's something I would love to capture with my game. 

One idea I've come up with to differentiate my game from Minit is to have random blocks of time assigned to players during each play session, so it won't be the same each playthrough. The idea here in connection with Paul's statement in the verse is we all have a different time table on Earth. At the end, all our works will be judged by God. So Paul has fought the good fight, finished his race and kept the faith. He is content with the life he has lived. And confident that God will approve of it. Thinking on this, I find that some things we do may add to that time or may take away from that time (exercise, healthy living, drugs, alcohol, etc), and can affect our way of achieving our life goal or mission.

Analyzing the text in order to find a structure that I can design my game around, both mechanically and narratively, I've found the following:

The verse flows in three segments, [1] I have fought the good fight, [2] I have finished the race, [3] I have kept the faith.

The first segment has the verbs: Fought, Fight - And the noun: Fight.

The second segment has the verbs: Finished, Race - And the noun: Race.

The third segment has the verb: Kept - And the noun: Faith.

There is one adjective present: Good - and it is applied to Fight.

And the verse describes to me: A sense of completion after having done certain actions in one's life.

So, armed with this knowledge, I arrived to the core game idea I wrote above. Using the nouns, verbs, and adjective, I will create a game that uses them through visuals, narrative, mechanics or general theme and aesthetics. Verbs are great for describing gameplay actions-reactions, and the nouns can describe perhaps a name for this game or elements within the game's UI, World, Environment, etc. The adjective can help with that as well.

Stay tuned as I continue with further updates!

No idea what you are going to do yet, but from what you are describing, sounds like this might be something unique and worth a see.

Sounds like you're really getting into the design. Can't wait to see what you come up with!

Day 3

So Sunday I spent some time thinking about what kind of emotion and mood I'd like to convey in the game. I searched through art word lists so I could have the right vocabulary to describe what I wanted to do. 

I want my gameplay to convey a sense of joy and contentment. That doesn't mean that it will contain that throughout the entire experience, but overall that is where I'm pointing that. 

I want to convey an energetic mood, stimulating and thought provoking for the player. 

Color wise, I'm going to explore a four color harmony using complementary colors that are bright, brilliant, and electric.

I've continued thinking through the gameplay design and realize that the verse I've chosen and it's description along with my core gameplay idea is a mirror of every major story or epic out there.

There's an overarching goal, but the hero or heroes must complete several tasks along the way, being tested throughout the journey. When they finally reach their destination, they've either kept the faith (kept to their goal) or changed. LOTR is an example of this as Frodo journeys to Mordor to destroy the one ring. In Batman: The Dark Knight we see the same thing with Batman and Harvey Dent who later becomes Two-Face. The White Knight of Gotham ends up falling; figuratively and literally.

So my task here is to either create a more specific core idea from what I have, or using my current core idea, ideate a world that is creatively original in nature (even if it borrows from other IPs).

I've got a few ideas related to that, so today, Monday, I'll wrap up the design phase and commence development.

Blessings!

Day 4 - END DESIGN PHASE & START DEVELOPMENT PHASE

So today I'm gonna do some quick research to help me visualize how I want the game to look and play, stay tuned for updates amid all the E3 news!

P.S. So after doing some research for about two hours, I've selected some images that help me imagine what I want to convey in this game, in gameplay, mechanically, and visually. Going for a Top-Down overview, and looking to implement micro-gameplay as a concept, similar to Minit. I should also think of a name for my game...

P.P.S. So played around with my color schemes and made up different tile types.

Probably final post for the day; the beginnings of a mock-up scene!

Ah, now I am starting to finally see what you are after, although half is still a mystery. But starts to look like something worthy.

Day 6

Starting to build this in GMS2 and moving more fully into development. Design-wise, I was caught up in how to express the player goal and the why for having limited time in completing it. Further reflecting on the verse and squeezing it for more juice, I came across what I think points towards a good player goal, a why, and gameplay actions that help the player move towards his/her goal. I don't want to reveal it yet as I want to keep some sense of mystery and excitement until the game becomes playable.

Meanwhile, here's a house!

P.S. And so I've officially started development as I've placed the first objects into GMS2; the house, the characters, the tiles. It's a basic room I can roam around in with some basic movement code and a scrolling camera. And so it takes life!

My next steps involve giving the characters life with animation and dialogue, followed by some questing for the player. I want to eventually finetune the camera movement, the player movement, add several rooms, add the end game scenario, and maybe add some mini-games the player can interact with. Most importantly, make sure the game is fun!

That's all for tonight, tomorrow is another day!

Day 7

So this day I worked very little on the game. What I did manage to do was start a walk cycle for the main character. That was fun!

Day 8

Going to test my character's walk cycle today and continue working on the game.

P.S. Prepped the animation, fixed some issues, and put it in-game! Works like a charm!

Day 9

So today I took stock of what I need to make my game playable at the least, then what I would be able to add to the game in order to make it bigger and more exciting after meeting the initial goals.

In concept art as in product design, there is what is called M.V.P. or Minimum Viable Product. So, for structure, I'm going to use an offshoot of that term called Minimum Viable Game.

M.V.G.

- Players receive initial goal or 'gift'.

- Players can interact with other characters.

- Players can receive tasks from characters.

- Once players complete each task, they are rewarded.

- Players will play in chunks of 24 seconds (fulfills the micro-gameplay core idea)

- Play will last for 7 days (each second will count as if it was an hour, 1 day = 24 seconds). At the end, player is rewarded on how many tasks were completed and whether they kept to the goal they received in the beginning.

Completing this, my game will be playable while respecting the theme and concept I came up with using the verse. After this, I can move on to expanding the base game.

After M.V.G. is achieved:

- Add character animations.

- Add mini-games.

- Add end-sequence on ferry or train.

- Expand game world.

- Add extra rest stops for when night falls..

Right now I've gotten a 24-second timer set up which restarts the game every time it counts down. This gives me an idea of how long it takes to reach certain characters and move around them. It also allows me to explore gameplay with that time constraint, so I know how to fit in everything else. I've also revealed to you a little of the game's underlying narrative in the above lists.

I hope the mystery entices you to want to play the game!

Day 10

I spent some time today implementing the character's dialogue. Wasn't liking how it was coming along so I took the liberty of searching out some tutorials to help me at coding a dialogue system and did a study project. I even got a nice typewriter effect to the text! So tomorrow I'll spend some time taking the knowledge from my study and putting it into the actual game.

Day 11

So no update today as I was not able to put in the time. Tomorrow I plan on implementing the dialogue system I learned from doing the study yesterday. After that comes tasks/quests.

Nice prioritization Raul. Really helps when you're on a deadline.

Day 12

Another day goes by with not much work being able to be done. When I finally sit down to work I find that GMS does not want to open my project. I try several times only to be frustrated again and again. The project acts as if it's loading but then it just stays in the main home screen. I ended up creating a new project and simply importing all the assets and files from the project that wouldn't open. So, crisis averted!

I've begun writing in the dialogue but that's as much as I could do today. Tomorrow I hope to sink quite a few hours in and get this game moving along after generally two days of inactivity.

Day 13

So got a good start today and have been implementing the dialogue into the game. With that done, I now move on to implementing some tasks/quests. Here's also a build so you all can test it out! A few quirks to manage but it's a work in progress! Enjoy!

SPACEBAR to interact with characters, WASD / ARROW KEYS to move.

Dropbox Link to Build 001

Day 14

So, tasks have been implemented! I have three more tasks (no pun intended) to complete from the M.V.G. list and then the base game  will be playable. After that I'll be polishing it up!

Day 15

Another playable build today, this time with the tasks implemented, and a 7 day counter in addition to the 24 hour counter! Give it a try and leave any ideas or feedback that comes to mind!

WASD / ARROW KEYS to move | SPACE to talk with characters

To pick up objects, just run into them. I'm still using placeholders, but the idea is to bring certain objects to certain characters.

Also, finally have a name for this project, ENVOY.

ENVOY build 002

P.S. Last bit of work today was fixing a text bug, and implementing a reward system. Tomorrow is another day!

Day 16

Not much was accomplished this day. I think I may have worked a little on implementation of tasks.

Day 17

This day was spent doing bug fixing related to my tasks/quests. Took long and hard and I still have an issue where if you run into a character with an item it will disappear and appear with the correct character. Pouring through my code, it's been difficult trying to find the culprit. So what's next for me for tomorrow is: 1) finding a work-around (I have an idea in mind which may simplify things), 2) then start polishing up some assets,  3) adding some music (found some great free music sources that fit my game), and 4) possibly develop some suitable sounds for my game. If I have time after that, I'll see to extending my game with more gameplay and such. We'll see!

It's been fun everyone!

Day 18

WHEWWWWWWWWW! DONE! Finally! This day was spent trying to fix a bug, then polishing up things, adding a title screen and an end screen. Also finetuned a few things during gameplay. Enjoy the fruit of my labor!

Blessings to all!

Here are my thoughts about your game.

First of all, what I liked most in that game was the overall feeling of it, which had a lot to do with the simple graphics that reminded me of several older systems without actually pinpointing any precisely. It reminded me of early mobile phone games when colors were just shades of black, Of Old handheld devices like Gameboy + color, of NES, of 8-bit alternative computers to C64 and that generation before. Hence the connection was very warm and welcome.

The type of game increased this feeling, especially towards the Gameboy/NES. Actually one of the first things that came to my mind playing that game was Zelda games from Gameboy color or SNES zelda 3 lookalike zeldas.

I also basically liked the game idea that it was small puzzler, you try to give characters items that they want, and i felt that was fun, from which we also come to one bad point. For while I liked the graphics style even very much, they however werent drawn clear enough. I figured the painter was wanting something like colors or canvas or something like that, but even when i had it, what ever it was, I still didnt realise i had it, but in practice when i got some item, i would just go to painter to see if that is the item he was after, hence ruining the fun of finding and figuring out that, hey, this is exactly the thing the painter was looking for.

From all those items, only two items i was able to figure out what they were, both which i actually figured out who was after them, although I am not sure i figured the other item out right. For it looked to me like that one item was a heart, and hence thinking Wizard of Oz, i thought maybe robot needs that one, so i took it to him and it worked, but i still dont really know if that was heart or not.

Another slight problem was with the item picking. It was bit unclear that you were able to carry only one item at a time, and i kept looking for that dogs item for a while, not because i didnt find it, but because when i had first time found it and thought it was an item, it didnt pick it up, as i already was carrying an item, hence i thought it was just background graphics, not an item, until i accidentally noticed that i failed at beginning another item i already knew was an item (picking for second time) and realised why it was so.

One annoyance in the game was the clock going down continuously and not taking breaks while talking to some people. Especially when i went to talk with the painter the first time, there was still plenty of time left, i think i went quite directly towards him even, and then when the painter was in last sentence, time ran out and i got back to beginning, being not sure if the painter actually had finished hes talking or not even.

Also it was confusing that when i had delivered all the items, nothing happened. Game didnt end or anything, just continued going on. That felt quite unsatisfactory.

But i guess this is mainly because of your MVP approach, which is somewhat interesting approach by the way, and after you had mentioned it in one of your posts, i had that same idea in my mind for my own game too, although in bit different sense. I wasnt aiming at minimum viable product, but minimum satisfactory in certain areas, it was actually quite helpful way to think about it.

Anyway, despite its shortcomings, generally speaking I did like your game., and indeed it was quite much MVP in positive sense, that indeed, it was good enough to be shown and submitted, although the title screen was much above MVP, which i liked very much by the way, that reminded me of Nintendo handhelds better title screens that have been similar than yours. Title screens which had some background scenery with some movement. And yours looked real good, that only slight problem was the text going too far right at bottom, but other than that, that was basically graphic style taken into consideration, commercial level title screen.

Game was also suitably short. Had it been long, it might have been very boring since there werent much content, but this short a game, theres quite good amount of stuff to do. It was very suitably designed in that sense I would say. It is bit like jokes. If joke is long, it better be good, but  short joke can be of less quality and still pass.

Christian message part was okay. What I liked about it was that you were quite much implementing it to the game mechanics. It is always interesting to see what people come up with when they implement passages to game mechanics. In my opinion that is much more difficult than putting it to story, because how do you get the message out through mechanics, much harder.

Overall, good job and well worth submitting despite its MVP stage.