Well I've had some time to think, and relax. So here it is, the post mortem.
What Went Well?
Well, there are a few areas to talk about. First off the main menu, settings and the UI all went quite nice and easy to make. The settings icon I used a screwdriver sort of icon instead of a gear because I find gears hard to make and although still not the best icon, it went well in terms of what usually happens for me.
What Went Wrong?
There were numerous problems throughout the development. First off, the AI. That was just painful to deal with at first. The AI would keep combining into one AI and some AI had no head or arms and just generally a nightmare. Eventually I decided to use IDs which worked. Another problem was the lag from the AI. Considering this was a 2D game with simple AI, it shouldn't have been too laggy, right?
Wrong. After putting 4 or more AI in the game, you could definitely notice the lag. So tot fix this I disabled the AI until the player got to certain points, reducing the lag that occurred. Additionally my lack of motivation at the end also wasn't too good but this was likely a result of thinking I could make 10 levels in the time frame, which would've involved a bit too much crunch for me.
What To Improve Next Time?
I think one of the main issues I have is that I can over estimate what I can do in an amount of time. I though 10 days to do the main coding, 20 days for 10 levels. It took from the top of my head 12-14 days for the main coding and 16-18 days for 4 levels. Another problem is also the lack of controller testing as I currently don't know if that input method works at all so ill have to ask for some playtesters to help out with that. Another thing I should work on is how long I work on working on my projects. This game I probably did 1 to 1 and a half hours a day of development work. This may not seem like a lot, but over time it adds up. I think this combined with a small amount of views each day didnt help my motivation resulting in me stopping development for a short break.
What Am I Going To Do Now?
Im currently working on another project relating to 3D. I'm planning on spending some more time on it and then ill come back to development on this game, so that ill be more motivated to actually work on this for those of you who are actually interested in this game.
Thanks for reading.
- User8426