Play here: https://itch.io/jam/my-first-game-jam-summer-2019/rate/447350

Intro

Hello,  my name is ScPlays, or just simply Sc, depending on what platform I'm on. This is going to be my first ever game jam, but not my first experience creating/designing a game. While I unfortunately have no finished games, I did learn quite a bit from my past exploits. I wanted to put myself under a strict timeframe to get as much done as possible.

What is "Through the Eye of Innocence?"

TEI is a platformer game inspired by games such as Eversion. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eversion_(video_game). With that said, the genre of the game is psychological horror. The game will not be honoring the theme of the jam, as I had been contemplating designing and creating this game about a week prior to the announcement of the theme. The name of the game is also subject to change, we'll see.

Tell me about the plot.

Click here to see the concept art I drew in approximately one minute

You play as a little girl from a race of Cyclopes (SAI-KLOH-PEES). You have an amazing gift, the ability to drain unhappiness from those around you. You see the world through the eye of this child, so everything is portrayed in a child-like manner. Unfortunately, the world isn't quite so pleasant. The eldritch forces present in the world are capable of turning a typical day into a nightmare on a whim. One day, she crosses paths with an eldritch being which immediately takes to disliking her. In order to combat the innocence of the child, he corrupts her mind such that she can only see horrible, terrifying things all around her. What will she do? What CAN she do...?

What are your goals for this project?

I've never finished a game project before, and I want to create a solid foundation for a less ambitious project, compared to my previous attempts.
I want to learn how to use AnyPortrait (Essentially Live2D but it's a plugin for Unity.)
I also want more practice using Sai2. So far I like it better than Krita but I'm not very used to it yet.
I want to experience what it's like to have a deadline for a project like this.
By the end of this jam, I hope to have a working demo that showcases the best elements of the future finished product. (More specifically, I'm going to try to finish everything in the PERT chart before the due date. Keep an eye on it as I'll be updating it regularly.

Criticism, thoughts, concerns, whatever are all welcome and encouraged. Keep it civil, please.

PERT Chart (or road map, if you prefer.)

(Last updated 7/15/19)

Day 1: July 5th, 2019

I started and completed the sprite sheet for the main character. I imported the sheet into Unity and rigged it up with AnyPortrait. It sucks that drawing, coloring, and shading takes up such a large portion of my time with any given project I do.
Here's an early look at the animation so far.
I almost spent half the day trying to make a platforming system that doesn't rely on Unity's built in system. However, it proved to be a bit too much work so I found a way to integrate the Unity physics2D system in instead. Currently you can run, jump, and wall jump. Nothing particularly impressive, but that's one big thing to check off my list.

Tomorrow, I will probably work on the battle mechanics. (Which will include throwing flowers to cheer people up, or using a sword to vanquish your perceived enemies.)

LETS FUCKIN GOOOOOOOO

Day 2: July 6th, 2019

Today I worked on the "combat" mechanics of the game. While there are no collision interactions (since there are no NPCs yet,) the animations are complete. 
The controls are axis locked, meaning you can throw directly horizontal or vertical with no in-between. My reasoning for this choice is that it's more precise and controlled movement than if I were to let the player use their mouse to aim.
In any case, you are now able to cheer, which means you throw flowers. The idea is that these flowers alleviate unhappiness from NPCs in the world. You can also swing a sword when cheering doesn't do the trick anymore.

Click here to see a GIF of the animation progress. (The FPS is not very good, considering it is a GIF.)

I also added more controls to the AnyPortrait editor, an eyebrow to the main character, a sword object, and a flower basket.

The plan for tomorrow is probably to build a tile set, and learn how to use the built-in unity tile map editor. That and/or drawing up enemies. I have been drawing up concepts in my journal.

Thanks for reading, see ya tomorrow.

Day 3: July 7, 2019

Ahhh, tile maps, gotta love 'em. So much effort to get everything to fit nicely together and yet, not much to show for it. (Particularly because I am not a very good artist.) Not to mention unexpected complications.

Today, I designed, drew, and then fixed the main tiles that will be used in the first act of the game. Drawing and editing tiles always takes so much longer than you expect it to.
Once I imported the tiles into the tilemap editor within Unity, I encountered an error where wall jumping and even walking were basically broken.  This resulted from an error in how I checked for collision with the wall and ground. By using a Boxcast, the collisions with long colliders such as the debug platforms I was using worked perfectly. However, they did not work with the smaller tilemap colliders. The solution to this issue was to instead use the overlap function built into the Collider2D class, and now it works perfectly.
Or at least, I'd like to say so, but I also encountered one of my favorite type of bug: the kind that happens seemingly at random. Sometimes, the player will completely stop moving while on a wall, and the only option you have is to jump. I haven't found the cause of this bug. Also seemingly at random, the player will be slowly pushed away from a wall they are on, until they fall out of range of the walljump animation. Now that I write this, I suppose a way to fix this symptom is to just simply lock the x vector of the player's velocity while they're in the walljump state.

I also modified some of the jumping physics as well: Now there is an instant large force to counteract gravity, mixed with the constant force supplied by holding space. Also, the player maintains their momentum upon entering the walljump state. This makes it possible to jump quite quickly up the wall, unless you try to jump after falling from a great height into the wall.

In any case, here's an obligatory GIF.

The plan for tomorrow: probably going to work on special tiles as referenced by the PERT chart in my second post. Either that, or drawing some NPCs. (I might even get on that tonight, if I feel up to it.)

'Til next time,
ScPlays

Day 4: July 8th, 2019

Today I drew the parts for an NPC, rigged them together, and animated them.

Watch out, he'll bully you if you touch him! But if you use your cheer ability, you can cheer him right up, preventing any further bullying.

I had some issues getting stuff to work today, but eventually it all worked out. The first problem I had was regarding the order of mesh rendering getting messed up when flipping the rabbit sprite. The problem, as I found out, was that I was setting the localScale.z to 0 without realizing it. I also fixed the issue where characters would get caught on the many tile colliders present in the scene. Turns out the solution to that little issue was simply using edge colliders instead of box or capsule.

You currently don't suffer any penalty for touching the NPC, but a function exists that is called when you do touch one. Currently this just plays an unhappy animation for the player character.

That's all for today, thanks for your time.

Day 5: July 9th, 2019

I have a few things to show off today.

First thing is the new HP (Happiness Points) bar. It goes down if you get bullied by NPCs or if you touch some spikes. Don't worry though, they won't kill you, you only have to restart at the beginning of the level! Plus, if you make an NPC happy, you'll regain happiness as well! Spread the love!

I also clamped the camera and playing area such that you can no longer see or walk outside of the x axis clamp coordinates, and you will restart the level if you fall below the minimum y-clamp coordinate.

I added spikes, but again, don't worry because they won't kill you! The world i̶̫̺̫̓͒̚s̸̬̔̏͘͝n̵̥̹͖̕ͅ'̶͎̝̎ť̵̠̗ that dangerous, after all.

Next up: I added bouncy tiles. I decided mushrooms would be the most childlike thing to bounce off of.

The final thing I have to show you is probably what took me the longest to implement today. A moving platform. But  not just any moving platform! You can actually ride on these without slipping off (which is a common issue for anyone attempting to make a platformer).

Ah, wait, that's not quite right... The platform had a bit too much to drink today.

There we go, perfect. A platform with an easily changeable path (with options like looping, reversing, and such). No matter how fast it's going, you will be able to hold on, making it quite effective transportation. Just keep in mind your momentum is not sustained from the platform (for now).

Anyways, that's it for tonight, I hope everyone enjoys all these GIFs as much as I like posting them. From here I have a few choices as to what I want to pursue: Creating more NPCs, either for the "sane" or "uncanny" act, finishing up a level with a clear condition, creating a boss NPC, or creating the tiles for the "uncanny" act.

Thanks for reading, and remember,

Everything is n̴̨̨̮̮͔̖̙̩̩̪͉͎̜̰̺̥͎͉͍̔̒̽̒̅̋͛́̈́̈́̏̚͜͝ǫ̸̨̡̡̙̗̘̰͇͚̬̜̲̟͈͗̓͋́͐͒̿͊́̈́́̎̽̾̚ͅt̵̝̯̖͉̮̮̅͗̃̌͂̈́̀ going to be fine.

YOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO 

L ET S FUCKING 

GOOOOOOOOOOOO

Day 6: July 10th, 2019

I wasted a lot of time today trying to figure out why my editor code wasn't working. It's supposed to let me click a button to quickly add a waypoint to platforms, but the inputted information is erased when I click play. Research into the matter says it's something to do with serialized properties, which I've never really used, and don't have time to troubleshoot. I opted to just manually input the coordinates in for now. 

I created a short, bare-bones level that is beatable. Your goal in the game is to collect these power flowers:

Once you collect it, you beat the level, and you get to move on!

I also worked on the tiles for the u̴̫͖̬̫̘̟̬͗̍̆͗̋́͒̃̐͘ń̷̨̛̥͎̳͓͇̯̻̠͊̐͑c̶̨̢̖̻̘̳̹̳̅͒̾̈́̿͆̽͘ą̵̖͈̫͙͈͓͆̋̊͆n̵̤͓̹͉̳͇̻͆̃͒͑n̵͙̜̦̜͑̍̏̅́̓̅̅̀̕̚͜y̸̘͈̼̜̲͌̚͝͝ ̴͓͐̄a̵̲̥̹̻̕c̷̮̮̖͈͙͓̠͉̜̋́͊͂̏̂͂̚̚͝t̶͔͈̠̼̩̓̆̄̃̍̕ͅ.

[Possible Spoiler] The u̴̫͖̬̫̘̟̬͗̍̆͗̋́͒̃̐͘ń̷̨̛̥͎̳͓͇̯̻̠͊̐͑c̶̨̢̖̻̘̳̹̳̅͒̾̈́̿͆̽͘ą̵̖͈̫͙͈͓͆̋̊͆n̵̤͓̹͉̳͇̻͆̃͒͑n̵͙̜̦̜͑̍̏̅́̓̅̅̀̕̚͜y̸̘͈̼̜̲͌̚͝͝ ̴͓͐̄a̵̲̥̹̻̕c̷̮̮̖͈͙͓̠͉̜̋́͊͂̏̂͂̚̚͝t̶͔͈̠̼̩̓̆̄̃̍̕ͅ tiles

[Possible Spoiler] The o̸͕̓͜ṯ̷̜̚h̷͕͉̚ẹ̴̣̑̉r̷̭͙̔̿ HP bar

I wish I had accomplished a bit more, but with waking up later than usual and spending so long on that editor problem, it just didn't work out. But I did accomplish some important goals in any case, so I guess I'm not that upset about it.

See you all tomorrow night, as usual.

Day  8: July 12th 2019

As previously stated, I will be withholding spoilers. What I will say is I've gotten the transition cutscene from Act 1 (sane) to Act 2 (uncanny) completed, with sound. It may need a bit of fine-tuning and maybe some extra effects, but it'll do for the jam. With that said, I learned how to use Unity's built in timeline feature. It's easier to use than I originally thought, you've just got to put in the effort to learn it, is all.

Now that I've got some bare-bones demo levels for Act 1, I will be moving on to create the demo levels for Act 2, and drawing up an NPC or two to fill it with. Unfortunately due to the short timeframe remaining, I don't want to spend forever designing long, challenging levels at this stage of the game. That comes after the jam, once I start the serious polishing and development for mainstream consumption.

Thanks once again for your time, and I hope to see you tomorrow night as well.

Day 9: July 13th, 2019

I got a few things done today:

First, I redid the tiles that I made, making them quicker and easier to use. Before, I had a layering system where I'd place dirt collision blocks and layer grass or rocks on top of those. This proved cumbersome, so I opted to condense the possible combinations into a few tiles which don't require layering. I then redid the first two levels with those tiles and created the third level (which is in the second act.)

I also finally implemented sword interactions with NPC's, however the called method doesn't do anything yet because you can't possibly have the sword this early in the game anyways, but it will decrement NPC health until a death animation is called on them, easy peasy.

The more perceptive of you may notice that I need to sync up the animation with the slash a bit more, but I'm too tired to make that change tonight.
I'm going to finish up level 4 (2-2) tomorrow and try to get a transition to act 3 started. Of course, before I can start working on act 3, I need to create the tiles for it, so I'll probably start on those tomorrow as well.

That's all for tonight,  see you tomorrow.

Day 10: July 14th, 2019

I spent a few hours hunting for a bug that, seemingly at random (yay) would cause a wall jump to just simply not let you jump, and instead make you fall off the wall. As you can imagine, this is a game-breaking bug, and I finally fixed it. It had to do with some reversed numbers with wall checking. Essentially, if you were going the opposite direction, it would interpret that as you trying to cling to the wall, which was a ridiculously stupid error on my part. One little typo caused me hours of headache and basically ruined the first half of my day.

In other news, I finished level 2-2, which features an auto-scroll mechanic. I also did the short cutscene for the transition to act 3. Tomorrow is gonna be tiles or NPCs.

Seeya later.

Day 11: July 15, 2019

Today I created the tiles for the third act. I also have the act 2 npc complete. Keep in mind, I am only doing one npc per act for the game jam, due to time constraints. I'm getting closer and closer to my end-goal. I estimate that about a month or two after the jam is complete, I will have a marketable game. I make no promises, but I do like the concept I have going here. However, for the context of the jam, I may not even have a boss fight included in or anything. It's not something i want to rush, and I'm tempted to release the game jam demo as-is after a bit of polishing. I'm going to think it over and come up with an answer tomorrow. I'll probably throw in some last minute sounds and open source music.  The last act will probably just be a preview of things to come, since it will be a major part of the game that i'd rather not spoil too much for a full release. 

Thanks for the interest you've all shown so far, even if you haven't explicitly said anything. I'll be back tomorrow night.

I absolutely love your little cyclops girl she's just adorable!

Day 12: July 16, 2019

I've decided to upload the game as-is. I will continue to work on it, but this demo will be the only version open to the public until the game is finished. Thanks for the support, and I hope you enjoy the demo in its current state!

https://itch.io/jam/my-first-game-jam-summer-2019/rate/447350

Edit: I did continue working on the game but ultimately college work caught up with me. If I ever revisit this particular idea, I'm likely going to remake it from scratch. There are a few things I feel I did wrong, but overall I still like the original idea.