One day I got a newsletter from itch.io with (some other) game jam and I've got an idea to join it. But since it was looking way more advanced I've found MFGJ. For some time now I wanted to make something with Unity but there wasn't any "deadline" so I never did finish. Hopefully this time I will be able to make some working prototype

Game idea: Open world island where you can drive a car and activate checkpoint trials. 

Task list: 

• (In progress) Open world island or at least partially open
  V1=  V2=
  (here is my initial height map (V1) I painted yesterday- and it's not a ghost and current slightly more detailed) I've imported it into Unity and with some tweaks I think it's gonna be just about right. It's supposed to be 300x300m but most likely it will get restricted areas if I won't have enough time to fill it with content
• (40%) 2 drivable cars
• (Done) 3 checkpoint races
• (not started) few collectibles scattered around an island
• (90%) simple menu with New Game, Continue( saves current player position, finished trials and collectibles) and Options( with controls and some graphic settings <edit>autosave, volume  )
• (80%) car fx sounds like engine or collision
• (Cancelled) any background music 

Additional content: I would really like to add some AI drivers but this may prove a daunting task and I leave it for later

Day 1: Prepared heightmap and imported into Unity.  Created few terrain textures which I would like to keep in hand drawn style to make it easier and less time consuming  

Day 1 screens

And finally for this day an overview of an island with not-yet-drivable box-car 

Day 2: It's been a long day without any progress

Day 3: Car became driveable. Handling is not yet  nice and dosen't feel natural but it moves and dosen't flip all the time. While I knew that cars have a thing called swaybar to prevent them from flipping over I wasn't entirely aware that it is a must have in a virtual world. Then I  scripted a camera which started to follow the car but it was quite jaggy at first. It took me a while to make it move relatively smooth. I've also created initial low poly car model with UVW mapping and painted some minor details but since it dosen't look good I'm posting it only for my future self ( here it it)
 

Here is my first unwraped UVW map with edged faces. An interesting thing I've found out is that it makes it easier to make a texture when you overlap both left and right side of a car and mirror half of top onto other half, then you just paint on both sides at once with a nice symmetry effect

Very cool. Looking forward to seeing how this project develops!

Nice

Nice to see someones looking :)

It's good that jam lasts for 14 days because I couldn't finish by Sunday

Day 4: No progress
Day 5: Added tire model and texture

Day 6: I think there is significant progress today:

• Main menu is starting to work with main features like New game, continue and load. It is just prototype with out any art yet
  Load button opens up saved games which are saved on Drive. Object serialization seems to be quite easy when security is not important. Saving/Loading works fine and you can have save multiple playthroughs)
  
• I scripted checkpoints so now they behave like they should. For now they have 4 states: Hidden, Active, Next and Finish 
  Below is short video how it runs( recording fps is not actual fps I had, but I wasn't able to record it smoother)

  
  

Day 7 (04.07): Tweak and fix day

• Checkpoints have to be collected in right order when you drive through wrong checkpoint it vanishes and shows up again some time later. I've added a waypoint arrow showing next checkpoint as well in case you wander off path 
• Game is saved when player reaches final(red) checkpoint. For now save includes player position and rotation and information about trials completed and best time
• Auto-save every 10min ( not that I think there is enough content to play that long :)  but this will be available to change in Settings
• When you load game first checkpoint of each trial shows up so you can start it

Day 8 (05.07): Plan for today is to add some sounds
(Edit) I continued fixing and published initial version it's available here https://xevoss.itch.io/island-racer
It's far from ready but I guess it now counts as "playable". I'll use time left to improve handling and graphics.

I added engine sound as well but it's more annoying than complete silence

Day 9 (06.07): Engine sounds are fine and I managed to loop them I will try to record my car engine if I'll have a moment to find quiet surrounding. I still struggle with a camera when you move in ralatively same direction it's fine but when car gets in air or terrain is bumpy camera is going crazy

Day 10(07.07): I've added some particles when you hit checkpoint and more importantly I made wheels emit different particle depending on terrain texture by using Terrain SplatMap. Also added some grass, a cave and some collectibles

In a last 3 days I spent just a few hours on a project but camera works much better and shoudn't fall under the ground. Altought I didnt't improve grapics too much overall I'm quite happy with the results. There is still much to do but I've learned a lot in past 2 weeks. I've used Unity URP(universal render pipeline) for the first time and created a few shaders which was fun and interesting.

I've completed most of tasks planned and most likely expand this project further
Thanks  J, Adrienne Lombardo and lysander for this jam!