Hey all, I'm Brady and this is my first game jam. 

https://kuzzi.itch.io/brand-yourself

(final product)

as the -1st day of the jam comes to a close I've learned 2 things. First, I love creating ideas for games, and second, I always shoot way out of what I can actually do when it comes to creating ideas for games.  I've decided to create a devlog for the game because it will be nice to look back on in the future to see where my head was at, and it also keeps me motivated to continue my game instead of dropping it, something that I really don't want to happen but I can't guarantee won't.

Let's take a look at our team for this jam.

Our lead designer is me.

Our lead writer is me.

Our lead audio designer is me.

Our lead artist is me.

Our lead programmer is me. 

I don't know any other roles but I think I know a guy who could fill any one that comes up.

Jan 28, 2023 - 2:22AM

Today I've come up with some sort of idea where you need to run a social media account and try to grow your account to be the biggest on the platform. I plan for the game to have a bunch of different types of posts which you can put up and tons of hilarious outcomes for each one.  For example, if you post a "skill showcase" photo you may be greeted by this message the next day:

"After posting a meal you made, Gordon Ramsay ratio’d you and it was all over after that" 

along with the visual of some of your followers being lost.

I spent most of the day working on all these outcomes so I can focus on programming and art and everything else when the jam starts. After a day I feel this is a pretty solid base to work on, and tomorrow I plan to begin designing the menus and look of the game! 

Jan 28, 2023 - 10:07 pm

I guess the game is no longer untitled

I spent all day creating the menus for the game and nothing else. It took me forever to create this logo (it looks better on a dark background)

After creating the logo, I spent an hour inputting it into the game and figuring out how to get it to fade out.

I wanted to get this to fade out so it would look almost like a mobile app that shows the dev logo or game logo before loading in.

I finally got it to fade out which was exciting, then I began work on the actual main menu of the game. I added a smaller version of the logo along with buttons to start and continue a game, along with an extras button and a how-to-play button (I'll do these menus later). After this, the menu was looking kinda empty so I had the random idea of making the sides of the screen have randomly generating stock charts to go with the stocks theme I ended up going with.  I'm not sure how I want them to look in the final product so let me know if you have any ideas :)

Tonight I may work on the menus for the actual gameplay and stuff, but I'll make another update on that when I get there!

January 29, 2023 - 1:10 pm

I created some concept art for the different menus of the game in ms paint lol

This is the concept art for how the game will look when you're choosing which posts to put up. I don't like the green and blue circles but those colors will be fixed when I actually make the menu (I also just realized I used the wrong your lmfao)

This is the concept for the profile section, where the player can see all their statistics and the most important part, their stock price. This is also where they would get booted after they make their posts every day. I would color it in but it would look ugly so I'll figure out colors when I actually get the game set up.  The verified symbol would only appear if you've had a value at some number, I'm not sure which one yet we'll see once I get the game balanced.

Main menu looks AMAAAAAAZING :D

Jan 31, 2022 - 3:41PM

My exam this morning went quite well and I'm quite happy now that school is done for the rest of the week. I can finally put all my focus on the game jam! That's exactly what I plan to do today and for the rest of the week.

I have learned SO MANY THINGS today, here's a quick list:

How to add text boxes to the game,

How to take the data from a text box,

How to hide a text box after its done (idk why it took me so long to figure this now out),

How to save data to a .JSON file to use in different instances of a program,

How to read data from a .JSON file saved from a previous instance,

I can't wait to keep learning more :)

It seems like I've learned so much and I've made so much progress, but all I've really done is create a name selection screen that saves that name to a .JSON folder.  

Here's a video of the menu in action! If someone types too many characters it will give them an error message and a chance to retry inputting their name! I don't have a further menu to go to so it just boots you back to the main menu rn but I'm really happy with this

February 2, 2023 - 1:27AM

I didn't code much today, but what I have coded will help me to be more efficient later in the jam. For example, I created a Player class for anything pertaining to the player. I then added a hashmap and string array to get the names and numbers of the possible post options. I couldn't figure out how to turn the key of a hashmap into a string so I gave up and just manually created a string array instead. :(

 I have begun making a basic gameplay loop, starting with some quick introductory lines before the gameplay actually begins. I don't like how this looks but I'm not sure how to update it to look better.  Please let me know if you have any suggestions!

I then moved on to creating the screen where the player will choose which post they want to pick. I have got most of it down, I just need to finish it but I definitely cannot do that by tonight I need sleep. Currently, it randomly displays four options for posts and outlines a box in white when the player's cursor is over it. 

Again, please let me know what you think of this sort of view

Goodnight all!

I haven't been able to get much done in recent days, and I'm starting to get scared I won't be able to get this finished :(

February 5, 2023 - 11:58AM

I woke up early today and finished the menu I was working on before, I think I'm going to try and get an entire day loop done by today.

Here's what the menu looks like, I need to change the colors of the circles as they are pretty much placeholders for now.

Each possible post has a different up, neutral, and down the chart to display the risk of choosing each option.

February 5, 2023 - 4:09PM

I have created a working loop of the menus, I just need to make the actual scoring system of the game and saving when you close the game. I currently have it so that it only saves the players' name, ill have to fix it to include their progress and stuff too but I can do that later, I have to go to work now but I'm happy with today's progress.

here's a video showcasing the loop

a game social market stock media !  sound good ! good luck.

February 6, 2023 - 9:58PM

I haven't been able to do much since school started again today but I was able to get the calculator for stock change working, tomorrow if I have time I'll set it to save to a table and maybe begin making the stock chart :0

cool a calculator. good luck and continue  !

February 8, 2023 - 12:24AM

I DID SO MUCH TODAY

first I got the summary screen showing the days stock change completed.

second I got the stock graph working using data which is saved in a table

third I got saving working so now it saves the name, date, and all previous choices. 

the third action broke the first two ofc but that's fine I can fix it tomorrow.

IM SO HAPPY YES

February 8, 2023 - 12:49AM

EDITING MY ORIGINAL UPDATE

I figured out how to fix all my issues through loading the table in the main method instead of the class through the use of a method. SO HAPPY THIS WORKS NOW OMG I FEEL SO COOL

is good new for fix the bug ! continue

February 9, 2023 - 10:20PM

I was super busy today but I had some time to finish the actual base gameplay for the game, now it is fully playable and will not break unless you do this one specific thing I can't figure out how to fix :). I got the stock chart working and at the moment it will always show the last 30 days of stock change no matter what.  I would figure out another way to do it but that would take too long and I'm on a time crunch.

This is what the menu looks like after 60 days of playing, I will add the rest sometime between today and tomorrow ig lol

or I'll cut the most and least controversial post parts who knows lol

February 9, 2023 - 11:52PM

I added the lines of dialogue for each of the possible options to the game through an individual .json folder. 

This took a while but is TOTALLY worth it as I don't need to jumble my already messy code and it also lets players view them easier if they just want to see them. There unfortunately only 3 lines for each possible outcome (good, neutral, bad), but with 11 possible post options that pad out to 99 lines in the game. I'm DEFINITELY happy with this if I can implement it into the game properly.

jsoneditoronline.org was the most useful thing ever for this, as I would just cut my text in and change the file name, before saving it and boom all lines were added.

I also cut out the most and least popular post tabs, as I have no time to make them work.

I am excited to actually implement the new function for randomly making text into the code tomorrow! I will also get playtesters if possible and have a final push to get all the other menu buttons and other features working!

This jam has been a blast and whether I finish or not, I'm glad to have participated and I look forward to what people think of my game!

February 11, 2023 3:17AM

I HAVE FUCKING DID IT I COMPLETED A WORKING GAME FOR A JAM OH MY GOD THIS FEELS SO GOOD

TODAY I DID SO MUCH IN LITERALLY LIKE 3 HOURS DAMN

finished implementing funny quips and algorithm for choosing them

Fixed Saving (again)

fixed stats screen issue not showing first stat

added function to how to play and credits buttons

added ability to go back in menus using esc

that broke saving 

fixed saving (again again)

updated chart to take up entire profile screen and changed constraining to suit this

THE GAME IS SO COOL

anyways I posted today's version if you want to playtest it

audio isn't going to happen I don't have enough time to make it and I don't want to usfe any cheesy free music... I can add some later perchance

PLEASE GIVE FEEDBACK PLEASE

Itch.io page link