2024 Goals and Progress Thread

So, I am posting weekly updates on my Sudoku Games in Development thread, but I figured I would give a small update here as well.

Since my last update, I have made a lot of progress, but the most significant things are:

• I solved the Random Puzzle Generation challenge and it works perfectly, except it can take a long time sometimes. Up to 5 minutes. But I have mitigated that by pregenerating puzzles and the player can select from those instead of generating a random puzzle each time.
• I partially solved the Auto Hint Generation challenge, but it requires more testing and experimenting. At 37 Hints, an Easy puzzle is always generated. At 33 Hints, an Easy puzzle is consistently being generated, but I have to confirm. But there can be a difficulty spike for puzzles below 33 Hints so more work is required.
• I solved the challenge of allowing the player to insert up to 4 numbers in an empty square of the puzzle as notes.
• I got help figuring out how to increase the Picture IDs used for Show Picture so they can be above 100. That has been an absolute life saver for this project. I am now up to a max of 400 for Picture IDs.

I incorporated a lot more, but those were the major functional hurdles.

Update on the games:

Montagors Legacy:
Got the sprites made for the main 8 that start the game. Here is what they look like in what I call Line Up Cave as I use it to dump all my sprites in to see what they look like in game:



From left to right it is Liana, Alex, Phoenix, Danielle, Josie, Salazar, Cedric and Savina. And yes I did put some small height differences in them. Phoenix and Cedric are tied for the tallest, Josie is the shortest.

Also drew up a sketch for the first dungeon on paper.

24 Hours:
-Mapped out the top level of the mines for hour 6 of 24 Hours. Need to do the lower level next, though that is only 2 - 3 more maps then all of them are done for the hour.
-Did some plot flow edit and more skill edits. I think they are final now, at least until testing shows some need rebalance and changes. Also here is the menu showing the 4 ladies all in one spot:


The text runs in the middle, that is because it is trying to show the full variable name there. I can fix that by changing the name and using all icons but I don't want to do that while in dev as Clarissa is easier a variable name than \i[260] to tell what it is.

And now to back up these projects in triplicate.

I've mapped out the dungeon portion of Chapter 3 (game gonna have four chapters and a finale) for Shadowloom: The Last Dragon Nymph, next Ima populate and event those maps. Errything prior to Chapter 3 is pretty much done, I just finished up writing my optional beach scene WHICH WAS AN UNHOLY LOAD OF WORK, but I think it helped me get a better sense of the cast, so it evens out? :kaoswt:

The game has a very linear structure (story and gameplay) and it's helpin' out, I think, 'cuz I always know what to do next! :wub Ima not make a thread, because I figured it's eventually a few dollars worth of sauce above the PG-13 pay grade, so it wud not be fair to have it disappear once it gets above that saucy limit. But still... I'm makin' a game and Shadowloom is that game.

Hey Alice, I’d be interested if you point me in the right direction whenever that game is out of the oven. :p Seriously, am interested to see it!

Well, I guess I’ve finally made a game myself, small as it is and a bit of a surprise. Guess I should count myself lucky, in my current financially insecure employment situation, that at least I had the time to participate in this game jam that came all of a sudden, amongst a group of friends of whom I’m a bit surprised don’t seem to frequent this forum. But I guess discord is really the in thing these days, so go figure.

But anyway, that’s also a New Year’s resolution down as well, not that I take them very seriously. But kind of proud of it. Seeing some of those friends play it and give their thoughts, I’m a lot more confident now, and it’s nice to see what I could improve on, even if they don’t necessarily articulate it well I can kind of tell where I’ve dragged a scene on too long or didn’t put enough content to fool around with, whether some mechanics are too confusing, etc.

I’ve been mulling over whether to create its own thread here, since it’s so short and a lot of it is full of in jokes between us. But even so, I’d like to post something here I’m glad I finally finished. Maybe I’ll start working on writing one.

Ima make an Itch page for it eventually and poop out a demo, maybe later this spring? :kaoluv:

And hey, congrats on jammin' out a game! That's how it starts! :wub Lookin' forward to you putting out a thread!

All three main characters for Spirit Stone Revelation have sprites, and the first dungeon is done.

On Spring Break. Time to go soak up the sun and...

Nah.

Instead I soaked up my computer monitor and did game dev. Got some updates as a result.

24 Hours:
-Can play through hours 1 and 2 now (again). Everything has been rebalanced to this point, has a flow in how mechanics get introduced and so on now. Also adjusts for the fact you got 6 playable characters instead of the old 5, but only 3 are in battle at once.

And new menu pic:

Got the text fitting in the box too. Clarissa goes by Risa sometimes, though its an old childhood nickname that few use anymore.

Might have more updates though said I'd spend tomorrow going over finances and other things I need to adjust. Depends how long that takes mainly.

I've finally finished the next update of my game. While this dungeon is the largest and has more going on in it than any I've made previously, I'm not happy with my pace . . .

Fairly happy with the dungeon itself though. The location was one that let me do some weird and creative things, and I think I made a few decent puzzles and a good boss fight.

Another day, another update? What is this madness?

24 Hours:
-Finished the rebalance of hours 3 and 4, updated all dialogues. Also did the opening dialogue of Hour 5.
-Hour 5 is fully mapped it just needs monsters and loot. And some dialogues.

But...I think I'm running low on steam after 5 days of game dev. Going to go play a game for a day or two. May return Saturday or something to update hour 5. Until then, have a pic:



Ok have two. This one I have not yet turned off all the HUD plgins so they are in the way, I do that after it goes final.

I think it's time to resume gamemaking.


Just noticed I have forgotten to resize the backgrounds :p

Been awhile since I posted any status updates, however I've taken a break from Xbox debugging to expand upon some of my game content. During the later parts of the game, I wrote a scene where the party requires protective helmets with attached breathing devices connected to air cylinders and inflatable vests in order to traverse an underwater passage, only to realize that it doesn't actually make sense to force such heavy gear into use right away since it's basically a life-dependent provision. As a result of that realization, I moved the shop for that to a much earlier part of the game and changed it to function as a progressive series of upgrades that can also tie into side quests and other plot mechanisms. So far, I've got the sprites planned out for the level two equipment (which moves everyone up from half masks and standalone regulators to a full mask setup) and have written things to where the dive instructor uses the latter provision in all of her underwater scenes (including the tutorial segment) as a matter of both preference and being able to more easily proctor the training by speaking from behind her mask instead of using visual cues. Here's the instructor's forward-facing sprite and face set designs for when she's in the water:

@BreakerZero This can be a cool mechanic. I still remember a part in Wizardry 8 that required the party to use essentially scuba breathing gear for an entire underwater cavern area. And that meant the party lost some beneficial item slots for other gear and might feel that during underwater combat. If I remember correctly, some spell casting didn't work either underwater.

I haven't seen this used very often so it is definitely interesting.

I'm personally not sure if I am going to have underwater combat with this (and it's intended to follow realistic patterns, anyway) so probably the only HP risk would be from not waiting out a cool down between levels of ascent and thereby not having enough time for the effects of the lower depth levels to wear off, resulting in the party taking damage from the rapid decompression. But you also don't want to run out of air, or else it's game over. So the plan is to design these segments with accuracy in mind, such that your air consumption is quicker at lower depths but evens out as you ascend to the surface, and the risks of rapid ascent in a low air situation have to be strategically calculated against the physical toll of dealing with the "bends" of the matter.

With that said, I'm writing this in a way that accounts for the existence of mana arts education on the distant world on which most of the story is set, so the part of the tutorial in which you learn how the compass works on the dive gauge will have an explanation for how your air supply is not counted during this part of the training, and that the instructor will pass the knowledge along of how she made sure of that after the initial training process is complete.

Probably the only other restriction that I'm planing for is not having access to the item bag (since ingestion of potions would also mean ingestion of seawater) so the use of that air multiplication trick (as well as your healing abilities in the case of the bends) would also have to be strategically calculated while at depth since it relies on mana energy to work and therefore has an MP cost.

Weekly update here:

24 Hours:
-Placed monsters and loot for hour 5. Now you can play through it up to the boss of the hour.
-Added more skill upgrades to the game. To this point most skills had no upgrades as I was adding it later, but now is that time. Here is a peak of Ellie's upgrades:



Ellie has the buffs so was wondering how to make those upgradeable as didn't want to do just stat increases, but found a notetag in VS Skillstatescore that lets me set the buff length to anything regardless of what is set in the database. So now her upgrades increase the duration of the buff!

So not long after I posted the sprite set for the dive instructor, I realized that the design was not ideal (I didn't have the back mount for the buoyancy vest representation, meaning the inflator wasn't properly placed - plus the buckle wasn't even centered under her chin) so I went ahead and borrowed from the 3D model for the overall dive gear concept and angled/edited to make it more authentic. I also did likewise to plan out the facial appearance of the beast girl in the party for when she upgrades to a full mask, and with that here are the results from both these matters:


I have also written the dialogue for both the initial training and the upgrade to full masks. In the former, the beast girl basically sets things in motion by which everyone ends up in scuba training; but in the latter she's initially thrown off by the fact that she still has to fall back on the more conventional setup in an emergency situation and almost doesn't go through with it. (As a side note, the instructor always has a full mask in her underwater scenes as a matter of preference, and also to more easily proctor the course.)

Of course, with this being written for authenticity I had to start everyone off with the more conventional set of equipment so that there's an easily understood starting point, so half masks and standalone regulators start things off (just as they would in actual scuba training). With that in mind, here's the concept image for the entire party after they suit up in their dive gear for the first time:

Significant delay in my project to announce. I have a conflict with another developer over their planned implementation of a charged specials mechanic which is not unlike what I have in my project, and while I have not had a chance to review their implementation for any conflicts, I also don't know when they started planning for it (and I certainly don't want to take the chance of being seen as copying someone else for both legal and ethical reasons). As such, I am undertaking an indefinite delay on the development of Advent Heroes until I can change the battle system to account for this unplanned conflict.

@BreakerZero Obviously, I don't have the full context of what is going on, but unless the "charged specials mechanic" is totally unlike anything you have ever seen before in a game and is truly a unique concept, I don't think I would worry about it. Almost every modern game I can think of uses mechanics and concepts that are similar to other games. But, of course, you always have to do what you think is best and what makes you the most comfortable. I hope this gets resolved for you.

Thanks for the kind words. I have already followed up on this comment in the legal discussions thread, as the developer is dead set on implementing this as a part of their game design. Although I have not had a chance to review their work for any issues, I don't want to take any legal risks either; therefore, I decided that it would be in my best interest to simply redesign or replace the mechanics in question (which could potentially take a while, and thus hence the delay).

EDIT: Change in plans. I'm going to try to approach the developer again in relation to some other conflicts that have come up. More specifically, I just found out that I can't claw my way out of Next Fest as I intended to with regard to this, as my registration is locked in. So rather than change things, I will see how the other developer plans to proceed and see if I can suggest for them on any ideas that they can use to put enough difference between the two projects so that it works for both of us.

Making 3 games at the same time is smart right? xD


Tiles made by @The Mighty Palm

G**dammit, that reminds me of the first iterations of Pokémon!