(Posted to my blog as well)<\/p>\n
This past weekend was another Ludum Dare game competition<\/a>, and the second one I\u2019ve taken part in (this first you can read about here<\/a>).\u00a0 I also organized a local meetup with the Knox Game Design group and we had five games in total submitted by the deadline<\/a>.\u00a0 So without further adieu, here is my wrap up of what went right, and what went wrong!<\/p>\n For my game, YoGo Burger<\/a>, I used the theme in a few ways.\u00a0 The setup is, due to some budget cuts, you can only put one topping on a burger.\u00a0 The customer will either be okay with it, or hate it and this will affect the amount of tip you get.\u00a0 To make matters worse, if a single customer complains to management you\u2019ll be fired.\u00a0 To keep this from happening you use your tip money for bribes.<\/p>\n In practice the game is like playing multiple games of Mastermind<\/a> at the same time.\u00a0 Customers will get back in line and order a second burger and if you remember what they liked before you can use that to get it right the second (and third, forth, etc) time.\u00a0 To make it interesting I reset the customer preferences each day, added more customers, and I also upped the value weights behind what they like and don\u2019t.\u00a0 The effect is you\u2019ll probably be deep in debt and fired by the end.<\/p>\n The design was very emergent.\u00a0 The initial idea was a Burger Time<\/a> \/ Tapper<\/a>\u00a0 \/ Diner Dash<\/a> clone with one ingredient.\u00a0 It\u2019s fair to say I didn\u2019t really have a strong direction at the start, but as I added mechanics it began to take shape.\u00a0 I\u2019m very happy with where I wound up and think that this kind of creative exercise is what the Ludum Dare excels at (even if the game isn\u2019t fun for very long).<\/p>\n Just like the last time, I used the competition as an excuse to learn new technology.\u00a0 You might say this is the wrong time to learn something new, but twice now I\u2019ve done it and shipped a game so we\u2019ll have to agree to disagree.\u00a0 The new tech this round was Unity 4.3\u2019s new 2D support.<\/p>\n Having working in Unity before, and having read up on the new features, this wasn\u2019t so bad.\u00a0 Prior to the competition I had started porting my XTiled<\/a> library to Unity, so I wasn\u2019t completely green for this project.\u00a0 I had to google an issue here and there, but for the most part things went smooth.\u00a0 For the most part.\u00a0 Let\u2019s talk animation\u2026<\/p>\n Unity revamped their animation system for the 4.x release, and it\u2019s now called \u201cMecanim\u201d.\u00a0 It\u2019s a very complex, yet powerful setup allowing you to define animations then link them with a state engine and create smooth transitions procedurally.\u00a0\u00a0 That\u2019s all good, but I need to move a sprite a few steps to the right and this seemed impossible.\u00a0 I\u2019m sure spending more time with the system is what\u2019s needed, but I have reservations about any system that cannot handle a simple, common use case well.\u00a0 If you cannot do the simple well, how am I to trust you won\u2019t make the complex a nightmare?<\/p>\n In the end I wrote a few lines of code to handle all animations.\u00a0 I\u2019m a programmer, it\u2019s what I do.<\/p>\n Nothing good to report here.<\/p>\n I am no longer satisfied making excuses that \u201cI\u2019m a developer\u201d or hearing \u201cnot bad for developer art\u201d or worse \u201cit\u2019s so bad it\u2019s good \u2013 you nailed the MS Paint ironic art style!\u201d.\u00a0 See, I\u2019m not trying for that.\u00a0 I don\u2019t expect to be amazing, but I think it\u2019s perfectly fine to expect decent.\u00a0 I commonly tell people I\u2019m not \u201ctalented\u201d I\u2019ve just spent a lot of time writing code and anyone can reach where I\u2019m at.\u00a0 I believe this to be true of anything, and it\u2019s time I took my own advice.<\/p>\n So next year I\u2019ll be reading up on art 101 and spending quality time with Gimp, Inkscape, and even Blender.\u00a0 Check back with me after 10,000 hours<\/a>.<\/p>\n I needed exactly one sound effect for my game, so why is this even a section? Because it was my favorite part of the whole competition!<\/p>\n I wanted a cash register sound when a customer paid for their order, but because of the rules I cannot use anything I didn\u2019t make during the competition and this include sound effects.\u00a0 Normally I\u2019d use the amazing bfxr<\/a> app to generate game sounds, but it wasn\u2019t really suited for this task.\u00a0 I grabbed a portable microphone and headed out to hunt samples Foley style<\/a>!<\/p>\n In the end I used a bell from my daughter\u2019s bicycle and the opening and slamming shut a wooden drawer full of screws, bolts, and nuts.\u00a0 I then edited and combined those samples in Audacity, speeding up the playback by about 150%.\u00a0 The end result was a very convincing cash register ca-ching<\/a>!<\/p>\n While I\u2019m a horrible graphic artist, I am \u201cdecent\u201d at music.\u00a0 This time I wanted to use my own guitar playing (as Dylan<\/a> and Levi<\/a> have done), however I\u2019ve never actually hooked up a live instrument to FL Studio with my current audio gear.\u00a0 This led to a frustrating session of attempted guitar recordings before I decided there wasn\u2019t enough time left to keep fooling with it and went with all synths \u2013 something I\u2019m pretty comfortable with.\u00a0 (Yesterday I tried again, and it turns out I made a very simple mixer error).<\/p>\n The music inspiration came from the depressing, you-can\u2019t-win-gameplay and reminded me of Papers Please<\/a>.\u00a0 To get in the mood I loaded up some depressing Russian folk songs and waltzes until I had the right state of mind.\u00a0 Not going to win a Grammy, but I think it fit the game well.<\/p>\n Theme \u201cYou Only Get\u00a0 One\u201d<\/h2>\n
Programming in Unity<\/h2>\n
Graphics<\/h2>\n
Sound<\/h2>\n
Music<\/h2>\n