{"author_name":"XAND","cat":"LD #34","comments":[],"epoch":1450983840,"likes":0,"metadata":{"p_key":"9402","p_author":"XAND","p_authorkey":"52238","p_urlkey":"44620","p_title":"There\u2019s No Going Back \u2013 Post Mortem","p_cat":"LD #34","p_event":"LD34","p_time":"1450983840","p_likes":"0","p_comments":"0","p_status":"UPD5","us_key":"52238","us_name":"XAND","us_username":"micromacro","event_start":"1449792000","event_key":"31","event_name":"LD34"},"text":"

So this is the first time I’ve done a proper post-mortem. If you’ve not played my game yet, play it here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

What Went Right<\/strong><\/p>\n

Graphics<\/em><\/p>\n

The graphics in TNGB came out much better than I expected. Though there were a few tidbits I wish I could have changed in the details (for instance, the wood texture doesn’t really fit in with everything else in my opinion), the rest of the graphics came out just as I wanted them too.<\/p>\n

Audio<\/em><\/p>\n

Sound effects were easy: a few BFXR sound-bytes was all. The music however was awesome. I had a couple of drafts and mostly-complete songs waiting to be finished that all had a similar genre and feel, and to me they sounded perfect to fit in with a puzzle game, so I finished them to a point where they could be used in the game, and voila!<\/p>\n

Gameplay<\/em><\/p>\n

I think that the gameplay went well. There are a few collision errors in stuff like the spikes; they collide with the size of a whole tile, not the size of the spike itself. However, player physics, boost-pads, and basically every other aspect of the game worked out very well.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

What didn’t go so right<\/strong><\/p>\n

Level Creation<\/em><\/p>\n

Though the end levels came out nicely, the process of doing so was very clunky and not easy. I have included the level editor with the game if you want to try it out.
\n I’ve worked on a new level editor and it is much better, more advanced, and easy to use, so that I can continue developing the game further.<\/p>\n

Animation Creation<\/em><\/p>\n

Another situation where the product came out alright, like the coin animations and the end-goal’s crystal hovering up and down, but the process to make the animations was very difficult, as I had not found the program I will use from now on (GraphicsGale). I had to manually save and edit and resize each frame in Paint.NET, which is a good program, but not for fine-tuning animations like that. Each time I edited an animation and wanted to see how it looked, I had to save it, an relaunch the game and find the animation to even judged if it looked good. With GraphicsGale, I get a live preview as I edit, making it much easier.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

That’s all I have! Please, if you haven’t tried my game, I would very much appreciate if you did! This is my second Ludum Dare, both being Compo. I think this is the better of the two, and I’d love to see what you think!<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Happy LD-ing!<\/p>\n

 <\/p>","time":"December 24th, 2015 2:04 pm","title":"There\u2019s No Going Back \u2013 Post Mortem"}