Postmortem: Gain Quest: The Art of Muscle
Third's the charm they say, right? Time to have a look at our Ludum Dare 39 entry with @Mindhead.
Check out Gain Quest: The Art of Muscle
Considering how disappointed I was at my own personal performance last time around, I can safely say that I'm relieved. I had this idea pretty much instantly from the get-go, which enabled us to really hammer down on the work right away (well, right after some sleep). We decided to really tone down on the scope which resulted in a much more comprehensive end result. I had some downtime due to some electrical outage, and yet we we're able to push a submission in good time.
What went right?
* We aimed for a small game this time. This is the main takeaway for anyone who has participated on Jams and hasn't gotten preferable results. Large-scale ideas will most likely not succeed, for 72 hours, let alone 48 hours, is simply not enough time to flesh out those intricate details. Scheduling and concentrating becomes easier the less filler you have. Even more so, people rarely play LD games for more than 5-10 minutes, so having less content makes it easier for you to make that 5-10 minutes awesome. Add to that how much easier it is to test your game. KEEP IT SMALL. This is obviously something we failed at last time.
* Accept that you're going to run out of time. Instead of trying to desperately include things I really liked, I actively shortened our feature list as soon as I had the hunch that things weren't going to get done in time. That was pretty often, and resulted in a playable, fun little game instead of a possible bug-crash-fest.
* I started on the UI right away. First, this game was very UI-oriented, with minigames done with UI components being the main mechanic. Second, I have a slight disdain towards Unity's UI system all things considered, so I thought blasting through the painful process from the very start will help me afterwards, and also help with the concurrent problems regarding the lack of visual feedback we've been having in earlier entries. I was right, and while there is still to improve upon, we performed much better on that area overall.
* The choice to go with 2D. While 3D is very much manageable and my usual preference, 2D just usually requires less work from both graphical and coding perspective. It is also lighter.
* I designed a more efficient, yet still simple state machine to run the game loop. Incidentally, it does not require much code to create a custom IEnumerator-swapping State Machine complete with transitions. Such state machine can make sequential gameplay so much easier to code and manage than with the quick-and-painful Update-loop switch() type crapjob I had in my two earlier entries. Sometimes a more complex solution can land you an easier time afterwards, so plan carefully. This was an adaptation of an earlier, more complex State Machine I had made a Node GUI Editor for, so I had enough experience to build one quickly from scratch.
What went wrong?
* Did not take enough breaks. I'd like to believe I did, but the fact of the matter is that I was mostly bashing my keyboard 24/7. I didn't sleep much at all, didn't go get some fresh air, and all that combined really toned down my ability to work efficiently the longer it went on. This is the main reason for mistakes, errors and especially balancing issues in the game. It's a fact, yet I still can't win over my obsession to just keep going :P
* No documentation. Ok, I had a small, unfinished feature list lying about somewhere but other than that, I had no documentation on what we were doing. Luckily we had the idea rather clearly set out, but still, it's a grave mistake to not plan things "on paper" and resulted in some time wasted on trying to remember what I was supposed to be doing.
* Not much actual game-making documentation either. Not really game-related, but I'd have really liked if I understood to leave a stream on or something to catch my working hours on tape. It's a thing that would only make that time even more valuable as a learning experience, considering all the split-second solutions and efforts you're making to race for that finish line.
* Still not enough time left for sounds. This is more of a pet peeve for me, and pretty much related to me simply not being in best shape at the last day. In any case, in reality sound often happens to be one of the most crucial things in getting the feel of the game right, and I didn't get all music and sounds in and that always bugs me. I should start prioritizing them earlier, or try making them the centerpoint of a game for a change.
What was left missing? * Better balancing of minigame difficulties. * Other random people training in the gym. * Status effects that alter the game.
So, we had a blast with this Ludum Dare. I'm currently playing and rating games, and hope everyone else had fun with their creations! Can't wait 'til the next one.
This game is inspired by I wanna be the guy!
https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/39/d34th
Many people have played our game and the feedback is mostly about that one thing - it's too hard to beat it, or even to enjoy playing it due to flawed balance and less than obvious controls. So we have a question for you, people who may or may not yet played our game.
