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Ludum Dare 40
Dec. 2nd, 2017 05:00 am5:00am - Well Ludum Dare is here at last! The theme this season is "The more you have, the worse it is" and I've already got an idea for it. I'm going to make a game where you have to carry a stack of boxes and the more you have, the worse it is!
5:52am - Alright, I've got some teetering boxes attached to my player. Now I need to make a couple sprites for the player.
6:24am - It looks like my protagonist is a cute little warehouse robot. Though now that I have my little robot man with his little wheels I'm left wondering how he can jump. ^.^;;
Well I'll worry about that later.
What do I need next?
Some sort of game, I wager. Heh. I'll eventually need to make the script to pick up the boxes and add maybe remove them from the stack, but for now I need some sort of game involving stacked up boxes.
I was thinking I might make it so that you have to get all the boxes and make it to the end of the map, but I'm not sure what kind of challenge to put in the way of the player. The idea is that the more you have, the worse it is, so I thought I'd make the player slower the more they carried, and have to deal with enemies that are effectively faster the more you weigh yourself down. I was also thinking about having low-hanging ceilings where you needed to think about the order in which you get the boxes in order to proceed. But I'm not sure about either of those mechanics now.
7:00am - A fellow on the GameDevLeague Discord made a few good suggestions, the best being that I implement a timer of sorts for score, where you have to deliver all the boxes to the target, either fast enough, or faster gives you a higher score. <3
7:31am - I set up the main menu. I'm not sure why I decided to do that now, but I did it. Now to make that timer!
8:04am - I went ahead and had breakfast, and watched a short video on Marx's contributions to sociology and conflict theory. But that's not related to Ludum Dare so it's time to get back to work!
I have the clock partly done but not completely done, so I'll work on that some more.
8:31am - Okay I have the clock now and it counts up the time since the level started. Later on I'll grab that value of time when the level completes and pass it to the score page.
8:36am - I'm not entirely sure what to do next. I've still got to do the box pickup mechanic.
8:53am - I went to the bathroom and now I'm back. Still waffling on what I want to do next.
9:21am - Geez it's been a long time of messing around, watching YouTube vids and looking at Twitter and looking at Discord and I still haven't continued on the game. I'm on a time limit here. XD
I think part of the problem might be that the game isn't endearing enough to me. I mean, I'm not sure I like the game I'm making. I don't know if I'd play it on its own merits, even if I had all the features I can imagine in it. So that's a bit disappointing. I guess I'd rather be working on my other projects, like World of Thardomhainn or the Estheria Prototype. That said, I've comitted myself to doing Ludum Dare and this game will look good on my Portfolio if I can finish it in time. So I'm a bit conflicted.
Oh and about the Estheria prototype; Zax finally contacted me again and he says he'll fully integrate me into the team and add me to their Discord today, so that's good, though it's another thing to do today besides Ludum Dare. XD
He was also hoping to use my Dialogue system in another game, but I had to tell him it wasn't ready for that. It would be with the changes I'm planning to make to it, but I haven't made them yet. Alas.
9:39am - Geez gravy, I just started writing the PlayerStack script to track and control the player's stack of boxes, and I got butterflies in my stomach real bad. :/
I'm gonna get some tea and try to calm down.
10:34am - Alright! I did it! I made a collectable box and scripted the stack to build as the player collects boxes.
Next up I should probably make the target for the level end. I'm thinking I'll make it a pallet, and when the player gets to it, it'll dramatically place the boxes on the pallet with sound effects and stuff.
10:58am - Okay I've made a pallet and put copies of the boxes on it. Next up I need to make the end of level stuff. So, when the player collides with the pallet, it checks if they have all the boxes. If not, nothing happens. If they do, the clock pauses, the game pauses? and the pallet fills up one by one while the player's stack empties one by one. Then the end of level UI pops up, showing the player's completion time.
So, let's start by scripting the pallet I guess.
12:17pm - Okay I got the Pallet working halfway. It doesn't show the end of level screen yet but it does the animated 'boxes here!' thing and that's great. It'll be better with sound and special effects, but it's great.
Now I've been working for over seven hours and I need lunch and a break, so I'mma go home and eat then go to the library to work more.
5:52am - Alright, I've got some teetering boxes attached to my player. Now I need to make a couple sprites for the player.
6:24am - It looks like my protagonist is a cute little warehouse robot. Though now that I have my little robot man with his little wheels I'm left wondering how he can jump. ^.^;;
Well I'll worry about that later.
What do I need next?
Some sort of game, I wager. Heh. I'll eventually need to make the script to pick up the boxes and add maybe remove them from the stack, but for now I need some sort of game involving stacked up boxes.
I was thinking I might make it so that you have to get all the boxes and make it to the end of the map, but I'm not sure what kind of challenge to put in the way of the player. The idea is that the more you have, the worse it is, so I thought I'd make the player slower the more they carried, and have to deal with enemies that are effectively faster the more you weigh yourself down. I was also thinking about having low-hanging ceilings where you needed to think about the order in which you get the boxes in order to proceed. But I'm not sure about either of those mechanics now.
7:00am - A fellow on the GameDevLeague Discord made a few good suggestions, the best being that I implement a timer of sorts for score, where you have to deliver all the boxes to the target, either fast enough, or faster gives you a higher score. <3
7:31am - I set up the main menu. I'm not sure why I decided to do that now, but I did it. Now to make that timer!
8:04am - I went ahead and had breakfast, and watched a short video on Marx's contributions to sociology and conflict theory. But that's not related to Ludum Dare so it's time to get back to work!
I have the clock partly done but not completely done, so I'll work on that some more.
8:31am - Okay I have the clock now and it counts up the time since the level started. Later on I'll grab that value of time when the level completes and pass it to the score page.
8:36am - I'm not entirely sure what to do next. I've still got to do the box pickup mechanic.
8:53am - I went to the bathroom and now I'm back. Still waffling on what I want to do next.
9:21am - Geez it's been a long time of messing around, watching YouTube vids and looking at Twitter and looking at Discord and I still haven't continued on the game. I'm on a time limit here. XD
I think part of the problem might be that the game isn't endearing enough to me. I mean, I'm not sure I like the game I'm making. I don't know if I'd play it on its own merits, even if I had all the features I can imagine in it. So that's a bit disappointing. I guess I'd rather be working on my other projects, like World of Thardomhainn or the Estheria Prototype. That said, I've comitted myself to doing Ludum Dare and this game will look good on my Portfolio if I can finish it in time. So I'm a bit conflicted.
Oh and about the Estheria prototype; Zax finally contacted me again and he says he'll fully integrate me into the team and add me to their Discord today, so that's good, though it's another thing to do today besides Ludum Dare. XD
He was also hoping to use my Dialogue system in another game, but I had to tell him it wasn't ready for that. It would be with the changes I'm planning to make to it, but I haven't made them yet. Alas.
9:39am - Geez gravy, I just started writing the PlayerStack script to track and control the player's stack of boxes, and I got butterflies in my stomach real bad. :/
I'm gonna get some tea and try to calm down.
10:34am - Alright! I did it! I made a collectable box and scripted the stack to build as the player collects boxes.
Next up I should probably make the target for the level end. I'm thinking I'll make it a pallet, and when the player gets to it, it'll dramatically place the boxes on the pallet with sound effects and stuff.
10:58am - Okay I've made a pallet and put copies of the boxes on it. Next up I need to make the end of level stuff. So, when the player collides with the pallet, it checks if they have all the boxes. If not, nothing happens. If they do, the clock pauses, the game pauses? and the pallet fills up one by one while the player's stack empties one by one. Then the end of level UI pops up, showing the player's completion time.
So, let's start by scripting the pallet I guess.
12:17pm - Okay I got the Pallet working halfway. It doesn't show the end of level screen yet but it does the animated 'boxes here!' thing and that's great. It'll be better with sound and special effects, but it's great.
Now I've been working for over seven hours and I need lunch and a break, so I'mma go home and eat then go to the library to work more.
