1/31/23

Time Worked: Like an hour 

As you (nobody? myself?) can tell, I've hit a roadblock. It's been tough lately. Had people playtest it and I guess just because I have put in so much work I thought they might give it more of a shot but they were kinda just disinterested. Which is a hard response to accept when you really work hard on something. Also it's now pretty much me (plus the audio guy! Respect bro). At least in terms of developing the game and doing everything that isn't audio, it's all me.

So that's always tough to hear right. But I'm moving, I'm making decisions and I am NOT giving up. I am going to make this fucking game.

So today I made some changes to the design. I don't feel like explaining it all, but I have been reminded (rightfully so!) that I have so much learning to do and this is game is not going to be my masterpiece. It's going to be great, but I can't obsess over it too much because I have too much to learn. So I have set a deadline and made the design clear. 

It's time to get back in the game.

1/26/23

Time Worked: 6:47 -  8:48

Total Time: ~ 2 hrs

Today I worked on fixing crouching. Finally figured out a way to have actors target crouchers - just creating a gameobject that is just the "target" for when the actor should be targeted. I.e. where the enemy should aim on the player. Or vice versa. 

I also fixed some gun qirkiness.

I realize I'm pretty much definetly not going to get all the stuff on my wall done by the 31st. Unless I really dedicate serious time which I could Sunday if I wanted to. We will see.

I also thought about where to host the game and when to do so.

 

1/25/23

Time Worked: 5:45 - 7:00

Total Time: 2 hrs, 15 mins

Today I fixed a few bugs and ended up working on crouching. I need to make a decision how crouching will work, mainly how actors will target actors that are crouching. Do they automatically adjust their gun to the correct rotation? Then how do I do so for the player since the target of the player isn't so clear? What if there's a crouching enemy and a standing one behind it, how do we figure out which one the player intends to shoot?

I'll think of something later or tomorrow. This is actually why snap-to-cover systems are good, because they can simplify questions like this.

 

1/22/23

Time Worked: 7:42 - 2:57 PM

Total Time: 3 hrs, 32 mins

Oh noooo I missed a day.

Anyway. Today I worked on the inventory system. I guess it's a really good thing that I decided to go with a much more simple system because this itself was already so much work to implement. I think I need to continue making design calls on the based on the principle of simplicity. It was a good move.

So now weapon pickups, explosives pickups and weapon swapping are all implemented. Also explosives now can be placed anywhere on the map rather than just breakable walls, but they only trigger slow motion on breakable walls.

I think I need to organize my process a little more. I'm chugging through another slog period where it just seems like endless tasks. I mean I'm really making progress and it's amazing. But every task generates more tasks and I need to make sure I'm prioritizing correctly. And that I can start to organize work into completable, rewarding groups.

I'm probably going to take a little time to re-prioritize later today.

I'm proud of myself for doing this and I'm not gonna stop!

1/20/23

 Today I just sat down and looked at the game and wrote this.

It still counts mannnnnnnnnn

1/19/23

 Today I worked on implementing the equipment system.

1/18/23

Time Worked: 12:50AM - 1:17 AM

Total Time: idk like 30 mins

Today I just dug up some particle effects from the Unity particle effects demo scene. It was great.

It struck me just how many resources are available to independent/hobbyist developers. It is crazy cray. There is so much shit out there you can use for free. I feel like honestly they are begging for people to give it their best shot. It's a good time to be me, there is no better position I could be in right now.

1/17/23

Time Worked: 7 - 7:57 PM

Total Time: 57 mins

So today I worked out some stuff about how equipment and inventory management will work. Here's a summary of what I kind of came up with from my working Design document:

1/16/23

Time Worked: 6:45 - 8 PM

Total Time: 1 hr, 15 mins

Today I made the Plastic Explosives a lootable. I haven't figured out a good architecture for inventory yet, it's a whole feature of it's own... so I should probably keep it simple. There is temptation to try to make it good, but the thing is I have not really put much thought into it at the moment and it'd be better for that to be a task for later perhaps.

But in this iteration the PE and the Assault Rifle will be lootables. 

Time Worked: 5:45 - 8:30 PM

Total Time: 2 hrs, 15 mins

Guys. Guys. The game is fun!

I implemented a new weapon (the pistol) today, figured out a few simple bugs and played around with lighting. I also added 3rd party models for the guns (sooooo much better). I changed out the gun sound effect cause the old one was trash. 

I actually played the game myself like 15 times because it was actually kind of fun. I found myself wishing there was more. What a good feeling! 

We'll see what people think later this month though. I'm going to focus as much as I can to make sure to present the best thing possible, to get the best feedback I can. But I'm really feeling confident.

1/14/23

Total Time: 20 mins

 Didn't do much today, just a little cleanup of the explosives code.

1/13/23

Time Worked: 7:27 - 9:53

Total Time: 2 hrs, 26 mins

Today I fixed up the map. I also decided to change the camera angle to 45 degrees instead of 30 and shorten the walls, which has turned out really nice! It means I don't have to bother with making see through walls and dealing with actors being obscured. I actually think it looks a little nicer too.

I also got the destructible walls implemented into the map. I added the slow motion which was really easy and even set the pitch of bullets etc. to be much lower during slow motion, and it sounds and looks quite cool! Feeling good, in fact great about this. I also finally found a way to make GIFs on Mac. 

A good day.

1/12/23

Time Worked: 5:30 - 6:20

Total Time:  50 mins

Today I met with the animator, and he showed me a really cool IK plugin he found that he applied to the model he made, and it looks sooooooooo good. It's awesome. He's gonna put it in the game soon so I'm very excited to see that.  It'll be very motivating to see a visual for the player and enemies other than a capsule. It will kind of make it all feel more real. Can't wait.

As for the work I've done, I was able to just do one or two more rooms implemented in the map. It's really not hard work it's just repetitive. It's not so bad. I'll see if I can get it done later tonight. I enjoy working on this today.

1/11/23

Time Worked: 3:45 - 7:30 PM

Total Time: 2 hrs, 30 mins

Today I worked on implementing the map. Got a little discouraged when I watched a video about how Enter the Gungeon was made. So weird, like it's an awesome game and I'm happy for the guys who make it... but sometimes I just feel kinda depressed after watching those kinds of videos. I think it's because I start to compare myself to them. And then see all the things that they have accomplished. And it makes me feel like I can't' do it or something.

But that's fucking bullshit. What's true is, I will never be anyone else but me. I can't go back in time and suddenly have a bunch of Game Dev experience or start when I was 5 or something. Or just snap my fingers and be a success. 

I have to make my own path. This is the path here. This is the work it takes to do it. This is my story and nobody else's. I don't know the end or what will happen next. There will never be a way to know until either I'm there or I die. I just know I have to keep working and we'll see what happens, that's all anyone can do. 

1/10/23

 

Time Worked: 4:47 - 6:59 PM

Total Time: 2 hrs, 12 mins

It's really hot in my office. 

So today I basically have finished the prototype functionality of the destructible walls. Basically the last task was to figure out how I am going to fit them into the map, so I realized I needed to design the map. So I did. Here's version 2 of the Apartment Prototype. I feel really good about this. There's an alternate weapon and plastic explosives that can be looted off of specific enemies. I designed it in such a way that the player doesn't have to fight those enemies, they can attempt to just go straight to the VIP room.  But if they do the other rooms as well, they are rewarded with weapons and equipment.

Should be cool! I started doing the probuilder layout today as well. 

Now it's time to play some Darktide!

1/9/23

Time Worked: 9 AM - 4 PM, intermittently

Total Time: ~ 45 mins

Today I made things go boom.

1/8/23

 Today I met with the animator/modeler, and he told me he was ready to get stuff done on the project. We discussed what we want for the January build. So that's exciting! I'm not really going to do much more today, I have been busy with other things. But at least had a little meeting.

I have set a deadline for the entire game to be done December 31st, 2023.

And we're going to try to make builds of the game every month as milestones.

1/7/23

Time Worked: 7:51-10:58

Total Time: 2 hrs, 10 mins

Today I decided to set aside the LOS and perception stuff. Shit was just too confusing things just kept popping up. I was advised to do so by my friend Steven. Always helpful to have someone else to discuss projects with. Anyway now I'm working on explosions which will be a lot more fun.

I decided just to reveal rooms once the player opens them, and just leave them visible. Maybe I'll go back to some sort of LOS thing in the future but not right now.

 

1/6/23

Time Worked: 7:30 - 8:25

Total Time: 55 mins

Yeaaaaah boi I made progress today. I decided using a 3D mesh was just a bad idea for LOS. The thing is I can't waste a bunch of time trying to figure out a "perfect" solution, I just have to do what works so I can move on to other features. It's an iterative process, I can come back to it as long as I can get it into a playable state. So I decided to just have it be a 2D mesh on the floor. Furniture is affected by the LOS stencil as previously. Walls just ignore the Outside LOS fog, so they're always regular brightness. Enemies are invisible, but as soon as LOS can see the enemy they are made visible. It doesn't look like PERFECT, but I think it's really probably good enough. If I reallly really need to come back to it later I will. But I'm so excited to not be working on this part any more lol. I just have some cleanup to do tomorrow and it's on to more exciting stuff... maybe the Placed Explosives! That would be so fun to work on.

1/5/23

 Today work dragged on and on and I had some family stuff to attend to. I at least got up here and played the game.I think I need a little time to recover anyway.

1/4/23

Time Worked: 7:08 - 8:49AM

Total Time: 1 hr, 22 mins 

Ok I took a good crack at it this morning before work. It's not looking as bad. I created 3 more meshes. The first is basically a copy of the original raycast-heavy mesh (the view cone), but at a higher y-position. The other two are squares that I'm using to connect the two meshes on the sides. At this point I just need to connect all the front vertices. It will take some number crunching. This may be pretty performance heavy with all this duplicated ray casting, but I'm just going to get it done iteratively. Before I give a shit about performance there has to be something to perform. I also made the LOS circle around the player flat because it looks way better, and created an additional stencil mesh that's the same shape as the player so they are never "outside LOS".

Something I'm learning over time is, anything is possible if you don't get discouraged. Just keep trying every single day and whatever it is will come together. No matter how scary it is. Just keep chugging away.

I can't wait to get this feature out of the way. I wanna work on explosions and shit.

1/3/23

Time Worked: 8 - 9:30 PM

Total Time: 1 hr, 30 mins

Man this shit is hard. I just can't seem to figure out FOV in an isometric perspective. It's a weird one. For the record I CAN figure it out. I'm just struggling. I think I need to change strategies maybe. Or at least I need to be open to the idea.

This is one of those big challenges that could make one quit. But not this guy.

1/2/23

Time Worked: 8:30 - 9:35

Total Time: 1 hr, 5 mins

I'm pretty tired. I had a lot of other stuff to do today but I was like "I just wanna take a stab at this perception problem". And so I guess an hour is a pretty good stab lol. This is really good, this habit I've got going. Really good. Excited to see what comes about.

Anyway I figured out what exactly I want for FoV at least for the first iteration of it. And right now I've got it pretty much working - the only real problem left is I have to create a 3D mesh from the 2D mesh for the visual effect. And I'm just not really comfortable creating meshes from code yet. But I think it'll turn out alright. It probably isn't that hard. But I think I need to go at it with a really fresh mind.

 

1/1/23

Time Worked: 7:30 - 10:00 AM

Total Time: 1 hr, 55 mins

Today I kept working on the perception zone. It's pretty complex and a really big change. But I think it will be neat. It will change the gameplay experience a lot. I'm fucking hungry. I also learned some Shader Graph stuff to hide things that aren't "visible".

Happy New Year.