Game Development Diary #5

I’m not going to lie to you, it’s been slow going. What should be a relatively simple game is taking much longer than I thought. I am currently in the design stage still and I have six-level backgrounds, most of the core buttons and a simple logo. Along with that I now have four ‘fallers’ all with an animated parachute. As these are essentially the main bulk of graphics one of the biggest problems is the urge to jump into the programming. Seeing the game in front of me in my design program is making me want to see it in action.

It seems like every time I boot up illustrator to complete the assets I fire up Gamesalad as well in some faint hope that I will be able to start the development side. Yet at the end of my hour (my lunch break) I have not yet been able to take the graphics and put them into Gamesalad. I have to force myself to concentrate and just do the game graphics first as this will save a lot of going back and forth further down the line.

Reducing the scope
I have decided to move forward with just six levels to begin with instead of my planned twelve. This will allow me to get cracking on the actual gameplay. I would like to offer the player two game modes: a simple arcade version which is just for getting high scores and a bit of fun and a challenge version where you unlock levels, fallers and goodies.

A quick look
The screenshot above should give you a pretty clear idea of the game and its graphic style. I am going for a soft color scheme and simplistic graphics due to the time frame and although you might think it looks uninspiring I hope the simple, one mechanic gameplay will make it fun for a bit and the unlockables will keep you playing. If I have any time left at the end I will add the additional levels, characters and extras.

Fingers in pies and plates in the air
A positive side effect of being so motivated to create games is that the enthusiasm and motivation is seeping into other areas of my life as well. I am eager to find time to hit the gym, I am blogging a whole lot more and I have a list of game graphics I want to create for my online shop graphic-buffet.com, which is as long as my arm. The only issue with all this is that I don’t have enough time to do all these things which is a real shame. I know I just need to focus on a couple of things but it’s hard not to use motivation on all the other projects. One such distraction is the re-building of AppTrawler.com, a game review site that was popular a couple of years ago but changed hands. Now I have it back I wanted to resurrect it… But more on that later.

Start your engines
Now the initial graphic work is done I will fight with my urges one more time and sit myself information of the illustrator to finish any niggles before I export all the elements for the game engine on Friday. I will export for iPad and iPhone at the same time so I am ready to port it over later on.

It seems you need a lot of self-motivation AND self-discipline when creating games. If you don’t put in the groundwork then your project is sure to sink… Lesson learned (or being learned)