So against my better judgement, I decided to participate in this month’s Mini Ludum Dare!  I will be building a game in C++ using the SFML framework, and creating my game assets in Paint.NET.  Unfortunately, I don’t think I’ll be able to get a whole lot done, since I also have homework to attend to, so I am scoping very low for this project.

My game will be a one-screen, top-down monster shooter set in a labyrinth; nothing fancy on the experience side.  However, I am using this as an opportunity to teach myself new things, in the spirit of the compo.  Specifically, I implemented a new AI pathfinding method I’ve never tried before, use cellular automata to generate my levels in a way I’ve never done before, and am going to try to practice my pixel art a little more.

The following screenshot is a debugging view of the pathfinding technique I mentioned.  It is essentially my own implementation of the technique described in this article, where it is called “diffusion-based pathfinding”.  The brighter the tiles, the nearer they are to my player character, as you can surely see; the data is updated constantly, in real-time.  Monsters will use this diffusion- or scent-based grid to navigate towards the player at all times.

Hope everyone’s having fun, and getting their proper rest!  I’ll be cross-posting to my personal blog as well.

Tags: MiniLD #45