{"assets":[],"author_link":"author\/seconddimension\/","author_name":"SecondDimension","cat":"LD #25","categories":["LD #25"],"comments":[],"epoch":1356028140,"event":"LD25","likes":6,"metadata":{"p_key":"79916","p_author":"SecondDimension","p_authorkey":"0","p_urlkey":"288926","p_title":"PsyGoat Post-Mortem","p_cat":"LD #25","p_event":"LD25","p_time":"1356028140","p_likes":"6","p_comments":"0","p_status":"WAYBACK","us_key":null,"us_name":null,"us_username":null,"event_start":"1355443200","event_key":"14","event_name":"LD25"},"source_url":"2012\/12\/20\/psygoat-post-mortem\/","text":"

INTRO<\/strong>\nMy game, PsyGoat, is a platformer about an evil Goat who can control weapons with his mind.\u00a0 As the Goat, you must escape from a maximum security prison and use your evil superpowers to generally cause chaos.\u00a0 Overall I\u2019m really happy with it, I think shooting a giant laser out of your eyes and controlling machine guns with your mind is fairly fun, but there were definitely some problems that meant the challenge level and variety really suffered.\u00a0 If you like to vapourise guards with a giant laser beam, play the game here:\u00a0PsyGoat Game<\/a><\/p>\n

\"PsyGoat\n<\/a><\/p>\n

\nWHAT WENT WRONG<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Time \/ Priorities<\/strong>\nSo imagine you decide to make a platform game, you get the collisions and gravity working and you have to make a decision regarding your game design, do you:\na) Stick to pure platforming; just running, jumping and maybe bouncing.<\/em>\nb) Add a single combat or manipulation mechanic to complement the platforming.\n<\/em>c) Add 5 complicated superpowers that involve slowing time, creating objects, projectiles, <\/em>controlling defences and changing gravity.\n<\/em>\nSo the correct answer is \u201crun as far away from option c) as possible.\u00a0 Guess what I did.\nThis bizarre decision was supposed to lead down the route of having a multitude of awesome powers that would complement each other perfectly.\u00a0 Then the levels would offer interesting ways to use these powers.\u00a0 An ambitious goal, but it was mind-blowingly obvious that it wasn\u2019t going to work in 48hrs.\u00a0 So I got all the powers done, which I\u2019m really happy about, but they were all either over-powered or totally useless.\u00a0 There was no requirement to even use them at all.\u00a0 This leads to the 2nd<\/sup> problem:<\/p>\n

Level Design<\/strong>\nIn summary, I spent 46.5 hours getting the game working, getting the powers working, writing & recording some music, setting up pause menus, writing tutorials, creating title screens and generally making sure everything would function together as a game.\u00a0 Great, I was very happy with this; it was my plan all along.\u00a0 Now to duplicate my empty level 20 times and set about design a series of challenging and interesting levels\u2026 just get a coffee first\u2026 BLARG THERE IS 1 HOUR LEFT!\u00a0 Yes people this actually happened.\u00a0 It also happened in an identical way during LD24.\u00a0 Level design is very important, you can\u2019t do it in an hour.\u00a0 The levels just weren\u2019t engaging, and I have received some entirely justified criticism in this regard.\u00a0 So next time I\u2019ll go for slightly simpler mechanics and allow more time for level design.\u00a0 Well I\u2019ll try.<\/p>\n

WHAT WENT RIGHT<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Music!<\/strong>\nThis was a main goal of mine, I play and write a little bit of music in my spare time, so I felt this was an area I should try to perform well in.\u00a0 I set about writing & recording a simple synth soundtrack on GarageBand, and I succeeded.\u00a0 No auto-play or samples, just me play virtual synths with my actual fingers.\u00a0 I\u2019m really pleased about this, if you want to check out the soundtrack it is online here:\u00a0Soundtrack<\/a><\/p>\n

\nSuper-Stuff\n<\/strong>As much as most of the powers\u00a0weren\u2019t\u00a0that inspiring, I felt that the main power of telekinetic guns was solid, and fairly fun to control.\u00a0 Even more so with the laser; I like games that do bug stupid stuff you can\u2019t do in real life, and I\u2019d like to think that giant laser made a few people say \u201cwhoa!\u201d<\/p>\n

Sprites\n<\/strong>I\u2019m not an artist and really struggle in this regard, but I am professional developer of Excel reports & systems\u2026\u00a0 so I found using Excel to create auto-shapes as body parts really helped me! \u00a0It meant animating was easier and more consistent, and I was able to re-created some scribbled character drawings quickly.\u00a0 I think I got the scale wrong, everything looks a little lost in amongst the platforms, but overall I think this went well considering my lack of artistic flair.<\/p>\n

\"Excel<\/a><\/p>\n

CONCLUSION<\/span><\/strong>\nUltimately I finished a platform game and created some music I\u2019m happy with, so all my goals were achieved.\u00a0 I call that a win!\u00a0 I also learned more during the 48hrs of this LD than I have in the whole 3 months since the last one.\u00a0 It is an amazing way to learn what you are good at, and how to prioritise the important stuff.\u00a0 This time I also spent a lot more time reading the community blogs, so I had 40 interesting games bookmarked already when the voting started.\u00a0 Overall, a great experience.<\/p>\n

6<\/a><\/span><\/div><\/div>\n

\n\n\t\t\t\t\t\tThis entry was posted\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\ton Thursday, December 20th, 2012 at 6:29 pm\t\t\t\t\t\tand is filed under LD #25<\/a>.\n\t\t\t\t\t\tYou can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0<\/a> feed.\n\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tYou can leave a response<\/a>, or trackback<\/a> from your own site.\n\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/small>\n<\/p>","time":"December 20th, 2012 6:29 pm","title":"PsyGoat Post-Mortem","title_was_empty":false}