{"assets":[{"original":"http:\/\/ludumdare.com\/compo\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/01\/coloring.gif","local":"\/data\/posts\/2016\/01\/f9dec605c114cb9ad81bba327cbdf18c.gif"},{"original":"http:\/\/ludumdare.com\/compo\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/01\/coloring.gif","local":"\/data\/posts\/2016\/01\/f9dec605c114cb9ad81bba327cbdf18c.gif"}],"author_link":"author\/jezzamon\/","author_name":"Jezzamon","cat":"LD #34","categories":["LD #34"],"comments":[],"epoch":1451925480,"event":"LD34","likes":9,"metadata":{"p_key":"83314","p_author":"Jezzamon","p_authorkey":"0","p_urlkey":"294052","p_title":"Tamamystery behind the scenes","p_cat":"LD #34","p_event":"LD34","p_time":"1451925480","p_likes":"9","p_comments":"0","p_status":"WAYBACK","us_key":null,"us_name":null,"us_username":null,"event_start":"1449792000","event_key":"31","event_name":"LD34"},"source_url":"2016\/01\/04\/tamamystery-behind-the-scenes\/","text":"

(First of all, I was originally concerned about not having enough votes when I started this post, but I\u2019m all good now. That said, you should still play my game because it\u2019s cool, but perhaps consider playing other games too, there\u2019s still time!)<\/p>\n

Tamamystery is a cutesy virtual pet game with nothing mysterious or nefarious involved at all. Nope. Why would you suggest that? Also it\u2019s in Flash, so there\u2019s no download or anything, which means you should totes play it!<\/p>\n

[Click to play!<\/a>]<\/h1>\n
\"You<\/a>

You should totes play this game<\/p><\/div>\n

Now that that\u2019s out of the way, lets get to what this post is about: How I came to using papercraft for my Ludum Dare game!<\/p>\n

The first thing you\u2019ll notice is my freakish hands holding some type of paper-craft device. But it wasn\u2019t always going to be this way\u2026<\/p>\n

Once I knew I was going to do something Tamagotchi related, I started off by doing the classic Google image search to get ideas.<\/p>\n

\"\"

So many Tamagotchis\u2026<\/p><\/div>\n

I also watched some Youtube videos to get an idea of how the Tamagotchi gameplay typically works. I also came across this Tamagotchi device with the little cake on the top, which I liked, and is why I added a bow on the top of my toy.<\/p>\n

\"Apparantly

Apparently if you\u2019re into Tamagotchi videos then you also want to know how to make a Crochet Mini Coin Pouch<\/p><\/div>\n

So I started creating the graphics of the game. I knew I wanted the game to look like a real device, and so it had to be fairly realistic looking. So I started in GIMP,\u00a0first by taking photo of an actual Tamagotchi and adjusting the colours a bit. Using that as a basis, I was going to try to essentially redraw it in GIMP, but soon realised that it looked pretty bad, and was going to take a while to do.<\/p>\n

\"\"

(I\u2019m not very good at this way of doing art)<\/p><\/div>\n

So I ditched that idea. Then I remembered \u201cHey, I\u2019ve done nice vector stuff in the past, right? I\u2019ll do it in flash!\u201d. I quickly realised that THAT was going nowhere too.<\/p>\n

\"\"

I was hoping the grid would help me make things even, but I couldn\u2019t even get the curves to look right<\/p><\/div>\n

So I drew this little place holder graphics and moved on. Also, here you can see I had the idea of having a background that\u2019s permanently etched in the game, like some Tamagotchis and small toys do.<\/p>\n

\"5-2\"

The \u201cfiguring out graphics is a problem for Future Jez\u201d graphic<\/p><\/div>\n

Then I tried to figure out what it would look like on paper, and an idea hit me: If I can make it look good on paper, why not just use that as the graphics as is! I have a whole bunch of cardboard in my room (I often use it for craft things for kids), I had everything I needed really.<\/p>\n

\"\"

Even though I wasn\u2019t trying to make it look good, I felt like this sketch was better than my my actual graphics attempts<\/p><\/div>\n

The actual process of making the toy wasn\u2019t too hard, all I did was draw each piece lightly on the cardboard in pencil and then cut out the outline. I made sure to measure out a piece of cardboard with the same dimensions as the screen so that they lined up.<\/p>\n

To put the pieces together, I used Blu-Tack, which is good\u00a0for two reasons. Firstly, because it\u2019s not permanent so you can move things around. Secondly, it makes the pieces stick out a bit, so you don\u2019t just end up with a flat piece of cardboard, but instead have something with a bit of depth in it. Depending on how much Blu-Tack you use, you can adjust the height of each piece a little bit.<\/p>\n

\"\"

From side on, you can see the layers\u2026 kinda. That screen is coming of a little.<\/p><\/div>\n

To get it into the game, I just took a photo on my phone, put it on the computer, and then skewed it a little bit to compensate for the slight angle I took it at. Then I scaled it to make sure the screen was a nice multiple of the game window size, in pixels, because otherwise you get awkward half-sized pixels or blurry edges due to\u00a0anti-aliasing, and nobody wants that.<\/p>\n

\"\"

This one is nice in the way that you can clearly see that it\u2019s made of paper, it\u2019s not as obvious in the actual one.<\/p><\/div>\n

It looked pretty good at this point, but I felt like it needed colour to look more like an actual device. So I added in the colour in GIMP by using layers with the \u201cMultiply\u201d blending mode. If you just transparently overlay a colour, you lose some of the contrast as all your shadows become lighter, whereas with multiplying,\u00a0you preserve all the blacks as black, and keep the subtle paper texture better. That\u2019s a little tip for ya.<\/p>\n