Piecemeal Jack - post 0

My goal for this month is to produce an art-ready game before December 1st.

Art-ready is a made-up term to describe a mostly-complete game that is missing all art assets. This approach to game creation should generally be frowned upon due to the potential of technical issues arising from the late introduction of said assets. I decided to attempt this approach with my new game for 2 reasons:

1. I recently realized, with the help of my roommate, that I really don't enjoy the process of designing and crafting art for games. I enjoy programming and game design, but the art side has always been the kind of thing that I only attempted to do on my own because of an assumption that it's the indie thing to do.
   
2. I've never attempted to hire an artist as a contractor before. I want time to ensure I have a good estimate of how many assets I'll need, which may require the whole month to work out.

 

Now, before I go over what Piecemeal Jack is, let me cover some history:

One of the first videogames I ever tried to make was based on an old series called Splatterhouse. I wanted to take the simple 2D platforming of this series and transplant it into a top-down 2D perspective. I worked on the project on and off for a year, and finally released a prototype I named Punch in the Dark. I'm not very proud of what I ended up with, but I am happy I released something as the response to it was inspiring in unexpected ways. You can play the prototype here:

https://dgalga.itch.io/punch-in-the-dark

 

The game that became Punch in the Dark went through so many iterations that almost every idea I originally had was stripped or filed down in some way. Over October, while I was brainstorming and prototyping ideas to work on for this month, those scrapped ideas came slithering back to me.

Piecemeal Jack will be a short, combat-oriented 2D platformer set in 1 large-house-sized level. I'm talking jumping, ground slams, punching, the ability to fall between floors, the ability to discover secret passages, use of 3 weapons you get from boss enemies, and a focus on enemies as your primary obstacle instead of jumping challenges. In this way, I intend to adhere much closer to my original design idea for the game. For example, I plan to featured holes in the floors of the house, which were previously challenging to design in a fun or interesting way from a top-down perspective.

I get 4 full weeks out of November, and I intend to build the full game over those 4 weeks. This first week will be focusing on building out the main character, then the 4 bosses I have planned and design of the house if there's time. Work progress will slow greatly after this first week, but I'm hoping I'll be able to come up with and implement all low-level enemies over the following 2 weeks. The final week will be for implementation of menus and the 4 difficulty levels I'm planning:

1. Easy
1. Double health
2. Double damage
3. Checkpoints
4. No unlocks
2. Medium
   
1. Normal health
2. Normal damage
3. Checkpoints
   
4. Can use unlocks
5. Get 3 unlocks whenever you beat the game
3. 1 life
   
1. Normal health
2. Normal damage
3. Can use unlocks
4. No checkpoints
5. 1 unlock on death
6. 3 unlocks on win
4. Punishing
   
1. 1 life
2. No unlocks
3. No checkpoints
4. Normal health
5. Normal damage
   

Some difficulty modes, chiefly Easy and Punishing, may be cut for time if needed.

I'm planning to post 1 new blog entry every Sunday of this month with an update on the status of the game. I don't think this will help my productivity any, but I am hoping it'll catch some interest for the game.

Until Sunday.

New Production Strategy

Over the past 5-ish months since my last post, I've learned that programming only really matters to me in the context of programming a game. Accordingly, I've quit school with the intent to do everything possible to move into a game development career. My first priority in this regard is to find a new and better production strategy for myself.

Of the strategies I've encountered so far for making games, my favorite has easily been the boardgame production strategy:

Produce prototype > find players > get feedback > repeat until "ready" > submit to a contest or group of other designers to tear apart > make corrections with intent to pursue a publisher or kickstarter, with additional testing as needed.

However, I haven't found a way or group to work with to easily apply this strategy to my videogame production. The closest similar outlet I've found for videogames are game jams, where you craft and produce an idea in accordance with a theme (or, sometimes, no theme) and (hopefully) receive feedback from other jam participants. Even if you don't get feedback, you get the opportunity to compare you work to your peers.

Jams are very good for testing new ideas and mechanics you might be interested in. It's my impression that making jam games can do alot to develop your ability to craft mechanics that "feel good". But, how do you take a jam game and turn it into a full title? I've yet to figure this out, despite trying to for at least 3 projects. The spark goes out once the prototype game is "done", and I find myself moving on.

My only alternative to the boardgame strategy and jams, until recently, was just to "plan to finish a full game this year" and work on and off on the project. This strategy led to boredom and frustration. I spent a good portion of my free time tinkering with programming languages until I finally decided to go back to school.

I need tight deadlines, the ability to work rapidly, and built-in time off in order to ensure I can continue working full-time while attempting to change my life. I've decided to try the following strategy:

• Sent aside 4 months twice a year to produce a full game with the intent to charge some amount of money for it
• First month is just brainstorming and experimenting with the goal of selecting 1 game idea to continue with. I've been completely derailed by experiments in the past and, in the game jam I most recently participated in (MechJam II), the game I actually finished was started with 12 hours left out of 2 weeks. It's my hope that providing more time at the start will allow me to get a better grasp of my project and its scope.
• The remaining 3 months are intended only for the production of the idea I selected in the first month. The 3rd month is intended as a safety net only, so if I'm starting over again in the 3rd month that's a sign I need to shelve the project for later.
• The remaining 4 months are sprinkled between big game projects and are for pushing my games on social media, game jams, programming, life events, whatever else arises. I've found social media in general to be an annoying distraction, and I hope to keep interaction with it to a minimum while developing.
  

 

This new strategy doesn't include time for user testing, feedback, or coordination with other artists. There's so many prototypes vying for people's attention, not to mention all of the completed games from every decade imaginable, that I find the idea of attempting to attract an audience with my current resources extremely intimidating. I've also given up on the idea of paying others to work with me for now, as I no longer have the spare finances.

Every now and again, I hear about weird little indie games. Projects buried in the mass of steam, or invisible on the prototype-heavy platform of Itch.io. I hear about these games from videos posted by other game makers, or through quirks of the YouTube algorithm that lead me to tiny channels with minuscule followers. It really seems to me that any sufficiently entertaining or distinct videogame has the potential to be discovered and cherished by a tiny group of zealots.

Aiming for tiny success is not a good business strategy. However, when all you want to do is produce something worth actual money with your very limited resources, ie not an asset flip and typically more developed than a student project, it is a strategy. Worst case, no one notices your games and your portfolio expands beyond jam projects. Best case, you make a game a few people like enough to tell their friends about. 

 

You don't have to ask for money as part of this process, but I want to. It gives me reason to aim for a higher standard in my work.

As part of this new strategy, I plan to spend this month planning a project and then next month attempting to make 1 game. This would allow me to treat December as an off month before planning a new game in January.

This will be my only blog post for October. However, I plan to post weekly updates in November. I plan to continue posting here because I'm not ready to divide whatever audience I might have. 

 

Until then.