Battle Gem Ponies DevLog #40 (NPCs, LinkedIn, & Crowdfunding My Heroes)

A lot of catch-up gaming happened this week.
It's been a while since I just sat down and enjoyed playing a game.

     I admit to some serious slacking this week, but on the technical side, I was researching a lot of games I've been curious about. thanks to my friends I've now tried out Catherine, Metal Gear Rising, Alice: Madness Returns, Hyrule Warriors, Mario Kart 8, UnderTale, and InFamous 2. It's been refreshing honestly, and my creative batteries feel recharged.

You can still see some of this week's accomplishments below.

Some WIP NPC sprites. I still have a lot to do.
Each citizen one will have a color swap while most trainer types are more unique.

   Completed:

• Front Facing NPCs
• Edited Avatar Sprites
• Sketches for Confirmed Pony Ultra Forms
• Edited Item & Move Spreadsheets
• Reduced GP of All Moves by 60% (5 becomes 3, 10 becomes 6, etc.)
• Updated Project Plan Chart
• NPC AI Planning
• RoShamBo Battle Scene (for Capstone)
• Comfortably over 600 Twitter Followers
• Gave a Lot of Care to My LinkedIn Profile
• Researched Working in the AAA Gaming Industry

     Lessons Learned:

• Found some Budgeting Advice.
• Had a tour of my school's 3D printing lab.
• I discovered the Designer Notes Podcast.
• After playing a lot of new games in a row, I feel like I have a better idea of how to deliver an awesome, polished, and intuitive game experience.
• Google Play is doubling the maximum app size to 100MB! I don't have to really worry about BGP being too big as phones and tablets continue to become more powerful.

       Although my ultimate goal is to be free, happy, and wealthy it's still necessary to have plans for the case where the free part isn't possible. I had a random urge earlier in the week to look up statistics and read job advertisements for a bunch of game companies I could see myself working at if Yotes Games bursts into flames. It was a nice exercise and put me in the mindset of learning to be a better leader and motivator (and thus, a better designer/director).
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   Downloads:

TriGrid hit 500! Lots of cool numbers to see here actually.
There's almost 20,000 people out there who've given my work a try!

   I've decreased expectations to $25 a month now instead of $50. Unicorn Training really is fading away and I'll need smaller releases in-between my bigger games to hopefully keep things steady in the future. I expect things to get really quiet until Battle Gem Ponies is looking more complete.

    Featured:

Cartridge allows videos to be posted now.

     My work is still out there, and people are still discovering me. I didn't get onto EQD, but I'll spam harder when a bigger announcement comes by. All I can do right now is inch toward the next demo and let other projects hold the spotlight for a while.
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Them's Fightin' Herds has been on my mind for quite a few years.

     I'm a proud supporter of the Them's Fightin' Herds crowdfunding campaign. It's nice to see the people who inspired me to get into game development start to succeed. It took them about 4 years (from my perspective) to reach where they are today. I may end up doing a campaign of my own someday, so it's good to take notes on how a team similar to what I want to grow into handles this.