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Saturday, March 15, 2014

Status Report #29


     My mission was to work hard through Spring Break to make my game more tangible. Mission accomplished. Along the way I also finally cemented the game's scope. The design document's numerous blank pages were filled with details with exactly what Unicorn Quest will be made of. I also made a new friend who is working with a team on a pony action RPG of his own. Keeping up with that game is inspiring me to continue work on my own.

Time for graphs and retrospectives below the break!








   Completed:
  • Organized GDD
  • Filled in GDD (90% complete)
  • Made Loading Screen
  • Made Scene Transitions (fade in/out with black or white)
  • Redesigned the Collision System
  • Implemented Teleporting
  • Demonstrated Teleportation in a Video
  • I'm More Active on LinkedIn Now!
       I was hit by a wave of inspiration the other morning and spent that whole day writing in the design document. I finally ironed out a lot of details and game systems that were just vague ideas in my head. More specifically I wrote about equipment, items, rewrote the story, edited some spells, came up with lots of enemies, defined every boss, came up with names for every character, detailed each region of Equica, wrote what debug variables I'll need, doodled the pause menu screens, and adjusted how the currency system will work.

       I was going to make all the sprites needed for every spell next but I think that would be too draining. I want working on this project to be fun, so that positive energy carries over to the product. Switching hats every day is the most enjoyable way for me to work so I'll be working on each spell one at a time. Making sprites for each upgrade, coding each upgrade's behavior, then testing and tweaking.

     I think I'll do just Blast, Slash, and Pyre just to get started, and start building an enemy to fight and try them on. That way I have a variety of things to do, get to see the pieces come together, and have something to show you on YouTube! Just the way I like it.

    Posting progress here really helps motivate me. I make my own short term goals and deadlines then put them on display for the world to see. For me this is meeting a challenge. Proving that I'm not all talk and able to produce the big things I dream up on a whim. Having this project under my belt should give me the confidence to do anything.

   Downloads:






   I'm surprised at how much Candy Shop Catch took off. It's my most popular game on Android and is likely to become the Fish Feaster of the bunch. I had my bets on TriGrid or DragCore dominating, but all my apps are still pretty new so their rankings with each other won't settle for a while yet.

    Because of Samsung's 100% Indie campaign is ending, I have no reason to hold off submitting apps to them anymore. I wanted to get in on that but was a bit too late (I thought the promotion was permanent and would help me launch Unicorn Quest). I'll see if I can get DragCore on it since it's really the only game I'm able to port easily. 


     With the teleportation milestone from yesterday done, Unicorn Quest feels real. With the design document detailed it feels like I thing I will work on and finish in the foreseeable future. If I just keep chipping at it daily it'll be out early next year just like I wanted. I'm also planning on releasing a free demo in time for the holidays. Just the early part of the game and a taste of what it feels like deeper into it. It'll be a way to get some attention and get feedback from the masses before running betas for the full version of Unicorn Quest in spring.

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