Battle Gem Ponies DevLog #8 (Maladies & Battle Interface)

     This week is going to be a productive one. I'm determined to get to a point where the ponies can use moves and hit each other. No fancy animations just yet, only functionality. Messing around with ideas for this has gotten me to dress up the menus again, giving a nice polished feel to everything.

Check out this week in gamedev below the break!

Animating Malady Icons

   Completed:

• Animated Malady Symbols
• Updated Malady & Weather Rules
• Contact Musicians
• Code For Hiding/Revealing Game Objects
• Discovered GitHub File Collections For Old Pokemon Games
• Redesigned Move Selector Sprites
• Move Selector
• In-Game Class Match-Up Chart
• New Button Click Animations

     Lessons Learned:

• There's always an easier way to code something.
• Always test your sprite sizes in-game. Redesigning to account for big icons is annoying.

       A friend of mine shared a link to the code behind the original Pokemon games. Finding the GitHub files is a cool highlight of the week because I got to peek into the structure of those Gameboy classics and get ideas of how to structure the massive amounts of data I'll need for Battle Gem Ponies. This got me into the mindset of a mod creator and I also got to study a programming language I'll be learning next year.

      I know it would be more beneficial to look at the latest Pokemon games and study their code, but this is just a great start for me to forge my own path. I was able to spot more efficiency ways to code things right away thanks to all the advantages of using the Unity engine. Overall looking through this stuff was a great exercise to get pumped for coding my own game.
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   Downloads:

   I saw a sudden burst in Unicorn Training Demo downloads this week. Perhaps a response to my IGN feature? Either way I'm glad to get it into more hands. It's nice to see so many people interested in the kinds of games I want to make. I just have to exceed their expectations next time.

    Featured:

     That IGN Spotlight boosted me up to over 80 followers, quickly matching then passing my Facebook Page likes. Twitter remains my most popular broadcaster with my site and SlideDB closely following. I've also noticed the Unicorn Training Trailer approaching 10K views. Hopefully it;ll get there by next week and I'll have something to celebrate.
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I'm going to have this floating above the move details page mid-battle.

     I'm still building the move info page as this post is going up so there won't be any pictures until next week. Everything is going smoothly though and each new addition gets me more excited to play Battle Gem Ponies. I'm including every little thing that will make it stand out from the rest in the app store.

      Having class match-up charts readily accessible in the game can help players master the rock-paper-scissors element more quickly. Players shouldn't face penalties for not getting the basics early on. I feel like having this foundation will keep newcomers from getting frustrated or overwhelmed.