#panelopticon

[ertopena]

Yes, I had already named another stage Mycerinos, but given the way that the list of levels has evolved, the name now makes more sense for this one.

The list of levels has evolved, and continues to evolve. Between S-panto spicing up some old levels and the new stuff I’ve been working on as the skill check run before the final boss run, this game is looking more and more like it’s got a good progression with good challenge.

I also came up with an idea for a boss that I think would be glorious if it weren’t so clearly taken from a certain other arcade game. I don’t even think I’d be able to swing it as a reference. Maybe I would! I will probably try it anyway, even though it will take a solid day of coding at least.

But first, levels. And level selection. Lately I’ve been leaning more toward just having a barebones list of levels, a la Monaco or EDGE. Compared with the current world selection screen, with its cutesy doors and secret passages, it would allow me not to worry too much about which things unlock which and so on. It would also be faster to use, which will be critical when people inevitably speedrun the game at AGDQ 2016 thru AGDQ 2046.

[ertopena]

Great day today: I improved the design of a few levels, made the code for the black holes massively more efficient and also improved the enemies, and in an unexpected turn of events put the current build up on the web.

That’s right. There is now a site where you can go play SmallBall (or the current dev version) if you want.

If you do visit the website, excuse the construction. We are racing to get it up to snuff, as with the game.

Oh, I also made a different design for a SmallBall poster, ’cause things are at a point where I do want to have it printed and put on the wall. The only thing to do now is register an LLC and make a logo for it so that I can start putting it everywhere.

Incidentally, the new website means that PanelOpticon.com will return to its roots as an art practice blog, while all the game dev stuff moves over there. It will mean I’ll be writing more stuff, but then the upside is that I’ll also be drawing way more stuff, as well as working on the game. So basically you’ll be seeing way less of me until October, except of course online.

[ertopena]

The pause screen now consists of the screen getting dimmed and the controls being revealed along the edges of the screen. The shift key may need some work, ’cause early testing reveals that you can’t tell what it is. Otherwise, it’s looking good. I am currently not convinced that it needs anything else, but we’ll see what testing reveals.

By the way, I pushed out a new build today. Let me know if you want to play it!

Steam Left, a nifty new webapp, estimates that playing through my current Steam library would take upwards of 1800 hours. That’s about 76 days of uninterrupted play. If most people are on the same boat, I look forward to the uptick of people finally getting to SmallBall in 2019.

Also, the business cards I ordered to hand out at PAX arrived today. The website is totally illegible, which at this point is good ’cause it is not close to done yet. Ha!

[ertopena]

I believe I have finally figured out the world and level selection business in SmallBall. At the very least, it’s a definite way forward. I don’t feel that happiness of achievement yet, though. Hopefully that will come when I finish the draft of it all, i.e. tomorrow.

Today at AGDQ there was a fantastic relay race where two teams of three people each tried to finish Ninja Gaiden 1, 2, and 3 for NES as quickly as possible. It is as good as these races get. If you’re curious about this sort of thing, or if you’d just like to watch what the buzz is about so that you can get it and either talk hype or talk smack about it, then this is the clip to watch.

[ertopena]

I used to have a full 3 slides explaining the controls, and everyone just clicked through them without reading them, and then they never discovered how to play.

Instead, now when someone clicks anywhere on the title screen, an image of the arrow keys appears, then fades away slowly. The rest of the commands are in level. You guys cannot dodge learning to play now. It is not possible.

Actually, I hope I come up with an elegant way to go over even the remaining controls without words (e.g. retry, next level, back one level, pause, slow motion). Then it will really come through how much thought has gone into showing all the mechanics through the gameplay.

[ertopena]

This is the scheduled reminder that these comics are not autobiographical. We didn’t even have a Christmas tree this year, so ergo QED.

[ertopena]

Today I tried adding an explosion effect where the ball appears when a level starts, and it’s not looking great. Maybe I need to go with more of a cloud effect.

I also gave the ball and the enemies a new death animation, and that I like a lot better. It’s a bunch of concentric rings in random orientations that expands from the center of the ball that died.

Of course I also coded some. I wrote the part of the title screen that I could make without having the game save system hooked up and ready to go, and I also have that done but I don’t want to put it in place (which would also involve putting in the level progression) without a solid list of levels.

I guess I ought to work on a solid list of levels next! But no… The mind resists… It’s much easier to write lots of pieces of code I have to make eventually…

Oh! I also got a great piece of music from my brother, which gave me back hope that I’m going to pull this off (this being a sweet demo) in time for PAX.

And a promo video. And a website! And there it goes! Goodbye, hope! How you flutter as you fly into the sun!

[ertopena]

This weekend I worked on boring bug fixes and code optimization, so for today I decided to tackle something flashy and make a new title screen.

Since it’s best appreciated with video, I also fired up QuickTime and After Effects and edited it just a little bit, so now here it is in HIGH DEFINITION. Also, rest assured that the choppiness is due to my bad video capture situation, but the game itself runs at hundreds of frames a second. I also forgot to set the correct aspect ratio on After Effects, but you’ll get the picture.

Unfortunately there is no sound for the moment. I’ll figure out why some other day.

Out of curiosity, after the animation plays, what would you try first in order to get things started?