My last release seems to have given me some respite, but I've still been hard at work developing. You might be surprised by how much work it takes to put a game together - not just technical work, either, but conceptual work, too. You have to figure out what shape you want before you can start filling it in. Anyway, here's three things I've been spending a lot of time on in the ten days since my last alpha release.
The next time you visit Grassland, it may be a little different than you remember it. I'm not sure what possessed me to build an actual school - although I was very excited about it and hope to feature it at some other point in my game - but my original concept called for something a little more primitive, less modern. Namely, an Elders Council, where the village elders (those with the most experience and, presumably, wisdom), confer on matters related to the running of the village, as well as take the opportunity to teach the young ones and collect whatever wisdom they have in the form of a small library.
Besides, Grassland is a small village, and a school the size I had previously made just begs for a certain number of students, which makes an uncomfortable assumption about the population of the village. And the graduation thing was already more of a big deal than I had wanted to make it. My own assumption was that the ceremony itself would have already been completed, and the picking up of the diploma was more of a formality than anything else. At any rate, it works more smoothly, and much more like I wanted it to, with a smaller Elders Council, and now I can go about adding that element to the other villages I'm working on.
Speaking of which, I've been spending a lot of time on that harbor town I believe I mentioned previously (or did I?), and an associated sea-related dungeon. An interesting thing I've noticed is that for a map to come together, it needs a 'hook'. I was stuck for a while thinking about how to make the harbor town work (i.e., look good, and feel fun to explore). I knew it was going to be a beach town, with a pier, but it wasn't until I decided (in a great "light bulb coming on" sort of moment) it was going to have a boardwalk that it really started coming together, and I started feeling good about it. I had a similar problem designing the forest town (Splintwood) that featured in the last release, until I figured out the hook - the town needed a lake!
So since the harbor town's come together, I've been spending more time on some of the plot elements that occur in that town - it's actually a really cool scene (or set of scenes). A lot of the stuff I'm putting in to my game I have to kind of make up as I go along, because I only had room for so many details in my head before I started putting this game together. But this is one scene I've had in mind from a long time ago. It also involves meeting another member of your party - a new playable character that I haven't introduced yet! Although, it also happens a bit later in the game, so I don't have it connected up with the other stuff you've seen in the demos yet, and it's not the first extra character (beyond the first three) that you meet up with.
That first one is actually a very important character, that I've been spending a lot of time trying to work out how to get into your party. She's a character that I think is suited to joining your party early, gameplay-wise, but on the other hand, she has access to crucial plot elements that I don't want to surface until much later in the story. So it's been a bit of a struggle figuring out how to make that work. I think I've got it mostly worked out, but I've still gotta put all the pieces together (more towns and dungeons and things) before I get to the point where it actually happens.
But, the past several days I've been totally and exclusively absorbed into something that is almost a side-priority. Basically, it amounts to picking out a wardrobe for my playable characters. But, I want it to be just right. I want the characters to all have their own sort of color scheme, and they have to each have so many outfits. A lot of them are necessary for the game, for various scenes, but I've also made the decision that I'm going to include "alternate outfits" for your characters to wear - possibly as a bonus unlocked after beating the game the first time, to improve replay value and give the player something fun as a reward.
It may be entirely superficial, but I've long considered alternate outfits one of the most fun and most desirable unlockable extras in games that I play, and so I definitely want to include that option in my game. I'm actually really excited about it, and that's partly the reason I've been putting so much time and work into picking out all the right outfits (from the limited selection available to me in the program software) over the past so many days. You might not think this sort of thing would take days of continuous effort to complete, but, well, you'd be wrong. I'm just about finished, though (with room for adjustments to be made in the future, if needed), although it would probably be prudent to develop some kind of "wardrobe manager" or something.
The work never ends!
No comments:
Post a Comment