Piece by piece

Another relatively productive week leading up to the playtest. So far in my experience, game dev has been a combination of wildly unobstructed progress and fixing obstructions I have made for myself in the past.

Now that I’ve finished most of the game’s “meat,” I can focus on the finer and more grueling details. I spent many hours yesterday trying to fix the equipment buttons and menus. If I had better foresight, it wouldn’t be as messy. This is why you have to plan ahead when you can! The main issue I had was when I first started the game, I didn’t think I would add a secondary weapon to equip. Well, I was wrong! The lesson is to prepare for many possibilities, but that’s quite vague advice. Better advice would be to design for scalability.

I’ve also spent the majority of my time working on the combat and exploration of Memoirium. It’s time to get back to the other portion of the game, which involves the room and writing. Honestly, I have no idea how people are going to treat this in the long run, and I am curious to see what happens. My best guess is that most people will ignore it. I don’t mind if people don’t pay attention to it. The room exists outside the core gameplay loop; it is there for those who may be interested in reading and writing. I worry it may come off as preachy or pretentious, but I cannot read what is in the hearts of people!

As I continue hacking away on my statue piece by piece, I am constantly surprised and grateful for the form it is taking. The same foundation I started with is still there, but it has evolved into a better game than I thought it would become. I too am looking forward to seeing what playtesters think of its current iteration.