Let's talk board game mechanics: Tiles

If you're a fan of European-style board games, like me, you'll no doubt have come across some kind of tile-based game. Carcassonne, Galaxy Trucker, Goblins Inc, Forbidden Island, and so on, are all tile-based games with very different gameplay styles. I'm a fan of them all. Tile games have long since been one of my favourites, largely because the very nature of them guarantees a different game experience every time. Because of the sheer number of possible ways those tiles can be assembled, I'm always facing a different challenge while playing.

But there are a lot of different kinds of tiles. And this is where I am looking for input from you lovely readers. You may or may not be aware that I am currently developing my own tile-based board game. I've been working on it for some time, and have already subjected some very forgiving friends and an even more forgiving boyfriend to an awful lot of playtesting. However, I have recently come to the conclusion that I'm still just not very happy with the way I've done the game tiles. So, here I am looking at different options of what I could do with them that would work for the game.

Option 1: Medium/large-ish tiles with four playable spaces on each tile. This is what is in place at the moment. One of the big features of the game is the ability to move these tiles around - flip them over, rotate them, swap their places. The larger tile size makes this incredibly easy to do.

However, finding the right number of tiles to use for the board is something I'm still struggling with. I have a number of special "action" spaces, which requires the tile to be flipped over once used. I don't like putting more than one of these spaces on a single tile, as it then feels like it will influence where the tile is initially placed in game setup. It also just... looks wrong. This means I end up having what looks like an awful lot of blank space on the board where nothing really happens. I don't like the sheer amount of unused space there is on the board, and I can't really condense it any smaller without having to change a bunch of other mechanics and rules to compensate.

Option 2: Small, single space tiles. This is the option I'm seriously considering. Having each space be its own tile would make it even easier to move pieces around. I wouldn't have to worry about having too many action spaces on a tile, because I could simply add in or take out however many I needed to for balancing. It also means I can make the overall playing space a bit smaller, which is something I think would help in a game where the board will potentially change size and shape during gameplay.

The downsides here are fairly obvious. The biggest one is, of course, that means a LOT more pieces to keep track of. It would be much more expensive to produce, because I would need at least twice as many tiles as in option 1. The pieces would have to be smaller as well, which could potentially turn off players if they feel the tiles are too fiddly. This also would increase set-up time for the game. I initially designed this as a quick, easy to learn board game, and this wouldn't fit that ideal - but then again, since then, the game has wandered a bit from that original intention anyway.

Option 3: Large, multi-space tiles that can be put together in different formations. This would be similar to something like Mansions of Madness, where each room is its own tile, and they are put together to form the board. Something like this would be very quick to set up, would require far less pieces, and can still provide some variety, especially if there are extra pieces which can be swapped out to change things up a bit.

Of course, this kind of set-up would make the moving of tiles very difficult. Rotating wouldn't be too bad, but swapping and flipping could be nightmarish, depending on how many players are on a given tile at the time. With tile manipulation being one of the main features, this would probably not go over well at all.

Option 4: A single, full-size board with a few single space pieces for special tiles. Up straight? I don't want to do this. For a game like Last Night on Earth, which uses this mechanic (kind of), it's fine. It's less expensive to produce a single board with a dozen extra tiles than it is to produce a hundred tiles. It still allows for some random set-up, since the special tile pieces can still be distributed randomly over the board. It makes for far less bits and pieces to potentially get lost.

But it completely removes the essence of the idea, which was to be able to move any tile. I don't want to lose this mechanic, as I feel it links closely to the theme of the game. This single mechanic was why I started the game, and I think removing it would also kill any desire I would have to finish the game. However, because I know it is an option in use in other games, I've included it in my list here.

So there you have it. Four options that I'm most familiar with in the various games I've played. Which would you prefer to play with? Why? Have I missed another option? Please tell me in the comments!

Insta-plot!

So the other half and I were talking about how much we like point and click games, and how we wouldn't mind making one at some point, drawing inspiration from various other games, both classic and recent. One of the most important parts of a point and click game is having a good story.

I was a bit stuck, knowing I wanted to make something, but not knowing what. The best idea I could come up with was a game which started with a run-of-the-mill, completely unoriginal spaceship crash. Beyond that? I didn't know what to do with it.

Enter my other half. In a matter of minutes, he turned the unoriginal spaceship crash into a creative story with an interesting plot and loads of points to expand upon. It's like his brain comes with an insta-plot upgrade that I don't have.

It's awesome. He's awesome. And I'm now uber excited about working with him on this story and making it into something fun in the (hopefully) near future.

Plot holes the size of Texas

I've been looking over my NaNoWriMo novel from a couple years ago with the intention of rewriting it, and then using NaNo of this year to write the second book. (Yeah, I know, typical fantasy author can't seem to fit it all into one book. Oh well.) And I realised why exactly I've left it alone this long. It has plot holes the size of Texas.

And I don't mean plot holes that are easy to fill, like "This character came in from this room, when they should already be in that room." I mean the very essence of the plot, like "Why is this character doing any of this at all?" It occurred to me that while I love my plot, and my characters, and my story, I didn't have a reason for that particular character to be doing any of this. Truth be told, it would be much easier to have somebody else do it for all characters involved.

So I dug out the plot hole spackling.

With that, some extra research, and some very creative liberties, I've managed to fill most of the holes in my story. Only one now remains (as far as I can tell), but it's a biggie. The plot hinges on my main character not having any idea what happened in the history of this time period. If she simply went back in time and stayed there, this would not be an issue.

However, this is not the case. My main character goes back and forth between the modern world and ancient Egypt. With the presence of the internet, it is absolutely ridiculous to assume she just wouldn't look this stuff up the moment she got back. So, I need a reason for why she would not be able to get any information about the relevant history in the modern day.

... Right. Easy peasy. (Or not.)

So, I still have work to do. And unfortunately, since there is a good chunk of story in the modern world, I can't start rewriting until I have this solved. It's going to be an interesting couple of days while I work out this rather thorny problem.

Progress! (Finally...)

So that long list of things I have to do has finally been written out on paper. I'm fairly confident I have enough stuff to keep me going until at least the middle of next year. It's a bit terrifying that I've given myself that many things to do. And not things I necessarily need to do, just things that I want to do.

On the upside, I've had a few days this week to make some actual progress on that list! I've written an article for Proud Lion (which will hopefully be going up next week!), done some work on our mess of a garden, continued my efforts with learning to program, made a start on a knitting project I've been delaying, and finished balancing my board game.

I've also been doing quite a bit of work on the redesign for this place. I initially wanted to make the new design completely from scratch. However, I soon realised the folly in this: I don't have the faintest idea how. Explanations online of how to figure out the convoluted Blogger-ese that makes up what should be straight-forward CSS were less than helpful. So, I went with a different approach. I selected a standard Blogger template that vaguely suited what I wanted to do with the blog.

Then I edited the fudge out of it.

It's not done yet, obviously. I've managed to pretty much get the layout in a way I like, and that took some doing purely because my CSS knowledge is only functional. (I know how to make it all work, but I don't know all the properties off by heart. I definitely need a massive reference sheet.) I've got a basic colour scheme picked out, though that wasn't hard - it's not going to be too much different from what I had before. What I have left to do is background images and the like. Once that's ready to go, it will be uploaded and put through its paces on the blog!

Contemplating NaNo... 3 months early

It's going to be that time again soon enough. That time of year where everything else goes flying out the window in favour of spending an entire month doing nothing but write frantically to hit 50,000 words. Yep, soon indeed.

Okay, when I say "soon", I mean that in relative terms. I still have two and a half months before NaNo starts. (If you don't have the faintest idea what I'm talking about, look here.) Plenty of time, you'd think. However, I really want to do something for NaNo this year which is not yet another pull-an-idea-out-of-the-back-of-the-mental-closet kind of thing. Ideally, I'd like to either do the follow-up to the novel I wrote the year before last, or do a complete rewrite of the fantasy trilogy I started several years ago but never finished.

There are problems with both options. The first option with the follow-up novel will be difficult because before I can write the second half of the story, I need to rewrite the first half. It has a fair share of problems. While I am confident I can fix them, it's going to take time. Probably all of the next two and a half months, and that's if I don't spend a lot of time doing much of anything else. Doable, but difficult.

The second option, rewriting the first novel of the trilogy I began, is equally complicated. That trilogy began as a single story, intended to be one book. But as I expanded it, as I tried to dig deeper into the story to make it more meaningful, more interesting, more worthy of being written and read, it expanded enormously. It turned into a monster of a story that will take at least three books to tell, the way I've set it out. Now, keeping in mind that this was a few years ago, I now feel I overextended that a bit. I'm fairly confident I could cut it down, possibly to two novels, without losing the heart of the story. But doing this means not only recreating my main character (who, quite simply, is boring right now), but also ditching the 60k or so words I've done, as well as quite a lot of story planning. It means essentially taking all the world building and general plot ideas and rearranging it all into a more sensible and concise order. This also would likely take me the next two and a half months. Also doable but difficult.

So, to my writerly or readerly friends out there: any advice on how I decide which way to go with this one? I want to do both - but that quite simply won't happen. Ideally I'd like to make a choice by the end of the month, so I have time to do any prep work I need to do before November strikes!

Another redesign? Really?

I have a problem. It's a combination of tunnel vision and a toddler's attention span. I do something interesting for someone else, and suddenly I am intent on doing more of it for myself. And then I think, well, I could do more than one, right? I could do a bunch, right?

Yeah, I'm looking at redesigning the blog.

I have a history of this, sadly. My previous blog, dedicated only to writing (and long since gone dark), went through several redesigns in the short time I kept it active. I would be happy with it for awhile, then feel the need for a change. I like trying out different colours, styles, layouts, and so on. I'm a bit goofy that way.

Maybe it all relates to my stance on change: I like changes when I'm in control of them. When that control is taken away from me, all change is bad. When I have the power, I like to make things different on a semi-regular basis. It's why I change the layout of my furniture every two years, almost like clockwork. It's an odd little habit of mine.

So, it looks like a redesign is on the cards. I'm hoping that if I do it from scratch, rather than relying on a template somebody else made, I'll be happy with it for longer. Who knows. Guess we'll find out, huh?

Board game testing!

I've mentioned in a few recent posts that I've been designing a board game. I think I did, anyway. I may have forgotten to actually write about it. In fact, now that I've walked away for a minute to check my past blog posts, I realise I've not actually said much about it at all.

So, since I've not said much about it, here it is: I'm designing a board game!

(... That sounded much more dramatic and much less rambling in my head.)

It's fairly obvious that I love a good, complex board game. And I've been itching to design one for ages, so when I finally had what I thought was a good idea for one, I jumped on it! I'm keeping most of the details off the internet for now, until I can refine it all a bit more, but I will say it's a tile-based game, which is one of my favourite kinds of board games.

To the people in my day-to-day life, I've been discussing this topic almost non-stop. Is this a good idea? Would this work? What do you think of this? Would this be too complicated or cheesy? I'm pretty sure they'll all be grateful when the darn thing is finally done, but in the meantime, I hope they continue to put up with me.

Anyway, I've reached a point in my design that is both a turning point and a stopping block, if that makes any sense at all. The turning point is that technically, the game is playable. Pretty much everything that is needed is there, with all the mechanics in place. The stumbling block, though, is the numbers. When I first ran through all the cards and dice rolls, I more or less picked numbers that sounded good, rather than made mathematical sense.

This proved to be both useful and awful. With my very tolerant boyfriend and two of our good friends, we sat down to have a play through, with me acting as a living rule book. The results were pretty much as I'd expected. There were rules I had not thought out all the way, and had to correct to close up loop holes. There were issues I hadn't considered at all, and had to make up rules for on the spot, which sometimes worked well and other times ended in disaster. Most importantly, the numbers proved to be very, very unappealing. Forty five minutes after we started the game, we found ourselves no closer to winning than when we began. A huge chunk of that was due to the numbers and the lack of balance in the game. We ended up calling it quits at that point until I could fix it.

I learned a great deal from that play through, though. I discovered that the mechanics of my game were intact, and that the players seemed to like the idea and the theme behind it. I discovered that a rebalance of all the numbers would likely fix a lot of the issues we had with the gameplay. I discovered that playing it and needing to fix it has made me all the more eager to do it again until this game is perfect. And then start all over again with a new game. (Be strong, my friends, one day your poor tired ears will recover from my abuse. Hopefully.)

I'm alive!

Whew! Forgive my absence. Helping with moving stuff in and getting stuff organised, at the same time as all my projects and work and family stuffs, has taken a lot out of me, and I'm only now feeling like I have the energy to start blogging again!

So, let's start off with what I've been working on in my (rare) spare time over the last few weeks, hmm? A website! Yep. My cousin, trusting soul that she is, has asked me to build her a website for her nail art business. Me, being a geek who used to build websites for fun when I was a kid, could hardly say no. Though there were a few missteps initially on my part, a bit of work has given me a draft site that I'm mostly happy with, but suspect will need a lot of editing before the final version is ready to go.

Doing this has made me realise a few things. One, I really enjoy designing things. I learned basic HTML when I was 14 years old and bored in my graphics design class in school. (Not bored because of the content, but rather because I already knew most of what was being taught, and I finished everything in an hour rather than a week.) Since then I've toyed with website design off and on, always with it in my eyes as a hobby rather than anything else. Admittedly with this blog, a lot of it came from a template - but I don't think there's anything wrong with using a basic template and editing it to get what you want, right? Until recently, I've not considered it as anything more than a hobby - and now I'm wondering, if I had a bit more knowledge and a lot more practise, if it's something work looking into one day.

Two, one of those bits of knowledge I lack is exactly where that line is between a website that is accessible and personal, but is also professional. Having always made personal sites before, I'm happy to add lots of colour and gadgets and whatever to the site, anything that catches my eye and seems to fit with the rest of the feel of the blog. However, when it comes to professional websites, I hit that stumbling block. How much colour is too much? Does this look too amateur? Is this too dry with not enough style? It's a question I'm struggling with right now, and I'm hoping a bit more time and work will get me the answer.

Three... um... Okay, there was a three, but I can't remember it now. See what happens when I let myself ramble? I talk and talk and talk about stuff, probably repeating myself several times, and then forget the point I was trying to ramble toward. Oops. Ah well. That's what the "Update" button is for, right?

No case too big, no case too small...

"If you need help just call..."

... Okay, so that title sounded a lot more amusing in my head than it actually looks on the screen. Bonus points for anyone who's able to finish off the line and get the reference.

So, the reason for the odd title was the first bit of it - "no case too big" - seems like the mindset I had at the beginning of the year, when I decided to finish a project every month of 2012. I certainly have more than 12 projects that need finishing. Having enough stuff to do was never the issue - the problem was, of course, finishing it.

Now, here's the problem with this problem. Most of those projects I have lying around undone are big. Very big. Takes-way-more-than-one-month-to-complete kind of big.

Here's the evidence. Just a few of the things on my list of to-be-finished-stuff is:

• A novel which desperately needs editing
  
• A trilogy which needs the first part completely rewritten and the rest re-planned
  
• A collection of short stories which needs to be written and edited
  
• A video game
  
• A board game
  
• Several large knitting projects
  

I'd go on, but I don't think I need to. I think I was incredibly foolish to think I could complete any of these things in a month's time. I think I should have instead picked a project to work on until it was finished, without the time requirement on it. Yes, I need to get these things done. But I ain't gonna get 'em done this way. So, a project a month? Massive fail. Continue to work on these projects until they're finished? Definitely still on the cards. "There's no case too big, no case too small..."

Project TARDIS returns!

This post has nothing to do with the awesomeness that is Doctor Who. This is a personal project to clear out all sorts of stuff that is hiding away in the many corners of my home. There is so much junk squirrelled away within these walls, it feels like I live in a TARDIS, hence the title of the project.

Some of you may remember when I last posted about this project, last month. As you can probably guess, it did not get finished last month as I intended. However, I hope to finish it for this month. Except there's been one tiny, minor little change. I'm not just focusing on cleaning out my bedroom.

I'm doing the whole house.

This is, quite simply, insanity. My bedroom alone is enough to make anyone with a need for tidiness beg for mercy. In fact, I have spent the last three hours working almost solely on my room. The closet was stuffed full, and needed everything taken out. Only the items which I use, or have sentimental value that is strong enough to warrant keeping, went back in. Since a lot of what came out was just a bunch of empty boxes from various old appliances and objects around the house, this was a bit easier than I expected.

But I'm not done. I have a total of four rooms I need to do this massive de-cluttering to. Thankfully the living room is already partially done. And now, my bedroom is at least halfway done. The other two rooms... Well, let's say it's going to be a very busy weekend. There will be several trips to the local charity shops, as well as a few much-needed journeys to the tip for anything that is no longer usable.

Project TARDIS: you will be completed. You will be completed. Complete, complete, complete. (If I keep saying it, maybe it will have a better chance of coming true.)

Two Week Game revisited

Recently I set myself a challenge to make a game in two weeks. While I did not finish the entirety of the game for various reasons, I was able to finish a very rough demo of what was completed. I had initially intended to release it as it was, but have now decided against it.

The reason for this? I've still been working on the game. I've given it a slight graphical redesign, which I think looks nicer and cleaner on the screen. I've redesigned several of the levels I had completed. I've tidied up a lot of the code and made the game as a whole much easier to build. All in all, I'm quite attached to this game, and have reached the point where I would rather see it finished and released as a whole game than as an awful demo.

To give you an idea of what I mean by "graphical redesign", here's a comparison. A screenshot from the demo:

And a screenshot as it looks now:

Now, clearly, I'm well outside the two week challenge at this point. It doesn't really seem logical to continue calling it the Two Week Game. Instead I will start calling it by the actual project name: The Golden Ankh. Not particularly original, but since it can easily be changed right up until it's released, I'm going with it.

Two Week Game: Done! ... kinda

Okay, so the entire game itself is not done. All the logic and actual game events I need are functioning and ready to use, but I haven't developed the levels yet. There's no music. The art is as basic as basic can get. It's a pathetic excuse for a "finished" product. And there are reasons for that: illness, day job, family life, and the physical need for sleep all played a role in me not having a fully complete game. But, I have an early stages demo completed. And that, in my opinion, counts as a success.

The best thing I feel about this project is how I was able to accomplish something in so little time. Yes, I had a design already mostly ready to create, which gave me a head start. But actual game development, over those two weeks and few odd days I allowed myself, added up to, I think, maybe twenty hours. At least half of that was spent burying myself shoulder-deep in scripts that should have worked properly the first time... had I entered it correctly. (It is absolutely horrifying how many problems one missing equal sign can cause.) Another quarter of that was spent looking for bugs that were often of my own creation. The other quarter was spent on making basic programmer art and actually building the levels once the logic and scripting was done. Overall, on a time budget, I think I did well.

Now, I'm happy to put that demo up somewhere so that people can download it and try it. (And point. And laugh. And mock. This thing is functional, but truly ugly, I promise you.) However, I don't have the faintest idea where to put it. Where do people upload small game files these days? Any suggestions? I'd prefer something that isn't going to spit ads, pop ups, and possibly computer diseases every time you click. If you know of somewhere I can upload the file, and you're interested in having a go at my little five-minute long game, let me know in the comments!

Two Week Game: Day 13? Already??

So, as you may have noticed, I've not updated on my Two Week Game. The reason for that? I've been ill. Ill enough that I couldn't bear to look at the computer, so it wasn't even turned on for several days. Today is the first day I've felt well enough to actually sit at the computer and see what I've missed over the last week.

Now, saying that, I'm still intending to finish this game before the end of the month. Well... a version of it, at least. It will probably be an alpha version, but hey, that's good enough for me! I'll keep working on it right up through Monday. Naturally, due to the sheer lack of time I have left, it will be considerably smaller than I anticipated. There will only be a few levels to begin with. There will be nothing but basic programmer art so that the player isn't running through walls. The big final level? Not going to be in there. I don't want to release a bunch of levels that have been thrown together just to be there. So, I will release the levels I design that I think work for the game, and hopefully release more later.

Some of the features I had hoped to include in the game have already been cut, though thankfully not only due to time. One or two things have proven to be impossible to accomplish at my skill level, and will require far more time and knowledge than I currently have. One or two other things could be done, but feel like they won't add anything but complications to the game, without really making the gameplay any better. So, those few things have been scrapped. However, everything else is just about ready to go. All that remains is designing the various levels that will be ready by the end of the weekend.

Wish me luck? I'm probably going to need it...

Two Week Game: Day 6

More progress has been made! Not as much as I'd like, but more than I expected to with everything that went on today and how I was a bit ill in the afternoon.

Again, I'm getting more work on the basic game logic done. I've finally managed to get two particular objects doing exactly what they're supposed to do. One of those things is the level timer. Yes, levels will be timed. They're small levels. They can handle it. As of this morning, I was having a horrible time trying to ensure that the timer restarted every time the level did. For at least an hour, it refused to do so. It was a huge relief when I finally discovered that for it to work properly, I only needed to make one small correction. Which I made. And then rejoiced. Mostly the rejoicing was that I got it working. (Some of the rejoicing was that I now don't have to touch those objects again except for altering the amount of starting time for each level.)

The major progress I made today was on the on-screen display. I had originally set up the screen display of how many lives the player has left (amongst other things) so that it sat at the top of the level. No problem, right? I can see it, it's easy to read, all good. And then the brain kicked in, and asked me how visible it would be when the player is on a larger level, and the screen scrolls down or to the side.

Um... oh. Right.

So, I spent some time getting reacquainted with scripting in RGSS (descended from Ruby and used specifically for this game engine, so I'm told), something I've not done in a few years. I discovered that the basic concepts were easy to understand, since they don't differ too much from other scripting languages. I also discovered that I remembered more of the scripting than I thought. It didn't take me long to get my lovely on-screen display up and running. I mean, it's not pretty. And it's not completely functional, yet. I have a few other bits and pieces I need to make sure I can get working before I finish putting all the extra stuff in. But, it's definitely coming along, and it stays on the screen even if the top of the level does not, so I'm happy!

Unfortunately, there's always a downside somewhere. I had intended to include various power-ups in this game. Most of them I will have no problem implementing - however, one gave me a serious problem. I spent a couple hours on this one power-up alone, tweaking, re-writing, double checking all my scripting, but to no avail. I quite simply cannot make it work without getting a handful of error messages thrown in my face. So one of the power-ups, which would have added to the amount of time left to finish the level, has had to be discarded. Unless I get a brainwave (or somebody who is more skilled at RGSS than me can tell me what I'm doing wrong), it won't be in the game. I'm better off spending my time on things I know I can done, and things that are required for the game to run at all.

No new screens today, as they would look pretty much the same as yesterday's. Hopefully I'll soon have some more interesting things to show.

Side note: It's occurring to me that I haven't the faintest idea who would be interested in reading this. I have no idea if any of you are remotely interested in game design, or game development. I hope you do, since otherwise I would be wondering why you read this far.

Two Week Game: Days 2-5

Combining the last few days all into one post, because I've not gotten much more done. I've had my day job to contend with, and by the time I get home from that I don't have the energy to do much more than eat, check my email, and fall asleep until it's time to get up and do it all over again. I have the next few days off though, so I should be able to make some progress!

As I mentioned before, a big part of what I'm doing now is relearning things I've forgotten, mostly little things that make a big difference. Just trying to get a timer that worked correctly took me half an hour, because I missed one crucial step, and somehow kept missing it every time I went through it. I got it working in the end.

However, I soon discovered as I looked through the logic steps for all my game objects... a mess. I could barely read through it, with so many switches and "if" conditions and other stuff that probably was not strictly necessary. So I took a drastic step, and turned to my trusty pencil and paper. I wrote down all the objects I would need for my game, and under each wrote down all the things I needed that object to do. It's not so detailed as to take over the pages, but has just enough for me to remember what bits and pieces I'm going to need to make them work. With that done, it's now a matter of putting it all together (again) in the game itself.

So, while I work on that, how about a few screenshots of rubbish programmer art?

Yep. This is my intro screen. As you can see, the main character doesn't have a name yet. Or a decent character graphic. That pathetic little dude up there? Yep, that's supposed to be the main character. He's, quite frankly, pathetic pixel art. But, it's a start.

As far as plot goes, this one doesn't scream with originality. In fact, one of the reasons I'm using this as my Two Week Game is because having less to think about for story means I have more time to make sure the game actually works. Definitely an upside, in my opinion. Besides, I'm hoping that if I have enough time, I'll be able to do some decent artwork to have a solid Egyptian theme running through the whole game. Because ancient Egypt is awesome.

And this is a quick shot of a level. Again, very poor art, but enough to get going with the level building. This is the first level, so it's nice and small. Theoretically, by the time I get to the ending levels, they'll be about twice this size. I wonder how many times I can use the word "level" in a single paragraph.

That's it for now. Hopefully tomorrow I will have made more progress on the game, and will have more to say and show!

Two Week Game: Day 1

If you haven't yet, please go read this post so you know what the Two Week Game is.

Off to a good start! I've got some of game logic done, mostly the basic stuff that I'll need throughout the entire game, such as player lives and the level timer. I've got some extremely poor, programmer-style graphics in place to help me build levels. One level is already mapped out, with two more designed and waiting to be mapped. I'm intending there to be about sixteen levels. The early levels will be smaller and very simple, introducing the concepts and the rules of the game. They should get more complex as time goes on, which means it's going to be a challenge to find the balance between big-enough-to-be-a-level and damn-it-isn't-it-done-yet.

Only one day in, I'm beginning to remember the headache some of the little tidbits of game development can be. It's remembering when to set off this timer, when to change that variable, and why that event isn't taking place when it's supposed to be. The little things are currently kicking my ass in making things take a bit longer than I think they should. I honestly thought I would have a lot more of the logic done by now, at the very least. Ah well, live and learn, right? Besides, I still believe designing and testing all the levels is going to take the most amount of time, especially as the levels and the things to test get more complex.

Having spent several hours staring at the computer screen today on this project, I'm going to put it away for today. Come back tomorrow, where I'll likely be talking about how horrible games look and feel in their early stages, and showing off some truly tragic screenshots to prove my point. (And probably hoping with everything I've got that the finished game looks better than it does right now.)

Can I make a game in two weeks?

A year or two ago, I took a very short course in game design from the Open University. It's not had an overwhelming impact on my life, but all the same, I'm glad I did the course. It taught me a lot about games, development, and design, and pointed me toward a lot of resources I would not have found otherwise. More importantly, it pushed me to design games. Not massive, sprawling RPGs like I aspire to, but smaller, simpler games that can be made in a short amount of time, but still prove challenging.

In rifling through old documents on my computer, I came across the folder with the work from this course. Included in that work was a design document for a simple maze game. I remember being really pleased with the design, and excited to get started on it. I also remember the serious development problems I had making it. You see, this course focuses on the students using GameMaker. GameMaker is a decent tool for development, don't get me wrong - but it really only works well for certain types of games. For the style of game I wanted, it simply was not working, and proving to be far more trouble than its worth. (It should probably also be said that because this course focused on design, not programming, there was little to no emphasis on learning to code or script games. I still lack skills in that area.)

Fast forward to today, when I read through the document and once again felt that excitement I had when I first wrote it. I still want to make this simple little game. I still am dead set against doing so in GameMaker, and I'd rather not code and script the entire thing by hand when there are so many other tools available to make the process easier. I still have every intention of learning those things - but not on this game.

I do have another option, another game development tool which I have experience with, and I believe will be much more suited for this kind of game. I want to make this game, both to build up my development skills and experience, but also to prove to myself that I can make a whole, finished game. It may be simple, it may have nothing but pitiful programmer art, and it may be so pathetic that nobody would ever want to play it. But I'm going to do it anyway.

Now, I honestly believe it's a small enough game that I could finish it within a couple weeks. That makes it a contender for April's Project of the Month, if I manage to finish it in that time. I'll update both here and on Twitter as development progresses, and include screenshots where I can. If there is any interest in the game, once it's done, I'll offer it as a free download for anyone who wants to try it. Today's task: sort through the design document and fill in any holes I've left, and start planning the development process!

Project TARDIS!

No, it has nothing to do with Doctor Who. Or time travel. Or space.

Project TARDIS is, hopefully, to be my project to finish by the end of this month. What it boils down to is that my house, though there are relatively few family members living in it, is... Well, I suppose "cluttered" would be the kindest word for it. If we're being brutally honest, it's crowded and messy and extremely disorganised. I honestly don't know how I've fit so much stuff into it, especially when most of it is stuff we don't use or need to keep. (Have I mentioned I'm a horrible packrat?)

Worst of all the rooms in the house is mine. My bedroom is like a TARDIS in that almost everything I can think of is stashed in it somewhere. Locating things is next to impossible, but I at least have the satisfaction of knowing that whatever I'm looking for is bound to be in there somewhere.

Project TARDIS is about to change that. It has two phases, the first of which will likely take me all of today and part of tomorrow as well. Phase one is the clear-out. I'm taking all of the junk out, all at once, and sort what can be kept and what needs to be binned. This is probably disaster waiting to happen, but it's the only way I know of to make sure I get it done. If I only do a little at a time, I'll get bored, I'll want to do something else, and it will never actually be finished. So, phase one is likely to leave me sleeping on a tiny little corner in the floor where I've managed to keep junk from straying into.

Phase two is the organising bit. I now have in my possession several storage boxes, though it's likely I'll eventually add a few more. These boxes will contain everything which survives phase one. They are all of the perfect size to fit under my bed and out of the way, or to stack nicely in the back of my closet. That part might take longer. It's just so much easier to get junk out than it is to put it all away again!

This is probably a very boring post. But it kind of shows my thought process. And demonstrates why I clean when it is necessary, and avoid it otherwise.

Edit: Apparently it's not Tardis, but TARDIS. How silly of me.

March Project: Fail

Erm... yeah. My finish-a-project-every-month thing? Failed for March. I had a lot of things going, had a few options of things I could have gotten done, but quite simply didn't get to them. So, March is a fail.

But I'm not giving up, because that would be... um... well, I can't think of the word right now, because I'm tired and just got home from work and wanting to collapse, but suffice to say the word amounts to "not cool". And I don't want to give up entirely after only the third month. Instead, I'm going to accept that sometimes we fail, and that I just need to try again.

Okay. Returning to irregularly posted nonsense now.

February Project: complete!

I said I wanted to finish a project every month this year (that post is here). So far, I'm on track to actually achieve that! Yay!

February's finished project is another knitting creation. This one is a shawl made of some blue yarn which I suspect to be a DK acrylic. The pattern is called Summer Flies. It's gorgeous, and available on Ravelry. (If you're a knitter or crocheter and you haven't discovered Ravelry, go there. Now. It's awesome. No seriously, click the link. You know you want to...)

I started this project in January, mostly as a practise project for my first attempt at lace knitting. I'm glad I picked this pattern, since it's very easy to follow, and looks brilliant now that it's done. Of course, getting to the finish point wasn't as pretty. Here's what it looked like straight off the knitting needles.

Less like a shawl, more like a clump of rolled up sweater remnants. But it's amazing what you can do with some kid's foam puzzle pieces, push pins, and a steam iron.

Much better. And it grew! Stretching and blocking this out added at least ten inches to the width, possibly a bit more. I didn't really measure the rest, but I don't think I really needed to. It's definitely bigger, and more wearable.

I made a few mistakes. In the beginning there was a part of the pattern I didn't know how to do, but that was simply because I hadn't learned beyond knit, purl, and yarn over. I also managed to mess up one of the butterflies in the very middle of the shawl. Oh so conspicuous to my eyes, but I imagine only because I know it's there and it's the first place I look. Other than that, I'm happy with it. I imagine I'll be wearing it a lot come summertime!