Hi there I decided to set myself a challenge to create an iphone game in 7 days. This is the first day. To be clear, I'm not starting completely from scratch. I already have a fairly comprehensive library with things like sprites, particles, fonts, texture/music/sound managers, etc. But I will try to make a simple, cute, fun game in 1 week. That's the plan. Anyway, I thought I would share my progress each day on TA and hopefully get some criticisms and suggestions. It's not such a serious project, I just thought it would be a bit of a laugh. Later on, I plan to run a small competition. Perhaps people can suggest names for the characters and win a promo code. Anyway, enough banter. Back to work! Tomorrow: platformer physics! Gyaaaaa!
Day 2 Second day of challenge. Improved graphics, control system and added two types of enemy. The physics are coming along nicely. There is now interaction with both playforms and enemies. Currently the platforms are optimised in that appropriate data structures ensure only nearby platforms are included in rendering and collisions. However, all the enemies in the level are tested each frame. Tomorrow: more enemies, add collectibles, optimisation, death.
Day 3 I didnt manage to get the collectibles or death working, but I did a lot of work on the graphics. Added monocle and tophat to make main character more identifiable and add personality. Put the background mountains on a separate layer for paralax. General improvements to efficency, physics, rendering, etc. I am toying with the idea of calling the character "Filby". I think it is quite fitting. In terms of gameplay, still not sure what kind of game it will be: Collect everything, get to end of level, kill everything, find something, flick switches, time limit, etc. Tomorrow: aforementioned collectibles and death.
Day 4 So today I managed to get the collectibles in. I will have to add particles or something for when you collect them. I made many general improvements all round. Added a bat and put in the logic for dying and winning the level. Tomorrow: think more about the 'game' aspect. Improve UI
Wondering how everyone could keep their hands away from this thread What a sweet progress you have going there ! Asking myself what you mean with "library of assets" - does that mean you had these purchased/collected ? Or did you do all of these on your own. Maybe you could share some more insight in the development
Hi Acumen and ianpaget Thanks for the nice words. Development is going very well. I am on day 5 now, will upload a new video soon. I doubt it will be 100% finished by day seven, but I think I will have the overall meat of the game done. After that it will be stuff like finding music, menu screen graphics, making it run on iphone, and general tweaking/debugging. I am having tremendous fun doing it, taking a short break from my major project Glade. Sorry, I didn't mean library of assets, I meant code library. I have my own engine with code for sprites, particles, font rendering, etc. It all makes development pretty rapid. I will try to share more details about the development. If anyone has specific questions I would be more than happy to share. Thanks again for your interest
Most people, myself included, tend to steer away from these time limit challenge threads cause they mostly look like crap. This one does look good though.
Yep completely agree with this. So is more gonna happen with the enemies, because right now they do not seem to have much effect at all. Good luck with this.
@injuwarrior: Yeah, I'm still thinking about the gameplay mechanics. Not sure whether I should have a continuous health bar or discrete 'hearts' like zelda. I'm not a fan of one-hit-kills, but you never know @Acumen: I am a one man show. I can do the graphics and programming myself, but it's the sound and music I can't do. For two of my previous games, PinPon and AngelBounce, I used fantastic free music tracks from a guy called Achim Tober. Maybe I will use another of his for this game, unless anyone knows any other place to get royalty-free music. Just uploading today's video to youtube now. It's taking a while. Ho hum
Day 5 Most of today's work focussed on the map. I have expanded it to 100x20, although I might go higher for later levels. The biggest change is that now, the different sized blocks are not laboriously placed by hand. Instead, I wrote a function which places the blocks automatically. This will speed up level design considerably. I can now focus on the general shape of the terrain. Here is an image taken from the map editor I use (TiledMapEditor) Other additions are particles and non-solid blocks which allow access to secret areas. Tomorrow: Need to make injuwarrior happy and sort out enemy interaction. Also, think about gameplay more. And the goal of the levels. Currently, I am think something simple like collect all stars before time runs out. We shall see
Aww, I envy oneman-shows ^^ Gotta admit I kinda not like the movement of the background (guess it's parallax or something), it tends to get me dizzy within the short time of your video. Also the pattern of the level tiles is starting to shrink on me ): A bit too prominently featured all around for my taste. I'm just blabbering, knowing you'll tweak each and every aspect, anyways ! Having a close look at this thing ! What an awesome challenge you took so far
Hi Acumen Thanks very much for the feedback. Yeah, the background needs some work. Originally it was just going to be a horizontal scroller so the background is hard coded to only move left and right. I will have to polish it a bit. Only 2 days left, and I still have a lot to do
Thanks, I really appreciate your comment. Thanks to all who have said nice things. I will upload today's video later. Didn't get a chance to do much though, what with taking daughter to ballet, shopping, looking after son, searching for runaway dog, etc. Oh, woe is the house-husband indie developer wannabe
Day 6 Well, day 6 has come and gone with a whooshing sound. Changed the colour of the main character so he doesnt get lost in the green of the background. Speaking of background, it scrolls horizontally and vertically much better now than before. Added getting hurt by enemies and being able to ride them. Made lots of small invisible improvements. Also, got it running on target platform. Runs smoothly. Tomorrow: more tweaks, map screen, maybe more enemies, spikes, and anything else I can think of.
So impressive. I figure you will release all art assets and code snippets to the public in order to celebrate the sucessful challenge, right ?
The final day of the challenge has arrived. Today I added spikes, a map screen, and hearts hidden behind blocks. The game is pretty much complete in terms of code. All that remains is to make the remaining levels, (I have about 5 out of 15 done) and the graphics for the menu screen and stuff. Just a bit of polishing really. Also, I want to connect to OpenFeint, so that will take a bit of time, although I already have some of the code for that. So I am very happy with the outcome. In 7 days I have made a game that I am proud of. Another week of painting, designing, polishing, and testing and then, if all goes well, I will submit to the store. Thanks to everyone who followed the progress. I will be giving away a few promo codes, particularly to everyone who has posted on this thread thus far: Acumen, ianpaget, arta, injuwarrior, Iljimae I will also have a small competition to hand out a few more codes. Stay tuned for that. I have thoroughly enjoyed the last week of programming and I once this game is submitted and the marketing underway, I am looking forward to getting back to Glade. Cheers everyone
