Progress Report

Greetings, everyone!

In case you're unaware, game development is a side job that I do in addition to my day job as a software developer. Typically, my day job is stress-free and relaxed (relatively speaking), but this month has been anything but. My job is balls-to-the-wall busy this month, and it's not about to let up in the near future. I kind of like it, but I can tell it's taking some of the attention away from developing Supermodel and patching LLtP. 

Not that you need to worry about that. I'm compensating by putting in extra effort during the weekends. Last weekend was a perfect example of that, and it saw me achieve several milestones in a row. I hope to do similar things this weekend, too. 

Most importantly, I expanded the capabilities of the particle system since last week, allowing it to trigger multiple times simultaneously. I'm using this for cards that damage multiple Challenge cards. Let me tell you, seeing explosions ripple down a row of Challenge cards, making them shake and (when destroyed) fly off the screen, is immensely satisfying. And that's why I've spent so much time focusing on this. It's supposed to feel good to kick those cards around. They're punishing while active, so getting rid of them is meant to be cathartic. And boy, does it feel that way now. I'm really happy about how this has all turned out, and I can't wait to share the results.

Additionally, I have added other kinds of effects, primarily text-based, that illustrate card events that might not be immediately obvious. For example, cards that earn (or cost) Heat at specific points during your turn will now clearly demonstrate this by having numbers float out of them when this happens, pausing briefly before zooming over to the Heat gauge. It's not a perfect way to represent it, but it's more than enough for the prototype. This effect is complicated to implement in Ren'py (the game engine) because I want multiple cards to show off their effects at once, which Ren'py is not fond of. But I managed to solve that problem, too. 

I can't stress enough how much difference all these effects and transitions make. Everything happened all at once when I first made the prototype playable. If you weren't intimately familiar with the rules and the cards, it was easy to miss important events or simply not understand why something was happening. Now, the game rules should feel much more intuitive and obvious. The less time you spend looking up rules and card effects, the better. I want players to jump in, get a brief overview of gameplay, and start playing without feeling overwhelmed. The game needs to clearly communicate what is going on at any given time for this to be possible, which is what all this work has been for.

I expect to spend some more time adding effects like these. There are plenty of card effects that need visual cues. Still, the good thing right now is that I have already created the necessary systems and mechanics to easily add these things. 

So, that's the current state of things. Every week of development makes this piece of software feel more like a game and a reasonably polished one at that. The day of the prototype's release is drawing ever closer.

Until next time!