Hello everyone!  

I started this small blog series for a couple of reasons. First of all, writing these little blog entries really helps me to reflect on my progress on different projects. Second I value feedback a lot so I think this is a perfect opportunity to share my ideas and thoughts with everyone! Last but not least I am currently a little bit bored and thought this is a good time to start a new blog.  

These entries will probably pretty short and will contain some random thoughts that I had during the week or different things I have tested.

This weeks content

Now that I am done with the Frogger GameDev challenge it is time to start a new project. Currently, I am sketching out three different ideas and I am still not very sure which one I want to pick for my next project. I am currently done with prototyping. I really want to start, and more important finish, a project that is based on my own idea. Of course, I will also be joining future GameDev challenges and other game jams. I really love those short but fun projects that offer the chance to try something new.

Turn-Based Thief Strategy Game

Yes, a TBTSG!  So the thing is I am really into stealth games. But what I like even more are games about thieves. I played a lot of the Thief games and on the contrary to most of the others people I was a big fan of the Thief 2014 game. I always wanted to make a Stealth/Thief game myself. Currently, I am playing Lara Croft GO. Even though it is not really a Tomb Raider game that a lot of people are used to, I really like this little game. I love the art style and the isometric perspective combined with little puzzles and things to collect in each level.

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My idea would be to create a Thief game with a similar art style and an isometric view. Compared to most other stealth and thief games the gameplay would be turn-based. You have to plan out your moves and navigate through procedurally generated houses in a medieval setting without getting caught by guards and other enemies. With the loot, you collect you can buy new equipment and open more opportunities to rob bigger and more challenging houses. 

This project idea would "force" me to pick up Blender again and finally learn how to create and animate some decent looking models. The big advantage of this art style is that texturing can be done with some easy color pallets. I would not focus on an implementation for mobile devices like Lara Croft GO, but I would not exclude this option. This would create the challenge to find input controllers that fit a lot of different types of user input.

Revenge of the Myps

This is the idea I mentioned in my post-mortem of the Frogger GameDev challenge. Everybody knows those little slime enemies that are the first type of enemy you encounter in a lot of games. Typically the player is able to beat these guys pretty fast. What would happen if one day one little slime called Myps would actually be sick of this idea and creates a plan to destroy all the heroes that have bullied his friends?

This game would most likely be a 2D platformer. You start as the small slime Myps that has a lot of difficulties to get around the first obstacles of the games. The further you get the more abilities you unlock and the more your power grows. The ultimate goal is to become the biggest slime and destroy all the bad-guy heroes. As you can see in the first sketch of Myps I would probably pick a simple pixel-art style for this game. I have already watched and worked along some tutorials on YouTube in order to improve, or actually "get", some basic skills in creating art-assets.

Plant Tamagotchi

This might sound a little bit strange for some people but I kinda like the idea. Plants are a wonderful thing and urban gardening is a little side hobby of me. I always had the idea to create a little "Plant Tamagotchi". Currently, I don't have a better name for it. You would basically start with a random gardening pot and you can select a seed, to begin with. You have to take care of the plant on a daily basis in order to make it grow. Once the plant grows there will be more different tasks you have to complete so that your plant does not die. The longer your plant lives the more points you get. These points allow you to add more plants and increase your little virtual garden. This could also be a small little project to try some GameDev for mobile devices (what I haven't really tried a lot yet). For this project, I would probably pick up MagicaVoxel again and go with a VoxelArt-Style. 

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Of course, I would go a little bit more into details with the flower models. I would also try some different approaches with randomly generated flowers and the ability to combine different types of flowers to create new species. 

Currently, I want to pick up my first idea. Creating a stealth game with a different approach was an idea I had for a long time now. I am kinda feared of the challenges that are coming with creating 3D models, but learning something new is always an important thing for my projects. On the other hand, I think that this project, along with the second idea, would need the most time. Due to my new job, time is kind of limited at the moment. I also should not underestimate my third idea. Developing some decent algorithms in order to create all sorts of different plant species can take a lot of time, but probably also a lot of fun.  I guess I will think a little bit more about all three projects for the next week and maybe sketch out each idea a little bit more on paper. Even though I don't really want to do too much prototyping I guess it would be a good idea to create a simple prototype for each idea in order to test some basic gameplay elements.

That would be all for this week.  

Thanks for reading and until next week!

- Znippy

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