The game is coming along fine. Got a little nettled at making a house for her. I’ve never made such a large sprite or one with so many elements. But I have the foundations down which is fantastic. The rest is just detail and detail is fine.
Also worked on the camera view.
Someone asked why I didn’t make this game a 2.5D game – top down view as in your classic Legend of Zelda games or Stardew Valley. It’s a great question. And truth is when I started out I wondered if I should have gone with that camera perspective.
I’ve decided against it for a few reasons. I thought I’d make a bit of a longer post to show how I think about game design and development.
(1) Indie game development is hard. Efficiency is important. To change direction, I would have to scrap all the work I’ve put into the game to this point and all the trust credit given to me (if only by a few people) to see this game go somewhere.
It’s not that I don’t believe that sometimes major changes should be made early to save more work later on. I do. But I do not believe this to be the case. The game jam version was already proof of concept that this current system worked. It may not be the greatest bestest oscar winning system ever. But it works. And good finished is better than perfect unfinished.
(2) Verticality. Alchemist’s Mountain name suggests that you are climbing a mountain.
Again we are in early game development, so it’s not like changing the name is going to be a very bad thing to do. Still. I like the name. No one has complained about it. And the few narrative pieces I’ve written around it work well with the name. The current platformer view works better to show ascension.
(3) The energy system. Jumping, climbing, swinging, diving, falling – are all a lot more visual with the platformer angle. Because the energy system is about doing all these things, players ought to feel the effort more. These are mostly lost with the 2.5D design.
Well that’s all for now folks. Remember to come visit our Discord for (almost) daily updates on the development. Or follow is on Twitter or Instagram!