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GameDev Log # 1

General updates on my game dev journey~  Wow. It’s really been a minute. And by minute I mean a month. I low key forgot about this blog. But I promise I’ve been putting in that work!!!!! 😤 Unfortunately I couldn’t meet my one month development + release goal for the Bunny Teeth game. TBH ya girl really doesn’t know when she’ll be done. Implementing the rhythm game functionality has proven to be a lot more difficult than I originally expected. I was following a great tutorial series on youtube on how to make a rhythm game in Unity, but a few videos in I realized that I would have to manually map the note game objects in the scene. Although I could totally do this, I just think its tedious and time consuming. I only planned to have 3 songs with this game but what if I wanted to expand it? What about when I want to make a full length rhythm game in the future? I mean, I don’t have any plans as of yet to do that but bottom line, I figured that there had to be a better way to implement this. I wanted to generate note game objects in the scene based on the midi track being used. After googling for a while I found a few different tools that I could use. I wanted something that was free and landed on Midi Took Kit - the free version. Can’t lie, the first few days trying to use this tool were frustrating. Not because of the quality of the tool but because I’m still very uncomfortable with C#. The tool comes with a lot of documentation, but once again, because I don’t know C# very well, I was just confused AF. I didn’t know what properties and methods were available to me and how to really do anything. For those first few days I was LITERALLY just trying to log to the console when a midi event occurred. 

Funny enough, I started having a breakthrough in my understanding because I paired with another developer at work and he gave me a quick rundown on typescript. Once I realized that if I just imported the classes in my file correctly I could use autocomplete in VS Code to see what properties were available to me I started to make some shit happen! Also I started looking through the package to find examples in the demo and tests. I was finally able to log the midi events to the console! Fast forwarding a little bit, right now I’m stuck because I can’t figure out how to map the game objects in the scene relative to each other, if that makes sense.  I had to take a break from game dev stuff for a week-ish. Work was getting CRAZY! I’ve been so busy and by the time I got off I was just too tired to even think. Because of this I was feeling pretty down.  But we’re back!  I haven’t started working on the bunny game just yet, I was still a little emotionally scarred from my troubles lol I planned to start learning 3D modeling again this month (August) but that was when I thought I would be done with my game. Because I still felt that I needed a longer break from the game I started 3D modeling again. 

Right now I’m doing Mort Mort’s Blender series and I love it! Over a year ago, I did the very very long doughnut tutorial that everyone is familiar with and this year when I decided to get back into game dev, I started the 2.8 version of the tutorial but I just couldn’t finish. Its just so long and I don’t even want to make photorealistic stuff so the tutorial isn’t even interesting to me. That’s why I really love Mort Mort’s series. Its 4 videos, all pretty short. The last one is the longest being 45~ mins. I really like the art style he’s demonstrating and he explains things very well, just enough depth to get you going. I’m almost done with the last video, I plan to finish this weekend. 

So that’s where I’m at right now. This weekend I want to finish up this Blender tutorial and get back to working on my game. I really would like to release the game this month or the beginning of September but we’ll see. What’s most important to me is that I get back into the habit of working a little bit everyday. Even if its just 30 mins, that time will add up. 

[yeahyeahbaby]

Wooo!!! Started my SECOND GAME!! It’s called Bunny Teeth!  I started brainstorming ideas this past Wednesday, July 1st, and I finally came up with an idea late Saturday night. My goal is to release this game on my 25th birthday which is August 1st, giving me a month in total working on it.  I’m super excited! I’m learning a lot about pixel art right now.  So far I made this background for the scene, the little keyboard and some music.  I’ll post more details soon :3 

[yeahyeahbaby]

this may be too small this is way too fucking small lol but I’m having fun learning about pixel art

[yeahyeahbaby]

Finished my first game and game jam!

Link to my game Ahh, Crabs! I realized that I haven’t posted in a while, so I thought I would write about finishing my first game and game jam, and what my next plans are.  Get ready for a fucking novel lol. 

I entered the I Can't Draw But Want To Make A Game (Again)  game jam because I wanted to make a game. Before starting the jam, I’d thought about game development and 3D modeling on and off for about a year, but hadn’t started any projects. Last summer, I’d watched BlenderGuru’s series and made a render of a doughnut which was cool and did a few tutorials on the Unity learn site, but I didn’t do anything with those newly developed skills and eventually forgot most of what I’d learned.  I’m currently 24, going to be 25 in August, and I think a lot about how I spend my time, am I on the right path, what do I want out of life, etc. All of the big existential anxiety inducing questions. I work as a front-end web developer, its a great job, but I know that I don’t want to do web development forever.  Anyway, I’d recently started thinking about game development, and wanted to try committing myself again. Game development presents the opportunity for me to create something that combines all of my interests. Art, music, technology, story telling, world building, animation, etc. It’s also appealing to me because being an indie developer means being an entrepreneur. I know that I want a life where I’m my own boss. I want to decide what projects I work on and what takes priority. I want to build a creative life where I can support myself financially from my work.  I thought about how this time could be different from a year ago where I tried to get into game development, but never committed. I started off slow by creating small assets with MagicaVoxel while I tried to come up with ideas. This is when I remembered that game jams were a thing.  I found the game jam (not going to keep typing the name cuz its long as hell lol) on itch.io and was hesitant to enter. I was afraid of starting and committing to something only to let myself down when I didn’t finish.  I’d recently started journaling and was writing about this fear that I had. I realized as I was writing that I was stopping myself from trying something because of fear. That’s when I decided to commit to entering.  The great thing about game jams is that they take place over a set period of time and you’re usually given some kind of parameters. This was EXTREMELY helpful to me because I was able to quickly come up with an idea for the game. I knew that I only had two weeks to finish. Not two full weeks because of course I work full time and have other home chores to do. Plus ya girl likes to relax and watch anime ( I think at the time I was actually reading Hana Yori Dango aka Boys Over Flowers uwu).  So being given a set time period helped me to plan a semi-realistic scope for the game.  So I started to work on the game! I had a lot of fun making silly art and music. Because the mechanics of my game were also SUPER simple, I could easily find tutorials for everything that I wanted to implement. Even with the tutorials, I still had small hiccups as I worked my way around Unity and C#, but I was never stuck for more than a few hours.  Things were going great! And then.... I stopped working on the game.  I think I didn’t work on the game for like 4-5 days?? I got off track because of some personal stuff that I had to deal with. Once it was handled, I didn’t immediately get back to work. I wasn’t really motivated anymore and I was running out of time. I felt like I had wasted time already, I wasn’t going to make the deadline so why FUCKING TRY *sobs*.  BUT! Once again, journaling saved the day again lol.  I was writing about these feelings and saw how stupid I sounded. Why TF am I giving up before the jam ends???? BITCH!!!  So I got back to work.  I think at this point I had like 3-4 days left?? Something like that. I worked my butt off , literally until the deadline. I was rushing like crazy, super determined to finish. I was keeping up with a Trello board of things I wanted to add to the game, but a lot of things had to get cut. For example, the help button, a pause game function, cleaning up the mechanics, also wanted to add some pre-game comics, etc. BUT thankfully I was able to prioritize the absolute must haves to make the game playable and shippable lol.  So, the deadline was 12am CST Friday. 11:59pm CST rolled around. And I’m still waiting for my build so I can upload it. 12am came and it was too late. I didn’t make it. I was literally sobbing. I don’t remember the last time I cried so much. I was just feeling super emotional. I had a long day at work, just spent the last 8 hours crunching to finish my game to submit to the game jam, and even though it was finished, in the moment I felt like a failure because I couldn’t submit it to the jam. I know it may sound silly, like BITCH you did the thing! You made a game! You reached your goal! Buuuut I was still feeling like shit lol.  The build finished and I uploaded it it itch.io. I was sniffling around the discussion board on the jam’s page, feeling sorry for myself, and decided to post a link to my game and let everyone know that Hey! I finished this game but couldn’t submit it in time. pls check it out *sobs* WELL! Many blessings came my way, the creator of the jam was sending unique submission links to people who missed the deadline a little! They saw my post and sent me a submission link. Of course I submitted that hoe so fucking quick lmaooo  A wave of relief washed over my exhausted shriveled body. It was time for celebration and sleep because a bitch had to go to work the next day.  I’m so thankful for this experience. I saw something that I wanted to do, I committed, almost QUIT, BUT PUSHED THROUGH AND REACHED MY GOAL!  I feel so much confidence in myself and my ability to pursue and finish my creative projects, whatever they may be.  SO WHAT’S NEXT BITCH???? Well, thank you for asking uwu I’m going to make another game! This time, not part of a jam so I have to keep myself super accountable. I want to make a game where I can learn and experiment with dialogue, camera movement, art, and sound design. I think I’ve settled on an idea but need to give it some more thought before I commit and reveal the idea.  I’m hoping for about 30-45 minutes of game play?? And I want to work on this project for 6 months, so pretty much the rest of 2020. Might as well keep myself busy while the world burns :/ If anyone is reading this and made it this far, wow, i’m impressed. I wouldn’t have read this much lol I think I’m going to make a youtube video on this topic?? I mean, if I can write a novel about it might as well talk about it on youtube. It can be my first dev-log-ish type video for the yeahyeahbaby channel (that has yet to be created lol) Okay. Bye-bye now. 

[yeahyeahbaby]

- Game jam ends tomorrow night - I’m very behind - But we’re stompin on these crabs

[yeahyeahbaby]

: (  lol

[yeahyeahbaby]

There’s a lot going on IRL right now. It’s physically and mentally exhausting.  I’m thankful that I have this project that allows me to escape, and I feel very lucky that I even have the option to do so. I’m not going to get into details here because I’ve been having these conversations on other platforms and IRL. This is my little escape from reality.  This blog is for me to document my learning process for myself without the pressure that my Twitter or Instagram account brings because I have no following here.  So, Saturday I spent a lot of time, practically all day, working on my game! I had a lot of fun. It was a struggle just to get my character to move and not fall into the depths of hell. I have an empty game object with a 2D box collider protecting her from peril.  You can’t hear the chaotic background music from the GIF but get ready, because its pretty great lol.  Saturday night and into this morning I also made the first “page” of the end-game comic that I wanted to include. I’ll share pictures of that later this week.  Today was a little rough for me. I haven’t been feeling well since 5am, but started feeling a little better tonight. I wanted to work on the game, even if just for 30 minutes and I was able to get the crabbies to randomly spawn!  I watched this really great video for help: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AI8XNNRpTTw As you can see in the GIF, they’re off the screen lol but baby steps.  Next will be to get them to move up the y-axis into oblivion.  Excited to see what I get done this week! 

[yeahyeahbaby]

Some art for my game jam game: AH, CRABS!!!

I’m very much feeling these little cuties. I would do anything for them. Wow. My love is endless.

This will be a 2D game. I barely know anything about Unity but the things I do know are mostly related to 3D projects lol.

I have lots to learn this weekend!

Also, Nick and I made a very chaotic song for this game lol I can’t wait to share it 😂

[yeahyeahbaby]

My first game and game jam!

I’m participating in my first game JAM!  This will be my first game. I have two weeks.  The title is “AHH, CRABS!” Here’s a link to the jam: https://itch.io/jam/i-cant-draw-but-want-to-make-a-game-again WOOO!!

[yeahyeahbaby]

WOAH BABY! Its a chicken! Or maybe its a duck? Either way she’s cute :3  I made this by following a tutorial by VoxelGuy on Youtube. Its not perfect, but I’m feeling pretty good about it.  My initial reaction when finishing was: “Well, it doesn’t look that great. The animation isn’t smooth and the proportions are weird.” So negative! This is my first time trying anything like this so of course its not going to be perfect. I’m trying to learn to be easier on myself, but it’s a hard habit to build. Learning anything takes time and I’m trying to learn how to code in C#, model in MagicaVoxel, animate.....the list goes on.  SO congrats to me for finishing this small baby 🐥 ON TO THE NEXT!

[yeahyeahbaby]

Blood? Fire?  I’m trying lol I needed a collectible item so that I could move on to scripting. Vampires drink blood so here we are.  Honestly today was a long day, I’m ready for the weekend, and I’m close to 0% energy right now. But I did something! So that’s one small step forward. 

[yeahyeahbaby]

Making a little pivot. I don’t want to get stuck in tutorial hell so I paused on the Blender tutorial and found a tool that allowed me to create assets with a lower learning curve to get started.  Tonight I made this little middle aged vampire bb. It was really fun and pretty easy. I think I’ll stick with this tool to make game art while I focus the majority of my energy learning Unity.  Unity has a lot of tutorials and courses but I want to try reading the docs. Not all in one sitting, but starting with the basics to get me started with a project and search for specific functions that I need. I learn more by doing things on my own, running into issues, and solving them. I think most of us do.  Next, I’m going to make a collectible item, something blood related for my vamp. Then I’ll try setting up a new project in Unity and importing the assets.  The first milestone is getting my vamp to collect blood items and keeping score. Keeping it simple and achievable! 

[yeahyeahbaby]

Following Blender Guru’s Bender tutorial series for version 2.8. This is where I’m at after the 6th video in level 1. About a year ago I completed the older version of this video series but didn’t keep up with the new skills and forgot everything. Hoping to finish this series in 1-2 weeks so I can start making cute game assets! 

[yeahyeahbaby]

Art Journal

9/22/18 

It feels like I have a never-ending list of things I want to do. Small tasks to do in my apartment, larger long-term goals, just a bunch of SHIT! It’s kind of stressful because I feel like I’m never getting anything done. I’m trying to make small steps every day, but sometimes I slip up and accomplish nothing. It’s hard :))) But I’ll keep trying tomorrow.