#1GAM July – An Old Friend Returns

Remember how I said last month I’d take some time off? Ha! Oh past Liz, you so silly…

Instead I’ve begun work on a larger scaled version of Devolution. Surprise!

Devolution was made almost a year ago (it was my year one #1GAM entry for August) so you could say this has been a long time coming. Playthroughs on GameJolt have cracked over 8,000 which is crazy. Not only that, the game keeps gaining new followers on the site which is encouraging. Players have liked the game. I like the game. Why not try and make it something more?

I’ve been hesitant to expand the game up until now through fear of spoiling the original experience. With a bit of a push I’ve decided to give it a crack – I mean the original still exists there’s no way I can’t hurt it!

I’m still in very early stages right now. I’ve been working on a prototype/proof of concept of the new direction I want to take and it is going pretty well. My main concern is getting the story right. Gameplay wise I’ve got some good ideas on where to go but the story has left me quite stuck. This is really what has held me back from tackling the project, I don’t fancy myself much of a writer so coming up a decent narrative is tough. It’s best not to force anything though; I’ve got plenty of time to get things right and have to trust that the best ideas will come.

I have been using Gamemaker so my progress is understandably slower than normal simply because I am unfamiliar with the engine.

Gamemaker had me rather befuddled at first. The way it does things is so unfamiliar coming from Unity and I’m still getting my bearings. I do miss the freedom the Unity editor provides in terms of tweaking on the fly though. That said the engine is really impressive; I’ve managed to get the visuals on par if not better than the original and was able to get gamepad input functioning great within a few hours.

Wondering what’s happening with Reversal? Well I’m uncertain right now. It needs more work for sure before I’d be comfortable publishing to the app and google play store. I might see if I can dedicate a day or two a month to keep some progress chugging along.