Posted August 21, 2019 by Crayon House Games
#platformer #juice #game design #godot
Hi! Thanks for reading the devlog for my little platformer, Pitch (working title...)
Pitch has a very simple premise; you can only see the layout of the level while standing still. If you move, you're shrouded in darkness and need to rely on your memory to get you through each obstacle.
I made Pitch on a whim a week ago because I discovered that I can borrow assets from much more talented people than I, and prototype passing ideas rapidly using Godot (https://godotengine.org/). It kind of snowballed from there to the point where I'm actually considering making it my most complete, polished game yet.
To that end, I'll of course need to start adding a range of different levels and mechanics, but I'm being very careful this time around to smooth out the feel of the game first. So, I've spent the last few dev sessions adding audio, lerped animations, smooth transitions to the endgame screen, coin indicators - basically the sort of thing I leave to the end of development cycle, or more realistically, never.
This has a couple of benefits:
1. My game feels good to develop. There's something just magical about the impact of adding simple feedback to inputs (AKA juice). Having that in place while adding mechanics is much more enjoyable than stamping them on at the end.
2. I finally get to learn about adding juice to a game. I've built basic input and collision systems dozens of times, but since juice normally goes at the end of a project, I've never learned how to do it, and certainly not how to do it quickly.
3. The game is fun for other people! As the developer of the game, I have these rose-tinted glasses where I see what the game will eventually look like. But if all objects on screen are programmer art, I'm the only one that sees that. Thanks to the kind artists uploading their work for free on Itch, (see the list of contributors on the game description page), players can share that vision I normally have bottled up in my head.
So in short - the game's getting pretty juicy and I'm learning a lot. Please give it a try and let me know what you think. And expect a lot more content in the near future! :)