Week 2 Devlog:
Let's start with the video:
First of all, you can see I'm starting to get assets that aren't purely placeholder in from EdwinDamen, who's helping me with some assets for this project. The three textured blocks (red, yellow, and green) are close to final, while the grids are more in-progress. You can also see a lot of functions from the sandbox, like the basic grid structure (expanded to 12 x 6, and now with two grids on the same screen) and the preview pane (which scales the picture, and eventually will be dynamic). Other than the assets, there are three main new things in this build:- The neutral grid (the pieces floating in space since there's no non-fully placeholder asset for that yet) that lets you grab pieces and place them in your grid. There's a lot to be solidified here, both in the grid's size (especially since I'm testing bigger pieces now) and mechanics like refilling the grid and the simultaneous picking by both players, and is going to be one of my next "big" projects.
- Garbage that doesn't match naturally but clears when you clear pieces next to it. Right now the only way to send garbage is through that debug button, but the plan is to scale it based on the number of pieces and/or spaces you clear, possibly modified by powerups (more on that in a bit)
- The powerup meter fills up as you clear pieces, and when full it does whatever powerup your character has. The latter isn't implemented yet, but that will likely be next--the first character will be Grymmt Dundle, since his apples seem easy to implement (just add them to the grid, treat them like garbage, and add extra to the powerup meter when they're cleared), but I have ideas for all eight OG Skremplets, and adding a new one shouldn't be that hard once I have each category of powerup implemented (ignoring assets of course). However, the powerup bar hides an annoying bug where clearing pieces sometimes adds more to the powerup bar than it "should." I have theories on what's going on, but it's extremely inconsistent, so it could just be a "crit" if I can't figure it out (thanks to wujak for that idea)
As for what's next, obviously I'll integrate new assets, and I mentioned stuff like the neutral overhaul and actually sending garbage/powerups, but the other hard thing is implementing AI. I have the basic AI code from my sandbox I can bring over, but I need to do things like picking and clearing garbage. I also eventually need to start thinking about story and other "boring" stuff like real menus. I also want to get music and/or other sounds, if anyone's interested in helping with that.