First of all, thank you so much for participating in the game jam, especially with a game that explored the engine’s features so well, and also for your feedback post.
Sorry for the delay in replying. When the game jam ended, I got really excited and ended up dedicating all my time to developing the engine’s v2, which has just been released. I tend to focus on one thing at a time, hahah.
I’m glad you liked the variables. They are a core part of the engine. They’re what allow games to move from being static to truly dynamic, enabling many different gameplay possibilities. In this update, objects, NPCs, and enemies now display an outline colored according to the variable they use, making interactions much more visual and intuitive.
I’ve considered making the engine Turing complete by introducing logic gates like AND, OR, and NOT. That would allow for more robust mechanics, such as multiple variables per gate or more complex scenario interactions. However, this is a fairly complex change. Let’s see if something like that becomes viable for a future v3.
Regarding custom pixel art: at the beginning, my goal was something similar to RPG Maker’s RTP approach, providing ready-made visuals so users wouldn’t need pixel art or programming skills. The engine has always aimed to be extremely accessible. My own Bitsy games, for instance, didn’t look very good because I’m not skilled at pixel art, which became a creative bottleneck.
This new version introduced the palette system, allowing for very different visual styles. It’s now possible to customize colors and give each game its own personality, although this currently affects colors only. I still need to study deeper sprite customization, since it directly impacts the game’s URL generation system.
Today, URLs remain short because the engine relies heavily on default assets. An enemy, for example, can be represented by a simple number. If every sprite becomes unique, the engine would need to encode an entire matrix into the URL, making it much longer and potentially impractical depending on the level of customization.
Thank you again for the feedback. It really helps. Yours was amazing. I truly appreciate it!