Taayakin's First Game: FOOL'S GOLD

 FOOL'S GOLD officially has its AudioManager created and implemented, along with its first SFX! 🎧 Now when Kenny has finished his MiningAction, and a LootDrop occurs there's a SFX; one for RealGold and one for FoolGold. 🔊

Updated and polished FOOL'S GOLD UI/Menus!! I'm just going to share one, so the others will be a surprise for when ya'll can play it for yourselves. 😄 🕹 Polished "How To Play" Menu Screen This post is a couple of days late, but it's been a very busy time! I'm hoping to have the finalized demo of FOOL'S GOLD hosted and playable in-browser by EOD tomorrow. It should be a realistic goal, as I only have to add the audio into the game, and the assets have already been selected and organized. 🙌

The final major game mechanic for FOOL'S GOLD version 1.0 has been created and implemented! 🥳 Check out the new Field of View toggle mechanic: I didn't get to work on FOOL'S GOLD hardly at all last week, but I'm thrilled to be making progress again! Between last night and the night before, I was able to create and implement the last main game mechanic I wanted to create for FOOL'S GOLD, a custom Field of View toggle mechanic. 🚀 I wanted Kenny's torch to do more, functionally, than just "exist". What if the torch could add an advantage strategically, even though equipping it would spend the player's main resource of time? This led to figuring out Kenny's line of sight, his field of view, shadowing the environment, and hiding the gold, all only when the pickaxe is equipped. Equipping the torch allows the player to see the whole cave and all the gold. 💡😀 Building this mechanic gave me the opportunity to learn about meshes, how to create my own

Been slow-moving on FOOL'S GOLD as my other responsibilities have prevented me from being able to spend much time on the game the past couple of days. However, FOOL'S GOLD officially had its first round of playtests (thanks to my awesome Binary Beast pals, inside joke 💚)!! I got some great feedback and was able to make some important gameplay tweaks. Plus, a few bugs were found and promptly handled. 💪 There's not much left in the game to do, but without much spare time during the week to dedicate to my passion project, I'll likely only be able to make small steps towards the finish line on this version of FOOL'S GOLD. The silver lining to this situation is that it's much more realistic, compared to the "Game Jam" pace where I cleared my schedule as much as possible haha. Getting some great practice in time management and keeping my life balanced. 🙌 Check out this post-playtest tweaks, gameplay clip! 😃

THE FIRST PLAYABLE, (rough, unpolished) DEMO/MVP VERSION OF FOOL'S GOLD_v1.0 IS COMPLETE!! 🎉  Gamplay tweaks are needed, I'm adding another game feature or two, audio, and of course polishing (particularly of the UI) is very needed haha.  But FOOL'S GOLD is officially playable!!!

  Still need to attach more logic to miningAction, but the core is finished! 😃 When Kenny "mines", the action will begin and end each interaction, the time it takes to mine will be a randomRange, and there is a custom UI Slider attached to randomMiningTime showing real-time progress %. Will be adding to the GUI, but this was a major improvement from the "animated valueless slider", fixedMiningTime version!

Kenny can now explore the whole cave!

 FOOL'S GOLD_v1.0 IS MOVIN' RIGHT ALONG! MIGHT EVEN BE COMPLETE BY THE END OF THE WEEKEND! 🙌😄🤞 Particle Effects Created and Functional! Kenny movin' so fast he's leavin' a dirt and dust trail behind!

 Our dynamic cursor logic, game timer, and backpack equip/unequip button are all created and functional! 😃

  We're making progress bringing FOOL'S GOLD back! 🥳 Check out the Menu Navigation and New HUD! Shiny New HUD!

 HE'S ALIVE!!! 🧟 Kenny Goldinski officially lives again!! He's back in his level, animated, and reacting to player input. Hurray!!!

  Now it's time to OFFICIALLY REVIVE KENNY!

 FOOL'S GOLD, Cave Level is officially recreated, and better than before! 💪 Before I knew it, the rebuild level was a MUCH larger and improved version! It was hard to avoid since I had already built it once, the process was so much easier. Increasing the scope simply meant doing more of the same, and the increase in efficiency made this extremely doable. The comparison in both layout and scope is very apparent when you compare the 2 versions directly, approximately scaled to each other! FOOL'S GOLD, Cave Level, version 1.0 FOOL'S GOLD, Cave Level, version 0.0

 I'm proud to say FOOL'S GOLD_v1.0 is on track and making fast progress! 🙌 The process really is much quicker the 2nd time around LOL. It's a lot easier when you've already built it once, know what assets to use, where to use them, etc.  However, building the level exactly the same would be way more work. Plus given it is a rebuild and much faster, it made sense to follow the same level design, but this time with a fresh, this time much larger, layout.  Check it out! The rebuild officially has walls and a background! Progress!

I made a presentation on FOOL'S GOLD_v0.0, the metadata loss and game corruption, where the game was built to, where it would've been built to, future version plans, the Unity course I used to learn, and an overview of the practice games made in that course.  Feel free to check that out  here .  ---------------------------------------------- After having some more time to process, and discussing the event with friends, I decided to give myself some grace. 😊 If it hadn't been for something out-of-my-control (like knowing in advance the hard lesson learned about Unity's metadata lol), I would've 100% finished the Game Jam on time, with a fully submitted game. And trying to rush to pump out a "Demo/Test" 💩 version of FOOL'S GOLD, just didn't feel good.  With these two truths in mind, I decided to accept that it was a wiser decision to let this submission date pass, and focus on bringing FOOL'S GOLD back to life!  After coding at "Game Jam&

Learned a very hard lesson about Unity metadata and GitHub compatability today....Suffice to say, I will NEVER make the mistake of trusting the Unity+GitHub combo again. Last night, I went to bed, riding high. I had solved the hardest challenge in my project, and had very little left. I was completely confident that I would be submitting the MVP (minimum viable project) version to my first game jam and was only unsure about how much polishing I would be able to finish. Today, FOOL'S GOLD does not currently exist. 💔 It's still hard to accept. I put my heart into this game jam and FOOL'S GOLD, and this turn of events almost seems surreal. I don't want to get into a lengthy technical explanation of what happened, and I'm honestly still feeling pretty deflated from the experience. Basically, using GitHub as a form of version control for Unity projects, not only just doesn't work correctly, but apparently when there is an issue, fixing it how GitHub is designed to

After about a day and a half, I FINALLY did it!! The ToMine logic for FOOL'S GOLD is COMPLETE!! 🥳 There were a few moments late last night (and very early this morning lol) that I thought about giving up on these game mechanics. At times I felt like I wasn't even making progress, and I started to seriously doubt if I'd be able to figure it out without wasting so much time I can't finish the rest of the needed game mechanics.  I know I can always submit a "demo version" if I'm unable to submit the MVP version. However, I really  want to submit the polished  MVP version, and I'm determined to do my very best to make it happen. I just got butterflies thinking how there are only 2 days left of the jam! 😳 So much to do, so little time lol. For now though, VICTORY CELEBRATION!!! I have about 3 important game mechanics to implement (all much more standard than what I just finished tackling thank goodness), so I'll definitely be working late again tonigh

Good thing I always leave extra time for inevitable roadblocks, cause it's been a slow trudge the last day or so 😬 It would take too much time and space to talk about every obstacle I've hit on FOOL'S GOLD in the past 24-36 hours lol, but suffice to say I'm definitely behind my "ideal timeline". But, that is why it's "ideal" after all. 😉  I was hoping to have a "playable test demo" version for my friends to check out today, but, unless I give them the "backup plan version" (if I can't figure some of these features out in time LOL), I was unable to hit this goal.  However, I'm still making ( slow ) progress, and this (should) be the last, biggest chunk/obstacle to overcome. I feel like I'm very close to implementation! I hope I figure it out in time, and maybe even can show my friends tomorrow. 😁 For now, check out a lil cursor toggle mechanic I wrote and attached to Kenny's backpack (see clip below). This wa

After thinking of several different versions of how to create the logic and gameplay for Kenny's "Mining Action", the MVP version has officially been decided upon! FOOL'S GOLD officially has its own (MVP version) "Title" menu screen, a "How To Play" menu screen, as well as a "Game Over, Play Again?" menu screen. For the "Mining Action", I've chosen to implement a HUD system. It's been created (check out the clip below), though it's still in progress. Still have a lot to get done, but making progress! 😁

I just have to give a quick shoutout to Trello, it's awesome!!! Every piece of game dev or game jam advice I've followed has been a huge  help, and using  Trello  as a way to organize my project's workflow has been no different. My  Trello Workspace has been a lifesaver   for FOOL'S GOLD!  It's made it so much easier  to break down my full project into smaller chunks, and then break those into actionable tasks. This has allowed me to continuously re-evaluate my project as I'm building it, especially with Game Jam constraints in mind. Using Trello has vastly improved my ability to fend off "Scope Creep", as I can quickly break down features by various versions as well. 

Lots to do today to have FOOL'S GOLD - MVP (unpolished) finished by EOD tomorrow 💪  Last night I knew it was worth calling it earlier around 9:30 PM. Mental fatigue was starting to really affect me, and I had already completed a bit more than my "minimum goals" for the day. I spent some time relaxing with my dogs and rested a bit, before going to bed relatively early.  Today I also slept in a bit more than usual, instead of waking up early to code for an hour or two. ☕ This longer mental break was just what I needed to be able to tackle Game Jam, Day 4! Now refreshed, I'm ready to (hopefully) crush today's FOOL'S GOLD tasks as well 🥊 : (DEMO/TEST) Start/Title Screen / End/Replay Screen (DEMO/TEST) miningAction "dialog box" to use w/ logic (DEMO/TEST) start coding miningAction logic (DEMO/TEST) visible to player game timer (DEMO/TEST) start on "loot drop" + scoring logic (DEMO/TEST) visible to player high score (shown on endScreen) I belie

I'm a bit tired...but I also feel great about hitting my "ideal minimum progress" goals for the day 😎 FOOL'S GOLD is really starting to take shape!   In addition to what I planned on completing today, I also accomplished getting all (supposedly) remaining assets FG needs from the Unity asset store (music and SFX, in addition to UI). For my game art assets, I purchased what I needed. However for the remaining assets, I decided to go the "Free Assets" route, and I was able to find a good variety of options. In fact for my next game, I plan to spend a bit more time diving through the FREE section of assets, even for the art. You never know if you don't check lol.  Tonight I'm feelin' the fatigue a bit. There are still a few more things I want to add in before calling it a night (for example, adding some more functionality to Kenny's follow camera). However, I plan to go to bed a bit earlier tonight. Rest is crucial, and there's still "

FOOL'S GOLD officially has a cave level with functioning walls and a protagonist with a fully implemented, 4-Directional movement input system, complete with functioning animations Mid-afternoon, and I've accomplished the first, and biggest, chunk from my "ideal minimum" goal list for today. I'm feeling great! Even though it's a lot of work, I'm having so much fun I can hardly tell. 🚀 At this pace, I believe the goal of having an unpolished "playtest version" of FG by EOD Thursday for my friends to playtest, is reasonable. On to the next objective! Check out Kenny's sweet moves in the clip below:  

I'll be including progress clips/GIFs in my posts when possible.  Check out the first game dev progress clip/GIF for FOOL'S GOLD below!  Kenny Idles