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Progress with the editor user interface

Still not fuctional but the look of the editor’s UI is shaping up:

So what do we have here:

  • Create new level
  • Load level
  • Save level
  • Place kittens start area
  • Place obstacle
  • Place goal area
  • Level settings
  • Delete object
  • Place wall

I will try to keep this editor convenient to use. For example, if one wants to place an obstacle, the mousewheel switches through the variants. Also the unplaced objects is shown at the mouse position to have full control over the placement.

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Bitmapfont is there, ideas are shaping up

Below you can see a screenshot in which I’ve beaten the test level (which is not that easy) by rescuing 52 kittens. It is necessary to save at least 50 and you start with 100. So that was really close. Somehow the scale2x algorithm of pygame doesn’t work as intended. Looks like I have to do it differently, maybe even scale the bitmap font beforehand.

For the level design a new idea is shaping up. For a campaign mode I would like to connect separate levels with entry/exit-areas to have some Metroid-like world of single screens connected. With that approach I can place “powerups” for changing swarm density, refresh time of bait, speed, etc to make later parts of the world solvable.

Nevertheless, next step for me is to make a level editor. Planning how it will work at the moment.

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Creating a Palette

Actually I’m not that happy with the look of my game. As this is interferring with my motivation I invested some time thinking about the graphical presentation. Basic challenge was that the choice of the colour palette isn’t as consistent as I wanted it to be. So I remembered a nice tool I found once to help making up a colour scheme. I created a nice one with three analogic and one accent colour and made a quick mockup how the colours could be used in the game. Here is what this looked like:

To my surprise I really dig the abstract look of the rectangles in this proof of concept and I’m thinking about using exactly that for my game with kittens as sprites like before. What do you think?

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Animations, Colours, Scale

Just a quick update cause I’m quite tired:

  • Figured out that 2x scale wasn’t active until today. Everything looks a lot bigger now and I had to resize the screen to keep the game playable.
  • Animation is implemented but really difficult to see in the buzzing kittenswarm.
  • Still trying to find a nice background colour.
  • Next to do is implement some status information (kittens alive, time left until next fish is placable)

Screenshot:

Good night.

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Animated Kittens

I’ve made a task list with subtasks for the further development of Kittenswarm. First task to do is the animation stuff. For that I’ve created a simple animation of the kitten sprite and two colour variations of the kittens:

 

 

 

These are scaled 4x. The original in-game sprite will be 16×16 pixels. Quite small, so I don’t need that precise animation and am quite happy with these. So have a look at my task list:

  • Animations
    • Animated sprite (done)
    • Different colours (done)
    • Implement loading spritesheets
    • Implement animation
    • Implement facing of kittens
    • Implement random coloured kittens

Still some subtasks to do to finish the animations task.

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Devlog is open – Kittenswarm

My plan for the next weeks/month is to expand my Ludum Dare 22 warmup game “Kittenswarm”. My main competition entry was rated as quite innovative but not that fun to play, so I decided to do a post-compo version of the warmup game instead. Personally I see a lot more potential in the swarm guiding puzzle concept of this game. So here is what at least to add:

Guide the kittens to the goal by placing fish
  • Visuals like animation, nicer sprites
  • Some status information how many kittens are alive and how many need to survive a level
  • Multiple levels / level editor
  • Bitmap font
  • Sound

So with this blog I will post development updates and other gaming stuff, especially Indie related.