https://www.saschawillems.de/tags/gamedev/ Recent content in gamedev on Sascha Willems Hugo -- gohugo.io de-de webmaster@saschawillems.de (www.saschawillems.de) webmaster@saschawillems.de (www.saschawillems.de) Thu, 30 Jan 2014 20:59:09 +0000 https://www.saschawillems.de/blog/2014/01/30/3d-loader-for-android-first-roaming-zombies/ Thu, 30 Jan 2014 20:59:09 +0000 webmaster@saschawillems.de (www.saschawillems.de) https://www.saschawillems.de/blog/2014/01/30/3d-loader-for-android-first-roaming-zombies/ A 3d game needs 3d models, so I wrote a simple .obj (wavefront) model loader, and it was surprisingly easy with java. It took me roughly 30 minutes and is no more than 50 lines of code (including declarations and comments). So the “game” (still no gameplay in) can now display 3d models, and since it’s a zombie game, I’ve put in a (drum roll please) zombie! But it’s not just visual, but also backed by an NPC class that makes it move (more or less randomly) around the dungeon in a turn based manner. https://www.saschawillems.de/blog/2013/10/05/project-page-for-trugbild/ Sat, 05 Oct 2013 09:40:42 +0000 webmaster@saschawillems.de (www.saschawillems.de) https://www.saschawillems.de/blog/2013/10/05/project-page-for-trugbild/ I finally got around creating a project page for Trugbild, my entry for the 2013 Pascale Game Development challenge. Results aren’t in yet (deadline was expanded for late entries), so I’m still waiting on how the entry did. I plan on adding stuff to the game in the future (that’s why the current version is called “PGD challenge edition”), and I’m also going to port it to Linux (and maybe Mac OSX). https://www.saschawillems.de/blog/2013/09/15/trugbild-finished-pgd-2013-challenge-edition/ Sun, 15 Sep 2013 13:56:05 +0000 webmaster@saschawillems.de (www.saschawillems.de) https://www.saschawillems.de/blog/2013/09/15/trugbild-finished-pgd-2013-challenge-edition/ The 2013 pascal game development challenge deadline is today, and Trugbild (at least the version for this challenge is finished and available to the public now). I haven’t had that much time to work on it in the final week of the contest, but I managed to add in new content (chapters, decisions), fixed some minor issues and made some small tweaks to the game to add some polish. And though it’s not perfect and not 100% what I initially had in mind for it I’m pretty happy with what I was able to create in roughly a month. https://www.saschawillems.de/blog/2013/09/08/trugbild-almost-done/ Sun, 08 Sep 2013 18:05:57 +0000 webmaster@saschawillems.de (www.saschawillems.de) https://www.saschawillems.de/blog/2013/09/08/trugbild-almost-done/ The final date is quickly approaching, with only one week left to finish work on Trugbild. Last week was extremly busy (including a business trip), so I didn’t make much progress on it. To compensate for this I sat down the whole weekend to push progress on the project, and I can happily announce that all coding work on the game is done. I finalized the ending screen, which now has two (slightly) different visuals, depending on the player’s bias. https://www.saschawillems.de/blog/2013/09/02/half-time-on-trugbild/ Mon, 02 Sep 2013 18:28:43 +0000 webmaster@saschawillems.de (www.saschawillems.de) https://www.saschawillems.de/blog/2013/09/02/half-time-on-trugbild/ The first two weeks of the contest’s one month deadline have passed and I’m pretty happy with the progress so far. Though I won’t be able to put much work into the game this week due to job assignments I’m confident to have it done in time. At least the “PGD Challenge 2013 edition”, and depending on feedback I may add more stuff to the game after it’s release. After all a month is not that much, especially when you’ve got a full-time job, so there are lots of things I’d like to implement that won’t make it in time. https://www.saschawillems.de/blog/2013/08/24/setting-and-progress-on-trugbild/ Sat, 24 Aug 2013 15:31:01 +0000 webmaster@saschawillems.de (www.saschawillems.de) https://www.saschawillems.de/blog/2013/08/24/setting-and-progress-on-trugbild/ Although my spare time is pretty limited these times, and motivating myself to code after work (where I code almost all day code) isn’t very easy progress on “Trugbild” is coming along very nice. I guess one of the best ideas was to limit the technical aspects of the game to some very basic OpenGL and gameplay stuff. This allows me to concentrate on the game itself, without having to think alot about complex programming problems. https://www.saschawillems.de/blog/2013/08/19/first-screenshots-from-trugbild/ Mon, 19 Aug 2013 20:04:24 +0000 webmaster@saschawillems.de (www.saschawillems.de) https://www.saschawillems.de/blog/2013/08/19/first-screenshots-from-trugbild/ After getting the first prototype for my PGD Challenge entry up and running I quickly found a name, it’s called “Trugbild” (German for “delusion”). Once I got the visuals of the prototype the way I imagined the game to look in the first place, the name somehow directly came to my mind and I found it pretty fitting for such a “game”. First work-in-progress screenshots (click on the thumbnails) : https://www.saschawillems.de/blog/2013/08/17/taking-part-in-the-3rd-pgd-game-challenge/ Sat, 17 Aug 2013 09:48:46 +0000 webmaster@saschawillems.de (www.saschawillems.de) https://www.saschawillems.de/blog/2013/08/17/taking-part-in-the-3rd-pgd-game-challenge/ Once again, Will from Pascal Game Development has organized another game dev challenge. Though it’s more of a game jam due to the lack of any prize and registration requirements the theme of it is pretty interesting. It’s called “at your command” and requires indirect control of some main protagonist (or multiple ones). While reading through the theme of that competiton, creativity struck and I decided to participate with a rather abstract “game”. https://www.saschawillems.de/blog/2013/05/10/the-challenges-of-a-games-sound-design/ Fri, 10 May 2013 18:08:19 +0000 webmaster@saschawillems.de (www.saschawillems.de) https://www.saschawillems.de/blog/2013/05/10/the-challenges-of-a-games-sound-design/ Usually I’d add some nice screenshots to show off progress on “Phase 2”, but this time it’s an area of game development that’s pretty hard to show off in screenshots : Sound design. I find this is one of the hardest parts as far as game design goes, at least for me. I do all the parts of game development on my own (design, code, content, etc.) but when it comes down to sound design, the result is usually so bad or bland that (I guess) most people just turn it off. https://www.saschawillems.de/blog/2013/01/21/going-multi-platform-part-2-first-compile-and-run/ Mon, 21 Jan 2013 12:25:01 +0000 webmaster@saschawillems.de (www.saschawillems.de) https://www.saschawillems.de/blog/2013/01/21/going-multi-platform-part-2-first-compile-and-run/ I’ve been working to get the current code of “Phase 2” to compile and work under linux for the whole last weekend (and my eyes kinda hurt, again sitting in front of a monitor ;)). And things went much faster than I expected, so I was able to compile and run the game under linux for the very first time ever! First step was to add code for all things that are specific to an operating system. https://www.saschawillems.de/blog/2011/07/21/secret-agency-and-some-icons/ Thu, 21 Jul 2011 20:44:58 +0000 webmaster@saschawillems.de (www.saschawillems.de) https://www.saschawillems.de/blog/2011/07/21/secret-agency-and-some-icons/ As already told (countless times I guess now) I’m still working on the new GUI but I’m making good progress. Only one window needs to be transitioned over to the new GUI before I can call this milestone done and move over to work on other stuff like adding content and functionality. My current plan is to have a version with the new GUI and all features (only one feature of “Phase 2” is missing) done that I can release for public testing by this yeas end. https://www.saschawillems.de/blog/2011/06/24/the-eternal-circle-of-gui-design-and-some-new-screenshots/ Fri, 24 Jun 2011 13:13:44 +0000 webmaster@saschawillems.de (www.saschawillems.de) https://www.saschawillems.de/blog/2011/06/24/the-eternal-circle-of-gui-design-and-some-new-screenshots/ Odd title, but it perfectly describes my “workflow” when it comes down to the GUI of “Phase 2”. But since the user interface is such a crucial part for a complex strategy game I don’t feel bad when putting hours and hours (and days) into optimizing the interface of a single “window”, especially seing as how horribly one of my old drafts looked. And yes, I really like the current UI. https://www.saschawillems.de/blog/2011/06/12/game-design-game-modes/ Sun, 12 Jun 2011 11:22:50 +0000 webmaster@saschawillems.de (www.saschawillems.de) https://www.saschawillems.de/blog/2011/06/12/game-design-game-modes/ Something that has been lacking in “Phase 1” was replayabilty or better said the motivation to replay the game. This was mainly due to the fact that there was only on single game mode (now called “default”) to choose from in both singleplayer and hotseat games. So basically each game played the same except for maybe the player playind it different or the random factors that change some of the AI’s behaviour. https://www.saschawillems.de/blog/2011/05/27/game-design-coastal-building-spots/ Fri, 27 May 2011 12:08:11 +0000 webmaster@saschawillems.de (www.saschawillems.de) https://www.saschawillems.de/blog/2011/05/27/game-design-coastal-building-spots/ Once again personal things kept me from posting news recently, so excuse the big gap between the last (game design related) posting and this one. Though I haven’t posted news recently I still worked on the game almost every day and a lot of things have been changed, added and done. So expect a higher posting frequency in the near future concerning my progress on “Phase 2”! Something that has been implemented into the game from the very first prototype onwards was a property for all regions with a coast. https://www.saschawillems.de/blog/2011/03/11/game-design-regional-construction-queue/ Fri, 11 Mar 2011 17:22:29 +0000 webmaster@saschawillems.de (www.saschawillems.de) https://www.saschawillems.de/blog/2011/03/11/game-design-regional-construction-queue/ This is something I’ve been thinking about for a long time now and I was pretty unsure wether it would be a good idea or not, as it would change a fundamental part of the gameplay, what I’m talking about is constructing buildings in your regions, a very important part of the gameplay that you spend a lot of your time with. Up until now you’ve been able to construct only one building at the same time in each region, forcing you do revisit a region once this building is finished in order to start constructing the next building. https://www.saschawillems.de/blog/2011/02/27/game-design-espionage-and-sabotage/ Sun, 27 Feb 2011 15:58:37 +0000 webmaster@saschawillems.de (www.saschawillems.de) https://www.saschawillems.de/blog/2011/02/27/game-design-espionage-and-sabotage/ As usual my last big posting concerning “Phase 2” is now almost three months old and therefore I decided to change my habbit on posting news for “Phase 2”, so from now on I’ll add a new categorie called “Game Design” in which I’ll post smaller “snippets” about changes in the game’s design. Those postings will be more frequent and should be a better way of showing what’s going on behind the scenes that thos “quarterly” big postings on my progress with “Phase 2”. https://www.saschawillems.de/blog/2010/05/05/the-old-gui-is-history/ Wed, 05 May 2010 20:18:31 +0000 webmaster@saschawillems.de (www.saschawillems.de) https://www.saschawillems.de/blog/2010/05/05/the-old-gui-is-history/ Yes, you read that right. In a “shocking” turn of events I decided to scrap almost the whole old GUI for “Phase 2” in favour of a new and better one. Most of you might now ask if I went insane or so, but to counter this I’ll elaborate on why I scrapped the old GUI and decided to put a new one in : When I’m not in front of my PC and working on “Phase 2” (that’s actually the only thing I’m doing in front of the PC nowadays, no more gaming or such, spare time is rare for me) I always have pen and paper in close range so I can put down and work on new ideas anytime they hit me. https://www.saschawillems.de/blog/2006/08/26/some-infos-about-gamedesign/ Sat, 26 Aug 2006 16:00:00 +0000 webmaster@saschawillems.de (www.saschawillems.de) https://www.saschawillems.de/blog/2006/08/26/some-infos-about-gamedesign/ Maybe some of you want to know how I do the design for my games, so I thought to write down something on this. Note : I’m no game designer and I never worked on commercial titles (though my freeware games and apps are rather successfull), so take the following stuff as my personal view on this matter, don’t cite me on this in a fiery discussion or so. Most important notice about gamedesign :