My Gaming Roadmap
Currently I'm working on two different gaming projects, Abduction! and one we're tenatively calling 'Hammer'. Abduction! is a solo project (though I will likely not do the music myself) and 'Hammer' is one that I'm collaborating on with the artist that I worked with on Nasty. I've also got several things that I want to work on (when these current projects complete). I just thought I would take a minute and talk about each one, when I hope to complete them, and what I'm planning for the future.
Current Projects
Abudction!
Abduction! is already far along in development. It's amazing how much more quickly this game has gone than Nasty. I attribute that to having a much better grasp of XNA/C# game programming and having a large code base to draw from. For instance, to implement the rumble functionality in Nasty I was forced to write a rumble class (necessary to manage all the different things in my game that could cause a rumble). For Abduction!, I just added that same rumble class and wired it up... rumble functionality implemented in a matter of minutes verse hours.
I'm keeping the scale of Abudction! smaller too... I doubt I will do more than five levels (if that many even). One big change from Nasty is that I'm trying to keep each of the levels more meaningful and there will be far more to do on each level... Nasty levels could often be completed in a minute or two, I'm hopeful that each of the levels in Abduction! will take 5-10 minutes to complete and offer several varied tasks that must be completed (as opposed to just "kill all enemies").
I'm aiming to complete Abduction! in November or December though admittedly I thought I would be done with Nasty a lot sooner than I was so take my estimates with a grain of salt. Most of the core functionality of Abduction! is already done with most of what remains is tweaking gameplay, adding the next four levels, and improving the graphics. I think it's perfectly feasible to make this timeframe though I won't force the game out if I truly don't feel it to be complete.
Hammer
Hammer is a collaboration between myself and the principal artist for Nasty, Phil Chabot. We've even setup our own little joint company specifically for this venture, The Happy Hermit. I really liked the artwork Phil did for Nasty but in many ways it wasn't as polished as he would have liked on account of me not wanting to pay him truckloads of money for this time. Because this new project is a collaboration and we will be splitting the profits (meaning I don't have to pay Phil for every hour he works on Hammer), a lot more time will be spent on the artwork and character design aspects of the game by a true artist and I will get to spend most of my time programming and playtesting and drinking beer (kidding... or am I?).
The basics of the engine for Hammer is setup already (walking around level, scrolling level, collisions with blocks, attacking) but there is still a ton left to do and neither of us have really invested a lot of our time on this project as of yet. One aspect that is going to make this project move along very quickly is the fact that the engine for Hammer is nearly identical to the engine used for Abduction! (this fact is definitively not a coincidence, it is something I've actively taken into account as development on Abudction! progresses).
You can follow our progress either here or on our Happy Hermit specific blog.
Future Projects
The following are games that I haven't started on but would really like to do (project
This article has been view 487 times.
|