May 13, 2014

what's taking so long?

In the true newb fashion I thought I'd be done in a matter of months and now it's years later with no true end in sight. The fact of the matter is almost all of the work has been done on my own without much outside help except once in a blue moon when I find myself with spare cash to pay someone for something specific. Yes it's true I have a basic build that's up and running but it's still so broken that to even call it a proper alpha would be just short of an outright lie.

That having been said what have I been doing the last couple months? I've been selling off chunks of what code I've done so far to other developers and shopping out the rights to the games. I'm not giving up by any means rather handing it off is more of a means to an end. The games will still get made and by people that have much more experience. Realistically I probably should've done this much sooner. What about kickstarter? True I could go that route and I would be able to afford to work how I really want and get things done, but it wouldn't have the same effect as putting it in the hands of truly experienced developers that will know what to strip out or add in for maximum effect.

What does this mean for the blog? It means I start new projects and elaborate on them while detailing what's happened to what I've already done. This blog isn't going anywhere if I can help it. Not to mention the games themselves haven't been sold off yet and I'm going to keep working on them until they are. With any luck I'll be able to keep working on them after they're sold too.

So what have I done with the games since my last post? I've brought back the old mech's as a clutch game mechanism which is to say they only show up at the end of each match as game changers in an attempt to swing the battle for a last minute come from behind victory possibility. I also brought back the stock system in a manner I finally think will be free of complaints. Namely most loadouts use the existing system and special flare items that don't have game impact aside from visual are the only things the stock system is really useful for right now. It functions more as a mini metagame and not as a real mechanic. I've also added special items with other equivalents that can be bought in other ways, these special items are one time purchases that can be re-used. You might think of them as similar in nature to the blueprints from dust 514 without the expense. I've made a few other tweaks here and there and worked on removing some of the game crashing bugs but otherwise that's all the major news.

From here I plan to work more on teamwork mechanics because the current system breaks down at more advanced skill levels and becomes a lone wolf game again which is not what the game is about. Hopefully when I finally get teamwork mechanics done properly it won't be an elmer fudd situation where I find out I turned the shotgun around the wrong way.