Dec 5, 2018
Supraland - DavidM
Everytime the editor is autosaving I'm glad that the end of this project is not too far away anymore.
In the beginning an autosave would take 3 seconds. Now its taking around 2 minutes and I'm angry everytime it happens.
That's what I get for not using level streaming but having everything in one file!
Very early on I tried to use level streaming, but it brought a lot of unexpected problems that I couldn't cope with back then.
I'm rather amazed how much I could cope with up until now. I started as having no clue about programming and just being an artist. A friend was supposed to help me out with all programming tasks, but he barely had time and I was stuck. So I tried around with the Unreal Engine Blueprints and I figured out more and more stuff and I somehow could get everything done that I needed.
World Building
Today I finished another huge part of the world - I call it "Volcano Part 1" - and I was wondering how much time all the parts of the world actually took me to make them. So I took this topdown screenshot and drew in the regions and when I released them:
Actually I started work on the game in April 2017 for 2 months, then went back to Supraball in June 2017. In February 2018 I couldn't really be any more useful in Supraball and went fulltime with Supraland.
The new Volcano part will be released next week I guess. The puzzles are all there, and they are pretty unique and cool, but there are lots of little things left to do before I can release it.
My biggest worry is with the new MacGuffin, which will be the last one. It enables you to reach so many places, that were unreachable before, I have to at least prevent the worst out-of-bounds cases for now. Which requires me to check every little piece of the world again and maybe change things.
There will be out-of-bounds regions, as usual. The plan is to seal off the world properly when all areas are built and the main story is done.
Then I will make sure, you cannot reach any places that you shouldn't be able to reach. You will in many places feel like you broke out of the map, but it will be intentional and you will be rewarded for it.
I won't be able to use all my puzzle ideas in the main storyline, so I decided to hide puzzle rooms everywhere in the world that will contain all the leftover puzzle ideas.
MacGuffins
I mentioned the new and also last MacGuffin. What does it do? The tutorial for it won't tell you. You'll have to figure it out on your own. :)
Originally I thought the game would be much easier and faster to get through. I thought it would be hard to get up to 10 hours of playtime. But right now the puzzle masters among the players already need 10 hours to get through and more average players need more like 15-20 hours. And this is without major backtracking. Getting to 100% will easily take twice as long. So I would expect a game that takes been 20-50 hours.
For that reason I cut out 3 entire MacGuffins because it will already be big enough and I will get to use those ideas sooner or later in Part 2 or whatever I'll be making.
Why do I keep saying MacGuffins? I realise most players have no idea what it means. I'm just making fun of typical "get this thing" structures of games.
The term MacGuffin is attributed to Alfred Hitchcock. In fiction, a MacGuffin is a plot device in the form of some goal, desired object, or another motivator that the protagonist pursues, often with little or no narrative explanation.
So when Indiana Jones is after the holy grail, it's not really about the grail. It's about having a reason to show an adventure.
I'm just having fun by not hiding it, but calling it just that. Instead of letting you right into Blue Ville to solve the actual problem, I have you puzzle your way through the entire map for no really good reason.
Regrets
One of my worst decisions with the biggest consequences was giving you the triple jump early on. It made building the rest of the world much harder without adding real value. Because by putting the cube under you and using a triple jump, you can always reach all kinds of places I don't want you to get to. I always needed to build everything very widespread and tall to make absolutely sure you can't do things you shouldn't do. Most places would be much smaller if it wasn't for me trying to prevent the abuse of the triple jump.
The triple jump isn't really needed to make interesting puzzles; it's only cool in the beginning right after you get it. For the rest of the game it's not really necessary. Also the only jump'n'run like part of the game is in the beginning until you climbed the red crystal tower. After that it's much more puzzle focused. Most likely because I was bored by building that kind of stuff... even though I love parkouring with accurate first-person controls myself. But I found it much more interesting to introduce new puzzle mechanics over and over again.
The cliff meshes that I use aren't really making the job easier. They have so many steps in them that it's hard to build a wall, that makes it clear, without the shadow of a doubt, that you will not be able to climb it.
You always see some steps in them that you could climb on. Except for the 2 meshes on the right, they are really steep. Next game I will definitely first get more properly steep cliff meshes.
In the beginning an autosave would take 3 seconds. Now its taking around 2 minutes and I'm angry everytime it happens.
That's what I get for not using level streaming but having everything in one file!
Very early on I tried to use level streaming, but it brought a lot of unexpected problems that I couldn't cope with back then.
I'm rather amazed how much I could cope with up until now. I started as having no clue about programming and just being an artist. A friend was supposed to help me out with all programming tasks, but he barely had time and I was stuck. So I tried around with the Unreal Engine Blueprints and I figured out more and more stuff and I somehow could get everything done that I needed.
World Building
Today I finished another huge part of the world - I call it "Volcano Part 1" - and I was wondering how much time all the parts of the world actually took me to make them. So I took this topdown screenshot and drew in the regions and when I released them:
Actually I started work on the game in April 2017 for 2 months, then went back to Supraball in June 2017. In February 2018 I couldn't really be any more useful in Supraball and went fulltime with Supraland.
The new Volcano part will be released next week I guess. The puzzles are all there, and they are pretty unique and cool, but there are lots of little things left to do before I can release it.
My biggest worry is with the new MacGuffin, which will be the last one. It enables you to reach so many places, that were unreachable before, I have to at least prevent the worst out-of-bounds cases for now. Which requires me to check every little piece of the world again and maybe change things.
There will be out-of-bounds regions, as usual. The plan is to seal off the world properly when all areas are built and the main story is done.
Then I will make sure, you cannot reach any places that you shouldn't be able to reach. You will in many places feel like you broke out of the map, but it will be intentional and you will be rewarded for it.
I won't be able to use all my puzzle ideas in the main storyline, so I decided to hide puzzle rooms everywhere in the world that will contain all the leftover puzzle ideas.
MacGuffins
I mentioned the new and also last MacGuffin. What does it do? The tutorial for it won't tell you. You'll have to figure it out on your own. :)
Originally I thought the game would be much easier and faster to get through. I thought it would be hard to get up to 10 hours of playtime. But right now the puzzle masters among the players already need 10 hours to get through and more average players need more like 15-20 hours. And this is without major backtracking. Getting to 100% will easily take twice as long. So I would expect a game that takes been 20-50 hours.
For that reason I cut out 3 entire MacGuffins because it will already be big enough and I will get to use those ideas sooner or later in Part 2 or whatever I'll be making.
Why do I keep saying MacGuffins? I realise most players have no idea what it means. I'm just making fun of typical "get this thing" structures of games.
The term MacGuffin is attributed to Alfred Hitchcock. In fiction, a MacGuffin is a plot device in the form of some goal, desired object, or another motivator that the protagonist pursues, often with little or no narrative explanation.
So when Indiana Jones is after the holy grail, it's not really about the grail. It's about having a reason to show an adventure.
I'm just having fun by not hiding it, but calling it just that. Instead of letting you right into Blue Ville to solve the actual problem, I have you puzzle your way through the entire map for no really good reason.
Regrets
One of my worst decisions with the biggest consequences was giving you the triple jump early on. It made building the rest of the world much harder without adding real value. Because by putting the cube under you and using a triple jump, you can always reach all kinds of places I don't want you to get to. I always needed to build everything very widespread and tall to make absolutely sure you can't do things you shouldn't do. Most places would be much smaller if it wasn't for me trying to prevent the abuse of the triple jump.
The triple jump isn't really needed to make interesting puzzles; it's only cool in the beginning right after you get it. For the rest of the game it's not really necessary. Also the only jump'n'run like part of the game is in the beginning until you climbed the red crystal tower. After that it's much more puzzle focused. Most likely because I was bored by building that kind of stuff... even though I love parkouring with accurate first-person controls myself. But I found it much more interesting to introduce new puzzle mechanics over and over again.
The cliff meshes that I use aren't really making the job easier. They have so many steps in them that it's hard to build a wall, that makes it clear, without the shadow of a doubt, that you will not be able to climb it.
You always see some steps in them that you could climb on. Except for the 2 meshes on the right, they are really steep. Next game I will definitely first get more properly steep cliff meshes.
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