First Look at Tzarr - Global Game Jam 2014!

Good Wednesday!  I've got a video taking a look at the results of week one of production on Tzarr, including the rough basics and turn based game play.  Tzarr is coming along nicely so far, yesterday was tough, as I had a bug that baffled me for the entire day.  Finally I figured out what was wrong and fixed it and wham, everything magically worked exactly like I wanted!

The problem code snippet was this:

As you can see if you click on it, I was setting unit_grid which was the entire 9x9 grid to a shifted version of the move_grid, which was only 7x7 and contained the movement ability of each piece.

But the problem was that I was using different indices so it was rewriting over old sections of the array with 0 when I didn't want it to be.  I was already initializing the unit_grid array to 0s anyway in ClearUnitGrid(); so I just removed that line and everything worked perfectly!

But enough programmer talk, let's take a look at the video on Tzarr:

Honestly the game rules right now need to be changed a lot.  I played a game with myself and it was very easy to stalemate.  I'll be doing extensive play testing and making all sorts of builds to find a good balanced and fun rule set for Tzarr.

In other news, I'll be attending the Global Game Jam this weekend!  I'm super excited, I didn't think I would be able to get in, but because I signed up on the main site, even though they ran out of tickets, the head honcho said I was alright to come.  It's been a while since I've participated in a Jam (Since SBX: Invasion for the GMC Jam January 2013!) so I'm super stoked to get out and meet some cool people and stay up late like a youngster again.

I've been thinking of tons of ideas for all sorts of topics and my work on Tzarr has enabled me to work quickly with C# and Unity.  I think with a good team we could turn out something truly awesome!

Also, I just tried out Infinite Crisis, a MOBA by Turbine Games Inc that's still in Beta, and it's still under NDA so I won't say too much but I'll say this:  Sign up for the Beta, it's fun!

That's all for this update, I'll likely have a large update after the GGJ this weekend with the project my team has created and updates about how it went.

Cheers!

Jason C. / WakeskaterX

A Week of Greenlight - New Project - Boston Post Mortem fun.

Well it's been a week since I've put SBX: Invasion up on Greenlight and it's doing... not as bad as it could be.  For the first few days the game sat at about 20% Yes Votes which honestly isn't that bad considering how niche tower defense games are, and there isn't a very good category to put them in.

Currently the game is at 14% Yes Votes, 3% Unanswered and 83% No Votes.  I haven't managed to get much publicity out yet, and I'm going to be trying to get some info out there about the game and see if I can drum up some excitement.  Hopefully driving some customers to the Greenlight page will increase the Yes to No Ratio and get more eyes on the project.

It's been tough getting the game out there, but I think it's probably time to shelf the project for a while and move on to new stuff.  I've learned a lot about game development and grown a lot as a developer on this project.  And I have already started on my next project as well.

The next project is going to be a smaller project in Unity called Tzarr.  I'll be working with a programmer I met in the GDU skype group, Derek, who will be handling the network side of things.  We're working on Tzarr in order to see how well we work together and make something smaller in preparation for a larger project later.

Here is a screenshot of what the board set up might look like:

The game will play similar to Shogi and Chess with some key differences, and we'll be going through various rule sets to nail down one that makes sense.  

The goal at the moment is to build a powerful flexible system to create all sorts of board set ups and rule sets quickly and effectively.  We're striving for a turn based playable build by the end of January to put out for people to try.

And then finally, last night was the Boston Post Mortem!  My good buddy Ben Taylor spoke on Game Jams and going into them with the right kind of mindset.  He gave a bunch of ways to "win" at Game Jams, whether it be coming out of it with a prototype, art, money, or new work partners, you should always focus on "winning" and planning on something you specifically want to gain from them.

It was a great time meeting people and networking as well.  I was introduced to Ken Rolston, the Lead Designer of Morrowind and Oblivion, and we got to chat for a good half hour and I was able to pick his brain on all sorts of things.  That was a great experience and it was fun talking to him about his start as a designer just making pen and paper games and how he got into the industry.

Boston really has some awesome companies.  One guy I know from Turbine told me I should check out Infinite Crisis, a DC Comics MOBA and it looks pretty interesting.  If you like League of Legends or DOTA you should sign up for the Beta too!  

It's been a very fun week and I'm excited about Tzarr and prototyping out a bunch of different game modes and rule sets.  Things are starting to come together in 2014!  I might even do a talk at BPM at some point about my first year as an indie and about the launch of SBX: Invasion! 

So subscribe to the blog for the weekly updates!  Cheers and Good Day!

WakeskaterX / Jason

SBX: Invasion is now in the Greenlight Process! - Update 1.2 is out too!

Well, I finally started the Greenlight Process for SBX: Invasion.  You'll be able to vote at the link below:

Also Update 1.2 is now out at Desura, IndieGameStand and will soon be out at FireflowerGames.

What's new in Update 1.2?

Well quite a bit!

• New Movement system:  The player will no longer bounce off walls and reverse direction and the movement system feels a little more slippery like you are in space.
• Upgraded UI and Planet Graphics:  The planets look a lot nicer now, I ran a Posterization filter over them to bring them in line with the games graphical quality and then added a glow effect.
• Updated Tutorial: The tutorial is a bit longer but the game lets you go free a bit sooner.  There a little less tutorial stuff after the tutorial, but more is included at the start.
• Optional Tutorial:  The tutorial is now optional to new players as well.
• New Loading Screen: The loading screen now says "Loading" and also gives a little tip about using Ghost Mode.
• New Voice Overs! My lovely wife voiced the entire monologue by AIUA in the game.  Instead of a computer rendered voice, my wife tried to stay monotone enough that the computer filters would work.  It was a pretty fun experience and we had to stop ourselves from laughing on a few occasions.
• Minor QOL Improvements across the board:  You can now use arrow keys to move between levels in any way, before it was locked for some weird reason that I can't remember.  It's better now.

And there is ALSO a new DEMO at IndieDB that you can play to try out all the changes!

Check out the demo HERE

Over the next few weeks I'll be doing some advertising and I'm really hoping we can get Greenlit as that would be a phenomenal boost!  I'll also be working on my NEXT project a little bit this month so stay tuned.

Cheers and Happy New Year!

Jason/WakeskaterX

End of year report for SBX: Invasion - Looking forward to 2014

Looking back on the year, it's been a fun ride, but difficult.  I've learned more than I ever thought was possible and through the process of learning realized how little I know about game development and design.

I've realized to be a successful solo indie you have to be an expert at Programming, Art, Game Design, Project Management, Marketing, Web Design, Sound Effect and Music Creation, Social Networking, Production, Business Planning, and Writing.  That's just the little tip of the iceberg, too.

I enjoy it but it IS exhausting.  I love learning so being an indie is incredibly fun, but it takes a continued effort to not succumb to Analysis Paralysis.  There are hundreds, even thousands of things to learn and all of them are applicable to game development, and I've noticed that unless I have a specific plan, it is easy to get overwhelmed.  I like to keep things organized with Trello, a simple interface for keeping checklists, and I highly recommend it.

So let's take a look at End of Year info, a look back at 2013 and forward to 2014.

End of Year Finances and Statistics:

So I haven't quite broke even yet.  SBX: Invasion was released November 1st, 2013 and has had 1 minor update so far.

During the first 2 months SBX: Invasion has:

• Sold 31 Copies across all portals and made $61.11 USD.
• Been the feature of 7 Youtube Videos by fans and reviewers.
• Been reviewed in 8 articles.
• Had 25 demo downloads (Demo released later on in December- derp)
• Been played in an indie game stream alongside some other great indie games.

So the game made $61.11 and between setting up the website and other minor expenses I've spent $253.34.  So that leaves me $192.32 in the hole.  Which is piddly money anyway.  

So the year wasn't financially great while an indie (I started full time in July, so I made money at a job for the first 7 months of 2013), but I have learned a ton and feel good about moving forward in 2014.

So let's look back at 2013 and I'll touch on just a few things I could have done better.  This isn't a fully fleshed out post mortem (that will come sometime later in 2014), but just some thoughts at the end of the year.

A look back at 2013:

This is my first year as a full time indie.  Jumping headfirst into the industry has been stressful at times, enjoyable at times, and a lot of work all the time.  I've had to learn to self motivate, organize and network (among many many things.)

Things I did well in 2013:

• I finished a game!  SBX: Invasion was a long process.  It started out as a terrible entry for the GMC Winter Jam in January 2013 and took a lot of love and revision to get it to a moderate state on release.
• Iteration.  The game got significantly better after release, and update 1.2 coming in January should improve the flow of the game and address some issues that people have with the game.  Feedback has been critical to the game getting better.
• The core idea.  People have enjoyed the base idea so far and feedback has been good on the games core gameplay.
• Attended all the Boston Post Mortems since I moved here.  I've met so many amazing people at the BPM (the local IGDA chapter) and it's been a phenomenal place to learn about other indies, meet local developers and aspiring devs and be a part of one of the best communities out there.  If there's a local IGDA chapter in your area, go to it!  And if not, start one!

Things I could have done better in 2013:

• An earlier demo.  I released the demo a month after release.  The feedback from Feedback Friday would have been good to get earlier before release.  
• More polish before release.  I ended up releasing the game immediately after I finished the art rework but I could have spent one or two more iterations on polish before pushing it out.  That said, there is a balance between forever polishing and putting it out too early.  I was sick of the project and burnt out when I released it, but also, the feedback post-release has been great and very useful.
• A better promotional video.  I might spend some money to get a really good promotional video made.  I had to learn video production myself in order to make the promo video, and as I AM a video production noob, the video looks like it was made by a video production noob.
• I had no advertising budget.  Something I will do moving forward is budget a specific amount of money for advertising.  The biggest problem right now is lack if visibility.
• Thinking about target market from the beginning as well as monetization.  The game falls loosely in the tower defense genre.  Well tower defense games are traditionally free flash games, so trying to find places to reach the target market has been a challenge.  If I released a free flash game or an iPhone game it'd be easier, but for a pay to play PC game, it's been a challenge.

So you can see there are lots of things I could have done better, and there are plenty more.  These are just a few things off the top of my head.

But, I do have a plan going forward.  I'm not quite done with SBX: Invasion just yet.  The game has potential and I've learned a lot and updated it a lot.  So what do I have planned for 2014?

A look forward to 2014:

First things first, I'm working on a large update to the game.  I've gotten a lot of feedback on various parts of the game and have put together quite the update.

Some new things coming out in Update 1.2 are:

• New Movement System!  No longer will you bounce off walls and turn around.  The movement is more floaty and feels a bit more like you're flying a space ship in space.
• Better Visual Feedback.  Things that aren't super clear like resources gained from enemies will now be noticeable in the GUI.
• Refined Graphics and UI.  I'm not the world's most amazing artist sent from the heavens to awe mankind with my creative genius, but I have put together some new art for the UI to make it a bit more refined and cohesive.  I've consolidated fonts, textures and am reworking a lot of the UI art.
• More compact Tutorial.  I'm going to combine a few more things into the Tutorial and open up the next few levels to be less streamlined and a bit more free form.  The result will be that the tutorial is slower and more tedious but the levels after will open up quicker and be faster paced.  I may even make the tutorial optional for new players.  
• New Voice Acting (possibly).  This one is tentative, but I'd like to redo all the voice acting with a real person and some effects run over it.  

Once the update is finished, tested and iterated on, I'm going to be moving toward getting the game Greenlit.  Steam is something I've avoided so far as a smaller, unheard of indie, but now that the game is getting a bit of steam (no pun intended) I think getting Greenlit is possible.

In addition to starting the Greenlight process after Update 1.2, I'm also going to start a targeted advertising campaign.  I've only got a few hundred bucks reserved for ad space, but hopefully I can stretch that out over a few weeks to promote the Greenlight campaign.

I'm also going to be working with another programmer on a Chess type game in preparation for a larger project (if we work well together).  But that project hasn't been started yet, so hush hush.

Anyway, 2013 has been a wonderful year.  I've made many friends since I move to Boston and have enjoyed being a part of a wonderfully creative community.  I'm looking forward to what the new year brings and excited for the future of Wakeskater Studio.

Cheers and Happy New Year,

Jason C.

SBX: Invasion Demo at IndieDB - Marketing Sucks

It's been a while since I've posted here.  2 weeks almost!  I really need to get it together and continue to post on Fridays.  Lots has been going on, from Boston Post Mortem meetings to getting Demos out to starting on new projects and project ideas, it's been a busy month so far.

So first, I've got a couple demos of SBX: Invasion available at IndieDB:

Check out the downloads page at the link below for the FREE DEMO:

Demo Version 1.2 is the latest and contains a completely reworked movement system.  No longer will players reverse direction when bouncing off walls, and it splits up the direction from the player facing vector, which were tied together before.

The new movement system won't be released until Update 1.2 but the demo will give you a taste of what is to come with the next update.

Also, marketing sucks.  It's one of those things I'm still learning about slowly and making tons of mistakes, but it's hard to get out there as a small, new indie.  I've had a few smaller sites and youtube let's players pick up SBX: Invasion, but I still haven't been picked up by any larger sites.

So, I think starting in Jan, I'm going to go for Greenlight with Update 1.2.  In addition I think spending a little bit of money on advertising once I start the greenlight process is a wise decision.  Right now there aren't enough eyes on the project.  The feedback has been good and the game has been refined to get rid of a lot of the things that bugged players or stopped them from enjoying the game to it's fullest.

Update 1.2 should clear up the movement issue which was the last really big thing that I saw from feedback as well as a few other things I have planned.

It's been a slow road, but I'm not giving up.  I'll start work on my next project soon but I'll also be spending some time each week to continue marketing and getting info about SBX: Invasion out there.

I'll be out of town for the next couple weeks spending time with various families so I'll try to get back and write another post before the end of the year.

Cheers,

Jason Carter / WakeskaterX

SBX: Invasion Update 1.1

Currently I'm working on an update for SBX: Invasion.  It's not a large update mind you, but just a small one with some polish work.


SBX: Invasion  Update 1.1 Notes:

• Reworked Title and Level Select Screens.  Reduced the amount of fonts used to make it more cohesive and thematic.
• Moved the Sell Building Key from 'S' to 'Q'.  People were having a lot of trouble with hitting the 'S' key while flying around, so 'S' now does nothing and 'Q' is used to sell buildings.  
• Added mini graphics to buttons.  Some buttons will now have a small graphic in the corner specifying the hot key.  This is implemented for Upgrade and Sell buttons currently.
• New sounds for selling and upgrading buildings.  I'm adding various sound effects to buildings when you upgrade them or sell them.  (No longer just explode).
• Improving Options UI functionality - specifically with the slider bars.  I want to add in click on bar functionality to it so you don't have to click and drag the slider every time.
• Increasing time between waves on Easy and Normal modes for Levels 1-6 and adding a Next Wave button in the last few seconds of each wave.  There wasn't enough time for newer players to rebuild and figure things out between waves, so on the early levels I increased the time between waves to give more time to explore the UI and rebuild after intense waves.  The Next Wave button will be there to speed the process up if the player gets bored.
• Improve repair drone functionality -- Repair drones tend to get stuck with path finding and use a lot of resources, so what I'm planning to do is remove path finding all together and remove collision and let them fly 'over' the fortifications to repair them.  This will make them not get stuck as often and will use less resources (they have a really complicated system for locating buildings and then checking if there is a path to anywhere within 3 radii, etc, etc it was too complicated.)

So here are some screen shots of the old vs new title screen and level select so you have an idea of the new graphical polish that's being added:

Screen Shots:

Old Title Screen:

Old Level Select:

NEW Title Screen:

NEW Level Select:

As you can see it's not a MASSIVE change, but it does bring it together a little better and makes it feel a little more retro.

Also SBX: Invasion is 50% off on Indie Game Stand for CYBER MONDAY:  Woot Woot!

Check it out here:   https://indiegamestand.com/store/675/sbx-invasion-base-defense/

Cheers!

Submission to Indie MEGABOOTH

Well, I just submitted SBX: Invasion to Indie MEGABOOTH for PAX East.

Pretty stoked, we'll see if I get in, but I'll be attending regardless.  I haven't been to any PAX events so this is pretty exciting.

Also, you can get SBX: Invasion on Desura for 60% off!  Check it:

That is all.

Cheers.