Weekly Update #5

Was able to put in 3 good sessions this week. I started implementing a dock prep mechanic where a player charges up each dock so that when a Greyhound docks there, it refills its water supply immediately, vs then having to fill up. It takes much less time to prep a dock than to land a dehydrated Greyhound and then slowly fill it. Although, Greyhounds docked automatically fill up and don't require a player there, atm. This is my imitation of Overcooked coop mechanics. I may, alternatively, switch this to being used for healing an injured Greyhound or player. I had this big idea for player injuries, which will prevent players from always and forever just doing one job. For instance, blindness would prevent...maybe most things, or just steering. Dehydration requires player to stay on Big Bird. Now I just had an idea for fatness, which would require a player to ride a Greyhound for a while. Hm.

I haven't played Overcooked, but I've watched it and it seems like once you've "solved" a level, it wouldn't be too interesting to replay. Hopefully, all the real time mechanics in Flock of Dogs will allow for more emergent "puzzles" that would have greater replayability. I'm thinking that there will just be more of a gradient in skill, whereas in Overcooked you see the pattern of the level, and voila, in Flock you begin to see the needs of Big Bird and can respond in a variety of ways, some better than others, as well as depending on the kind of build you go for. I'm considering structuring the game to guide players toward Big Bird builds. Builds could be focused around lots of buffed Greyhounds, or lots of upgraded turrets, or boarding, or Big Bird mobility (maybe), or resource collection/power ups/spells (maybe spells).

Next, I did remove a bunch of unused Bezier stuff, skybox assets, MJSTY assets, which cleaned up the project folder a fair amount. Felt good.

I made a long, handwritten list of items to get into the game by Friday, my play test night. I then went to the next item, which was item stacking for the storage, and got that pretty much working. Not thrilled with the way I'm currently displaying the number of each inventory item in storage (the item sprite is replaced with a sprite with the number of that item in that slot in storage every few seconds, then the sprites swap back). Also, created the Gem.cs with ruby, emerald, and sapphire type items.

Then I added a bunch of sounds. I don't have a particular principled approach for what to look for in a sound. Just getting free stuff as placeholder. Heard in a podcast that "we didn't evolve to be happy" and I don't wan't to forget that line. I think it better as "evolution didn't select for happiness" maybe. Anyway, also heard in a podcast an anecdote about a sound design lead saying that everything that could have a sound, should have a sound. Start there, then subtract, maybe.

I went to the next item on my list which was "2 types of dangerous environs". I started with spikey versions of Big Tetros. Also, made Big Tetros respond to collisions with damage and sound and causing damage, if spikey. Deciding on damage type, given the idea of player injury, Greyhound injury, and player bucking, is a design issue I haven't resolved.