Find the Door - game-jam2

A puzzle physics platformer game made in a week for the Brackeys Game Jam 2022.1.

Link to play the game

The goal is to have a semi finished prototype which include the following:

• game design which fits the theme
• better graphics, music and sfx then last time
• more polish then last time

Dev Screenshots

• first screenshot
  • 
• second screenshot
  • 
• third screenshot
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To Do List

? = not sure if enough time or if it should be implemented
crossed out text = done
|| = partly done (count lines etc)

General

• find a name for the game -> Find the Door (Red Eye, Invisible Door, , Rolling Glasses)
• get your game play tested by 5 people or more ? too late for that...

Most important for today (23.2)

• test the game design of the xray view -> works good
  • test change xray time to just work when player holds button down, and he has like 3 seconds to use after its depleted it take 3 seconds to recharge, but only when fully recharged its usable (grey while recharging)
    • -> added 5 sec viewable timer to platforms, they slowly fade out
    • -> xray can just be refiled with pickups'
• draw "ball player"
• and just 1 health, because it makes everything worse → instant death makes it better
• add parallax effect to game so it has depth -> added it but need to change art for the "infinity" layers

Most important for today (26.2)

• "level done" pickup w/ icon and next lvl canvas(without function)
• add some pickup for points/ u have to pick up all to pass a level... ?
• create a moving platform script with a lot of public settings, which can be used for everything (platforms, spikes, saws) -> use debug line to show their travel range,speed etc

Most important for today (27.2)

• a working webGL build an upload to itch.io

• fixing random bug of "start level" btn not working

  SFX (1,5h) -> took 2,5h

  should also be done before starting level creation. I very simple in unity.

  • player "rolling/walking", jumping, landing, getting hit, dying
  • canon shooting, bullet hitting
  • chainsaw working
  • pushing boxes
  • using xray effect

  Level Design & play testing (5h)

  Levels design and creation of the 3 levels should be done after all the art and game mechanics are almost final.

  • tutorial level |
    • text tutorial while clicking next etc
  • first easy level
  • second/end level
  • checkpoints ?
  • 5 min playtime for the whole game ?

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Art

• import all art without cutting the corners to hard
  • import new art
  • reimport old assets
• different backgrounds (tree layer, mountains/hills etc)
• draw hearts for UI
• draw icon/bar for xray view
• blur background images in gimp -> doing that in unity is too much work (setting up different camera for postprocessing etc)
• make the 3 backgrounds in gimp

  later

  • particle effects for everything (getting hit, landing somewhere)
  • post processing ?
  • light at pickups ?
  • shader w/ radius for x ray ?

UI (1h)

• show xray view somehow
• next level/level completed canvas
• death counter ?
• starting menu etc
• drawing it all & scanning -> maybe skip the level loader etc, just one big level....

Music (1h)

• some music which matches the style and pace of the game
• 1 songs minimum, which loops

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Things learned (misc list)

• Game Jam

  • time management and splitting the work for each day is critical
  • a week long game jam is too long to have a real "sprint"
  • the last hour should always be used
  • your game design should match the theme strongly
    • then you are better motivated to finish & add the extra hours into the game

• Art

  • art is never finished and can always be improved upon
  • importing and preparing art is time intensive

• Unity Stuff

  • always import all sprites with the same pixels per unit, so they look good with a scale of one. This makes it easier for scaling and all sprites look the same/better..
  • a second collider type can be added to a trigger collider. Then it can still interact with collision etc
  • when starting to design a level, move everything below the UI/Canvas elements. They wont intervene with "taller" level and selecting objects in the scene view
  • folder organization
    • the structure of the imported art runs threw the Sprite & prefabs folder structure
      • a good folder structure for the art should be chosen at the beginning of the project
    • the level hierarchy should always group similar objects together so it does not become a mess (should also match the art folder structure)

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To do after jam

• commenting & adding a description to all the scripts
  • organize the scripts into folders
  • rename scripts if needed