Virtual Yellow - Beta Version

What is this game all about? Well it's gone through some phases, and I hope the people who play it enjoy it. There was a huge amount of learning that took place when developing the game. The learning process was more level design based than technical learning in my opinion and I still think there is great room for improvement. Most of the games I've developed in the past have a focus on unique functionality of some sort , and honestly I never finish them because roadblocks in concepts that are too unique come up, which must be tackled correctly and with time in mind, so I often put my projects to the side only to never complete them. 

This game came about in a different way and goal in mind. Since I always think of out of the box ways to control characters, or have random functionality that is out of the norm, I challenged myself to stick to traditional concepts and develop a simple 2D platformer. This worked and gave me a bit of a blueprint to follow at first. The initial thought was to create a game that would require the player to land on certain platforms and light them up. Land on the platforms correctly and you beat the level. So the original game idea was more puzzle based, and I quickly grew bored of the concept. It might sound a little lazy but I ran out of ways to position the platforms in a single box puzzle level. I then decided I needed to keep things fun, and make sure I enjoyed developing the game as much as possible to keep development going. I work full time and while the game was started during the first weeks of April, I was in a different position at the time. I was laid off due to COVID and had nothing to do, but to try to develop games and stay inside of my house quarantined, and try not to catch COVID19. I then got hired! and development slowed down. To hold myself accountable, I started streaming my development sessions on twitch and it helped and met some cool people along the way.

Once out of the puzzle phase, I started to expand the levels and you can still see the imprint of the old levels in the first level. It feels more like a box setting, where there is nowhere to go or run or anything. Simply land on the platforms and you win! I kept it and even today I feel as if it's a bit too simple, but go figure.  With the expansion of allowing the player to move, came the technical requirements of having the camera follow the player and the traditional 2D platformer features. I added  "traps", as I called at the time and quickly thought about making the game feel like Mario Maker. I had a goal in mind which was to script up all the enemies and store them as prefabs in Unity. Prefabs for non-Unity users, is exactly what it almost sounds out to be - Prefabricated objects. These objects hold all the scripting and engine components, which then can be stored in a folder and be duplicated inside of scenes. My next goal was to have so many pre-fabs scripted out, that I would feel like I was playing Super Mario Maker and making levels and it worked, it was awesome. Hours and hours of streaming on late Friday nights thinking on where to place enemies and platforms was all worth it. 

The next goal was to reward the player. But why? That's when I decided to lock the levels unless you collected enough bananas. The reward was to advance, giving them importance. No longer was it just important to land on platforms, but to also collect the bananas. This revolutionizing and become the focus of the game. Little did I know but I saw a pattern, I then asked myself, "Well what's the point of collecting the bananas and quickly beating the level?". If I was going to lock levels based on a minimum number of bananas then I would place some bananas in difficult areas of the game. I then found myself thinking and trying to think of patterns and ways the player would choose to move throughout the level. Or placing bananas in patters that would temp the player to take a certain path. This then making me realize I could set these "traps" which were totally avoidable in the past, as un-avoidable due to the need of the banana collection. It felt balanced, it felt like there was purpose not only to the collection, and placement of the bananas, but so did the placement of the traps/enemies and level design. I absolutely enjoyed discovering this and in a nutshell it is the entire game. It doesn't matter how many platforms you land on. What matters is that you make it out of the level with as many bananas which were placed on intention in hard areas of the level. Proving you had control of the character, and the ability to move in perfection.

What was the main focus of the game in the beginning (landing on platforms), was now secondary. It's still a requirement to get out of the level, but it feels like another layer of difficulty added and not an objective as much as the banana collection.  I believe I'm just starting to scratch the surface in this style of development, and it makes me think I can somehow communicate with the player. They can maybe see why I placed certain bananas or traps/enemies in certain locations to their surprise and sudden death.  In addition, the player can exit the level with the bananas collected to not risk being killed and coming back and replaying a level for more bananas. This was awesome because it added replay value and goes hand in hand with the objective. If you die lose the bananas you had collected. You technical can collect as many bananas as you would like but you must make it out alive! 

I hope people enjoy the game, and whoever read my entire essay on the game, kudos to you! I will continue to develop the game if interest seems strong.  This is my first DevLog, and I'm not even sure if it sounds like a devlog, just listening to music here and writing away.

- Mando Mandiux