Rebuilding the Foundation "Ewww, Another Zelda-like?" (Devblog #2)

Evening doods,

Hope everything is well. It's been great so far starting a devlog here, been receiving great feedback. It's truly needed when trying to go forward with a project, especially one that's been sitting on your hard drive for some time now. Truly cannot believe it's the end of Summer! (Well kinda…my boxers still stick to my legs…). This Summer really flew by, also there were more storms than any other Summer I'd ever experienced. Still it was a modest one, especially since the Cursed Year we had last year. Though this Summer felt a bit somber; Time feels like it's evaporating & I'm not sure because I've been working on games for awhile now + covid, but this strange Cabin Fever feeling is slowly taking over. I mean I'm not full Jack Torance yet but there are times where I'm thankful I'm not stuck overlooking a hotel with my wife & kid…I mean I had any…I wouldn't do anything evil, just a figure of speech…anyway over to 88x.

So we've been revamping 88x to have a more solid foundation & precise feel. The first time ripping 88x apart, a Zelda-like was in mind. Now when you throw around a term like Zelda-like, you better come correct. Seriously. Everything has to be on point, & a major thing is Exploration & Dungeon Design. I was up for the task. Just devoured hours of Game Maker's Toolkit, so my balls were as strong as iron. Here I am, busting out the grid paper to come up with some hype dungeon designs, backtracking, dungeon tools, the got damn works. Though this time, I really had to think to myself, especially from all the times getting my ass handed to me by Game Dev; Could you afford to do this? The worst thing about Pre-Production is how big your eyes become as you daydream about the little intricacies in your project, before reality slaps the shit out of you.

Back in 2012 , really fresh to Game Dev, something I pledge to do was stay away from giant projects early in my career. It was a reigning sentiment in many Game Dev paths to keep your project(s) small when starting out. Still, Feature Creep is like a monstrous force, preying on your fertile innocent mind. The plan back then was to work on a small arcade project, in which I came up with LORD OF CHEESEBURGER. Still I couldn't resist & my imagination got the best of me. There in the back of my drabby sketchpad that I had recently spilled coffee on was a design for a Zelda-like. The desire to work on a Zelda like tempted me something evil, before I know it I was drunk on creativity, sketching out characters & map zones. As great as it was going, this was 2009 & I was fresh off my ass off of Tutorials. No mentoring, not any real experience.

That Zelda-like I tried to build cost me a Summer. Its when I realized how serious a Time Investment could be & ignorance will slow you down even more. The audacity of some of us to take on burden we are unprepared for, still how else will you learn some things in Life without a few bruises? Even though I made a promise not to waste time like that again, it wouldn't be the first time.

Fast forward to today, remodeling the project as an Zelda-like would take more finance + patience than I could afford. Also the base of this still felt like an Turn Based RPG of some kind. Playtesting actual combat became dull because of the importance of tools in a Zelda-like, as the structure of the world I didn't want to fall into the same traps as before. Immediately stopping the sink of time, I knew it be best to reform this into a Rouge-lite, especially with the Cast of Characters we have in mind & the Tilesets we had made. The fit was perfect.

I know right though, another Rogue of some kind. Hey if it works, it works. So we started restructuring everything, like ripping shitty foundation out of the ground, it was time to begin a new. Please excuse the crappy placeholder graphics. Again, the project feels more solid & this feels more precise, Really love we're taking our time building the foundation, as strong as possible. Looking forward to more progress.

See you guys next time.