Making a game in Godot: Update 4

Hello again, internet dwellers. I hope you’re well. I’m just stopping by to give an update as to what I’ve been chipping away at for the last month or so in my Godot project. There’s been some progress for sure, and I’ll break down some of the highlights below, but man - I’ve just realised I actually first started 7 months ago?? - and huh, I’ve done a lot - but also - not nearly enough :D

A Steam holding page! (almost!)

So, yeah, to keep myself focused on getting this game into an (eventual) releasable state and not get distracted, or forget that the actual goal was to create a fun, sellable little indie game, I’ve created a Steam holding page.

There’s not a massive amount on there yet, and at the time of writing Steamworks hasn’t even approved it, but it includes a little teaser video, a bunch of screenshots, and some descriptive blurb.

Steamworks made the process as painful and awkward as they could, despite it being how they make money? Seems harsh to stress developers out and then charge them for the pleasure, but that’s business, folks.

Hopefully it will eventually be public and I can share it to the whole 3 people who will humour me enough to follow/wishlist it. ♥️

The game has a name!

After giving it very little thought, and because I find it kinda funny to name things in a particularly matter-of-fact-well-you-are-not-wrong kinda way, the game will be called “A Nice Game About Balls”. I’m hoping it will be exactly that. Unless Steam has a particular problem with that name, I’ll likely keep it. Unless I think of something better in the shower, I might update it.

An improved trajectory UI!

An important improvement has been made to the ball roll trajectory UI, as inevitably, this is kinda the most important part of the game. The UI needs to be able to give useful information to the user regarding power, spin, direction, etc, but not too much that the process becomes mechanical - i.e. you can just dial in a win, that would suck. Anyway, I think there are still things to improve, but I’m happy with it for now.

Experimenting with hazards!

It’s all well and good directing the ball to the right place, but there needs to be fun, visually engaging parts to each course to spice things up. As a (surprisingly quick, but fun) experiment, I made a big munching mouth which players will need to avoid so they don’t get their balls all chomped up (I can’t think of a better way to say that). This would result in a player losing points they’ve already earned, adding some danger to each roll.

Other stuff!

There’s been a whole lot of other smaller things going on, from refactoring, bug fixes and UI tweaks, but I do think the ‘core’ of the game is largely in place, ready to build around it. I’ve started working on the next complicated part of the gameplay - which I’m still not entirely sure will work - but I’m hoping building it out (roughly and quickly) will tell me if I’m wasting my time or not...

We’ll find out next time!