As usual, I seem to have overestimated the scope of the project, and am planning for a reduction of scope in order to produce a complete cohesive prototype by the deadline on the 25th. I’ll list below some implemented and planned elements of the prototype, to better outline what’s in and what’s still needed.
Implemented
- Movement
- Inventory/Resource Management
- Harpoon/Cannon
- Dockables
- Character interactables
- Shop interactables
- Port Gates
- Derelict – Harpoonable + Interactable
- Dialogue System
- Display and Back + Forth
- VO capability
- Pause + Setting Menu
- Realm Generation
Needed
- Narrative Generation
- Scrumpy Hermit Region
- Gambler’s Gauntlet Region
- Final Region
- Shurrick Elements
- Scrap Shotgun
- Player Damage System
- Fail State
- Start/Ending Sequences
- Art (Large Bottleneck)
- UI Update
- Mevar Assets
- Shipwreck Assets
- Scrumpy Hermit’s Assets
- Gambler’s Gauntlet Asserts
- Shurrick Assets
- Character Models
- Environment Update
The largest current bottleneck is art as the artist assisting me on the project is consistently busy and therefore can’t keep up with the asset production needed to meet the deadline. This just means I’m reducing the overall fidelity I had in mind for the final product of the prototype.
This reduction in fidelity meant that I also went back to my narrative and world design documents and revised a little the state the world was in, from two young bustling settlements to two small struggling settlements to account for the lack of “stuff” in them.
I also wanted my tertiary sections to be drawn out challenges, but given the lack of time to complete a playtestable build, I felt it best to have them be short and interesting moral or mechanical challenges that a player could optionally complete depending on their goals that playthrough.
The goal is to meet my personal deadline to have a playable build on the 15th, with a clear start and endpoint and a barebones story. This would then be filled out and polished over the 10 days I would have to playtest the game, keeping in mind the game’s tone, narrative choices, and adherence to the principles I set out to achieve.