Shards of the Future - Post Mortem
## The Project This game was made by me and 1 other artist in the Staffo...
The Project
The South Pole was the first game jam game I created in under 1 week. I was able to create many things like 4 different enemy types each with their own way of attacking and dying, an upgradable weapon system, a overall upgrade card system, a fire mechanic using 2D lights and a pickup system with tweening animations.
The Overall Vision
The overall vision of this game was to make a game in 1 week, with the theme of Christmas, I decided to make a Christmas horror game with upgrade mechanics all cantered around keeping a campfire alive in a forest.
Architecture Spotlight: The Overall Package and Presentation of the Game
This game was made right after retrieve the artefact, and I took what I would consider issues with that game and used them to make this game better. What I mean is I focused my scope, I intentionally created every system and art asset, and there was no incorrect scope assignment or management. It led to a really polished end product, from the weapon system to the upgrade system to the multiple enemy types, to the fire mechanic to the knockback mechanic each mechanic fed into each other. I am very proud with the scope and size of the project for the time I had to make it.
Overcoming Challenges: Visual Polish
The problem with retrieve the artefact is that I had to manage the project and the code around my visual limitations as an artist, creating certain systems like a ranged enemy to avoid making another melee animation. Making the game about scaling knockback and always being on the move and defence, so the player doesn’t have any time to actually judge the art assets. Created a bloom system for pixel art, so some things like pickups and death animations really popped.
Key Takeaways
Even though this game took less than a 10th of the time as Retrieve the artefact, I feel like I learned just as much.
- Takeaway 1 - The first thing I learned is that to make a game feel way more polished in a short amount of time is to focus on juice systems like lighting, death animations, sound effects and knockback.
- Takeaway 2 - Playtesting and iteration is key to improving games in the later stage.
Looking back, this project laid the foundation for my understanding of [Insert 2-3 technical concepts, e.g., AI State Machines, UI Frameworks, and algorithmic generation], which I have carried forward into all my subsequent work.
Looking back on this project I really learned the value of polish and game feel, and also the fun of game jams and the game making process not everything has to be a technical feat for my portfolio and being able to create polish entire games is just as important for my personal development.
