Amulets and Arrows

As the title says, Bit Beast is now in beta testing! The game is finished (save one caveat, noted below), and we’re just looking for bugs and such.

The one thing currently unfinished (maybe) is the Bluetooth battle system. The code is finished, except it doesn’t work in my tests. This does not necessarily mean my code is flawed in this case, though. I have two Android devices, but only one with a working Bluetooth radio (the other was unfortunately dropped and busted). I managed to get a version of Android x86 running in VirtualBox, and I even got it to use a USB Bluetooth adapter plugged into the computer. Unfortunately, this USB adapter sucks, and so I am left unsure if my Bluetooth code is flawed, or if I have flawed testing hardware/software. I need either another USB Bluetooth adapter or (preferably) another Android device with working Bluetooth. If you have either of these and live nearby, please let me know! I’ve also got a Stack Overflow question up about this issue located here.

I plan to release the game sometime before the end of May, come hell or high water.

Goodness, I should have posted something sooner. We’ve moved, and that whole process took a bit longer than I had hoped (still dealing with random tasks related to moving off and on).

Bit Beast is still coming along well, and I still hope to meet my semi-conservative release estimate of mid-May. I’ve been playing around with a bunch of Android’s cool hardware features, such as the various sensors and GPS. There are now 3 “mini-games” that make use of these features and allow you to earn bits. You can shake your device in a mini-game measuring jerk (change in acceleration over time), earn bits based on distance traveled as measured by GPS, or by speed as measured by GPS. Those things were fun to play with, and make nice additions to a virtual pet. I know I had one back in the day that could be shaken to earn in-game moneys. I’ve tackled countless other Bit Beast tasks over the past almost-month as well, and my To Do list for the game is steadily shrinking. I’ve got some Android Dev Guide pages I want to read over at some point, and then of course there is testing. If you have an Android device with 2.2 or newer and are interested in beta testing, let me know!

In addition to game making, I’ve been playing some great games lately. A few are:
-Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War – Dark Crusade
-Tribes: Ascend
-Unreal Tournament 2004
-Unreal Tournament 3
-A number of Ludum Dare entries

Tomorrow my wife and I are moving, so I anticipate a couple of (or a few) days of hectic activity. At the moment, I am frantically updating things online, as we will be without internet for about a week.

Meanwhile, Bit Beast is moving along beautifully. You can train your pet with a little mini-game, and most other interactions are working now, too. I still need to add a few more mini-games that you can play to earn “bits,” which are the currency in the game. There are a few more art assets and animations needed. Then, that leaves sorting out the menus (adding options, credits, making the status window look like not-crap, etc.) and polishing. And the battle system. That’s the one thing I’m really unsure on, as far as time-to-complete. The plan is for battles to take place via Bluetooth, which I’m hoping is simple enough to implement.

In an earlier post, I mentioned some of the other projects I have on the back burner(s). I’d like to elaborate on that, and attempt to set up an imaginary schedule that I will not stick to:

Now-May 15: The plan is still to finish and release Bit Beast, as soon as possible. I hope to manage that by the end of April/beginning of May. Let’s say May 15 to be safe.

May 16-23: Then, I have a number of tasks regarding the company/website that I want to clear out. I’ll give this stuff a week.

May 24-June 7: Then I’d like to put some serious effort into promoting both Hubert’s Island and Bit Beast, as well as kicking off the Kickstarter (haha) for Project Hestia. Let’s say this takes about 2 weeks.

June 8-???: At this point, it really depends on how things have gone. If Bit Beast sells decently, I want to make another pet (something other than a dinosaur, perhaps some different games, etc.) and get that on the Market. If Bit Beast sells really well, I also have an idea for a sequel (which I would make after the second pet), which moves your pet from a small yard into a randomly generated RPG-esque world that he can explore.
If the Kickstarter is successful, I will obviously be pouring all available resources into that for a while.

Once I am either done or still waiting on the above items, I have a few options for what game to make next:

I have been wanting to make a small roguelike for the computer, although that is more of a “for fun” project. If I do make time for that, I want to port my engine over to Android, and then gussy up (probably just rewrite) the interface code to work on Android. I’ve really been wanting to try my hand at an Android roguelike.

I’ve also got an idea for another Android game, this time not involving virtual pets or roguelikes! It’s a fairly simple action game, and so it would take very little time to make (theoretically).

Finally, I have been considering updating/expanding on my Ludum Dare entry from last year, Cosmic Heist. I think I could build it up into a decent little computer game that I would sell for 5 bucks or so. If I go this route, it is very possible I might try my hand at an Android port when the computer version is finished. I think it might actually work ok on Android.

That sums up my current thinking for the future. I’ve got about a million other game ideas, of course, but these are the ones I am seriously considering spending time on soon. If a particular game sounds more interesting to you than the others, please let me know in the comments!

Oh, and stay tuned for the next post, in which I show Bit Beast for the very first time!

This week was spent working on Bit Beast. It is actually coming along pretty quickly, so I’m really pleased with that. The release time frame I mentioned last time still looks very probable.

The specifics of what I did this week on Bit Beast are all over the place, since the game is still in a really early stage. He grows up, dies, poops, gets dirty, gets hungry and thirsty, and regains energy over time now. There are tons of other little things that I got running, but I can’t remember them all. This week, I’ll be starting with the rest of the non-interactive logic, i.e., things that happen regardless of player interaction. I hope to have that finished within a day or two, and then spend the rest of the week implementing some of the interactions.

I keep referring to Bit Beast as a game, but maybe “software toy” is a better name for it. It doesn’t really have a set objective. You try to keep your pet alive as long as you can, or make it win a bunch of battles with your friends, or pretty much whatever seems fun to you. It does have a kind of end, in that your pet will always inevitably die.

I’ve been getting into roguelikes a lot again lately, probably as a result of catching up on all the Roguelike Radio’s I missed since December. I was sorry to miss out on the 7DRL challenge this year, but next year I plan to make time for it. I might have to work on a roguelike before then, though, because I’ve got a fun idea and I really want to work on one. In the back of my mind, what I would love to do is expand on my existing roguelike codebase: cleaning up the code, adding missing features, and improving the interface dramatically. Then I would either make a roguelike for the computer, or port my engine over to Android. I’d really like to try my hand at an Android roguelike. Most of the roguelikes I’ve tried on Android didn’t really have interfaces that I was happy with, but I believe that if done right, an Android roguelike could be really great.

I have decided to begin a personal blog, where I hope to post regular updates on my status and progress.

I run an independent game development company called Cheese and Bacon Games. I recently released a game called Hubert’s Island Adventure: Mouse o’ War for Windows. It’s a platformer (every indie developer has to make at least one platformer). Hopefully, making platformers is out of my system for a while, and I can try some new ideas.

One reason I wanted to start this blog was as a method of motivating myself. I keep a blog for Cheese and Bacon Games, but that is reserved for more “official” posts. I don’t really have a place to jot down thoughts and keep a record of my efforts on a more ongoing basis. Here, I can post frequently about what I’m doing, and where I hope to be going. Theoretically, this will force me to improve my planning and efficiency. Over the coming months, we will find out together how well that works.

I currently have a few game projects in the works.

My primary focus is an Android game called Bit Beast. It’s a virtual pet, much like the popular key-chain toys that were all the rage during the 90s. It takes all of the best features of various old virtual pets, mixes them together, and adds a few new ideas, too. I would like to have this done by the end of April/beginning of May. In the past, I have been terrible at meeting my own deadlines, but I am improving, so hopefully I can meet that date.
Before starting on Bit Beast, I knew no Java (the programming language used for Android stuff), and very little about Android. Thus, working on this game has been a huge learning experience, and I’ve still got a ways to go, but I am pleased with my progress so far.

I am also continuing to publicize Hubert’s Island, through a variety of means. I hope to use this first game as a means to learn as much as I can about marketing and such. For example, I just today concluded a giveaway contest in which I offered 3 free copies of the game to people who emailed me. That contest was, unfortunately, a failure. I only got a single entry, and that was my mother-in-law, who my wife bugged about it until she entered. I do plan on trying the contest idea again in the future, though.
I’m going to write a postmortem for the Hubert game as well, and I plan on trying to get it published somewhere online. Failing that, I will post it on the CaB site.
I am also planning a major round of sending reviewers copies of the game, in the hopes of garnering some attention.
Other plans for Hubert’s Island include some kind of “making-of” content (which will be free), and a near-future sale.
I think I might make another post soon about Hubert’s sales so far, as I’ve read many of those written by other indies, and they are always helpful. Spoiler alert: it has not sold very well!

The other game I am working on is codenamed Project Hestia. It is a real-time strategy game, in which you control your people indirectly (giving broad orders such as “capture this city” or “build a new city over here”) You also have the powers of an ancient god-type being. You can send down lightning bolts, choose a follower as your mighty avatar, and more!
This project is on the back-burner while I work on smaller, quicker things. I plan on trying a Kickstarter(or some similar fundraising effort) for it soon, though, and if it is successful, Hestia will return to primary project status.
A note on Kickstarter: The plan for trying this actually predates the release of Hubert’s Island. Since that time, however, Double Fine has had their incredibly successful Kickstarter campaign. Everyone and their brother are now trying the Kickstarter route, and I do not know if that will help me or hurt me. I still very much want to try it out, but now I am more uncertain than ever of its chance for success. On the one hand, this might be bringing lots more people willing to pledge funds to places like Kickstarter. However, it might also lead to everyone getting burned out on the whole idea. I guess we will all find out together!