Hello! The last few weeks have been hectic but exciting! Our game has transformed from a series of sketches and ideas to a full-fledged playable alpha! The most up-to-date build of our game will always be available to play online on this itch.io page, and separate builds for Windows, Mac, and Linux will also be available in the future.

Here’s an overview of our development process these past few weeks:

Week 4

This week, our team focused on getting a basic level prototype working so we could receive some feedback on it. 

The basic mechanics of running, jumping, and selecting interactables were already complete. Our tech team Bob, KK, and Stew focused on implementing the different interactables this week (fire hydrant, bird, manhole, crane, and umbrella; the window was already implemented in prior weeks). 

Our level designer Ethan was then able to produce a basic level layout with some of these mechanics. For the prototype, we wanted to implement a level similar to what we laid out in our GDD. Specifically, we wanted to have 3 main paths that the player could take: a challenging-yet-rewarding high path, a risky low path, and a medium path that could bridge the gap. 

Our art and music teams spent this week still coming up with ideas and prototyping designs. We didn’t worry about integrating their work for this week’s prototype since we were more focused on the actual level design, but we still took some time to make sure everyone was familiar with our development tools (especially git) and could import their work into Unity.

Karthik took a look at our prototype and gave us valuable feedback. His main point was that we should focus on refining and polishing the mechanics we already have, pushing them to fulfill their full potential. Other key points was to focus on the difficulty of our game (perhaps adjusting the speed), and to try to have some sort of reward for properly timing the activation of interactables. That last point helped influence a design decision we took the following week.

Week 5

This week and the next were focused on developing the alpha build. Despite being a reading week for our tech and music teams, Week 5 was overall a fairly slow week in the development process. 

    The tech team worked on several side mechanics in our game. Bob revamped the angel’s controls to be smoother and more visually engaging, and he worked with Stew to develop a camera that could track the pizza guy as he jumps. KK worked on creating collectable coins, along with a basic menu system. And of course the tech team made smaller changes and bug fixes throughout the week.

    The art team spent this week working on models for the background buildings, interactables, and our main characters. The music team worked on SFX for interactables.

    Ethan continued to develop the level layout, but he was running into issues with the camera and the slow activation of some interactables. Later in the week, we as a team decided to slightly pivot our level design direction after reflecting on feedback given by Karthik and Bryn Davies. Specifically, we decided to go away from our prior multiple paths idea and instead focus on guiding the player through one path through precise timings. The idea would be that most interactables, like windows, would only be able to be activated for a short period of time before automatically deactivating. So now, the goal of the game is to activate interactables *at just the right time* to safely guide the pizza guy; missing or mistiming a key interactable would just lead right to the pizza guy’s death instead of a lower path. This pivot shaped the way we would tackle development in the following week.

Week 6

This was the week it all came together. We took everyone’s work from the past few weeks, merged them all together into one version, and polished up a little for our alpha build.

    The tech team mostly spent this week just combining everyone’s work, fixing bugs, and getting the game to work on itch.io. This included things like adding a menu system, adjusting to the interactables so they would only be active for a short duration, tweaking the camera and gameplay controls, and importing various models and SFX.

    The art team was able to create models for many of the objects that will populate our scene. Aside from models for our various interactables, Yuenwoo also made models for things like scaffolding, pylons, patio benches, street signs, and more. Models like these ended up making the game feel so much more alive and Toronto-like. We also created a new Pizza Guy model and animations, which we will be able to add in before our playtests next week. However, we aren’t too worried about having all our art assets done right now; our main priority at the moment is refining gameplay over audiovisuals.

    Speaking of audio, our music team came back with different directions for the music and effects. We decided to shift our first level’s musical theme from synthwave to lo-fi hip hop, inspired by artists like J Dilla and Nujabes. Team member Luciano was able to create some good first-drafts of what the track would sound like, which we were able to include in our alpha build. This track (among others) will be refined in the weeks to come; we want the music and level design to be cohesive, so they will be developed iteratively in the coming weeks. Another team member Behnoosh was able to produce a music loop for our main menu, as well as sound effects for various interactables.

    We received valuable feedback from the panel on Friday’s demos. The biggest actionable critique we received was to better communicate our game mechanics to the player. In particular, the panel ran into issues with gauging how long our window platforms would stay active, and suggested some sort of visual indicator for how long they would stay open. Visual indicators for the Pizza Guy’s actions were also suggested. Many of the other suggestions were ideas that we could reflect on and try out for our playtests next week. For example: should we focus on creating a hectic experience where you have to time activations right on time, or focus on creating puzzles where the player has to think which interactables out of many they can choose to activate, with each choice opening up a different path? Over this coming weekend, our team’s goal is to reflect on our feedback so far, make minor adjustments to our build, and prepare for Monday’s playtesting session.

    These past few weeks have been hectic but so rewarding. Seeing our game come to life is so satisfying, and the future looks bright. Here’s to making this game the best we can!

• Stew