Most student projects consist of about 99% game and 1% game. What I mean by that is that we spend virtually all of our time creating the mechanical components of the game: the renderer, the models, the interaction systems, the AI and the UI. We make milestones and set deadlines such that all of these components will be finished by the end of our time limit, and we invariably struggle to succeed in that.
What we neglect to consider is that once all of the parts of the game exist, you can’t just mash them together and call it done. The game needs balance. It needs testing. Most of all it needs iteration.
We’ve now reached a point in our prototype where the majority of the game objects we intend to have in our GDC build are in and ready to be tested, and that is exactly what we are going to do to them. We are finally beginning to work on the ‘game’ aspect of our game, and not a moment too soon. When the conference comes around, we’ll not only have something that looks totally rad, but we’ll also have something that is fun and challenging — something that makes people say “Wow, I would actually buy this.” Then we say, “I’m sorry sir, but this demo is not for sale.” And then they say, “Shut up and take my money!”
Just like that.
Stay tuned for more next week.