Devlog Blog Post #1

Brainstorming:

This project started out strong with the theme of "bees". I had a lot of ideas for this project. I started playing with a shooter and the idea carried itself into a brawler with 2D shooter mechanics.

Development:

This project was a lot of fun. I wanted to carry on with creating all my own assets, but after finding references and building my main character the work ahead of me seemed like it was going to be too much to finish in 1 day, so I recruited a friend to help me out. I built some flowers while my new artist worked on a beautiful landscape and various background assets. I also built a multiplayer ready character controller and pawns that use fluid jumping mechanics for flight. I knew I didn't want the characters in the air forever, so I built a few limitations to force the players to eventually land. The shooting needed to be limited as a response to how quickly a controller player could press the butter versus the keyboard player. I also had to add in a few checks for movement, which were accomplished through the use of vertical plants in the environment. The last check I needed to do was on the missiles themselves. The rate at which the user could fire was fun and enjoyable, but it was too quick to respond to with jumping alone. I fixed this by removing a previous check on the collision with the missile, so the missiles can now hit each other and mutually destroy one another. This greatly improved gameplay and added some micro elements that the players have to watch for during their gameplay experiences.

Testing:

The biggest feedback during testing, beyond the laughter, was that the game had an imbalance in the controllers. 

Polishing:

I animated the characters with moving stingers to represent where they would be shooting and added various a bit of movement to the scene to give the users a feeling of life in the game world.