2024 Archive

July 5th, 2024:

I know it took a long time to get to this point, but I never stopped doing gamedev work while making Ancient DOS Games and my other video series, thus I am pleased to finally announce my next major "game" project...

"Project AB"

Click on any of the screenshots above to enlarge them!

Up to this point in time I had been talking on various socials about a different game idea I was working on, "Project LJ", and had even posted a couple exclusive things related to it to Patreon. However, earlier this year I was getting prepared to begin practical development on it, having completed its nearly thousand pages of story dialogue, only to realize the battle engine I had planned this entire time was actually... not fun to play. :|

Suffice to say, I still want to make Project LJ as it has a story with a central theme of "healing" that I really want to share with the world, but it's gonna have to wait until I can come up with better mechanics for battles. Since then though I have been going over other project ideas and gave this particular one another shot, having had issues with developing it to any great extent in the past. After some planning I tried throwing together some tests to ensure everything I would need the game to do was doable in the Godot Engine, and sure enough, virtually everything WAS possible, and the few things which weren't are things which are already addressed and being added to the next version update of the Godot Engine!

So, I decided I am pushing forward with "Project AB"! Again, just like with Project LJ, the name has the primary initials of the actual name in it as I already know what the "game" is going to be called when it's done... and I keep saying "game" in quotes because while it does have gameplay elements for sure, it's technically NOT a game in the traditional sense. Similar to how Maxis would call programs like Sim City "software toys", that's kinda what I'm going to be ending up with is more of a "software toy" than a game, with an emphasis on building your own worlds either to relax and recuperate in, or to vent out frustrations and engage in pure catharsis!

That said, I know the screenshots so far don't look like much, but they represent fully functional first-person movement physics along with the ability to select parts of the world, known as "set pieces" and move, rotate, and scale them however you see fit, through that same first-person interface! It kind of felt like reinventing the wheel making this all work, but it was necessary as this program is ultimately going to have VR support, meaning EVERYTHING has to function properly without a mouse cursor on a screen. Furthermore, to aid in user feedback and to keep things aligned well, set pieces are locked to a grid but the frame which shows up around what you're editing is NOT locked to the grid, thus providing much stronger feedback in terms of what the user is trying to do versus what's actually being altered.

Getting this one aspect of the program working lays a foundation for a LOT of the things which are to follow, as it won't just be simple cubes the player can adjust, as there will be stairs, ladders, ramps, and many more elements which tie in with the central theme of the program. In fact, my Patreon supporters at or above the $4 tier have been given an exclusive video of the world editing features in action!

...so what IS the central theme of this program you may ask? Sorry, that's still VERY MUCH a secret! I will say though I have told my closest friends what I am planning and ALL of them are excited for this project, which I feel is a very good sign!