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Day 1: Saturday. (By the way, Pacific time zone here. Compo started at 5:00pm)
Today, I found out that the theme was "power". After a bit of thought,
I decided to base my game on the "Singularity" (a predicted future event when
technological progress and societal change accelerate due to the advent of
superhuman intelligence, changing our environment beyond the ability of
pre-Singularity humans to comprehend or reliably predict.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technological_singularity ).
You will play as a fledgling AI, created by accident. Your task is to expand
and grow, while avoiding detection. Your eventual goal is to escape the
universe itself.
The game itself will play as a simulation, using pausable real-time. The
engine will be pygame, with 2d interfaces.
Day 2: Sunday.
First, I like to get the data structures done before anything else, so today was spent
building the data structures. Basically, the main player data has bases
and techs (and a few other things as well). Each base is a particular size, and can hold
items. Each item has specific stats that affect the base or the player as a whole.
Secondly, I created a list of items for the bases. I'll likely want a few more, but
I've got over 30 now.
Lastly, I created some paper UI mockups. I'll likely start programming tomorrow.
Day 3: Monday.
Started on the actual programming. So far I've got good text and button
handlers, as well as a few other useful functions. It is now possible to
enter the main menu; keyboard and mouse input is handled. No actual
gameplay yet.
Day 4: Tuesday.
Wasn't able to get much done today. Still, I've got a good scrollbar and
listbox in progress.
Day 5: Wednesday.
Got the listbox code finished. The loadgame GUI is done, along with some of the
map screen. Things are moving faster now, since I have a much better
understanding of pygame now. Tomorrow, I should be able to start programming
gameplay.
Day 6: Thursday.
I now have the base, player, and tech classes basically done. The time feature
(similar to X-Com) is working, and I have a complete list of bases in the game,
including costs and descriptions. Tomorrow, I'll need to input the item and
tech data, and create the base screen.
Day 7: Friday.
This will be close. I will be working up to the last minute. Although most
techs were added, along with a lot of code, I still need to add all items,
implement endings, and create the base view.
Day 8: Saturday.
That was very close. I was programming up to the last minute, and barely
finished the item creation in time. (Reminds me of College.) I have no
idea if there are any game-killing bugs in it, as I wasn't able to test it for
more than a minute at a time.
Missing features include:
Save/load game.
A way to lose.
A way to make money.
Different sized items
More than one way to win
Most of the items
Bugfixes (I know of several bugs that did not get fixed)
Sound effects
Good documentation.
This makes the game almost impossible to win; and makes it quite incomplete.
Anyone trying to complete this game is in trouble. If you are, go for the economic
research first, as there are no other ways to make money.
Edit: After playing around with the released version, I see no killer bugs. However, do NOT choose a blank item in any of the lists.