When using a powerful set of tools like those provided within Unreal Engine 4 it's not a bad idea to keep any bespoke tools you may need to use within the engine as well. The idea being that when you're creating your game and, say, you need to add or adjust a new puzzle, in … Continue reading In-editor tool design
Tag: Game design
Piczle Cross Adventure post-mortem
After every project is "finished", so far as they ever are, I like to look back on the development process and see what I learned, what mistakes I made and what I did well. Though Piczle Cross Adventure has barely been released I thought I'd do a post-mortem on it already, even though at this … Continue reading Piczle Cross Adventure post-mortem
Ramping up
When it comes to designing the Piczle series of games I have in mind some very specific ways I want players to experience the ramping up of difficulty and challenge. For Piczle Lines it was a little more difficult with its many different puzzle packs the player could choose from right from the get go, … Continue reading Ramping up
A man of letters
One of the many opaque elements of game development that players usually don't ever have to consider is the simple matter of fonts. What is the problem, right? You have fonts on your computer, there are plenty you use every day when you write your documents. Just use one of those! Sadly, it isn't that … Continue reading A man of letters
Product, not project
I have realised I perform a simple mind-trick with every project I move from prototype to production. Once I'm satisfied with initial tests and some basic prototyping, there comes a point where you need to focus on turning what you have into a full-fledged game. Now of course you don't need me to tell you … Continue reading Product, not project
Meta
One of the best parts of having total control over your own project is that you can so easily slip in references and Easter eggs. Piczle Cross Adventure is brimming with references that most people will probably not see, understand or care about, but they tickle me pink. Here's just a few of them. For … Continue reading Meta
Localisation
Unreal Engine 4 has a very nifty localisation dashboard, which, once activated, does a lot of the heavy lifting when it comes to localising your game. With it you can gather all the texts in your game from folders you've selected and create a robust localisation using .PO files. There are a couple of caveats … Continue reading Localisation
Completing Piczle Cross Adventure puzzles
When designing Piczle Cross Adventure I try to keep in mind several types of players and cater to as many of them as possible. Let's face it, everybody enjoys games differently and for different reasons. There is no "right" way to play games and though I try to "direct" the player somewhat in the end … Continue reading Completing Piczle Cross Adventure puzzles
Mini-games
Piczle Cross Adventure is mostly about following the story and playing picture crossword logic-puzzles. However, there is a little more fun and adventuring to be had outside of all that. There are some mini-games and mini-puzzles! When deciding on what kind of mini-activities to include and where I tried to stick to a few simple … Continue reading Mini-games
Dialogs
One element of the old-style RPGs we all know and love, and that persist in video games to this day, are the dialog boxes where the text appears letter by letter. Why these exist exactly is not clear. If you think about it they don't make that much sense. But they are part of video … Continue reading Dialogs
