Devlog 2ThemeEarly on I came up with the idea of “ringing the devil’s bell” as the goal and motivation of the whole game but as time went it, it just turned out to be a little hollow. I didn’t feel like it game me much to work with to add context to the game. I ran through a handful of ideas that tied in with this climbing mechanic and landed on this old time circus vibe.

There is plenty of reference material to pull from and it has a really distinct look to it. This changed a good handful of elements of the game as well as letting me iron out some of the game design (see below)
Now we aren’t dealing with the devil, he’s the ringleader of this traveling circus.

You’re still playing as the old man, but he’s now The Magnificent Murdoc, who’s a washed up circus acrobat that needs to train for the upcoming show.
Art
Since the theme was figured out, I’ve been able to push the art in more specific directions. Since all of this is supposed to be a summer time circus, I’m really trying to keep the color pallet restricted on the warm side of things. This is actually the first time I’ve put this much thought into the color composition of what I’m putting on screen so its a learning process when going for such a distinct feeling.
A few other things that are still WIP:
- Still playing with parallax backgrounds.
- Normal maps for character sprites + body parts
Game Design stuffYou now have 7 days to train and get ready for your upcoming show. The sign guy helps keep that on point.

Each time you start a new game, you are given new levels and mechanics that you have to deal with. I figured out this week that I’m tying in the reward system (after successfully completing your show) to the costumes + mechanics for each run. I’ll probably post about this next time.
