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[TheSneaK]

This looks amaazing. Getting those good good Undertale vibes. Earthbound is clearly a good game to get inspired by.
Maybe I should finally get Wine working so I can try to run Windows games on Linux...

Hey!  Thanks so much for the kind words! 

Maybe I should try looking into how to get my games to work on Linux and Mac 

[TheSneaK]

Hey friends! 

Got a new version of Cat-Powered UFO out!

This time there are some big improvements and additions.

The biggest addition being "The Sugar Dimension"!

I think this is my favorite of the alternate dimensions so far!  And I would really love to hear what you think of it! 










Give the version a go!  I'd love your feedback!

https://thesneak.itch.io/cat-powered-ufo



Here is the Changelog for anyone who is interested.

https://itch.io/t/1004572/change-log#post-2068330

[JobLeonard]

My enamel shudders in anticipation

[TheSneaK]

Hello friends!  

It's been a while since I've updated you on Cat-Powered UFO, so I thought I should make a post to show I'm not dead!  xD



Graphic update!  With the help of my wife, I have improved the buildings a lot



Notice the back of the buildings now has a fire escape.



The shop has a sign now, and there is some space devil graffiti on the back of a random building.



The mediocre bomb shop looks more decrepit now, which makes sense given the name.



And here is the front of the police station...  Yeah, it's just better, not much else to say about that.







Here are some of the old building just to give you some comparison









The perspective was wrong compared to the other sprites in the game, that and the shading was a little whack.





There have been a bunch of other improvements as well!

But I think I will put them into future posts as to not make this one huger than it is already.

I plan to update this devlog more often, I have been pretty slack in recent days and it's about time i got back on top of it!



To everyone who follows along with cat-Powered UFO, thank you so much!  I hope the finished product lives up to your expectations!!  

[JobLeonard]

Nice! Cool that your wife actively supports you in this project

The way you phrase that last sentence makes it sound like the project is almost done, is that true?

[TheSneaK]

Nice! Cool that your wife actively supports you in this project

The way you phrase that last sentence makes it sound like the project is almost done, is that true?

Yeah!  She sometimes helps me with the art!  I've become a lot better at understanding things like shading and perspective thanks to her!

Hmm, if I had to guess, it will still be months before the game is finished, but I feel like I've gone over the half way mark, maybe even over two-thirds finished!

I would bet there would be a lot of time at the end for bug-squashing and polish as well, sorry to get your hopes up!

If your keen to play the alpha version it's up on itch.io for free!
https://thesneak.itch.io/cat-powered-ufo

I'd love to hear what you think!   

[TheSneaK]

Hey friends!  

After playing games on itch and making videos about them, I thought it would be a good idea to make a video about the most common mistakes I see in game design.

So here it is!





I will come back with an update for Cat_powered UFO soon!  

Have fun 

[JobLeonard]

Good list of examples!

You know, you could also make it easy to reach backtrack from and go back to the Viking (like add a teleporter or something, or a menu choice that "fades to black", implying that you automatically navigated the whole maze). That way you don't frustrate the curious player who wants to explore first

[TheSneaK]

Good list of examples!

You know, you could also make it easy to reach backtrack from and go back to the Viking (like add a teleporter or something, or a menu choice that "fades to black", implying that you automatically navigated the whole maze). That way you don't frustrate the curious player who wants to explore first

Thanks!   

I actually do give them an item that lets them teleport back for that reason!   
But you are right!  Maybe I should make a way to get back to him quickly as well!
Something for me to think about! 

[TheSneaK]

The new version is out!  :D

There are A LOT of changes, I won't get into them all here.

But I will go through the changes to the early game and why I think they are necessary. 



First up, the way the game allows you to progress is significantly changed.

In previous versions, you could unlock the roll ability and the lift ability, and you would basically have free reign over the world from there.

The problem is, there are some situations later on that require the purple plasma attack, a player could do all the work of getting up to such a part, only to not be able to finish that section due to not having an ability they had no idea they could even unlock.



These smoking flowers make clear that they can only be killed by a purple plasma attack.  They block the way to several key areas and items that would usually allow the player to collect cats and travel to different dimensions.  Now the player needs to unlock the attack to make this possible.



Another problem was players not understanding that they can travel to different dimensions at all.

Now the player is forced to explore the slime dimension in order to unlock the ability to lift things.  This new Slime creature NPC is key in explaining this.





To make more obvious the importance of the Riddle master NPC he now has his own tent







TLDR:

So basically now the player is made to unlock the roll, lift, and attack abilities before they can get themselves in a dead-end situation due to not having said abilities. 



If you want to check out all the new changes follow this link

https://itch.io/t/1004572/change-log



Want to try Cat-Powered UFO for yourself?

Check it out here, don't forget to give me your feedback!

https://thesneak.itch.io/cat-powered-ufo



I hope you all have a wonderful day! 

Have fun! 

[JobLeonard]

Nice way to implicitly educate the players!

Whenever I read stuff like this I think to myself "I wonder how much education could be improved if they got some proper level designers involved in writing the assignments" 

[TheSneaK]

Nice way to implicitly educate the players!

Whenever I read stuff like this I think to myself "I wonder how much education could be improved if they got some proper level designers involved in writing the assignments" 

LOL!  That's a great point about getting level designers in on education! 
I would have learned way more effectively!  xD

Do have a game your working on yourself?

[JobLeonard]

Nah, don't really have that particular ambition or drive. But I like reading devlogs

[TheSneaK]

I've been working on a problem that has annoyed me since the start of the project

Shadows stack up and make sections with a heavy amount of trees or rocks look stupid, I've even had players think the ground was burnt. 





But now I have finally done away with this problem!

Have a look!



I decided to keep the tiniest bit of shadow stacking since that is the way it works in real life after all.

Maybe this seems like no big deal, and I guess It isn't as far as gameplay goes, but I have been perplexed by how to fix this problem since the very beginning of Cat-Powered UFO.

I feel like I should give credit to the one youtube channel that spoke about this topic

Here's a link to the video I used





If you're using gamemaker and creating a game with a similar perspective to mine, I'd suggest giving it a watch.



Another thing I have been working on is making the player have some visual indicator that an object is interactable.

Here is how I have done this



When you are facing an object and are close enough to interact with it, the object flashes slightly white.

It's a little hard to tell from the still frame image, but you get what I mean.



There is ANOTHER new version of Cat-Powered UFO out with these new features and some bug fixes!

Check it out

https://thesneak.itch.io/cat-powered-ufo



Have Fun! 

[JobLeonard]

Nice, that looks sooo much better!

[TheSneaK]

Hey Friends! 

Just wanted to show you that I am still alive and well.

And that Cat-Powered UFO is still very much happening!

Have a sneak peek at the newest and last dimension, SPACE HELL!





Have a go at the alpha version -

https://thesneak.itch.io/cat-powered-ufo

Like the music?  Check out the creator's channel -

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCf-nHIWTIQjb2XWuR-9G6Mw/videos

[JobLeonard]

[quickly scrobbled through instead of watching the full thing uninterrupted because work]

That looks awesome!

[TheSneaK]

At long last!  I bring you a new video!

It's been quite a while!

This one is about how combat developed in my game.



Check it out!

[TheSneaK]

Which of these looks better?

Any feedback is greatly appreciated!   

[JobLeonard]

The second one looks like a little more love and care went into the game, instead of just slapping some text on a simple "render this text string" command. I think it would look better with some colors though