The Past And The Future

Hello all, I know there hasn't been an update for a while but here is one and there's a few topics I want to cover.

Firstly someone has decided to start development of the original RPG Maker XP version of Zauber. The hongfire link is here so go check it out!
 
Now then, lets begin in the past, I'm not sure how well I explained why I dropped both my last game but I feel that I should, so here it is.

• I wrote the game originally as a learning exercise, with the intention to carry it one given enough interest. Note, this is MY interest, not those of the community (though that would have contributed a little :p). I learnt a lot, so this was definitely a successful project in that regard.
• Roguelikes are not the most popular of games, they are very niche I must admit, which probably didn't help people to like it :p
• The Game Engine was bad. Sadly my inexperience at coding game engines showed here because the Game Engine and general design was clumsy, buggy and difficult to manage. This contributed to my decision to drop the game, because even in its small, infant stage it was riddled with so many bugs, and was already so bloated with unneccessary code that a complete rewrite was neccessary, and I could not muster the enthusiasm to do it. I was using an inheritance based design for the game entities, and there was just so many classes and so much excess code it was horrible to deal with :p
• Real life: I had exams to revise for, luckily I have passed them all now :D so another 2 years of university for me! Woot!

So yeh, there's a list of some of my reasons to abandon the  ZauberRoguelike game. I'm sorry to all you who actually liked it, but as I have said the entire game code github repository is linked in the last post so you can see for yourself how ugly the design was :p

I haven't touched game programming all summer, I've had exams, then lots and lots of moving then just games and then of course GW2 :p But i'm back! With a new project. And with no further todo onto the future!

I'm currently working on a new game, this time a sidescroller. Not exactly a platformer sidescroller but tbh i'm not sure exactly what it'll turn out to be. This time however I will not be launching myself headfirst into creating the game itself, instead I will be creating a level editor (actually already completed, at least up to all the capabilities of the engine so far) and a bug free engine (well as close as possible). The engine is also using an Entity-Behavior based design, rather then straight up inheritance, and it is all commented so fingers crossed this time the project will be smoother. With this I will then release some example levels then I will ask you guys, as in the people who will actually play the game, what cool stuff do you think I should put in it. Of course my trademark terrible dialogue will be in there, and magic and gender switching. I have a few ideas but i'm interested in what you guys think would be fun.

Leave a comment with your thoughts on all this, and I will try to keep you all updated on the progress of the game. Oh, and don't worry, it will be fully graphical this time :p