Graphics Engine

We’ve started the graphics engine! The first focus on the graphics front was to create the main menu display. We plan to keep the console-only launch a viable option, so we designed the underlying menu system to share structural resources between the graphics menu and the console menu. Some areas of the graphics menus have a fundamentally different structure than those same areas in the console menus, so we designed flexibility into the menu system to provide the most intuitive navigating experience of both the console and graphics menus.

One of the largest challenges in designing the graphics engine was connecting button press events in the graphics thread with the core menu logic running in it’s own separate thread. After some fun multithreading design, this communication system now coordinates threads with fast response times for the user and full flexibility for future possibilities. This structure also provides the foundation for thread communication that will support the game screen.

Below are the main menus of the two functional prototypes of the menu system. The menus shown in both the console and graphics share many common options as a result of the shared structural resources. As the systems depicted below are just functional prototypes, they are not necessarily representative of the final layout or design, but offer a window into the development process!

Sound Engine

The sound engine has been started! The sound engine can currently play short menu click sounds and alert sounds. We are planning to expand the sound engine in the future as we consider support for longer audio samples, like soundtrack music or victory/defeat music.