Hi everyone,

Today I worked primarily with the graphics. I worked off the fantastic “Game Art for Programmers” tutorial, which can be found here: http://2dgameartforprogrammers.blogspot.com/2011/10/continue-fun-with-squares.html . I am not an artist, so although modest, I’m really proud the way it turned out, especially for doing it all in one day.

I also worked on the balance a little more, and it seems way better. One problem I was having is that with the limitations on where blocks could go, it was encouraging a bunch of disjointed small structures, that would be torn down every weather iteration or so. I wanted to encourage making repairs, and building a large structure, so I did away with the limitations on where blocks can go and added a “cohesion” bonus; the more blocks that surround a block, the more money it produces.

I also added a random event, tsunami, that only comes 1 in every 500 weathers, but it takes 75% of health away from a block. Its bad news.

Tomorrow, the plan is to continue balancing out the values, make the weather graphical effects, and start doing sound. Friday should be the main menu/options/game over screens, and then it’ll be testing and submitting!

There are some great entries in this compo, and no matter what happens, I’m really satisfied with my entry so far, and I’ve learned a ton about using Python, art, and software engineering with a tight timeframe.

I’ll post the screenshots on the game page, rather than on this news article. Check them out, and I’m open to comments!