Dev Diary

So this is going to be an all-in-one dev post, since I prefer it being in one place; 
additionally it's worth noting this game had 3 days of development time, when I originally scoped for 7. Don't forget about scope people :D

besides that let's get started

Day 1

For the first day, I brainstormed ideas ways to interpret the 'Absorbtion' theme and how that might work for the player experience. Originally I liked the idea of absorbing attacks and reflecting them at a later point; however I felt that other people would have similar ideas, executed in a similar way. Furthermore there were ideas of absorbing liquids, powers, creatures and so on; and in the end I decided to hit the nail on the head. 

I just went with a sponge, a sponge that absorbed liquids. 

that was the initial idea, and all there was to it. 

So I started protoytping the project, making a sponge character that can move and absorb liquids, and I found that I had completed the core mechanic within an hour or two, because of this I wanted to increase the scope and make the game more interesting so I added the mechanic of spreading liquids across the floor.

The Sponge Character [This made it to the final game jam release] 

Literally just a yellow stretched cube.

Whilst I was making the liquid absorption mechanic, I made a shader graph to create a liquid effect on the player; then through code I changed the colour parameter so I could have a variety of different looks without creating excess materials. 
In future I wanted to overhaul the shader, and make it look better; However I never got round to it in the time limit of the jam. So I was quite glad I preemptively had a basic solution for showing the liquids.

To make the stretched cube that is the player more lively, I added some animations through the unity animator, such as a basic walk cycle which was a hop, and a slide.

To extend the potential puzzle possibilities, I made it so the liquids could conduct a certain type of 'State' these being fire or electricity; With each liquid having certain advantages.

The reason I used common liquids, as well as fire and electricity is because their common knowledge and their interactions are intuitive to the player, such as water conducting electricity and oil setting on fire. This makes the game easier, and makes the game less hand-holdy; additionally I feel it makes use of the player's problem solving skills better without treating them like an idiot.

For the project this was the initial trello board.

It's incredibly bare bones, which was a major problem, so I added on tasks of any feature I was working on basically treated it like a note book for ideas, or bug fixes. after implementing the day's mechanics I finished off with writing up tasks for the next day, so I could get to work as soon as I load up the Unity Project.

Day 2

For this day the game plan was to let the liquids conduct stuff. 

So to get started I did the most least  appropriate plan of action, and started making the particle effects for the statuses first. 
For this I used the Kenney particle pack to help make the particles, as the PNG's that come with are brilliant for making loads of juicy particles.

For the most part I spent the 4 hours this day on tinkering with state conducting, particle affects and creating a respawn system, and in the slew of all these features, UnityEvents layed in it's wake. By that I mean I used a lot of UnityEvents, I mean a lot; and I recommend using them, they make design work much easier, and all the systems, and the connections are layed out before you. This advice mainly applies to game jams, but still worth using in your projects.

However there isn't too much to go into for "Day 2" as it was mainly just coding and tinkering values.  
By the end of Day 2 this was the result.

https://twitter.com/WatersDev/status/1574530648357801984

[Don't know how to imbed twitters link sorry :p]

Day 3 

For the last day, I was on full binge mode, I created art assets, scripted a robot and it's AI, made some custom animations for world interactions and created some new shaders, whilst designing the final level

I regret this. 

I left the level design late, and the things that the level design entailed/required, caused me to go back n forth between different jobs.  
furthermore I didn't want the whole level to be greybox so I just popped into blender and pumped out some models of questionable quality.

This day's log is gonna be short for the amount I did, as this whole day was a blur of work and panic.