Recently we purchased an HDTV for the purpose of testing “Marian” at various HD resolutions – but it also happened to be my first HDTV ever, so I was pretty anxious to see some of my games running at epic sizes.
The Latest Marian Prototype…
Back in the day when Derek and I were working on Aquaria (circa 2006), widescreen monitors weren’t a big deal. Everything was 4:3, and we designed the game accordingly. However, by the time the game was released in late 2007, 16:10 and 16:9 had caught on in a big way. We ended up releasing a major patch of the game that added full widescreen support – and it was a lot of work. Beyond the code changes, we had to create new artwork to extend the edges of certain scenes, edit all the levels so that the game wouldn’t spoil anything major, etc.
Aquaria: still sexy at 1080p/46”
Designing with multiple aspect ratios in mind from the start is a little bit tedious, but it definitely saves a lot of heartache down the road.
Today I’d like to explain another part of our prototyping process, something we call “Level Snippets”. Essentially they’re just little sketches of a piece of gameplay drawn up by Kyle, which I’ll implement in the engine to test out various core gameplay mechanics.
We’re only going to show you one of the most basic ideas that we’ve prototyped as an example right now, because we don’t want to give away any of the exciting stuff just yet. This doesn’t even scratch the surface. (in fact, this particular piece is a bit misleading, as “Marian” is not a traditional platforming game)
Once I get a sketch like this and we’ve talked about it a bit, I’ll get it up and running in Unity with some boxes to block it out. If there are reusable components, I’ll build them as prefabs. (in this case, platforms that fly in) Then all the work done for the small test level can be reused in larger areas!
We just got home from San Francisco, which involved a lot of good times as well as a fair amount of hard work on finding a good home for “Marian”. We brought a new, private trailer for developer friends, plus a few other interested parties – and it was a hit.
The trip also included the most epic TIGRadio episode to date: a two hour discussion featuring about a dozen indie developers. (including Phil Fish, Farbs, Petri, Kyle Pulver etc)
You can find the conversation archived here. If I remember correctly, it starts off a bit slow but gets into some pretty interesting game design territory eventually!
I’m back in the ‘peg – and it’s nice to be home… but I miss everyone already.
We’re down in San Fran for GDC! Due to the sheer amount of awesome hangouts, talk-planning and other insanity, we missed Monday’s Marian update.
Better late than never – here’s a picture of a little ancient photo album we put together to help us show off the art of the game…
Also check out Chrissy’s sexy GDC photos on Flickr… they’ll be updated at least once every day!
And if you’re down in SF, consider checking out my talk with fellow indie compatriots Adam Saltsman and Andy Schatz at 2:15pm on Wednesday. It should (hopefully) be entertaining and informative.
(in fact, this particular piece is a bit misleading, as “Marian” is not a traditional platforming game)
