Knife That Guy: The Unleashening

The moment has finally arrived. For 5-ish weeks I have toiled over Knife That Guy and now the world must see the abomination that I have wrought. To spare you from having to read anymore words, the PC version is here and the Mac version is here. I know, Dropbox isn't exactly ideal and I'm trying to find a better sharing solution, but I lack personal server space and the game is small enough to download in less than a minute anyway. Also, as I am without access to a Mac, the Mac version is entirely untested and offered as a meager sign of good will to people on the other side of the personal computing war.

So...yeah. First Game a Month down. I'm going to save an in-depth post mortem for later, but I'm pretty happy with the results and overall process of revisiting Knife That Guy. Give the game a play and let me know what you think of it. If you like it, mention it to your friends, family, coworkers, or attractive strangers you run into. Or, if you're shy, just play the game and keep your opinion of it to yourself. That's fine too.

I'm going to be taking a brief (week long?) hiatus from the Game a Month before I start up the next round so that I can review the first one and post Knife That Guy on every indie game site I can find. I'm also planning on submitting it to Steam Greenlight, the awesome service that Steam uses to allow its users to determine which games should make it into their store. Knife That Guy is far from being a sellable product, but during its development my brain was flooded with ideas on ways I can expand upon it. I know the original idea was to make a game in a month, kick it out to the world, and move on to the next one but if I find that there are people out there who can share some of my enthusiasm for This Guy and his Knife, I would love to spend some more time on making Knife That Guy match the version I've been playing in my head. 

Update: Already had someone find a bug for Mac that kept them from recording their high scores. Possibly fixed that and updated the version.

Update #2: Someone found a bug causing the game to lock up if you exit the game from the pause menu and start a new round. This should now be fixed in both versions.

Good News and Sweet Tunes

Just wanted to make a quick update so I am right now! The delay was definitely a good idea. I am currently polishing up the game as much as I can and it is on track to be released unto the world on Wednesday. For anyone who is still bummed out that they aren't playing Knife That Guy at this exact moment, here's the (way too awesome) theme song courtesy of Chris Zukowski:

Knife That Guy: The Delay!

So, it's looking like the planned release date for Knife That Guy (about this time tomorrow) isn't going to happen. I had pretty much been on track until this week, but right now I'm trying to wrap up some important freelance work and I haven't had time for programming anything that I am not contractually obligated (and paid) to do. I figured I could release the incomplete version of the game tomorrow, but I think it'll be worth it to break the rules of my challenge in exchange for a more refined game. The new release date for Knife That Guy will be next Wednesday, December 5th. I promise this will not slip. Unless it does.

Knife That Guy: End of Week 3

So it's the end of the third week of Game A Month #1. I have to say, way more got done this week than the last. I finished watching the rest of Avatar and, for some reason, I made the unfortunate decision to watch the movie. Oh, and I got sprites for the game done and the functionality to pause and a how to play screen and some other stuff. But no amount of progress will cool my rage over the abomination that is The Last Airbender film.

The game looks more or less like it did last week, but without pictures this post would just be a bunch of words (and who honestly reads those?) so here's a look at the enemy sprites that I've made this week:

Here's Normal Guy. He'd rather not be knifed.

Here's Sad Guy. He wouldn't mind it.

So yeah, those will be the two enemy types for Knife That Guy. Normal Guy tries to avoid This Guy, and Sad Guy attempts to run into him. I had wanted to have a few more enemy types in the game, but last week's distractions ended up reducing the amount of time I had for making the sprites.

The goal for this last full week of development is to implement the visual effects and sounds that will really work to sell the game's mechanics as well as adding the other necessary game infrastructure stuff like an options menu, high score saving, and credits. I've also coerced a friend into contributing a couple of music tracks for the game, so I can fill the uncomfortable silence in the game without risking a copyright infringement lawsuit.

I've also put together an early build of the game to get some gameplay feedback. If you'd like to be a tester, just let me know and I'll hook you up.

Knife That Guy: End of Week 2

Hey everybody. So today marks the end of week 2. Well, technically yesterday was the end but due to spending the past three days binging on the first two seasons of Avatar and trying to figure out what's up with DOTA 2, my schedule has gotten kind of shifty. So I haven't accomplished all of the goals that I had wanted to for this week. Although I have made most of the visual assets that I am going to need for the game, there is still a lot that needs to be implemented. This means that I will be saving releasing the early test build for the beginning of next week. I know getting early feedback would be helpful but I feel like all of the missing elements would be too distracting to really get anything valuable out of it right now.

That's enough negative stuff, so now it's time for some positive. I'm really happy with the sprites that I've made so far as I put a quantum of effort into them instead of scribbling them all out in a few hours. I also managed to get the camera to show an angled view of the game instead of the head-on flat view I had before. This was something that I wanted in the original student project version, but I could barely get my mind around working a 2D renderer so anything 3D would be double impossible. 

Here's a look at the changes to This Guy:

...and after!

   

Before...

And here's a shot of the current state of the game:

Look at that rectangular goodness.

So for this next week, I will have all of the sprites for the game made and have the additional animations that are needed (i.e. everything that isn't just walking). I will also try to get as many of the necessary sound effects as possible so that next week's test build will actually have some player feedback to go along with all of the knifing. This week's looking pretty good as I don't know how it could be less productive than the previous one.

Knife That Guy: End of Week 1

So it is now the end of the first week of development of Knife That Guy HD 3D Deluxe. I'm pretty happy with how it's going so far. I managed to meet my goals of having the design and rough gameplay prototype done and I've had time to dream up plenty of further complications and refinements that I will hopefully have the time to implement. Here's a little peek at the state of the game so far:

Right now, it's a bit more like "Knife That Primitive."

That's right, the game can both start and end.

So yeah, it's not the prettiest game on the block, but it's a start. I have the core gameplay of zooming around as This Guy, knifing That Guy, and avoiding everyone else as well as some placeholder UI elements and it's already feeling pretty fun. The goal for this next week is asset creation and integration. By the end of the week, it should look roughly like what the final product is going to be. There may even be a sound effect or two. 

The goal is to have the game far enough along by the end of this week that I can give a demo build to anyone interested in being a playtester. If you'd like the opportunity to provide me with feedback and stomp on my fragile ego in return for a place in the credits of a freeware game, let me know!

Game a Month #1 Begins

Alright, the time has finally come. I am all out of excuses--I've moved into my new place, I have internet access, I've figured out how to turn on the heat to protect myself from the frigid Michigan elements. I am ready. By this time on September 29th, Knife That Guy HD 3D Deluxe will be unleashed upon the world. I'm going to try to update at least once a week about the development process. The goal for this first week is to have all the planning done as well as having the base game managers and a rough prototype of all of the mechanics in the game. 

The clock starts...now.