Development News
Dance Dance Kevolution
June 22nd, 2023
Welcome to Dev Blog #6!
Today is about roadmaps, AI, and sweet sweet dance moves.
FAQ For Newcomers
What's this game about?
Your pal Kevin has run into a spooky house on a dare. He hasn't come out. You need to go in and save him!
Okay but what's in it for me?
Well, friendship! Okay but also: A new house, new puzzles, and new monsters every time you play.
Can I play this with friends?
Eventually! I'm just a solo developer working at this part time, but once multiplayer is implemented I'll be launching an Early Access version of the game.
Roadmap To Free Demo (and Alpha Playtesting)
This roadmap has basically governed my Kevining life for the last 12 weeks: house generator, character controller, obstacles (puzzles & doors), AI companions, monsters, and then go back and flesh it all out. So far I've been ticking along that roadmap much more smoothly than I anticipated.
You might know that I started teaching myself programming two years ago, and that I'm doing all of the code myself (controllers, game logic, AI, UI, etc). So the fact that I've almost got a full game loop going here is really exciting for me! But that said, the full game is still nowhere close here.
"Free Demo" can mean a lot of things. Eventually, it will mean a game that you can pick up, play, and have fun with. But first, playtesting. I'm aiming to have internal testing starting in July, and then around the end of the month or maybe early August I would like to have a small group of interested people try out the working alpha version of the game. If you think you might be interested, make sure you join the TromboSpace discord!
Companion AI
Something I haven't talked about much is: Who are your other friends? Well, I'm still not going to talk about. Instead, let me tell you a bit about what they can do, now that they can actually do some things!
The House is a big one. In order to explore all of its crooks and crannies, you're going to need help. Luckily, your friends want to help Kevin out as much as you do (maybe more, because I know some of you have already said that Kevin is just a jerk who's always getting you in trouble!). To that end, check out this gif demonstrating some of the core AI commands.
In addition to the basic commands you see here, your companions will be able to search, hide, flee, unlock doors, and more (whether on their own, or by your command). Setting up the code architecture for all that was one of the harder things I've done so far, but it's now looking very extendible for all sorts of things!
Video: Kevin learning to walk!
The boy does what he wants.
Third Paragraph?
I don't actually have another big topic to justify this paragraph, I just feel good things come in threes. If you read this far, you're a gem and you should definitely join us on the discord for daily mini-dev updates, gaming memes, and general shenanigans.
How To Keep Up With Kevin
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