14 replies to this topic

[3Ddreamer]

How long did it take to develop your last 2D game - days, weeks, months - and would you like to describe the game and the process as insight into why it took that long? What type of 2D game was it?

[HappyCoder]

I made this in about two months. It was for a game contest so that helped keep me motivated. It would have likely taken me longer to complete the game if I didn't have the deadline. I started by identifying the basic game play that I wanted to achieve and what I wanted to the game to do. I came up with a list of things my game would have to be capable of doing in order to achieve my goals. I tried to keep things simple so I could finish by the dead line but would still push myself. Then got to work building my game piece by piece. I started with making the graphics engine. Once I got things on the screen I built the collision detection. After that I started working on game logic, then level building. Once I had a basic game working I put more attention into building levels and adding features that the levels needed. Once I had a complete game I spent time polishing up what I could until the deadline.

The deadline determined how much time I spent on my game. If I had more time I could have done more with it. In hindsight I would have liked to put more time into polishing the game. The last 10% of the game takes quite a bit of work.

[3Ddreamer]

It looks cool for two months of work. 

 

After I clicked the link, I could not get the game to run for me.

 

What file format did you use for the graphic content? How did you render it?  What language(s) did you use for the game?

 

I tried the link again and all I got was a white page with the word "nope" on it.  What is that?

[sunandshadow]

It didn't get to "complete" because we burned out after 3 months of art production (me) and 2 months of coding (partner, I recruited him after I had already made some art).  At my best estimate we were 1/3 done then, so the whole game would theoretically have taken 9 months.  The game was a flash tycoon-style breeding game with a paperdoll system (mix-n-match-sprites) included.  Comparable to the free games Celebrity Pedigree and Monster Breeding, easy to google those and try them out if you want to know in more detail.  We had the paperdoll system working, though it needed more art assets; the breeding part needed more designwork.

[HappyCoder]

It looks cool for two months of work. 
 
After I clicked the link, I could not get the game to run for me.
 
What file format did you use for the graphic content? How did you render it?  What language(s) did you use for the game?
 
I tried the link again and all I got was a white page with the word "nope" on it.  What is that?

It doesn't seem to load the first time all the time. I need to fix that problem.

It was an HTML5 game written in javascript. All the images were pngs. Any other data files were custom data formats using json to encode them. If you want to browse the media here is the link. (link) A lot of the json is computer generated so it is hard to read. All of the rendering is done in a 2D HTML5 context in an canvas tag.

EDIT: It works best in google chrome. It works in firefox, safari, and IE 9.

Edited by HappyCoder, 10 January 2013 - 09:55 PM.

[Koobazaur]

Well I just announced Postmortem: one must die in the other thread, which has been an on-and-off gig I've been working for a few months (by myself) that actually branched out from another failed project from a local artists.

 

At the same time,  I am reusing a big chunk of my legacy fundamental code (i.e. strings, reflection, math, etc.) from even older projects going as far as back as two years ago!

 

I guess when you code and make games for a few years you end up reusing your stuff a lot, and sometimes things branch out like that hard to keep track when one project starts and another ends!

Edited by Koobazaur, 10 January 2013 - 10:06 PM.

[szecs]

My last game (or any desktop program) was this:

http://www.gamedev.net/blog/955/entry-2254673-let-loose-the-kraken/

 

It took 3 days to get there, it would take probably a month more to call it finished.

[3Ddreamer]

EDIT: It works best in google chrome. It works in firefox, safari, and IE 9.

I have the new IE 10, so that must be the cause. Nice stuff you made, hope you keep making games.

[3Ddreamer]

EDIT: It works best in google chrome. It works in firefox, safari, and IE 9.

I have the new IE 10, so that must be the cause. Hope you keep making games.

[Buster2000]

My last completed polished game took around 3 months including testing.  Unfortunatly I can quite easily spend just as long or even longer on a game only for it to never see the light of day

[3Ddreamer]

So, those who replied so far - approximately how many lines of coding did the game take total?  How many lines of coding for the components such as the interface(s) did you have to make?

[ApochPiQ]

I think the last time I did a game start to finish it took about 3 hours. Maybe 1200-1400 LOC. It was for a competition here on GDNet actually.

[kseh]

My last "completed" 2D game project was Egg Hunt.

There's a number of things that remain unpolished however the game is fully playable.

 

Initial idea June 2, 2010.
Work commenced December 14, 2011 ending June 29, 2012.

In that period there were 65 individual days of coding.
I will estimate 2 hours per day for 60 days and 5 hours a day for 5 days = approx 145 hours of work.

 

Don't really know how many lines of code it was that were added by hand to existing code I had or what actually counts as line. But if I concatenate everything together to a single file it comes to about 5000 lines in a 198k file.

Project notes here. (should essentially indicate why it took so long).

Various entries have also been posted to my journal.
The best screenshots I have handy I posted on this journal entry.
Latest build can be found on my website downloads page here.

 

Egg Hunt Quick instructions:

From the main screen:

Start begins the game

Settings allows you to set the size of the maze.

 

Main screen can be used for practice.

 

Search the maze of caverns for 5 eggs and place them in close proximity to each other.

Use arrow keys to move, X to eat things (blocks, flowers, eggs), and Z to spit them back out(except flowers).

Eating flowers affects the character in ways which may be found to help or hinder the search.

 

 

 

[szecs]

The Kraken game is about 2000 LoC. I don't actually know how many LoC coding it was, I mean coding for the actual project, because I reused a lot of code from pre4vious projects.

[JonathanJ1990]

it took me a little over 20 hours over a couple of weeks. it was my very first Graphic-based game a platformer inspired by sonic and mario . It's only one level long, unreleased, and  can be beaten in about 2 minutes but I still consider it one of my biggest game accomplishments ever. it was inspired by a friend from highschool and it is my very first lone game project .  definitely the game i consider my "baby".