Hi everyone!

Another week has passed, and more features have been added into my game. Today, I have found some time to create the end of level animation.

I have drawn my inspiration heavily from casual mobile games such as angry birds, cut the rope and Bag-It, which all have a sequence of stars at the end of the level which fill depending upon the amount completed.



I also managed to find some very nice sound effects on opengameart.org which have several different variations, each one becoming more excited and louder the more they progress through the sequence. I have used these to ensure that the better you do the more congratulatory the music seems.

Of course, if you don't get the required percentage at all, you get the classic 'game over' music, as in the previous 2D version of the game.

The general concept is to remove the need for the user to interpret percentages - in a short glance of a nice looking animation they have determined if they passed or failed the level and if their next step should be to try again (or perhaps throw their controller at the monitor in frustration maybe?) or advance straight to the next level with a big smile on their face, punching the air in a "YES!" pose.

I have also completed various small bits of polish such as the "picking list" on the bottom right of the screen, which indicates which crates are coming next and what order is correct. As the crates move along this list, the sprite shakes as if under stress and rumbling sounds are played.

Dropping crates off the edges of the playing field are now accompanied by a cartoonish "whee-kersplat" sound effect.

Oddly enough, just these small pieces of polish is making the game seem more like a game as time goes along, and showing non-technical strangers videos of the game in progress now results in "oooh's" and "aah's" as opposed to "what is that? looks like minecraft...".

On a related note i have decided to call the main character "Eric Boom", or "Mr Boom" for short as a result of this thread...

Stay tuned for further updates from the firework factory!