Secret agency and some icons
Posted on July 21, 2011
| Sascha
As already told (countless times I guess now) I’m still working on the new GUI but I’m making good progress. Only one window needs to be transitioned over to the new GUI before I can call this milestone done and move over to work on other stuff like adding content and functionality. My current plan is to have a version with the new GUI and all features (only one feature of “Phase 2” is missing) done that I can release for public testing by this yeas end.
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The eternal circle of GUI design (and some new screenshots)
Posted on June 24, 2011
| Sascha
Odd title, but it perfectly describes my “workflow” when it comes down to the GUI of “Phase 2”. But since the user interface is such a crucial part for a complex strategy game I don’t feel bad when putting hours and hours (and days) into optimizing the interface of a single “window”, especially seing as how horribly one of my old drafts looked. And yes, I really like the current UI.
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Game design : Game modes
Posted on June 12, 2011
| Sascha
Something that has been lacking in “Phase 1” was replayabilty or better said the motivation to replay the game. This was mainly due to the fact that there was only on single game mode (now called “default”) to choose from in both singleplayer and hotseat games. So basically each game played the same except for maybe the player playind it different or the random factors that change some of the AI’s behaviour.
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Game design : Coastal building spots
Posted on May 27, 2011
| Sascha
Once again personal things kept me from posting news recently, so excuse the big gap between the last (game design related) posting and this one. Though I haven’t posted news recently I still worked on the game almost every day and a lot of things have been changed, added and done. So expect a higher posting frequency in the near future concerning my progress on “Phase 2”!
Something that has been implemented into the game from the very first prototype onwards was a property for all regions with a coast.
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Game design : Regional construction queue
Posted on March 11, 2011
| Sascha
This is something I’ve been thinking about for a long time now and I was pretty unsure wether it would be a good idea or not, as it would change a fundamental part of the gameplay, what I’m talking about is constructing buildings in your regions, a very important part of the gameplay that you spend a lot of your time with.
Up until now you’ve been able to construct only one building at the same time in each region, forcing you do revisit a region once this building is finished in order to start constructing the next building.
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Game design : Espionage and sabotage
Posted on February 27, 2011
| Sascha
As usual my last big posting concerning “Phase 2” is now almost three months old and therefore I decided to change my habbit on posting news for “Phase 2”, so from now on I’ll add a new categorie called “Game Design” in which I’ll post smaller “snippets” about changes in the game’s design. Those postings will be more frequent and should be a better way of showing what’s going on behind the scenes that thos “quarterly” big postings on my progress with “Phase 2”.
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The old GUI is history
Posted on May 5, 2010
| Sascha
Yes, you read that right. In a “shocking” turn of events I decided to scrap almost the whole old GUI for “Phase 2” in favour of a new and better one. Most of you might now ask if I went insane or so, but to counter this I’ll elaborate on why I scrapped the old GUI and decided to put a new one in : When I’m not in front of my PC and working on “Phase 2” (that’s actually the only thing I’m doing in front of the PC nowadays, no more gaming or such, spare time is rare for me) I always have pen and paper in close range so I can put down and work on new ideas anytime they hit me.
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Some infos about gamedesign
Posted on August 26, 2006
| Sascha
Maybe some of you want to know how I do the design for my games, so I thought to write down something on this. Note : I’m no game designer and I never worked on commercial titles (though my freeware games and apps are rather successfull), so take the following stuff as my personal view on this matter, don’t cite me on this in a fiery discussion or so.
Most important notice about gamedesign :
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