Development Log

Overview:

The development process for this game began with working on deciding on an idea for the game. Once we had decided that the primary mechanic would be toggling platforms on and off we were able to begin the basic development. Our first step was to simply create the player movement and platforms that could be toggled on and off since that was the basis of our entire game. We then moved on to secondary mechanics such as the dash and double jump and obstacles to kill the player. When the basic elements of the game had been developed we were able to design all of the levels of the game, add portals between levels and create a complete game loop. Lastly, we focussed on incorporating playtesting feedback into the game by modifying some levels and making changes to the player mechanics. 

Player sprite sheet:

Platform sprite:

Rock sprite:

Spike sprite:

Development Screenshots:

Playtesting:

We did a series of playtests at different points in the development process and were able to gain valuable feedback as a result. Our beta version playtesters noted that the player mechanics felt floaty which made movement hard to control. As a result, we removed the dash mechanic and added a double jump feature instead. We also heard that it was hard to know what platforms could be turned on and off. In order to fix this issue, we added masks so that the player saw a slightly transparent version of the platform. This helped the player understand all of the options they had in terms of moving around. With the second round of playtesting, we focused on tweaking the levels in order to have a smoother difficulty ramp throughout the game. Overall playtesting was very important to our process.