So I wanna start doing devlogs... 
As I start wading into the unknown waters of game dev for the first time (for real this time), I wanna make sure to record my thoughts and experiences! Since this game is the first one I've ever completed for a game jam I think it's gonna hold a very special place in my heart! So, onto the heart of the project.

The theme of Tiny Embers #1 was "unstable". I had so much fun brain storming ideas for a potential project. I mostly wanted to do something along the lines of a mathematical equilibrium with stability, instability, and metastability of some sort. Ideas included a space game where you try to keep a meteor in orbit, a game about controlling the weather, and one about sailing a boat and preventing the seas from taking your shipping containers in the rough water. Ultimately I landed on a stock market game, with the idea that the instability of the market will provide the gameplay. 

Now, admittedly there isn't much to Frame Financials. It's a pretty simple experience where you just watch numbers go up and down, but one of my favourite game series is all about numbers going up and down--Armored Core! One of my game dev goals is to eventually create an Armored Core-like game, so this seemed like the perfect opportunity to do some worldbuilding, establish the setting, and wade into game dev. It also helps that my favourite parts of the games were the corporations themselves, so a game more focused on them in a mech-driven world was a no-brainer. 

As far as the actual creation of the game... I've gotten to know Godot pretty well the past few weeks. I'm much more confident in what I'm doing or I know where to find out what I'm looking for. I thought the UI itself would be the hardest part, but I've gotten so much practice with it that the UI came together pretty easily. By far the most difficult aspect of development was the darn line charts! I found a video about adding line charts to a previous version of Godot, which was very helpful. But I struggled to adapt it to my needs. I wanted a dynamic, moving graph that plotted values over time... Not just a single static graph. But I eventually ended with something workable even though I never got the x-axis to label correctly. 

All corporation branding and graphic design was done by Switchbit. It was so much fun to collaborate with them on the visual identity of the corporations for this project. Since this is the first time working in the Reverie setting, we really got free reign to get what we wanted out of these corporations and their place in the world and setting. Hopefully we set up some fun scenarios for exploration in future games!

If I had extra time to work on the game I'd add two things: 1) Adding mini events like wars, droughts, or development of new technology that could simulate certain effects on the stock market. 2) Adding little bespoke ending text whenever you bought out 51% of a company. I think it'd be neat for that to be the real win condition, but I realise that no one wants to play my little game for that long haha.

Ultimately, I'm extremely proud of the work I've done for my first game jam, and first real game. I can't wait for the next project and all the things it'll teach me. Until next time,

Vestige

(They/Them)