Game Developer
There are many different solutions to managing finite state machines in Unity. I don’t intend to comment here on the goodness of any other solutions - the best solution is the one that works for you. I just want to tell you about how I manage state machines. If you find it useful please go ahead and copy me and if you have any suggestions for how to improve on this technique please tell me.
This is a short editor script that I use for creating instances of ScriptableObject classes in the Unity editor. Most scripts that create ScriptableObjects require you to add new code for each object type. This script does not. Select any class that extends ScriptableObject and choose Create->Instance to create an instance of that class.
Many developers come to Unity from a background in object-oriented programming and look to use the same patterns in Unity that they used elsewhere. You don't neglect what you have learnt elsewhere just because you are using a different tool but sometimes you have to apply those lessons differently with the new tool. Unity has its own idea about how you should architect a game and before you start…
You may be surprised if I tell you that Freak Factory is about life, but it is. Every time you play Freak Factory you lose, eventually. You may prolong the game, you may get a high score, but eventually you will lose. Losing is inevitable and every Freak you make reduces the space you have, reduces how much game you have left. While you play it the game doesn't get harder, it gets less. With every…
In this session at the Develop conference in Brighton I presented seven important lessons that I learnt as a choreographer that are still important to me as a game designer. I accompanied each lesson with the story of how I learnt it and an example of how it might apply in game design.
This blog post was originally published on the Develop:Brighton website on 26 June 2015. I remember as a choreographer at dance school showing my choreography teacher my first dance piece. I'd spent a term making this dance, working with three dancers who were studying with me. This was extra-curricular activity but I wanted to make this dance and I felt good about it. So, in search of praise I…
This blog post was originally published on Gamasutra on 17 June 2015. Before I became a game developer I was an independent contemporary dance choreographer with my own dance company. And in my 14 years creating dances, and a further 14 creating games, I've experienced all sorts of collaborations. For me, there are three key ingredients to a good collaboration.
I've been heads down building stuff for Bubble Pack for a while now, which is why I haven't talked about it much. A lot of news has built up. A New Name The game now has its final name and art style. The name is Freak Factory. What were bubbles are now little critters called Freaks, and what was a simple box is now a factory in which you make these Freaks. And if you don't keep them contained they…
It used to be the only question about monetising your game was how much to charge, and you could leave that decision until quite late in the development. But in this era of free-to-play we have to ask ourselves how we propose to charge for the game, and we have to ask early because the decision can have significant ramifications for the game. How to charge for your game is sometimes very simple…
I have been playing around with the gameplay for Bubble Pack, adjusting it to get the right difficulty balance. There are lots of small adjustments that can be made to make the game a little easier or a little harder and I also tried a couple of bigger changes. First I tried letting the player set the power at which the ball is thrown. Unfortunately, this made the game far too easy whilst also…