These are my devlog entries from December 2013 to January 2014, where I talk about developing my game "Eden's Prison" over the course of seven weeks for a game jam from an old gaming community. The game had several working titles - Endless Tower, Etemenanki, Eighteen Star / 18 Star / 18*, etc.
The game jam was a winter competition, and the theme was "lost". I won second place, while my friend aeron won with an Eskimo-themed Sokoban game, "Eski Soko Mo Ban". I also mention working on Multimirror a bit, which was the engine for another 2d platformer I released two years later in 2016, Iridescent Crown.
Many of my games, like Cosmic Zephyr or Iridescent Crown, were developed sporadically over longer dev times, and so I don't have comprehensive dev notes for all my games. Eden's Prison is thankfully an exception to this.
There are several features mentioned in the dev notes that are not in the final game, particularly flying enemies and bosses. The inverted part of the tower is not yet used either.
Four weeks into development, our lives got turned upside down by the police raid. So these notes are a mix of personal events as well as game development notes.
Week 1
12/1 got KH2 today! got the new PS2 on Thanksgiving. wrote an idea called Endless Tower for F4D.
12/3 beat We <3 Katamari completely, except for getting a million roses. also maxed out my second KH1 game.
12/4 base for F4D engine, "Etemenanki", is programmed. needs player sprite, obstacles and enemies.
12/7 Jacob is here so i can’t program much. i did add gaps to the tower last night and fixed them this morning. showed Jacob the secret ending in KH1.
Week 2
12/9 added color/shading to the tower, no more wireframe. added ledges. added gravity, fixed collision. hanging from ledges works. more efficient form of ledges added, uses ~70 objects instead of ~210.
12/10 got Angel Sanctuary, books 15-19. only missing 20 now. i’ve been waiting a month and a half for this, so i’m pretty excited. got all my Sylvia Plath books too. read all the Angel Sanctuary up to 18.
12/11 i was kind of disappointed with Angel Sanctuary (one of my favorite characters died), but book 19 makes up for everything since 14 or so. i love Kaori Yuki. the inside of “Etemenanki" works now, coincidentally. the Escher-like illusion is cool.
12/13 Brooke hung out with me, and cooked me some food. <3 stayed up way too long and slept for about 18 hours. played Crash Team Racing for the first time in years.
12/14 inverted Etemenanki works! went to sleep pretty early, sick today.
Week 3
12/15 well, enemies generate from ledges now… no AI or graphics yet. added items, they need graphics too… fell asleep, woke up at noon. added more colors.. fixed the down key… yeah i’m getting nowhere.
12/17 posted the game on 64d yesterday, only to be distracted by IRC all night. ugh. recording guitar was no success today. just got the final Angel Sanctuary book!! i think i’ll read after a good rest. got God of War too!
12/19 i guess i lost my momentum from failing to write music… and Christmas preparations. flying enemies follow you now.
12/20 Tommie’s brother pulled up in a cop car (didn’t even come inside, just left), i had a panic attack and it totally ruined my morning. :/ running enemies work now, so flying enemies are kind of distracting. Jacob is visiting till Tuesday!
12/21 finished Angel Sanctuary, great manga. can’t sleep! added bouncing ledges, which makes the engine a lot more fun. added item collision!
Week 4
12/25 had a great Christmas Eve yesterday before Jacob left. i gave him all my Dragon Ball books to start his manga collection. i got a 1TB hard drive. also got God of War 2, Burnout: Revenge and Silent Hill 2 for PS2, and an Angel Sanctuary art book i ordered. now it’s 7am on Christmas morning and… i’ve made no progress on Multimirror! ahh! added moving ledges, why didn’t i think of that before? changed the level code a lot.
12/26 Jacob came back yesterday and is staying till the Sunday after this one! so i only had Christmas day to work, i’ll be pretty distracted now. spent the morning adding color and windows to the tower, it looks much nicer now.
12/28 [ the police raid happened. i've written about this in more detail elsewhere, specifically the chapter from my memoir. ]
Week 5
1/3 spent the week visiting my family in jail. it’s Friday now, so i won’t see them until Monday. added pausing to Multimirror
Week 6
1/5 added proper graphics for the player and enemies. uses three sprites and primitives for legs. began loading up old music to arrange as a soundtrack. made a lot of progress with music. pause menu finished.
1/9 shrank Multimirror to 640×480 for less lag. added nice-looking enemy bullets in Eighteen Star, collisions and health. made movement a lot faster and smoother. shield works. slept 4-5 hours to rest. added enemy health and collisions! attacking finally works! added limits to how far you can go left/right.
1/11 got mom out of jail yesterday! so we spent the day together.
Week 7
1/13 been clearing out Brooke’s closet to move into her room. it’s a total mess. added statue enemies. fixed player/enemy bullet collisions.
1/18 wtf, it’s taken me five days to clean out that hoarder’s wreck? it was mostly Dora’s stuff, so i don’t blame Brooke for being overwhelmed. so many trashbags, at least a dozen. i can’t believe i only have three days left for F4D. added punching animation for characters. added a basic GUI. fell asleep for a few hours. added a start menu. fixed the GUI, added a countdown. my back is killing me from sleeping on Brooke’s bed all week. added 6 second countdowns for shield and attacks.
End
1/19 read Angel Sanctuary books 15-18 again. rested for most of the day, then moved beds… now it’s 10PM and i’m still really sick. added death animation for enemies. beginning to add bosses. cutting it really close here.
1/20 last day to finish my game and i spent 12AM-4AM watching Bar Rescue on Spike TV. wtf am i doing i should be asleep. bosses work now. you can continue onto higher levels of the tower. added music. can’t add sfx or multiple difficulties in time. fixed item and tower colors. added countdown before level begins. i keep breaking the windows somehow, this is obnoxious. added a “game over" page for when you lose, or win. mute button works.
1/21 well aren’t i sleep deprived. takes 30 seconds to start my game since i loaded music. :/ added stats to game over screen. added help page. fixed a LOT of bugs. added upward attacks to bosses. uploading and taking a long rest.
Summary
tl;dr being thrown in jail REALLY screws with your plans. i also decided to invest five days in cleaning out my sister’s room, which would’ve been days to add sfx, more enemies, a lot of the things i know are missing from the game.
as it stands, i’m glad i was barely able to get bosses programmed in time. it’s enough to flesh out into something bigger. the tower itself is a linear set-up, so i may add an open world connected circular rooms (which you walk in, not around), and maybe an Animal Crossing-type home with furniture.
i still haven’t made use of the “inside of the tower”. it’s an easy and fun illusion that fit the “lost” theme, all i have to do is shift global.ledgelength from positive to negative. but alas, i didn’t have time to find use for it. i came up with the countdown/time items in the last three days as a way to keep the player on their feet. because i know it needs more enemies.
so, while i rest, i appreciate any suggestions on what i should add to 18 Star. i’m grateful for all the positive feedback, and i’m confident enough to continue the base engine i produced within these 7+ weeks, amid the new obstacles i’m facing in life.
i appreciate any feedback on what you’d like to see from me next, too.
link to Eden's Prison
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