Cavern Retreat Post Mortem
Well I'm finally getting around to posting a post mortem for Cavern Retreat. I wrote this game originally for Ludum Dare 15, a 48 hour game compo. I then revised it for another ~20 hours and released it.
Well lets get to the numbers. So far I've made $5.92 from 1,513 plays since its release November 8, 2009. Thats by no means a success. But I feel as if I've learned so much more from going from start to finish in my first game.
Now to what could have been done better. I wrote this game to serve myself. It was a fun weekend plus couple of months tuning it between hunting for a real job. First and foremost it was too hard! My favorite comment from my fans "THE WATER MOVES TOO D@MN FAST!!!". I agree I had originally thought hey wouldn't it be cool if there was an arcade like game for Flash where you don't just play for hours on end killing stuff and upgrading. Originally the game was meant to have a bigger and more dynamic cave life but with limited time I cut out many of the key features I had dreamed up.
Key Features
- Baddies (orcs / goblins / snakes / ect.)
- Dynamic procedurally generated caves
- In game shops
- Fluid water physics
As you can clearly see I cut all of the features I desired beyond the basic gameplay. Understanding my limitations I can now start on a version that implements all of these more advanced features. I've worked out a schedule where I can work on a more advanced 2nd version.
Every week I should be able to post about any progress I've made.
Some of the first tasks are these and all of the above:
- Limitless world generated on the fly
- Backpack for resources
- Build weapons/tools with resources
- World above the underground (mountains / clouds / space?)
- Visible character customization
This is just a version 1 of what could be my first public on going game. Once a few visible and fun features are built in I will post a new version at some interval so fans can keep up with the progression.
Thats about all this week hopefully next week I will have made more progress.