Dev Diary 14: Inputs Redux
Currently, the state of Lab 77 is as follows:
117 of 128 bugs have been squashed. Of the remaining 11, five require further work and six require more testing or minor fixes.
Artwork, music, sound design and voice overs are being worked on.
First and foremost, the inputs for keyboard have been fixed. Rebindable controls and all. Instead of using the new Player Inputs system I decided to revert to the old input system for all inputs and scrap the new one as there simply seemed no point in trying to get the new one to work. I could possibly have gotten the new one to work if I tried to completely re-implement it, but as I had to do that anyways I decided to go wit the version where I knew the problems I would encounter were solved. Furthermore, I also have controller inputs implemented for the in game controls. Though more work is needed to get the menu navigation to work for controller inputs as unity does not treat the dpad as four buttons but as two axes. An unintended side effect of doing this was re-examining the slidyness of S539-77 and making slight adjustments to increase the slidyness by a factor of 0.25.
Secondly, having solved the inputs issues I was finally able to do more playtesting and gather more data. I now believe I have sufficient data to properly implement both medium and hard mode, where there will be limitations on the number of placements you can do per level. I will set the limitations at the average number of placements in the recorded data rounded down for hard mode and the average rounded down plus four for the medium mode. Of course these will both be tested to ensure all levels are completable and you can collect all the lab notes.
Thirdly, I implemented more particle effects based on playtesting feedback. These particle effects are an explosion of red particles on the death block when it is hit and bursts out of the sides of the teleportation destination blocks depending on the direction they teleport in. I will probably keep whittling away at these and the other particle effects over time, but I am quite happy with how they look so far.
Lastly, I have begun outlining my next "weekend" project. I unfortunately do not have much to share just yet but I think I will be trying out the Flax engine for it to see what it is like to work with. As always if you are interested in seeing more about this project and Lab 77 behind the scenes you can join the Patreon at the special supporter tier and the connected Discord server. And of course if you want to join the supporter tier that is also very much appreciated. With the state the industry is in at the moments, I do firmly believe that supporting indie developers is the best thing you can do.
That is all for this dev diary, more to come in two weeks.
Thank you for reading.
- Olav