This is part of a series of updates on my 90 Days & Ship It! Jam 2021 journey. 7 weeks left!

Progress Report

I encountered some issues with the game design (which led to an unproductive week). As I was drawing maps 1-5 in Tiled and testing them, I realized that picking up, dropping and using items doesn’t work for all types of items. It’s much more intuitive to just pick up items and keep them. But what about consumable items, like fuel and TNT? How can users intuitively use them if there are several of them in the cargo bay. They also make designing the levels quite challenging, if they aren’t consumed immediately. Long story short: I decided to keep it simple. Fuel and repair kit items are consumed directly and I removed TNT and force field items for now. Instead I’ll focus on adding more static objects to the levels that have various influences on the players.

Here is an updated list of my core vision for the game.

Game Mechanics

• Fly spaceship through levels of varying complexity (single player or 2P split-screen coop)
• Spaceship has health and can be repaired with item
• Spaceship has cargo bay that can be expanded with item (up to 4 slots)
• Spaceship consumes fuel and can be refueled with item
• Players can pick up items; consumable items are consumed directly
• Keys open doors; doors can optionally be directional

Items

• Container: Players need to transport it to the designated destination pad
• Repair Kit (consumable): Replenishes health of spaceship
• Fuel (consumable): Refuels spaceship
• Cargo Expander (consumable): Adds another slot to the cargo bay
• Key: Available in 4 stylish colors and opens doors with corresponding color code

Static Objects

(TBD)

For the next update I will make a video of the initial five levels.