Playability has arrived! It is still not nearly finished, but the game is officially playable. You load up, have a menu, play the levels in order, and have a win screen. Hooray! I can see the light at the end of the tunnel!

Started and finished the level editor, which great results. I’ve had a surprising amount of fun just goofing off creating levels (it’s like pixel art, only… not). Here are a few examples.

Made some changes to the wall code – walls are now rendered separately and are added to the pymunk space as static objects. This brought my fps on the maze level (HEAVY on the walls) from 4 back up to the cap of 30.

Here is a screenshot of the maze level. Imagine doing this without the level editor… **shudder**

The bot builder is now finished. I’ve gone totally overboard on using basic sprites instead of a GUI, but I think it turned out. It looks a little corny, but maybe that gives it flavor (if you like corn, I guess). The bot builder will only allow you to pick the weapons available for the level you are on, so we can customize the challenges using the levels. I decided against letting people bind their own keys. It would have been nifty, but it just isn’t worth the amount of time I’d have to spend at this point.

Behold the bot builder! (Should really be called the weapon selection screen or something).

Office Space 5000 – Weapon Selection Screen

The pressure is really on now. Mix Tape (art) is out of town for the duration, but he is supposedly going to be sending in work from the road. I finished fluids and the menus last night. I’m behind schedule, but if no real work comes up today I think I can make it. Still have a few weapons to create, then the entire bot builder, the debrief screen, and the high score system. I’ve been judiciously stripping away features as time goes by, so we will see which of these actually make it to the final version.

I haven’t even started on sound and music yet, which is weighing heavily on my soul. I started to look around a bit for some free music to use, and I might go that route if I can confirm it is within the rules. Otherwise I have to hash out a BUNCH of sound in SFXR or with my mic, then figure out Musagi and quickly develop some musical talent. Sigh.

Anyway, there is a new video up on youtube with the fluids in. When you bash in a drum without blowing it up, the fluid inside will leak out onto the ground. Acid will eat through drums and boxes, gas will explode, water dilutes the others and washes them away. Check it out here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZNvHymEIXds

Not a huge update, but moderately different gameplay. Explosions have knockback now, so they will send items flying. I also scaled melee damage to speed, so you do more the faster you go and you don’t do any for just sitting up against something. Should make for more gameplay clearing the way to build up lots of speed and set off large chain reactions. Finally, you can also see the little rocket launchers on the bot now.

Here is the video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nSvZB9Jgi24