Cargo Released!

What's up everybody? You ready for some high-speed highway traffic-dodging action? Then look no further, because Cargo is officially out now!! After taking nearly the whole month, I've finally finished it. You can play it on Game Jolt here: http://gamejolt.com/games/cargo/122511

Cargo is an arcade-style driving game where you play as a trucker out to make it rich on the long-haul circuit! You control an 18-wheeler cargo truck barreling down a highway congested with traffic and patrolled by watchful police cars. Your mission is to reach the end of your journey as quickly as possible, collecting pickups and dodging other vehicles along the way. At the end of each day you can use your hard-earned money to buy upgrades for 
your rig. Your ultimate goal is to save up $1,000,000 and retire to a trucker's life of luxury!

This is far and away the most extensive game I've ever completed. Many hours were sunk into Cargo over the last few weeks. Here's hoping you enjoy playing it as much as I've enjoyed making it! :)

As always, if anyone out there plays the game and likes it, please leave a comment, because I would love to here from you!

Onward and upward!

Dev Blog #4: Doin' Time

Howdy howdy howdy! Time for another exciting developer blog from yours truly! This has been a pretty cool week for Cargo, as I've finally implemented what I knew from the start would be the trickiest core feature: Police chases! That's right, now you can lead the cops on an exciting chase down the highway! And that's not even the only thing I've accomplished this week...

The first batch of screenshots I'm sharing is an overview of the saving and loading screens. Cargo uses a simple save file system. You have three save files to choose from:

The save menu, accessible from the end-of-day menu.

And the load menu, accessible from the main menu.

Incidentally, this is the aforementioned main menu, in
all its huge-titled glory.

The next few shots show some details about police cars and their behavior. It took a lot of fine-tuning to get the cop cars to perform at the level I wanted them to. Probably no other feature in the game took more time to get up and running, hence the punny title of this week's blog.

Here we see a police car, relaxing in its natural habitat. Notice
the "legality" icon at the top-center of the screen.

You'll never take me alive!!!

Or, you know, maybe you will...

I've made a lot more progress as well, but that's about all I want to reveal at the moment. Not much stands in the way of this game being rolled out, aside from some assets (the game still woefully lacks music and sound) and final touches. The next dev blog is due in a week, and I may or may not already have the game released before then!

I'm gonna take an aside here and actually talk about this blog for a moment, since these thoughts have been on my mind and have no doubt influenced my development process (see, I'm still on topic!). I started this blog as part of my New Year's resolution to become a "real" game developer, since I reasoned that if someone out there read about my games and was expecting me to actually complete them, it would give me more incentive and focus. It is still quite early on in the year, but I'm pleased to say that my plan has worked well thus far. I've been a coder for a while, and I've made little (usually unfinished) games for five years now. I can honestly say that I've learned and grown more as a developer in the last two months than I ever have before.

This blog and my other social media outlets have taken me out of my comfort zone. I'm actually a very introverted person, but my ultimate dream is to be a game designer, indie or otherwise, professional or otherwise. I'll probably never become a hotshot developer, but I can at least say now that I'm a "real" developer: I have a game out there that you can play, and another on the way. I'm not in it looking to make a fortune, but I do want to be the best game developer I can be. Making games makes me happy, and part of making games is trying to get people to actually play them. You have to talk and be visible as well as code, draw, and write, no matter who you are, and I've realized that over the last few months.

I also realize that I'm rambling a bit. :) All I'm trying to say is, if you're a potential game developer, don't hide in your shell like I did for half a decade. Make something! Put it out there! Make something else! Talk about it! And do it because you love it!

So long! See you next week, or maybe before!!

Dev Blog #3: A Lack of Productivity

Hello everyone, I'm back again for my weekly developer blog! This week I don't have very much to report. Progress on the Cargo has slowed somewhat, thanks in large part to the Spring semester beginning for me this past week. Classes eat up a lot of my time, and what's more, I actually have a job on-campus, which leaves me with still fewer free hours.

But enough with the excuses! Since you're here reading this, you must be chomping at the bit to hear more about Cargo, right? Of course you are! So let me get right into it!

As I said, limited progress has been made this week. One of the main successes I've had is implementing the upgrade screen. It currently is missing much of it's text, but at least it is displaying.

I find the rich purple hue to be nice and relaxing after a long
day of barreling down the highway.

Most of the text is not there yet.

The other main thing to show is the fact that cars now leave behind a wreckage sprite when they've been crashed. This comes as part of a large series of tweaks to car behavior. The random traffic you encounter on the road should seem significantly more intelligent than before, especially in the thru-lane.

 

A grizzly scene...

That about does it for the progress I've made this week. I've been kinda slacking, I know, but the good news is that next week should allow me quite a bit more time to get things done with the game. Hopefully by the next dev blog, I've have the police cars (an integral feature) implemented!

Fare thee well, for now!

Dev Blog #2: Map-making

Hey folks, I'm back with another update on the status of my current work-in-progress game, Cargo! This has been a pretty eventful week for the development of the game. I've implemented several important features and learned a lot about Construct Classic in the process. So, without further ado, here's what has happened since last we spoke!

First, the external map is now up and running. You can now see information about possible destinations and choose where to travel to from this screen.

The green pinpoint indicates your current location.

The tooltip that appears when highlighting a location.

Who's up for a trip to Disney World?

Second, significant changes have been made to the UI. The current design is temporary and for testing purposes, but it displays nearly all the information that will be necessary for the final version (a time counter has yet to be implemented, but its not going to take long to complete).

Condition, fuel, distance to go, and money meters have all been
added to the UI.

That mysterious pickup will give you money. Who woulda thunk it? :)

Finally!

Lastly, several tweaks and changes to the game logic and organization have been made, thanks to my ever-increasing fluency with Construct (I like to think I've gone from a lost, floundering novice to a somewhat wiser, floundering novice). I really like this tool, and despite its quirks, I hope to use it for other things in the future. I also might make a few tutorials for Construct Classic to pass on some of the things I learn, since it seems like free training for the engine is comparatively scarce.

Development is still on track, and I hope to have the last two hurdles (the upgrade screen and the police chase mechanic) done pretty soon. Stay tuned for more info! :)

Dev Blog #1: Announcing Cargo!

Today, I'm pleased to announce some details regarding my next game for #1GAM: Cargo!

Cargo is a game about skill, resource management, and blatant disregard for posted speed limits. You are a trucker out on the open road trying to make a buck (or, you know, a million), and you must use every tool at your disposal to achieve your goal! Drive fast and weave madly through traffic, collect money for a job well done, and upgrade your rig to increase performance and profit! But watch out: The police are out and about, and they're always ready to chase a trouble-making trucker like yourself!



I've been developing this game for the past few days using the Construct Classic game engine by Scirra, which is available for free on SourceForge. Its been a while since I've used a game making tool like this, but I'm pleased to say that Construct is pretty intuitive.

The simple drag-and-drop general interface of Construct Classic.

I've made quite a bit of progress thus far, and have the controls, traffic and pickups, truck condition, MPH, relative world speed, and scrolling background up and running. The art is mostly still in a placeholder state, though I'm happy with the way the general traffic cars and the roads look.

 

Please ignore the hideous placeholder grass art.

At the rate at which development is going, I'm hoping that I can include most of the features I have in mind by the time of the due date. Here are a few more screenshots to help get you excited for this game!

Condition meter tracks the damage done to your truck.

Most cars travel at or near the speed limit. You will not ;)

A repair pickup, whizzing by at breakneck speed.

As always, thanks for reading this far, and be sure to check back regularly for updates! Bye for now!

(P.S. Happy belated New Year!!!)