Lazy Ben

I’ve been working hard on texture generation in the level compiler. Combining textures across prefabs to reduce overdraw is now a thing. You can lay down practically infinite layers of floor textures with zero overdraw. 👌
#gamedev | #indiedev | #solodev

Take a look at std::expected. It might be what you need. 😊

I’ve spent a second day working through c++ coroutines. Once you hide away all the fluff you can actually wrap them up in to a nice little api that’s easy to use. I’m a bit stumped on use cases tho.

Question: Anyone have any experience using them in their games?

#gamedev #indiedev #solodev

Took the day off engine coding to have a look at c++ coroutines…holy moly that was an experience.
#gamedev | #indiedev | #solodev

I’m 75% done with the level compiler in my game engine. Animated rigs, rivers, and ponds are now all supported. I’ve got triggers, colliders, and paths to do next but these don’t require any art assets to be compiled into game data, so should be quicker to do! 👌
#gamedev | #indiedev | #solodev

Just finished a good week of coding on the game engine. I’ve been working on the content pipeline that transforms text files produced by the level editor into binary game data. It’s 50% done I’d say so one more week should do it! 👌
#gamedev | #indiedev | #solodev

Finally, after 2 months of development, the prefab system in my engine is done! A lot of code clean up to do tho! 👌 #happy #gamedev #solodev #indiedev

Here's a nice screenshot of the editor in my #gameengine.
Still work to do, but getting there now!

#gamedev | #solodev | #indiedev

It’s the end of a productive week! I wrote my first Twitch overlay (to warn viewers/me ads are starting). I also made progress on my level editor. I can now add/remove triggers! 👌
#gamedev | #solodev | #indiedev

I’m going to have an experiment with the Twitch API today. The goal is to write an ‘ads starting soon’ overlay for my #gamedev stream. Am I going to be in for a good time? 🤷

I’ve been stressing out the new prefab system in my engine today. I integrated triggers and started on colliders. The system held up well overall and it should be straightforward to integrate gameplay specific content when I begin full production on the game in a few weeks! 👌
#gamedev | #solodev

Awesome Twitch stream today! I’ve been spending my days coding up a new iteration of the level editor in my engine. It’s nearly there! Today was the properties panel! Who’d have thought that would be my most popular stream to date!?
#gamedev | #solodev | #indiedev | #indiegame

Finally got to the end of implementing prefabs in my game engine. Nearly time to move to full-scale production of my Sci-Fi gardening game! It’ll be nice to get back to some gameplay coding!
#gamedev | #indiedev | #solodev | #indiegame

I got prefabs working in the editor today! You can now draw in a bunch of sprite sheet tiles and add collision, particle effects, scripts etc. Save this as a prefab brush and stamp instances of it around the level. Prefabs can also contain other prefabs and it’s turtles all the way down! #gamedev

I’ve been building a new pc and installing the new CPU may have been the scariest thing I’ve ever done! 😬 #gamedev

Great day coding up the game engine’s editor. I’ve been working hard on a content cache that allows for asset hot loading across the entire engine. The goal is to be able to slot in new asset types and have it all just work. 👌
#gamedev | #indiedev | #solodev

This week I’ll be reworking the Content Cache in the game engine. It has responsibility for loading and managing editor assets. Adding a new asset type currently requires a fair bit of boiler plate. But,I think I can eliminate almost all of it! 👌
#gamedev | #solodev | #indiedev | #indiegame

You know when a morning’s work turns into a several day slog? I revisited the engine’s lighting system. The plan was to fix a particularly unfriendly crash bug in the lighting generation…it turns out there is quite a lot that needs improving and the bug is probably due to bad design. 🫠
#gamedev

Just my finished my longest ever #gamedev stream! 7.5 hours of none stop c++ coding. Mainly refining code and fixing bugs. The engine is heading towards a pretty stable state now! Thanks to all the chatters! It makes streaming super fun! 🥰

#solodev #indiedev #indiegame

You know when you get to the end of a milestone/project and there’s that huge “todo” list that you’ve been putting off? Well I’m wading through that monstrosity atm! 🫠
#gamedev | #solodev | #indiedev | #indiegame

Currently spending some time designing RPG mechanics for my game. It’s quite amazing just how much work it adds. Every single stat needs at least one complimentary gameplay system. It’s not just a number that goes up or down.
#gamedev | #solodev | #indiedev | #indiegame

I’ve been spending the past weeks tightening up engine features. Feeling the pull back to gameplay coding now. There’s just one more feature to prototype before I’m off preproduction and onto building real game stuff! Exciting times! 👌
#gamedev | #solodev | #indiedev | #indiegame

I added a nice feature into the engine’s behaviour tree system today. You can now add “override” behaviours programmatically whenever you might need to interrupt the tree. Eg the player gets hit by an enemy and you want to use that event to trigger a cutscene? This feature allows for that! #gamedev

Good stream today! I finally got off the NPC instancing stuff and moved on to Path Finding Context. Eg when an enemy is finding cover they can pick the context that only allows paths that avoid the player location. This means NPCs can essentially avoid areas dynamically 👌
#gamedev #solodev #indiedev

Busy day working on the engine. I’m about 70% through an NPC instancing system. The goal is to be able to define behaviour/dialogue/quests/attributes etc for an instance of an NPC type. Eg enemy instances of the same type could react differently to different situations. #gamedev #solodev #indiedev

Two steps forward today! Path finding is fully working using background threads with and without a nav mesh! Even on my super low end laptop there’s no perceived delay when calculating paths for NPCs! 👌
#gamedev | #solodev | #indiedev | #indiegame

Today was a “one step back for two steps forward” kind of day. Except I’ve yet to take the two steps forward. 🫠 #gamedev | #solodev | #indiedev | #indiegame

Big love to all the devs affected by the layoffs over at Microsoft today! Hopefully a bunch of you come over to the indie space. Your passion project may turn out to be the best thing you ever made!
#gamedev

Good day of coding today! I finally moved NPC path finding onto background threads in the engine. It was stalling the game occasionally but now NPCs can just wait around playing some nice animations until a path becomes available for them to take!
#gamedev | #solodev | #indiegame | #indiedev

Fell down a rabbit hole this weekend. I’ve been trying to reduce dynamic memory allocations in my game engine so I extended my string class with Small String Optimization. I also went over all my support classes to see what’s what and it turned into a major refactor. It was epic codage! #gamedev