Neon Exodus Prototype: #Devtober Postmortem

Hello! My name is Jazmine and this month I challenged myself to work on a game everyday (well almost everyday).

My goal was to have a working game prototype to add to my portfolio, because I don't have any personal projects other than university ones. And of course to have a solid portfolio, I'll need to showcase that I can achieve a complete game (or prototype in this case) on my own time! I didn't want to overwhelm myself to achieve a complete game in 31 days, since this is my first game project solo, so a prototype was my starting goal!

What went well:

The programming went pretty smoothly. This is only the second time I really worked in Unity to create a game; the first time was with a group for a university project. Since that first project I've had months to build my programming skills in various courses, so returning to Unity with new knowledge made this second run fairly easy. Anything I didn't know a quick Google search or YouTube tutorial helped.

I learned so many new things like:

• How to create a shader to make objects fade within a certain distance of the camera
• How to work with the universal render pipeline to create a player silhouette when they're behind objects
• Post processing effects and lighting
• The benefits of occlusion culling
• How to use 3D audio for directional sounds
• How to use a mesh renderer to create a visible view cone with code
• Debugging tools like gizmos
• How to make AI smarter and combine logic with NavMeshes
• How to add animations

It was a month filled with new knowledge and it was so fun!

The idea behind #Devtober is to get in the habit of working on your game. To build some discipline and not let "motivation" be your only drive. I definitely feel the need to open Unity or work on some aspect of game development every day now. It's become a habit that I feel weird skipping. 

What went wrong:

Level Design was even scarier than Halloween itself!

If you've been following my game dev journey over on X, you may remember the challenges I've faced while trying to design a game level -- especially for a 3D stealth game set in a neon city. I had a vision in my head, but it was very challenging trying to execute the design. I had to think about where each enemy should be placed, what objects should be around to give the player a hiding spot, where should various decorative objects go. I was overwhelmed! I didn't realize how challenging level design was and I have huge props to all the passionate level designers out there. I spent days trying to design a level and ultimately decided to use the demo scene provided by the asset pack creator. It was a decision I had to make to push development forward after being stagnant for too long.

Feature Creep

OHH so scary!! I had grand ideas for Neon Exodus. I spent the earlier weeks of the month exploring them and ultimately wasting precious time. I had to be brave and cut out some ideas for the benefit of finishing this prototype.

Health

I wanted to include this because health is very important to remember as a game developer. The passion you have for creating games must not get in the way of your own health! I broke some good habits to work on this game daily and that was not okay! I still went to the gym and ate all my meals, but I would sometimes forget to sleep. Sleep is very important, so if you plan to do a challenge like this get some rest! You won't be able to be your best, creative, and smart self without that energy. 

Lessons Learned:

• Level design is difficult - I may need to reach out to level designers in the future and/or practice some more!
• Prioritize mechanics and game loop first - Because what's a game without a core game loop?
• Just complete the game even if its bad (especially as a new game developer). The mistakes made provide valuable lessons!
• With more time I would improve the placement of enemies, add some friendly NPCs to provide context to the world, and add climbing to the player can traverse the world vertically as well.