Tools used

IDE and framework:

I am using Android Studio as IDE and Libgdx as framework. I have hesitated for a long time between Unity and Libgdx both having numerous advantages.

Unity is really handy for 3D games and is more or less a drag-and-drop type of building tool. However, Libgdx might be even more powerful when it is part of 2D games and allows coding almost everything from scratch, which corresponds to what I do. And last but not least, Libgdx (as well as Unity) permits a cross-platform development: I just need to code once in Java and can export both for Android and IOS (Desktop too).

Skeletal 2D animation:

I have chosen Spine, which is a wonderful tool to animate my armors during fights. The tool is not only great for smooth animation but it also makes me save a lot of memory, which is the first challenge when considering image assets.

Map editor:

Tiled, short for Tiled Map Editor, is a must-have for creating tile-based maps and very handy with Libgdx. I use it for certain map-looped animations, for collisions and for event triggers.

Here is one of the maps I have done with Tiled as an example:

Image editor:

I use Gimp to edit some of the images and assets I need to. It is open-source, hence free.

Texture Packer:

I am using Texture Packer to pack certains of textures into atlases. This is very useful when I need to set a skill animation into one Atlas for instance.

Assets

I love developing but I am a terrible artist. My artistic skills stopped improving after my 4th birthday. That’s why I am actually buying every single resources I am using in my project.

Maps assets / Tilesets:

I have found a wonderful artist who has made several complete tile sets. They are not expensive and they actually cover every single piece of map in my project: villages, cities, mountains, island, castles, roads, forests, snow…and all the interiors.

I will be eternally grateful to Celianna and her wonderful creations.

They work perfectly with Tiled.

Example from her website:

NPCs sprites:

Celianna has also created a Sprite’s generator, which becomes very exhaustive with the possibilities offered by Gimp. The sprite generator is included in her Rural Farm pack.

Fighting armors and animations:

An amazingly talented artist, Naresa, with a limitless creative mindset is designing all of my characters on Spine (on commission). From the sketches, to the animation and without forgetting the coloring, she does everything.

Portraits:

I am using a Face Maker generator by Fox Richard. It is free of charge if you credit the original creator in your project and include the link to deviantart page where it is saved.

Backgrounds:

During certain scenes and mostly during the fights, I need several backgrounds. Most of them have been bought on Robert Brooks website: Game Developer Studio.

The rest was been bought on the Game asset market-website: Game Dev Market

User Interface:

The user interface elements, although not definitive, were bought both on Robert Brooks’ website: Game Developer Studio and on Game Dev Market

I have also used a Libgdx skin created by Raymond “Raeleus” Buckley for the TouchPad and another button: Skin

Items:

Bought on Game Dev Market. Mostly from the artist Rexard

Music and VF effect sounds:

Bought on Game Dev Market.

For the sounds, I have found most of them in these 2 packs: Magic pack and Fantasy RPG pack

VF Skills effect:

All the effects for skills animation have been bought on VideoHive through the RTFX Bundle, the 2D Cartoon FX pack and the Elemental 2D FX pack

 

  Game principle:

You will play the role of a young boy or a young girl going to an adventure as a hunter and collect fighting armors from wild, unstable robots (more or less rare and powerful).

You will be progressing according to numerous maps and encountering a lot of NPCs or other hunters who want to challenge you.

An elaborate storyline will put you in a place where you will save the world from conspiracies, make choices that will impact the storyline itself, choose the different guilds you want to achieve missions for…

The game is designed to be played offline, and I will add a LAN fighting multiplayer to play between friends. I might update the app with a WAN multiplayer later after the game release.

At that moment, I cannot tell you more but I hope the gameplay will satisfy you.
 
Current Progress:

I have been working on this project for more than a year already. Actually, not really, as I am far from working on it full-time: I used to spend about 2 to 4 hours in the evenings after my actual job. Some might say it is a lot but others will consider this as an hobby, which it is. At least it started as a fun thing to do during my free time, but then grew more and more serious. And now, it has become a project I really care about.

A lot of codes are already finished through the hundreds of java classes I have created. But there are so many pieces still missing.

Here, a non-exhaustive list of what has been done so far:

  • NPC modules
  • Animation modules
  • UI modules (will be improved with better skins)
  • Collision modules
  • Fight modules
  • List of skills, equipment, enemies….
  • Dialogs modules
  • Inventory modules
  • Save modules
  • Music and sound modules
  • Character modules
  • Event trigger and manager modules
  • Several screen manager (world screen, fight screen, menu screens, dialog screens…)
  • Global variables
  • And a lot more…

But there is so much missing still:

  • In-fight characters and NPCs images
  • Only 32 armors designed among the 135 planned for the release
  • World map modules
  • Only 45% of the cities, roads, caves designed and 35% of the storyline created and implemented in the code.
  • Others

A short video of the actual state of the project (not all functionalities are displayed in it)

 
Objectives:

I will be working with milestones and I will keep you posted on the progress I’ve made as much as possible.
Trying to have the best work-life balance between this project, my work and my family, this challenge is as interesting as tricky.
I hope finishing the alpha version by the end of this year. See you there !

First I would like to thank Ricardo (Clash Legacy) for letting be get inspired by his blog while building mine. Check out his project of how to build a Roguelike MMORPG game for mobile with procedural dungeon generation:

I will try to update the blog as much as possible with my development progress and other interesting information.  As the sole developer of my game, the road to achievement will be full of obstacles and difficulties. That’s why I will work with achievement milestones instead of trying to rush through it.

Setup

Platform

I have used WordPress for a quick setup and for powerful plugins, more especially for the blog-like website.

Theme

I have used the same theme as Clash Legacy Ricardo’s blog: Crangasi.

Comments

From most blogs I saw, Disqus seems to be the best plugin to replace the WordPress’ OOTB comment section. It is free of charge and really intuitive for all people to comment.

Hosting and domain

I have decided to use 1&1 to host the website and for the domain name as all is included in a cheap package and their support can be really handy.