7DFPS Challenge: Day 7

     "Empty Chambers" was completed at 3:00 AM this morning. You can read the pitch about it and download it on the games page. It's entry on the 7DFPS site is here.

     Before I talk about the game itself, I want to mention that the 7 Day FPS Challenge was a wonderful experience. I really enjoyed reading up on everybody's progress at the end of each day. Even though each team used a different development tools, were of varying sizes, and had wildly different end goals, I felt a lot of solidarity with the whole community. To each of you who completed a game this week, congratulations! Also thanks to those of you who helped organize it.

     Also, this is the first damn videogame that I finished making in three years. This is a really big milestone for me. Most of the time, I don't even get far enough to begin implementing sound. It was a good experience to have gone through the entire development cycle for once. Not only is it good practice, but it's a good reminder to myself that I am actually capable of making and releasing a full game.

     Now, I'm still damn tired from working lasting night and won't write too much else. I have a lot of things I want to say about game violence, shooters and storytelling, and this game in particular, but that discussion will be much more fruitful as I receive feedback on the game. This is in a few ways an experimental game - I made some creative decisions without knowing what the effect would be, and from the little feedback I have received I don't think that the effect was at all what I had intended. So give me feedback. Pretty please? Thanks!

EDIT: Oh, and as far as the last 36 hours of development went, it was pretty hellish. I spent 4-5 hours working out the gunfight at the end, another hour adding the zeppelins and bombs, another hour making and figuring out sound effects for the first time in forever, and still another hour doing boring mundane shit. Totally worth it, though.

     There was a lot I had hoped to get done that I didn't get to: there was supposed to be a section with turrets, and the last level was supposed to be a war zone with civilians under attack from the zeppelins and stuff, and I wanted to add more banter between the player and the fugitive, but it was all low-priority stuff. Perhaps I'll add it later.