Minor Changes

Today I tweaked a lot of the minor gameplay mechanics.  The lantern will no longer run out of fuel in the first area (still debating this - it might be better if it did) and you can run for a longer duration and with less of an interval.

The arm is now textured and in 3D.  It looks really nice in my opinion.

Any Maize-related questions?

Saving / Vacation

After a lot of consideration, I've decided to go with a save system, possibly without a "quick mode".  I think that will ensure everyone has a similar enjoyable (and terrifying) experience.

I've also been working on modeling a 3D arm.  That's going really well and should be done pretty soon.

Unfortunately, I'm leaving for vacation soon and there won't be any updates for a while.  Sorry.  I'll have some screenshots and maybe a beta build for you guys when I return, though, so look forward to that.  (There won't be any spoilers in the beta.)

Driver's Ed/GUI Promo

So I started Driver's Ed today.  Good, except the fact that the class runs until 7 PM after school every day for the next three weeks and that means I'm pretty much swamped with other non-Maize obligations.  That, unfortunately, means I might be a bit occupied for the next few weeks and won't update as frequently :(

Good news: this blog is really gaining popularity, and that's awesome.  Please don't hesitate to share this with your long-lost relatives on Facebook/G+/Twitter/whatever.

Maize is coming along very well.  The hand, GUI, and pause menu are coming along very nicely, and I think I'll have those done sooner than I expected.  To celebrate, here's a sneak preview of them:

Can't wait for these three weeks of occupation to be over.  But don't worry, I'll keep you guys updated.

Hands and Enemies

Today I've been working on the GUI hands that will appear in the game.  They're coming along very well so far.  Those should be done in, maybe, a week.

Another thought: after this is finished, I'll move on to working on the enemy.  Even after three months, I'm a little unsure as to what exactly the enemy will be.  The good people of reddit gave me some great ideas; feel free to show them up and leave some ideas in the comments.

So yeah, all is well.  I might be a little slow to update next week as state standardized tests approach, but I'll do the best I can.

Pause & Arm Progress

After combating several strange bugs with the pause menu, that's done for now.  Phew.  All I have left to do is script the option menu buttons.

Now I've moved on to a very important stage in the development, the creation of the actual arm that will appear on-screen.  I'm doing that in Autodesk Maya, which I've never used before.  However, it runs on OSX, which I'm currently developing Maize out of, and there are many comprehensive tutorials out there.  Still, the learning curve is steep and I should be working on this for the next few weeks.

Here's a snapshot of what I'm doing now:

So far so good!