Log 1 - Setting Out

Hi, I’m Will, and I’m learning game design.

I developed a game called Icebreaker - you can play it here. While I’m proud of it, it’s really more of a demo, and wasn’t everything I wanted it to be.

I then started developing Icebreaker DX, an expanded version with a much larger scope. I didn’t design things beforehand and jumped straight into development, so inevitably came to a roadblock and fell off working on the project.

To get back into things, I’m going to focus on designing an implementation of an existing game (Picross) in PICO-8, following good design convention and preparing for the future properly.

This starts with prototyping - the kind that doesn’t sprawl out into a game of its own - and drafting a design document.

I just wanted to see how it could feel in PICO-8, and consider how much space I had to work with on screen. But I already branched off into dealing with the controls, so I’m forcing myself to stop here and shift my focus to the design document!

I’m going to follow this template for the design doc, and I’ll track my progress with these devlogs. I’m busy with university work, but I still want this to be a short and focussed development experience, so I’m setting myself a 1 month deadline for the game.

Look forward to the game’s release on February 9th 2025!

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