[NEWS] July 1 Update
Hey everyone,
As you may know, my plan as of a few months ago involved having Level Q done by now, Level H by the end of this month, and the game by the end of August.
First of all, Level Q is done. This is a great milestone in my opinion, because Level Q is the last level in the game in terms of playing order. All that's left now level-wise is the hub level that these all connect to and the tutorial level. I've saved the tutorial level for last simply because it's the first thing people will see of the game once it's out, and first impressions are extremely important. I'm far from the only one to take this approach--Shigeru Miyamoto, who designed some of the greatest video games of all time, mentioned in an interview that one of the last levels to be made in Super Mario Bros. was World 1-1. That way, he could take in feedback from testers of the other levels and create a level designed to "accidentally" teach the player how to play the game.
But I digress. In any case, I do not expect Level H to take as long to make as the others, so it's entirely possible that it is finished before the end of the month. If that's the case, I'll move right on to the last step, making everything but the levels, which is actually several steps in one: adding some cutscenes to the current levels, fixing bugs, getting more feedback from testers, adding controller support, adding menus with options, etc. There's a lot to be done then, so I expect that to take me more than a month. Even if I finish Level H early, it's entirely possible that all of that work still lasts more than a month.
Another reason why I expect work to slow down a bit at that time is that in the middle of August, I'm moving to another city to start graduate school. Obviously, there will be a lot on my plate at that point, so I can't make too many promises about getting work done.
Overall, then, this means that you can expect to see Quaternion sometime in September or October. I understand that as that time goes on, it will be harder to justify calling it "summer 2017," but I don't care that much. I'm perfectly on schedule at the moment, just thinking that the schedule should probably be a bit longer than it is. Expect to see an official release date announcement within a month.
As you may know, my plan as of a few months ago involved having Level Q done by now, Level H by the end of this month, and the game by the end of August.
First of all, Level Q is done. This is a great milestone in my opinion, because Level Q is the last level in the game in terms of playing order. All that's left now level-wise is the hub level that these all connect to and the tutorial level. I've saved the tutorial level for last simply because it's the first thing people will see of the game once it's out, and first impressions are extremely important. I'm far from the only one to take this approach--Shigeru Miyamoto, who designed some of the greatest video games of all time, mentioned in an interview that one of the last levels to be made in Super Mario Bros. was World 1-1. That way, he could take in feedback from testers of the other levels and create a level designed to "accidentally" teach the player how to play the game.
But I digress. In any case, I do not expect Level H to take as long to make as the others, so it's entirely possible that it is finished before the end of the month. If that's the case, I'll move right on to the last step, making everything but the levels, which is actually several steps in one: adding some cutscenes to the current levels, fixing bugs, getting more feedback from testers, adding controller support, adding menus with options, etc. There's a lot to be done then, so I expect that to take me more than a month. Even if I finish Level H early, it's entirely possible that all of that work still lasts more than a month.
Another reason why I expect work to slow down a bit at that time is that in the middle of August, I'm moving to another city to start graduate school. Obviously, there will be a lot on my plate at that point, so I can't make too many promises about getting work done.
Overall, then, this means that you can expect to see Quaternion sometime in September or October. I understand that as that time goes on, it will be harder to justify calling it "summer 2017," but I don't care that much. I'm perfectly on schedule at the moment, just thinking that the schedule should probably be a bit longer than it is. Expect to see an official release date announcement within a month.