Back to the roots

I have a couple of semi-ambitious games in my pipe, but they're not close to completion in any way. This is kind of frustrating, doing this over and over again. And to top it of, I have the urge to start coding on more games. That would leave me with even more uncompleted games in the end, but with a more solid framework. That's the only thing that becomes better with every iteration.

Somewhere in my head there's a voice telling me that I should do a custom engine for every game, but then I wouldn't progress and save time in the future. On the other hand, every custom engine would probably be better. The one I have right now supports Unity, XNA/MonoGame and WPF3D. The WPF3D and XNA/MonoGame versions aren't complete at all. They're mainly used for fast testing when I do my game logic. My primary target is Unity since it covers so mant platforms w/o many compromises.

So, what about back to the roots. I've thought about remodelling my old game, Blow him up!, to run on my new framework in Unity. That should be a pretty small feat and would give me some motivation. So I don't feel like a complete failure when it comes to making games. Of course, I do it for fun, but it never feels good to only have unfinished projects in your history.

Getting things done

Seems like I can't get much done nowadays. With the kids and the many colds and flus during this season, nothing much is happening. During the days I'm working on my regular job and when the clock strikes 22 and my daugther is sleeping, I'm off to battle the noob in Dota 2. Great game, so fun. Have been playing HoN and LoL, but I started out with Dota and I'm going to stick with Dota. It's the same thing, still. Like an old pair of shoes.

Basic concept of a MVC inspired decoupled game framework

I've been looking at different game engines for the last months and finally I've settled for Unity 3D. I still don't like attaching scripts to GameObjects and that started me down a path of totally abstracting away the rendering and input part of the engine. So far it has been a complete success :). I've gotten inspired by Asp.NET MVC and how well it separates the code.

There's a lot to take into consideration and I don't strive to be 100% true to the MVC pattern. I use it where it makes sense and use a service-pattern where that makes sense. Concepts are something to help you, no constrain you. The important thing is that the view engine specifics have been clearly separated from the game logic.

Unity 3D to support Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8

Hmmm, this might be what swings me into the Unity 3D camp. Also, that Axoim doesn't really have any unified sound system (or input system) for it's different devices.

Unity 3D will handle everything for me. I just need to get used to making a lot of "scripts". I think it will feel very different from working in Visual Studio.

Articles:

Gamasutra: David Helgason details most ambitious Unity engine yet.php

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