Well, I'm stuck waiting until Friday to begin my plan for worldcompetitive domination, and in the interim I'm stuck making/fixing/upgrading my toolkit.

Already, I have a plan for my game, which is going to be 3D, and will use the core engine I created for the last comp (Which is just a display framework, really).

I'm planning on taking my failed idea from the last S4D comp (Lightbound), and translating it into a proper game, with a comparatively thoughtful story, and some actual gameplay this time, and fewer attempted jump-scares.

A couple of things I'm trying with the level format involve translating my levels into solid pieces of geometry using a custom-made BSP compiler; since the levels are still grid-based, this'll be fairly easy.

Another thing I wanted, which I've already implemented, is the possibility for layered levels. That is, being able to have Room-over/under-Room, something that was missing in Exile. The reason I didn't do it before was because I thought that adding in support for layers to my level editor would be a pain in the ass; turns out it wasn't nearly as bad as I thought it was.

Then there's the stairs. I want Minecraft style stairs, so that stairways look a bit more obvious and prettier at the same time. That won't be a problem.

Then there's the sloped walls; these will be part of the 'slightly harder to implement under the current circumstances than I like but Meh' category. And by sloped, I mean walls that, viewed from above, can be at an angle. Preferably an arbitrary angle, but given the wonderful implementation of my current level format, I'll have to settle for 45 and 20 degree angles instead.

On my list of 'potential' engine features lies an entry called 'static meshes'. Oooh. Sounds nice. I could've added 'em to Exile too. Only one problem: The lighting system isn't quite right at the moment… which brings me to two potential 'must haves' for the engine:

Shadows and Lighting. Best if shader based, for speed concerns and potential normal mapping. Which would look interesting. This actually requires me to 'bake' my levels into some solid geometric format first, because I need to calculate lightmaps and such. And this being the first 3D framework I've actually gotten somewhere with, I'm very much new to a lot of the techniques that I want to use. Therefore: I probably won't end up implementing a lot of these things. Besides the sloped walls, stairs, and trigger zones, because those are more within my field of expertise.

Anyways…

A fun night wasted…

So, yesterday I decided I needed to learn one of the alternate window toolkits, so I could forever escape from the absolute horror that is the Windows API. Also GTK.

In this spirit, I set forth and downloaded wxWidgets… And rolled my eyes when I saw that it requires one to compile it themselves (I'm getting used to it by now though).

At 6PM, I began compilation. At 11PM, I got a linker error.

Resolution? I'm downloading one of the slightly outdated but precompiled packages. End of story.

Anyway, arbitrary convoluted blog of arbitrary convolution is at an end. I'm almost in Wall of Text mode again…