Trying out a new approach for rewarding flagged mines. The engine now checks its neighbours when entering a cell. If you want to earn credits you'll need to flag the cells and take the risk of getting it wrong when you drive close. #gamedev #indiedev #godot #indiegame

New radio receiver upgrade so you can stay connected to the towers in transit. May add a range indicator but I want to be careful with the amount of info on the screen. Going to try a crane next to pick up items next to the track 🛤️ #gamedev #indiedev #godot #indiegame

Route planning is now sorted and our second favourite direction (backwards) has returned! #gamedev #indiedev #indiegame #godot

Still working on the more lightweight UI updates. Need to get to the next town over though to do some more testing which is a great opportunity to work on the new route visualisation. #gamedev #indiedev #indiegame #godot

Taking a break from hunting for feedback and swapped gears into applying a less saturated colour palette for a moodier feel. Drawing some new UI elements too that are less chunky to leave more space for the game world. #gamedev #indiedev #godot

Trainsweeper 0.2.0 is now available! This was a major rework of a lot of the core systems based on the 0.1.0 playtest. If you're interested I would love feedback and thoughts on the game. mangomoose.itch.io/trainsweeper #gamedev #indiedev #indiegame #godot #trains #playtest

Trainsweeper by Mango Moose

Survive a minesweeper world with your train

mangomoose.itch.io

Careful around those radio towers! #gamedev #indiedev #godot #indiegame

Got rewards working again for correctly flagging mines and added in a quick explainer for it. Final push to get a 0.2.0 release out for testing! #godot #gamedev #indiedev #indiegame

Skill tree is in along with some rough ideas for potential skills. Currently using a data transfer mechanic to extract research from buildings out in the world to be spent as skill points. That's all the big features for now so 0.2.0 release is around the corner! #gamedev #indiedev #godot #trains

Have pulled all the latest updates back in to the main game so we're on track for a 0.2.0 update next week! Have made the maps more interesting and plugged in mission rewards so they get awarded on completion. Last big piece is some kind of talent tree, stay tuned! #indiedev #gamedev #godot #trains

Created a minimap component for Trainsweeper that's now used for the main UI minimap, a larger map / quest log, and the missions section for the event UI! All part of the overhaul to improve the missions part of the game loop. #gamedev #indiedev #godot #trains

Beetles are back in. They're not a danger but they do slow you down which could be dangerous at later points in the game. The UV light upgrade deters them for now so you can make your escape. #indiedev #gamedev #godot

Big step forward for the upgrades, they now impart both stats and effects on to the train cars (and sometimes their neighbours). #gamedev #indiedev #godot

Busy couple of days of business admin and Linux setup so a quick one today, just setup a test scene so I can iterate on the train cars and upgrades super quickly. I'm quite enjoying the Tardis train station! #gamedev #indiedev #godot

Back from the holiday and have finally made the jump to Linux. In the process of getting everything setup but Godot and Trainsweeper are running fine 🥳🍻 #gamedev #indiedev #godot #linux

Have a busy week of travelling followed by a week of holiday so Trainsweeper updates shall be slow for a little while. Did enjoy this watch though about balancing safe bets against moonshots to try and carve out a space for your business www.youtube.com/watch?v=WueQ... #gamedev #indiedev

I Analysed 62,000 Indie Developers. Here's What Actually Predicts Success

YouTube video by Game Oracle

youtube.com

Added stations and radio transmissions. Big update in progress for train car buffs and stats. This is going to allow for tons of interesting choices for which train cars to get, what order to use them in, and which upgrades to equip. Can't wait to start adding them! #gamedev #indiedev #godot

Explosion particle effects are now in and mine functionality is working again with the new grid system. Also experimenting with having the camera's zoom affect the volume of positional sounds (like the explosions). Back to working on some train upgrades and cars tomorrow! #gamedev #indiedev #godot

Getting somewhere recreating Will's pixel explosion (link below) using particles. Particles are on the left and pixel art on the right. Lacking some artistry still but I think I can close the gaps. #indiedev #gamedev #godot #pixelart

Forgot to mention, as a part of the grid and rail track rework I added switchable tracks! Now you can build more interesting routes without needing to remove and replace lines. #gamedev #indiedev #godot

Didn't even manage to open Godot today 😪 I have been daydreaming about particle systems to add to Trainsweeper explosions though. Does anyone know if there's anything similar to godotshaders.com but for particles? A reference library of cool particle effects would be super handy. #gamedev #godot

I always enjoy People Make Games videos but this one had me smiling, laughing, and reflecting throughout the whole thing. A beautiful intersection of artists and creators. www.youtube.com/watch?v=Is8N...

He Won’t Stop Building a Map to an Imaginary Place

YouTube video by People Make Games

youtube.com

Got a bit distracted watching the $200k stolen Lego story this evening but did squeeze in a little time to start wiring up placeholder SFX for minesweeping interactions. Slight headphone warning on the mine explosion. #indiedev #gamedev #godot

Got inventory and train management working again. Upgrades are back on the menu boys! Hope you're all in for a good weekend 🌞 #indiedev #gamedev #godot

Got a little bit distracted adding some juice to the main menu, back to fixing equipping train car upgrades now. Looks like I need to figure out how to capture the mouse in Godot movie maker mode too 🤔 #gamedev #indiedev #godot

Minefield fog shader now working again after the rework for speedy load times. Also been doing a little mood boarding for some other cool games to take inspiration from. #indiedev #solodev #gamedev #godot

Finally sorted some splash screens for the game startup. Required moving the map setup to its own thread to prevent the loading animations getting blocked. Turns out using multi-threading with local to scene shaders can really lag scene instantiation! #indiedev #gamedev #godot

Another benefit of the map/track rework is that there's no longer a speed limit required to stop the game from breaking. You may experience extreme G forces at stations now though 😅 Time to try out the bullet train sprite 🚅 #indiedev #gamedev #godot

In the middle of a substantial update to incorporate feedback from the 0.1.0 release of Trainsweeper. I've completely reworked the map loading so there aren't any lag spikes when loading in new chunks. Now we've got a window of grid cells that load data as you move around. #indiedev #gamedev #godot

What a great weekend! Took a trip to the Lake District and got my first ever donations for my game dev work 🥳. A huge thank you to whoever the anonymous donors were 🙏