Happy new years to all!

The bi-annual charity speedrunning marathon Awesome Games Done Quick is on this week! I’d strongly encourage anyone reading this to check it out — it’s a week of the world’s best players beating games in record time (and sometimes even racing each other head-to-head!) all in the name of raising money for the Prevent Cancer Foundation. Pretty amazing to see games and gamers having such a positive impact.

As for me, I spent this week getting organized for the new year. I used sticky notes to map out what’s left and which parts depend on others, letting me figure what order to tackle things in.

I also decided to cut some extra features that were too ambitious or overly complicated. For example, I was going to have six difficulty levels (why!??) but now it’s back down to four — the game hasn’t gotten any easier or harder, there’s just a bolder difference between difficulties, making them feel more significant. It’s also easier to keep track of in my head. I’m hoping that focusing the design will let me get the game complete sooner than later (and also lead to a stronger game.)

Finally, I repeated my self-congratulating behaviour of last year and graphed my hours worked!

Last year I did 1,559 actual hours worked. This year was 1,786! I’m pretty proud of how disciplined I’ve become over time, so it’s satisfying to see it all laid out.

That’s it from me! I’m gonna enjoy my last day of vacation, and then start finishing this darn game!