Bubblegum Sunday - Devlog 9

Since putting out the clothing test in November we’ve been hard at work continuing work on the game. I had to focus on the Xmas project during December but now I’ve been busy with the game quite a bit!

Programming

On the programming side, the store is pretty much wrapped up at this point. Buying items has been integrated as is the ability for your own inventory to be built (so items that you buy will be added to your wardrobe). Besides that we’ve rethought some of the logic of the store to improve how it feels to use, as well as implementing some of the user feedback.

Since we want it to be easy for players to be able to not only create looks but also save them, we’ve implemented a system that allows you to save and load your created looks. It’s a simple addition that will make it a lot more freeing to experiment with your looks without losing your favorites!

Right now the big thing Vivi is tackling is the saving system. It’s quite complex since we are dealing with player customized information to save (not only which clothes you own but also which custom colors you have applied).

Art

On my side, I’ve been tackling many things at once. I’ve rethought how the UI could work and I’ve landed on the idea of using the phone screen as the UI. It’s a little hard to imagine perhaps but hopefully these images help to understand it a little better.

These are the 4 main UI screens we are currently dealing with. It may sound weird but it took FOREVER to come up with this UI solution that works for all 4.

Using this approach I can stylize most of the UI windows to be a phone UI (and stores could be visualized as websites)

I’ve also sat down and ironed out most of the how the map is going to look. This will help me ground the game more and find the correct position for each location/store. It was quite interesting to do!

I was able to use this map to then come up with the view that I will be using for the main menu. I've marked the area with a red rectangle. This is just a sketch but still gets the idea across.

(Just like the old BGS the main menu will have a day and night version)

I also experimented with animating the logo. I’ve had this idea in my head since I first designed this logo and I’m glad how this came out!

For the save slots I had the idea of using ID cards to represent your character and the progress you’ve made. This will be shown on screen when you are loading your save file. 

Finally here is another NPC character I drew. Not much context around her for spoiler reasons, but enjoy!

I hope you’ve enjoyed seeing the progress so far!

Love,

Alba & Vivi