INTRO:
After all the amazing feedback from the Improve My Jam 31, I am continuing with Project Aegis under the name Re:AEGIS! In spirit of its origins roots as an attempted entry for 32Bit Winter Jam I am also entering the newest version for 32Bit Spring Cleaning Jam! The way I write devlogs are inspired from SNKRX's devlog by a327ex.  I liked his devlog as it showed the process of the game was made day by day roughly and really showed how iterative the process really was. I hope to do the same here.

GOALS:
Specifically what I wanted done in this game this month is the following:

• Add 4 more entries to spawn table
• Add 6 more powerups
• Add an artifact system like 20 Minutes till Dawn
• Polish up effects for critical interactions
• Add music and sfx
• Fix bugs from feedback
• Polish up and iterate on art

Inspired by GameDevelopMonth Jam extra challenge of providing a Steam release at the end of the jam, I wanted to do the following as well.

• Publish a Steam Page
• Have a game trailer

DEVLOG:

Day 1: 02-05-2024

• Organized Pinterest reference photos into folders to which asset they correspond too to streamline modeling a bit more
• Create Trello Board for all tasks I wanted do for the jam
• Created new model + texture for Power Crystals

Day 2: 02-06-2024

• Long day at work, so did not have 100% of the time I wanted to work on art, so I finished all tags / descriptions on my Steam + Itch.io page, plus some GDD cleaning / brainstorming some power up / iterated on some enemy ideas I had to fit
• Got minor food poisoning, so sat this day out.

Day 3: 02-07-2024

• Took a rest day here. Knocked out

Day 4: 02-08-2024

• Made a recovery, and started to work again
• Created due date for material for first art / juice sprint based off feedback I received
  • Marked for Feb/14

Day 5: 02-09-2024

• Improved aesthetics of the main area by adjusting wireframe, applying a color palette to my assets, lowering glow and adding skybox
• Test and draft ideas for implementing diagetic UI into arm for tracking important session information (current amount to lvl and health)
• Drawing character face in style of Megaman Legends texture atlas

Day 6: 02-10-2024

• Model weapons out for tuning fork
• Played with using purely pixel art textures, but ultimately ditched for speed and not being needed for fitting core vision I had in mind
  • Opting with hybrid approach using image textures, with pixel art post processing. Aiming for mixed artstyle similar to an artist I like called brwler while using more of a late 90's anime style since that is what I like and still matches my theming a bit.
• Modeled 3D cards for upgrade screen
• Create model for the main character + FPS view
• Played Slyders which is like the game I want to make, and took notes on stuff I may want and things to improve on

Day 7: 02-11-2024

• Modeled player main FPS weapon, and imported into Godot
• Completed full player character. Able to be reused among other "humanoid" assets :D
• Created first base coat for player model textures

Day 8: 02-12-2024

• Play around with some designs, but ended up wanted to still want diagetic UI instead of a standard HUD for artistic reasons and immersion.
• Reworked the gun, and managed to implement diagetic UI which saves me so much time and also I am like really bad at UI so I prefer this anyday. Rifle now a mini gun which can animate barrel.
• Rigged character out!
• Modeled out the head without texture so I can get idea of silhouette

Day 9-10: 02-13-2024 - 02-14-2024 

• Rest day to recharge.
  • Art takes a huge chunk of mentally.
• Mark down the 18th as my final deadline for the first layer of visual polish so I do not get stuck into an endless loop
• Mark down sound design to be done at same time as first improve feature sprint starting on the 19th

Day 11: 02-15-2024 

• Create new weapon models bases for powerups
• Create base for spawner
• Finalized player model + main weapon
• Start textures for player model + main weapon

Day 12: 02-16-2024 

• Started adding textures for weapons + add details
• Modeling study for PS1 mech models
• Finish face textures + head model

Day 13 -14 : 02-17-2024  - 2-20-2024

• Okay, this is my bad completely I forgot to keep track of time. Sorry about that. Down below is the quick summary of what was done during this break
  • Created the mascot character and got her rigged up!
  • Created the base for "starting room" which the character learns movement
  • Finished the final block for the machine gun. I will be adding some more polish on that towards the end
  • Got art direction all made up! I got an idea what I want for all art going forward
  • Published by Steam Page. I did this way too early hindsight, but I can make changes after the jam is over.
    • Tangent for a second:
      • I might mention to Earley if I remember about maybe trying out a bonus challenge like Game Development Month Jam where a steam page with at least a coming soon + potential demo is made.
      • This would most likely be done for 1 Month long / Cleaning Jam. This would be fun and a great game dev exercise as its aligns with fast development. Releasing a game on Steam is a whole beast compared to Itch.io. Might be a great way for intermediate devs to get feet wet with getting a Steam Page.
        • My Steam Page: https://store.steampowered.com/app/2599640/ReAEGIS/

Day 15 - 16: 02-21 - 02-22-24 

• Break days for me to play around with the model and practice some animation techiniques.
• Plan out the rest of the jam as the hardest part which was that Steam Page is now over. Now I can get to business like forreals.

Day 17: 02-23-2024

• Solidified what I want for this last feature sprint. Set 1 day deadline to finish most important features.
• Fixed outstanding bugs reported for Project Aegis
• Cleaned out really old code stuff which was meddling with adding upgrades in and update weapons
• Built out Artifact system
• Created 2 new upgrades + 1 artifact
• Built the skeletons for the 2 minibosses
• Almost vomit looking at my Steamdb for the game seeing all the really old ideas I had and seeing it still being the history (well you live n learn I guess lmao).

Day 18: 02-24-24 

• Tried a new fried chicken place in town and got myself food poisoning again ... lost half my day to that.
• Finish up rest of upgrades: 5 powerups + 5 artifacts
• Create core logic for miniboss scripts

Day 19: 02-25-24

• Finished miniboss scripts + weaker varient enemy scripts.
• Recovered mostly from food poisoning
• Prepped task for tomorrow!
• Looked over fellow developers game in feedback

Day 19: 02-26-24

• Was a bit busy at work, so I did not have too much time to work today.
• Created magic circle effect for the gun

Day 20: 02-27-24

• Looked over fellow developers game in feedback
• Established the art style for enemies and will settle on that.
  
• Added enemy hit flash when struck
• Create new spawn table to use

Day 21: 02-28-24

• Added new complete enemy table! 
• Create scripts for two new enemy types to fill out experience
• Import all weapons into the game, and figured out what to do with their textures to get the vibe I want
• Added level up grades to all weapons. Left some room for more if need be.
• Playtest the game a bit and adjusted initial player power at the start to give better sense of progression
• Made the very gamble choice of removing secondary fire from A7 to just give her the minigun. Reason being is that now matter what I do her shotgun is too powerful and removes the sense of progression or at least to what I see. But ... I will see what the new players think about that. 
  • If no one seems to mine I will do the following: 
    • Create new characters S-2 who will have a shotgun main, and S-0 who will have both but with some unique abilities that are too extreme to make the first playable character. I like the Sorath / Old Swarmlake type of controller to just let it go.
    • If people really want it back, I will do some adjustments to how I handle powerups for the shotgun. Or maybe nerd it really hard for character not S-2?

Day 22: 02-29-24

• Patched up the bosses so they should all be running just fine :D
  • Would have loved to add some extra behaviors. That's nothing another dev cycle can't fix. Let's see how people react to they now to see if any more behaviors need to be added. Following a fusion of VS and actual boss here as I do not want to overwhelm the player too much as there is still enemies spawning.
• Patched some bugs with the upgrades being added
• Verified the artifact system works! :D
• Adjust spawn table values for balancing
• Tweaking and adjust game balance out
• Fixed asset imports
• Moved gun positioning based on Earley's advice!

RESULTS FOR THE MONTH

Pretty happy with the month though I would have liked to spend way less time than half the month to art direction. I feel this will improve more in time as I improve as an artist.

• Add 4 more entries to spawn table
  • Result: Finished
• Add 6 more powerups
  • Result: Finished
• Add an artifact system like 20 Minutes till Dawn
  • Result: Finished
• Polish up effects for critical interactions
  • Result: On-going. Still needs way more polish, but got the first layer done.
• Add music and sfx
  • Result: On-going. Still need way more sound. Sounds are rough around the edges. I am missing music intentionally, as I want to see how SFX hit first. If so I would need to craft a sound track that did not clash with the audio cues the enemies are having.
• Fix bugs from feedback
  • Result: Finished!!
• Polish up and iterate on art
  • Result: On-going. I got a good amount of art done. Still want to iterate on the designs though since I am not fully satisfied with everything. I will ask around for art checks when I finish my V2 of the art. Got the idea more down, but this can still be improved.
• Have Steam page up  + trailer
  
  • Result: "Finished", but I this is going to need to be improved when I go through improving the game. Also learned that Steam gives around roughly 1-2 weeks of exposure during this time. So I would def weigh that in before releasing a page. Did not