Sprintastic
Nov 03, 2015
We just finished our first sprint. I know what you're thinking: "Don't you have a game to finish? Why are you out doing track and field? Worst Kickstarter ever!"
Oh sure, to the layman it might sound like we're running around the track, sprinting for the elusive 4 minute mile. But rest assured, all of us are firmly planted behind our desks, sitting for 8 to 10 hours a day slowly developing heart disease. You Kickstarter dollars are hard at work (and slowly killing us).
In the parlance of game development, a sprint is where the entire team focuses on one small area for a few weeks, or maybe a month, striving to being it to a finished (or some other) state.
Sprints are nice because they give focus. With a large project (yes, Thimbleweed Park is a large project), it's easy to get lost in all the "stuff" that needs to be done. I find without that focus, I tend to flit around doing little tasks all over the place, and mostly tasks that I find interesting, not necessarily tasks that need to be done.
Sprints allow you to focus and also attended to details. It's easy to push off the little things in favor of large tasks, but a sprint gives you permission to attack the details.
Ideally, sprints should last less than a month. Any more than that, and you're back to being lost in the sea of tasks. Sprints also help to give the team a sense of accomplishment. It's easy to see one section of the game go from raw to polished and it feels good.
This was our first sprint and the goal was to get beginning of the game and the town done and polished, at least up to the first choke point. It's a nice little section of the game and it served double duty in providing a nice demoable section of the game.
We're getting to the point where we need to have a publicly showable section of the game, and the town is perfect because it's also the intro and playing through it won't unveil any truly spoilerific details. Keep in mind, this is not a demo we'll release, this is a demo we can show at events and start the long process of playtesting (as opposed to bugtesting, which has already begun).
We're aways from a releasable demo because the demo isn't hardened. Too many places it can go hopelessly awry. It's fine for controlled demos and playtesting, but not for releasing into the wild.
Thimbleweed Park is being divided up into seven sprints.
1 - Intro/town - Nov 1
2 - Circus (Normal and flashbacks) - Nov 25th
3 - County (Radio station and other misc locations - Dec 14
4 - Mansion - Jan 15
5 - Hotel - Feb 15
6 - Factory - March 15
7 - Panic!
Then from March until ship, it's general polish, plus getting translations and voice recording done.
Steve Kirk just started on the music but his track isn't following the sprints due to the music being more global.
As I mention above, we're going to start playtesting in the next week and if you're in Seattle or the Bay Area, there might be an opportunity to sit down and play Thimbleweed Park while one of us stands over you in a white lab coat and a clipboard.
Stay tuned.
- Ron
P.S. There will be a separate post when we are looking for playtesters, so please don't post your information here, it will be ignored.
I wish i had Ferraris patience to make art like that. Jawdropping.
It will be one of the most amusing part of the game!
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/thimbleweedpark/thimbleweed-park-a-new-classic-point-and-click-adv/description
Also, the podcast are awesome but maybe it's time to go for the next step forward: www.livecoding.tv.
Backers and fans would love to see you, Gary or David "in action" :-)
I assume the arcade has fancy lighting that turns on and off...
If the music and writing follows the trend this will be hyped into oblivion nearing release.
Oh i forgot, writing isnt really your biggest area of expertise ;-)
He said he's done over 20000 of them paintings.
Just curious about when we need to get our stuff ready for submission.
Hey, that was easy to miss. :D
Latest studies show, that sitting isn't killing us after all.
Also, there have been no studies that would show a correlation between heart diseases and Kickstarter dollars.
Sprints are a good idea, as it helps to outline the project better. And least it sounds like it. But you guys may be getting forgetful, as you did the Mansion already back in 1986 or 1987.
Compare to that:
http://bilder.tentakelvilla.de/mi1/screens/mi1-10.jpg
A tree would be great, especially a Weeping tree like in the Monkey Island Example:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weeping_tree
Mark, could you add a tree to the Arcade ??? Pines would also look super -great in contrast to the night sky: (i remember a lot of trees in Meele Island Forest):
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pine
Disclaimer: I'm usually against killing in real life!
The playtesters are going to be lucky. But on the other hand not being a playtester might save you from a lot of spoilers.
Ok back to serious. "Forever sorry": loved that at first but then started to think it sounds like something a bearded hipster or an internet kid would say nowadays, maybe less so in '87? Sorry, I know it's nitpicking and/or probably just me. Maybe the storekeeper WAS a hipster from the future, whoa! :O
And I love the new style of Agent Ray. Doesn't look like a priest anymore.
I'd almost say it looks better having the eyes 2 pixels tall.
http://imgur.com/ojl7VES
Because, ya know, there's the GameTron 3000 for example.
Or the TesterTron 3000.
C'mon, that's no coincidence.
The letters you left on the sign are there for a reason.
THERE MUST BE A REASON!