Cally’s Caves 4 development is proceeding at a furious pace, and we recently had a chance to revamp the way our start screen works. Our first game’s start screen was simply a logo on a black screen, and with each successive game in the Cally series, we want to improve every aspect of the game. In this dev diary, we will outline the method we used to create the Cally’s Caves 4 start screen.
How do we create a new game in the Cally’s Caves series that feels fresh and changes things up? The first 3 games in the series were very light on story, and although we were able to plant some seeds for future story ideas, we could take the plot for Cally’s Caves 4 anywhere. This dev diary will go over some of the decisions we’ve made to make Cally’s Caves 4 stand apart from our previous games.
Setting
All 3 Cally’s Caves games took place in “the Caves,” a place that started in Cally’s backyard and gave us a good amount of variety to work with. The story of Cally’s retaking of the Caves has now been told, and we want to take the environments in Cally’s Caves 4 in some new directions. Instead of taking place in one interconnected Cave system, Cally’s Caves 4 takes place all across the globe, in facilities owned by the Golden Skull Society (more on the G.S.S. later).
We are working so hard on Super Cally’s World right now! Currently, we are working on enemy implementation, and are fleshing out the last few systems that we have yet to code/design into the game. Over the next months, as more art gets plugged into the game, we will get back to posting weekly #screenshotsaturday’s and more specifics about the game. In the meantime, you can join the Cally Discord to keep up with what’s going on.
Also, our friends Luminosity Inc, LLC. are doing a Kickstarter and Greenlight for their game, the Painter’s Apprentice! The nice folks at Luminosity have been a really positive influence to us over the years we’ve been doing game development, and we want to help spread the word about the Painter’s Apprentice as much as possible. So if you see fit, please throw them a vote on Greenlight, or a few dollars on Kickstarter, and help make their #indiedev dreams come true!
A few Youtube and Twitch streamers are currently engaging in regular Cally’s Caves 3 Speedruns! The most active are NepumukGaming and MrKvikur, here are the last few World Record runs:
Sorry about the lack of posts lately. We have finally submitted Cally’s Caves 2 to Apple for review, so we are going to try and get back to posting regularly!
Testing a game on an iOS device seems like it should be a simple process, but we learned the hard way that minor details can complicate things at any time. In this dev diary, we will outline the steps of our testing process using Gamemaker: Studio, in the hopes that it may help some people overcome the same complications that we faced. This entry will be a bit technical and specific.
Note: We are using Gamemaker: Studio version 1.3.1344, and you will need access to a Mac.
1) Get your code ready for mobile.
We were developing a game that uses touch controls, but convenience necessitated being able to test on PC as well. This led to us having 2 control methods, and needing to switch between them. When we needed to export an .ipa file (the file type for iOS applications), we would need to disable the pc controls. We also based our resolution coding for iOS based off of the “display_get_size()” function, but when testing on windows we would use “window_get_size()” for everything to work properly. So, before you export your .ipa file, make sure you have everything ready for the mobile version. Continue reading
Cally's Caves 