A little while ago I started a side project to my adventure/management game Wildhollow: a simple Flash game for the website as a teaser. I’m aiming for a game where you learn what animals like what types of food; something that’s useful to know in the real game too.

In my previous two versions I was using…well…Flash, but now I’ve experimented with Flex and lately with flixel, a game framework compatible with Flex. Things are progressing much more smoothly now that I can focus on writing the ActionScript code instead of mucking about with learning basic Flash concepts. This is as far as I’ve come right now:

I’m starting to figure out the different game states, and I’ve added stages as well as a simple scoring system. By the way, if you get past level 5 the game will crash. Just so you know. It’s far from finished – but the main idea is beginning to crystalize.

Things left on the todo list:

• More stages with different animals
• Possibly, an online highscore table
• Sound and music
• Better loading screen
• One-screen tutorial
• General design issues – improve the look of the game
• Try out small things like should the food items start bouncing instead of just moving forward, etc
• Misc things like KarjaSoft logo, link to the Wildhollow homepage, optimize the game for size, etc…

Time to get some work done if I want to finish this before the Wildhollow release…

I simply have to brag about the awesome character art that’s been pouring in lately for my adventure-puzzle-management game Wildhollow! Take a look at the cast so far:

Tiny, tiny samples of the characters in Wildhollow. Tiiiiny tiny tiny!

It’s going to be a whole lot of characters, and a whole lot of fun! I’d really like to write a bit about the story and the characters, but I’ll do my best to not spoil anything. And either way, things might always change before the end, so I’d better not say too much just yet.

One thing I can say though is that I’ve re-thought the beginning a bit. Originally I thought of giving the player loads and loads of things to do from the beginning, but that’s just…a bit overwhelming. Instead I’ll focus om the adventuring aspects first, and maybe some puzzles, before I bring in the management bits. Essentially, you’ll have to progress a little into the game before it really opens up. Not to worry, though – it won’t be like a dull tutorial. Just… Focusing on other aspects of the game, in the beginning.

When you start the game you have to solve a few easy quests and gather enough money for your first ranch upgrade before you can start buying animals. That’s when the game will begin properly; when you’re able to breed animals and create new species. But I have a suspicion that there’ll be quite some adventuring and puzzling even after that.

Enough ranting for now. I’ll just briefly mention that it’s a female dog to find background art that fits…and is affordable. I might have something going now – I’ll just have to wait and see. Stay tuned for Wildhollow news!