Making a metroidvania with 0 experience - devlog 1

I've wanted to make a game for years at this point, but I've never had the time. I still don't have the time, but I'm also going to not have time for the foreseeable future. With this in mind, I've decided to allow myself 1 day a month to work on my game. 1 day a month isn't much, so at that pace this project will likely take 5+ years to complete. Completing this will be a marathon, but considering the fact that I've been interested in creating a metroidvania for at least 5 years at this point, I'm fairly confident I'll see this through.

Scope
As the title of this devlog indicates, I have 0 experience. With that being said, I want to talk about the intended scope of this game.

Firstly, I want this game to look amazing. This is because one of the things that entices me the most about the idea of making a game, is creating a world for the game to take place in. For me, a game with rich and aesthetically pleasing graphics serves to immerse one in the world more deeply. As a sidenote, I'm not referring to high fidelity graphics, but graphics that are artistically coherent and visually pleasing. 

The graphics of Hollow Knight is the direction I want to head in. Each area is absolutely drenched in its own specific vibe, and as a result the world pulls me in like no other game I've played before. I will be taking alot of design cues from Hollow Knight in an attempt to create as rich an atmosphere as I can.

When discussing game length, I would love to create a game that is at least 15 hours in length. This number is kind of arbitrary however, and in my eyes, the longer the better (as long as quality is not sacrificed to achieve this). I love games where hours upon hours can be spent inside the game, building a connection with the world, and so this is something I would also like inside of my game.

I intend to design all assets for this game, however I cant animate for shit so currently the player character is an asset. It does fit the vibe I'm aiming for, so when I do finally decide to do some animation I will likely come up with something similar. Designing and animating all the other beings I will need for this world will be an interesting challenge. However my first priority is to create gorgeous levels.

Another huge reason I've always wanted to make a game, is so that I can compose a soundtrack for it. Music from my favorite games has a huge emotional effect on me when I listen to it, and I want to try and evoke those emotions in other people. As a side note, my all time favorite music from a video game is from outerwilds. What Andrew Prahlow was able to achieve with that soundtrack was absolutely remarkable.

I have other ideas I intend to implement, such as dynamic music, but I think this is a good overview of my intended scope. It's possible that this could appear overscoped, or that I have eyes bigger than my stomach, so to speak, but considering that I expect this project to take 5-10 years to finish, I'm not overly concerned.

What I've Achieved So Far

As I've been sick off work recently, I spent the last 7 days feverishly working on this project (Going forward I will only have 1 day a month to work on the game, these 7 days were an exception). In that time, I've sorted a workflow for visually designing levels, created a basic test level, and created a nice character controller with the classic features like jump buffer and coyote time. Now, this probably doesn't sound like alot. And thats because I have no idea how to code, or even use my game engine of choice (gamemaker), so I'm learning literally everything from scratch. I spent 8 hours one day trying to "code" a feature which enables an animation to play when the character changes direction. In the process of coding this feature, I managed to break several other features, which then took additional hours to fix.

While I initially created a level which was completely open with platforms added in, this created the issue of readability. The image below shows that the platforms in this level do not stand out to the extent where the level is instantly readable. As a result, I am going to create levels in the more standard "tilemap" fashion, where unused screen area and platforms are almost black, as illustrated below.

Platforms in this level are hard to read:

vs Metroid Dread, its obvious immediately where you can and cant walk.

My workflow flow for level creation is currently as follows: 

Create the actual level layout in gamemaker using collision tiles. Import this layout into photoshop. Level aesthetics are then created in photoshop, and split into layers and separate assets. The layers are then imported into gamemaker, and assembled in the level editor. I can do this relatively quickly, which is good because it means I can spend more time balancing the level/room.

Development Plan

I don't really have a development plan. But what I'll probably be working on next is: Improving the character controller. Its not bad right now but could use a little finetuning. I will probably add a couple more features like increased jump peak time, and faster falling. Adding attacks. As of now there is no attack in the game. Adding enemies. Gotta have something to attack after all. And creating more test levels, in an attempt to refine my level designing workflow, and to see how visually appealing a level I can make.

This devlog is mostly for me, to organize my thoughts and look at in retrospect. But maybe you'll enjoy it too.

That's all for now, see you next month (edit: this was a lie. its likely i wont have time to work on this until next year)