A Week of Development on my Godot RPG!

Welcome to another devlog for Dauphin! In this episode I take you along with me as I spend a week trying to knock out a prototype of Dauphin's save system. Turns out there's a lot more complexity than I anticipated, but at the end we still came up with a working prototype. Hope you enjoy!
‪@Gdquest‬ tutorial on saving with resources: • Godot Save Game Tutori...
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[@eyitsgallery]

Sounds odd but, maybe most of the island sea is covered in mist in different shades, you can upgrade your vessel, make it bigger travel further, and the more you explore it removes the mist,

[@DevDuck]

That's the idea!

[@chained8749]

Hey DevDuck i think this might be a good idea: You could make it night time every 5-10mins so there could be diferent enemies spawn (just my idea maybe you allready thought of that idk)

[@DevDuck]

I do have a prototype day/night cycle actually! Just haven't shown it off yet :)

[@levifzephyr]

@@DevDuck hurray ! ;-)

[@chained8749]

@@DevDuck nice

[@britishinnit]

I can’t wait to play this. I would definitely pay a decent sum for this

[@laughingdev4119]

20€+ in my opinion, when it's done Or something like Stardew Valley

[@Charlie-tw3ef]

@@laughingdev4119 really? Games that are way more advanced than this (no offence) like mine craft doll for only £15 so I think 20 is a bit much

[@samtorres4996]

I'd say like 8 dollars would be fair.

[@sajanah1253]

Not my type of a game but I'm going to buy it for the satisfaction I get from these videos..

[@noa6925]

20p take it or leave it

[@grinning_tiger]

Could it be possible to discover shipwrecks and ancient statues, etc.

[@grinning_tiger]

Not just islands

[@elijahbuchanan2368]

Yeah! The player could explore them and find things that pieced together the lore and history of the world, kinda like Darksouls.

[@daario4278]

Grammar

[@Dylan-fk1do]

Shrimprecks?!?!? Shipwrecks with his shrimp around it as "enemies"

[@ottosjachrani7821]

That’s a really good idea hope he ads it

[@SpotCam]

these devlogs are so relaxing man

[@mthw]

Hey DevDuck, I like your well thought out desk setup against the wall, but from viewing your early morning dark room I'd recommend adding a light strip just behind and near the top of your monitor directed at the wall. That way the light behind and around your displays will be equalized, which in the years to come your eye health will thank you for. Thanks for the excellent videos - Matthew

[@levifzephyr]

I support your proposal !

[@DevDuck]

I appreciate that advice! I'll look into another light strip of some kind.

[@andy-kg5fb]

You should add invasive species on some islands that harm the ecosystem. The player would have to capture them and take them back to their native habitat before any species goes extinct or something.

[@hydra1346]

thats the point of the corrupted enemies

[@burntbeanies7886]

Woah, that creek area looks super calming to walk around. Hope you had a try at swinging on that rope swing! Awesome work on the save system, it's so cool how easy it is to make islands, I can see people making custom islands way in the future tbh!

[@DevDuck]

I did actually use that ropeswing, should have filmed it haha. Thanks for the kind words!

[@SamKeenDev]

Really great to see the progress on your game, can't wait to play. Thanks for taking all the time to publish these videos, it is super helpful to the community.

[@DevDuck]

Thanks Sam!

[@eliaspiersig9994]

I think you should mirror the vessel interior scene because the door to the cabinet is on another side as well.

[@alicewade7254]

One possible way to add more variety and revisitability to islands could be to have a weather system where rain or storms with go across the map and change the creatures during it, maybe make sailing more challenging if it's over the open ocean, or even have disaster recovery for the local ecosystem after a weather event goes through an island. Love this series and it's totally a must watch for me whenever it shows up on my feed!

[@saran9736]

Make the trees to wave using shaders, that increases immersion!

[@laughingdev4119]

Well it would be nice but it's a 2d game and Idk if it is even possible to do that. But if it is possible that would be great.

[@neongarlicbread]

@@laughingdev4119 the trees sway in terraria, im not sure how to do it but im pretty sure you can.

[@alshade]

Yop a simple vertex shader to make an animation out of it or a vertex shader with a semi random variable attach to the TIME function to make it move following a pattern completely in shader

[@sad_man10]

@@laughingdev4119 it's definitely possible. I've seen plenty of 2d games with swaying trees

[@Alche_mist]

It is very much possible even with pixel art (especially Dauphin style of pixel art that doesn't really concern itself with rotations, as can be see for example on the Research vessel binding rope), both with a shader and with separate animations (basically, the "Tree" scene has some animation frames it cycles through directly). With the direct animation, you can also make the trees wave synchronous or asynchronously (picking a random frame to start in the `_ready` function of the "Tree") or even change their animation (for example, have a separate animation for the "Typhoon" in-game even that waves far more vigorously). That said, while a great polishing touch, it's quite a lot of shader coding and trial-and-error work when using shader and possibly even more work in case of hand-animating, so I'm all for giving Duck all the time in the world for implementing that).

[@Zachary.Jordan]

Every time your videos start I get so chill and happy. You have the best devlogs, you should post more often

[@Karzikann]

Add a little boat to the title screen that bobs a little in the water for that extra _immersion_

[@boxim07]

I think you should add a mini-map and/or a compass for when your'e out in the ocean

[@DevDuck]

I will definitely be adding a minimap at some point.

[@EggoFr]

@@DevDuck that'd be nice maybe you could even make small villages where you could have tasks like helping people from corrupted creatures or something like that :D

[@LeMellow]

give the DevDuck some bread

[@arlingtoncummins8814]

🎵DevDuck UWUUU🎵

[@olidot7237]

The button textures on the main menu don’t actually look too bad

[@pius6330]

As I am starting to design my own simple save system it was really intresting to see how it is done in a contrasting project in a different game engine. Really great and intresting video!

[@BestMentalism]

I am amazed by the peace of mind your videos are bringing me

[@chained8749]

DevDuck i really enjoy watching your devlogs

[@breffish]

thanks for explaining how loading chunks works! never really thought about what that meant in games like minecraft until now!

[@ReneDeWees]

I'm Always looking forward to these devlogs! Till the next. Cheers

[@tsoraizw]

missed these devlogs, greetings from Zimbabwe

[@BornCG]

Great video Ben!

[@the11thboy]

Absolutely love the dev logs man. They strike a nice balance between the artistic side of development with the backend development needed to get it to work. ... Also how do you keep such a small planted aquarium so green?

[@Zeal115]

i love just chilling and watching progress on dauphin

[@willguidinger4025]

Hey DevDuck- keep up the good work! I love watching your stuff- it is very relaxing and motivating. You really embody the work of development- solving one problem after another with persistence and determination. I also love that you get up early and schedule time to work on your game, taking time to care for yourself and make sure you get the proper sleep, rest, and nourishment. Thanks for sharing your journey!

[@AxelWard]

Another video of awesome progress! I'm glad to hear getting out of the city has had such a positive impact on your life! Keep up the great work!

[@JoakimKanon]

Your keyboard color scheme is veeery tasty. 👌🏼

[@delugedrop1558]

Wow, that island-traversing system you've got is actually really impressive! It's cool how easy it is to make a new island on the world map like that. Great thinking! Also, maybe you could work in day/night patterns or a weather system (rain, clouds, snow, etc.). Keep up the great work; I love watching these DevLogs.

[@Skeffles]

Fantastic week! The progress on this is really coming along well.

[@DevDuck]

Thank you!

[@jackieboi5275]

When the Horros crab dies, it should split up into lots of small corrupted crabs that you then have to kill. Sweet video!

[@deadaccount-t6n]

Your devlogs are my favorite, they're so calming and motivating. And I wish I had a forest like that near my house, it looks so relaxing to walk in there!

[@ShlongMaster5000]

I am 13 and started game dev with very low experience.You helped me to concentrate and give me an idea of my future.love u thanks 😀👍

[@ryanlaseter7626]

I look forward to your vlogs man, they're so inspirational for my own project. Been struggling with working on my own so, so refreshing to see someone else achieving high goals in their own! :D

[@EthanEDITS1]

This video inspired me so much for my game! Thank you!

[@soncis]

its fun following your process

[@GamesBySaul]

Nice work as always :) - Saving is such a daunting task but also super satisfying when it's done right, I really need to do it for mine very soon, but I am quite excited to as well. I bet it was super satisfying to see it work for you! :D

[@DevDuck]

Loading up the game for the first time at the new island was pretty awesome haha. Thanks Saul!

[@Oofmania80098]

Wow I’m really excited about in the future when it comes out

[@robinmattheussen2395]

What a comfy setup!

[@CodemasterJamal]

Json objects are really great for saving game data because you can write all the variables and whatever numerical, and/or alphabetical data to the JSON and read it out the same way.

[@angrygeri7026]

Waking up to a new devlog is the best feeling ever

[@74Upp]

Big fan man, you’ve inspired me and my friend to start are own medieval themed rpg, thank you for the inspiration!

[@DevDuck]

That's really awesome to hear. Good luck with the RPG!

[@74Upp]

@@DevDuck thanks!

[@ForbiddenFlameStudios]

What a timing! I myself I am struggling with a save system in unity for a 3d survival world, even though every game has one, a good save/load system is harder to implement than it looks. Kudos to you man!

[@winterofthenorth6301]

Your game looks like so much. I'm excited for when it's finished!

[@bamfyu]

Great devlog :D

[@Bebeu4300]

This would probably be a low priority thing, but improving your font or changing it out for one made by someone else is a good idea in my opinion. The current font has some issues with the height of letters and an inconsistent baseline. Improving or changing it would help make it look and feel a lot better and probably be nicer to read. Anyway, the game is really showing some progress at this point! I'm not the type of person to actually purchase any indie games I may follow, but this game seems quite interesting in my opinion, and I like the idea behind it. It has some unique ideas but still follows a familiar game style. I will definitely consider buying it when it comes out!

[@joebartolozzi7259]

When you start the save you could add a cutscene where it starts black and transitions into you asleep on the shoreline and then you will get touched by a crab and jump awake, then you start playing

[@NoaTugy]

I implemented my save file pretty early on in my game, where I don't have a lot of art ready and just have a box moving around and colliding with enemies. I'm glad I did it early on

[@TheShelfman]

Nice job on the save system! Very cool :D

[@0tta146]

watching videos like this make me feel like ill never be a programmer. until i realise that ive only been coding for 7 months and already i have 3 good quality websites and the basis of 2 card games in my portfolio you motivate me sir

[@theanimeelephant2017]

Keep this up Ben! The future looks bright!

[@Hi_Brien]

Oh!!! THAT MAKES SENSE! Flag nodes to be saved so you only save like important things, and oh my goooooosh, thank you

[@nickizanewb8433]

I know I have commented this before, but once you get further in the game there could be randomized bosses in the seas just like Starbound has. Imagine travelling to another island and to get past it you can either battle a unique boss or just sail to another island. That would probably add so much I think

[@nichegames9590]

Good stuff as usual.

[@benjaminclaridge5066]

You mentioned trying to get the ship to a certain spot, you can use position 2d nodes to get a global position and then set the global position of the ship to it. You could probably add another variable to the ships docking and setting off of like port something that you set as the position 2d node every time you dock and then use that as the port position to take off from and you can put it anywhere on the island, not just the bottom.

[@Sk4lli]

I wonder what the performance of a JSON based save system will be. Especially if it keeps track of lots of small items. In previous games I used a sqlite database which seems to be a rather off approach but quite powerful.

[@elijahmentch4125]

Another great episode! Keep it up! Game is really coming together nicely! :)

[@pepegaplays4023]

God i love that setup

[@ErikNonIdle]

Great devlog as always! Love keeping up with the progress!

[@fennecfugames]

Yay another devlog 💜

[@DevDuck]

Appreciate the support Fennec!

[@JelowGames]

The motivation this guy has. I quit game development and came back made an online game, started working on my best game yet and he's still working on the same game

[@Chevifier]

I dont work on 2D games anymore but I'm always here for the updates. I just love your devlog format.

[@silverc3057]

Hey! This is awesome! I just noticed you had an aquascpe! I have Red Cherry's as well!

[@Destricz]

You can also do, in the beginning of the game, that you need repair your ship and later in game you can upgrade it, faster speed.

[@TheOneAndOnlyMart]

High Quality video I like it!

[@bitbraindev]

Hey Ben - I can highly recommend the json approach. I did the same for my crafting game, feel free to checkout the devlog on that. The cool thing is that I also unload any default game objects and replace them with their loaded version. This ensures that when e.g. defeating a boss or cleansing creatures, the save file knows about these things.

[@DevDuck]

Hey Miguel! Appreciate the insight, I'll check it out!

[@jimsmart2522]

The icon when near an island could maybe be a ship’s anchor ⚓️

[@aliilkerturp6170]

Ur game have very good concept.I really like. Good luck 👍🏻⛵

[@taisublack2599]

Your game is very motivated me to doing my game!

[@hithere7073]

Yeah do it!

[@DevDuck]

Go for it!

[@iconicdr8ke]

In your room on the boat you should be able to add a fish tank and be able to add fish

[@sajanah1253]

hahahahah also add a developer station in the cabby so your game character can implement this idea into the game.

[@RobertBMenke]

Awesome progress the game is really starting to take form! The JSON save file does seem better since I assume you’ll need several save flags for bosses and such. As a web/mobile dev that spends all day with JSON APIs I’d be curious to see what kind of structure you come up with.

[@desmondo3519]

Im pretty sure that you're gonna want to be able to go underwater at some point because well, the game is about exploration in the ocean

[@1nilusnilus856]

one of the best devlogs in my opinion!

[@LeGnonpi]

12:40 # TODO: Everything!

[@DevDuck]

I was wondering if anyone would notice that haha

[@NoradIguess]

This guys is the nicest person on youtube

[@connorb.6216]

A suggestion: diving areas in the water near islands marked by coral. They could be the same as islands but the player floats up slightly. I think in a game based around the ocean, there should be something like this. (There might have been something about this in an earlier video, but I don't remember that.)

[@hrstwn]

This definitely is a decent devlog series

[@reversible8740]

Biggest issues facing the game rn is what to do in the water. While your sailing, is there a side quest? Games like pathless have a fun mini mechanic to play while you stretch across the nap

[@johnsandler1967]

Are there gonna be an underwater adventure also or just focusing in "island to island" adventure?

[@DevDuck]

There will indeed be underwater gameplay!

[@KRYMauL]

@@DevDuck You should do something like Assassin’s Creed Black Flag for the underwater scenes.

[@enderduck4253]

@@DevDuck do you plan on having the player go underwater with scuba gear or something? Or are you going to add a submarine?

[@matangoldstien5922]

maybe in the future add some barriers in the water for example rocks to prevent the player from going too far, or heavy fog that will disappear only after an event happened, that way it will still be an open world but not too much for the player to get lost in. It would be unfortunate if the player will tackle the final boss because he wants to explore

[@splch]

your magic should destroy the giant crabs magic

[@eggeggington606]

Really looking forward to this being released. Great work so far :D

[@AwesomeTingle]

You need some type of visual cues for the sailing. When the ship was on the ocean it look like it wasn't moving at all. for a 3d game like windwaker, they solved this problem just by having the islands appear in the distance and grow as you got closer, but I think you're gonna have to come up with something more creative so the sailing doesn't just get the player lost every time.

[@nowherebrain]

no worries, I don't worry about save systems until I am pretty deep in development....things change, and so does the data that you need to save.

[@makemypetgamedevprocess6475]

Awesome editing, I didn’t know that Jsons could be used to save progress, gonna give them a try 😀

[@Someone-q6f5x]

This game looks promising.... Keep going

[@dl5857]

One idea I have is to make the horror crab have much more health

[@levifzephyr]

Hello @DevDuck ! Happy to be one of the first to see your new video :) Just a little proposition : On the first title menu you have a nice pixel art 👍 showing the montain, and you blow it with your buttons 🤔😭👎. You should move your buttons to the side⬅️ to keep your mountains clean, and then only when you load saved fille you will stack interface up the mountain. But at first glance keep the mountain free of any button 🧐 😉 ✅ :)

[@DevDuck]

Appreciate the feedback! I'll see what I can do to make that UI less imposing.

[@mandoe2894]

I cant wait to see how people are going go speedrun and sequence break everything, wrong warps, etc.

[@Menji_x]

Game looks great so far! I’m sure it will come in the future but when you’re on the boat and you pass the island, the name showing up when you get close would be cool. And also maybe a compass while you’re sailing would be cool too!

[@patrickRotmg]

Great devlog once again DevDuck! May I ask you, how do you script and edit your videos? I will start my own game dev channel and I'm having a difficult time with this. In the video, you said you were gonna edit the footage that was shown, so you record a day, then edit it? And how do you know what to record when developing/on your day, do you script it before the day starts? it's so natural! Thanks for the video, you're a great inspiration!

[@DevDuck]

Hey, thank you! I've created something of a "devlog-as-I-go" process, where I film for a day or two, then edit that, then repeat the process until I feel I've hit a good milestone to end on. Editing throughout the week helps me keep what I feel to be a good pace in my videos. As far as scripting - there is none! I just ramble on as I go, and it often requires a few takes to get my message across.

[@DefecTec]

I know this is a test build but I think the Islands should be a little farther from eachother. Great video as always :)

[@pedroduran8927]

I love your keyboard keycaps :D

[@swiggyawag7037]

Maybe the big crab needs some textures for when it’s in the water? Sunken legs or something

[@That_0ne_Dev]

Hey I know this sounds like a weird question. But you wouldn't happen to know / remember what desk it is you have?

[@vanders626]

I do believe there was great value in custom infected enemy sprites.

[@al.flying]

You should probably add a pause menu soon with the options, save, and quit game

[@mokafi7]

These videos make my day as always

[@biscuitsspam]

5:53 suttle voice crack when he said "Game" lul