Building an ITEM BAR for my 2D RPG

[@DevDuck]

Well, this devlog ended up being a bit shorter and less-detailed than I had hoped for at the beginning of the week. If you're interested in more details about the item bar, let me know, and maybe I can make a more helpful follow up! As always, thank you all so much for the support.

[@cristhiangarcia8845]

For an aesthetic look you should add this symbol: "

[@kingofcats8561]

Awesome video I can’t wait to play this game. Also I think it would be cool if you could see all of your hot bar items on the player at all times with like different positions for the items on the players back.

[@algs5483]

Tbh I like shorter devlog more

[@burgerdawg4630]

You should add numbers on the top right hand side so you can toggle it with the keys. Also i have an idea of an island A VIKING ISLAND its just an idea

[@ridlr9299]

I would recommend using hotkeys rather than scroll wheel (most gamers really dislike having to use scroll wheel for hotbar selection as it is usually slower and easy to overshoot/undershoot). I would also recommend that you don’t show the items in the inventory if they are also in the hotbar; it’s just a bit confusing.

[@Pontypants]

Here's som algorithm juice. Love your videos!

[@nitricswight]

Everyone: endgame is the greatest crossover in history Me, an intellectual: ponty and devduck

[@theanimeelephant2017]

Pontyyyy

[@daisukideshou]

i love this cozy chill style of devlog, makes me feel so calm like a friend is there

[@SilverDSlite]

I noticed that when you enter the cave, I could barely see the exit. Maybe the exit should emit light, just preventing you from getting lost a bit.

[@sosasees]

That would also make the enviroment more realistic (in the good way that fits in this game). Because of course the sunlight would come through from outside like this.

[@milton2774]

we got stick bugged at 2:21

[@pius6330]

Game balancing is always something that it is really hard to achieve, especially without any previous experience. I really like the idea to use items instead of a skill tree. Haven't thought about it myself. Great devlog as always! It is really intresting to see how you will tackle different problems and how this project will turn out!

[@DevDuck]

Thanks Pius! Hope I'm able to create some interesting items to make it worthwhile!

[@softibjorn]

@@DevDuck If you ever want to add more weapons I have an idea for an item that would look like an anchor with a chain connected to it, you would throw the anchor at creatures and when you hit one it would start reeling in and the creature would be pulled toward you and stunned for a bit so you could attack it with a weapon that deals damage. I feel it could be found in like a shipwreck that is guarded by a corrupted squidboss or something like that and it would be good for more difficult islands where creatures who cant be instantly cleansed by magic are.

[@kingbling7571]

@@DevDuck actually there's already a game called Albion Online on Playstore, they have a similar approach, no skill trees or bs, you are what you wear, so basically items have the most power for overall balance. Quite a unique approach to balancing a game.

[@CzlowiekImadlo]

Hi Ben! Congratulations on so much great progress with your game! I've been looking at your loot and combat system developments, and I think item-driven skills are a good choice, can't wait to see how you build up on this idea in the future. One thing that I would like to comment on is that combat based on damaging your opponents clashes a bit with the premise of helping the sea life by healing the corruption. You already have some magical attack, that is a placeholder to be replaced with more extensive system. You have also mentioned, that you would like to add some aspects of some real marine biologist work in your game. You could combine these, and create a research system, where you use a science bench in your vessel to study samples collected from cleansed enemies, and then use this knowledge (and items dropped) to craft progressively better medicine. That medicine would then function kind of like spells. Player would also start the game with some weak, base level medicine. It would change how combat works - instead of beating the corruption out of the sea life, you would have to weaken them, and, when they are stunned, use medicine on them to heal corruption and drop loot. Medicine would also be able to deal damage to corrupted enemies, just like weapons, so that player could use it to fight as well. It could also work for the player, since player character does not take damage, but accumulates corruption instead, same research system could be used to create healing items. As a bonus, some rare drops could be used to improve and modify your medicine - like adding an AoE splash with a bigger flask, or changing it from a simple thrown flask to a cone attack using spray bottle. I do realise that this is a lot of work to create something like that, and you might already have your own vision, but I hope that you might find some useful bits in this idea!

[@DylanMatthewTurner]

Watching you build your various systems in Godot makes me want to go start like 50 new projects lol

[@DevDuck]

I have to be careful watching other folks' devlogs for the exact same reason haha

[@mmaaauuuuiiiii]

Another great devlog as always! I have a couple cosmetic suggestions that might help, 1 you should change the cave exit to be white with a glow instead of black, so it's easier to see when in the cave and it will communicate to the player that it leads outside, and 2 you should add the green dots to the item hot bar when the inventory is open to communicate to the player that this is a place where you can move items when the inventory is open.

[@DanisThoughts]

will there be a way to expand the item bar? like, if you find some kind of bag will you now have 8 slots instead of 6?

[@ManikaVian]

I think that would work for the inventory not for the item bar imo, but yea you right, need a bigger item bar instead of 6

[@fantasyworlddrawing5219]

This man needs at least 2 million subscribers. His content is just so good and his game is just amazing.

[@tauheedgamedev2388]

Love your devlogs and your making great progress with Dauphin.

[@cashwarior]

When the player picks up an item and it shows the "item picked up" notification, it might be good to put under the notification what button to press to open the inventory. Or maybe even put something that tells the player where in the inventory it goes.

[@AngeTheGreat]

This looks great so far! It would be interesting if you could slowly upgrade your gear over time so that you could explore more challenging locations. These upgrades could come in the form of collectible items or maybe grants from some research entity that appreciates your work fighting corruption. Anyway, I really like the aesthetic of this game, nice work!

[@DevDuck]

Really want to have this kind of progression! Thanks for the kind words.

[@drsherifff]

Your videos have such a good oceany vibe

[@fosterturtle]

Congrats on the progress! UI makes such a big difference, and it’s super nice to see how intentional you are about the decisions you’re making!

[@amazingturtle4708]

Dauphin is your best series yet, great job!

[@FMontanari709]

Another suggestion about hotkeys, it would be useful if you mouse over an inventory item and after use a hotkey, the item gets assigned to that slot Other suggestions might be shift-clicking the item assigns the item to the first empty slot in the toolbar, if available

[@Chevifier]

7:34 What you could do is remove the item from the inventory because its now in an item slot. That prevents the player from having duplicate items. Minecraft does that exact thing you only see all the items in the inventory when your crafting or interacting with chests.

[@leetri]

That creates an issue of being able to hold more items than you're supposed to, since you effectively get 6 more slots for your BC vest. Instead of removing it, I'd suggest graying out the item in the inventory to suggest it's already in use and make it so you can't pick it up to move it. Instead you'd have to pull the item from your item bar and move it that way, thus preventing duplication while still maintaining the inventory limit.

[@Samich]

@@leetri Wouldn't this also mean that it makes no sense to have more item bar slots than vest storage slots?

[@patricktheguy4511]

Love these devlogs! I would suggest making a white outline around the item that you are prompted to pick up (the closest one), just to alleviate some confusion. Also, I would turn off the pick up prompt when auto collect is on. Besides that, all of the quality of life changes and sound effects you have made in the past few months have been amazing!

[@everythingjamie8080]

Ive been following this since the first episode and it has come a long way good job!

[@SuperDutchrutter]

Great dev log, dauphin is coming along so nicely! Looking forward to playing it one day 👏

[@maulcraft7138]

I love your videos and you are the reason why I started making games myself! Keep up the great work!!!!!!!

[@DevDuck]

That's awesome to hear! You keep up the good work too.

[@Skeffles]

Fantastic item bar! It definitely looks like a welcome addition to the game

[@Mrs._Fenc]

you're adding so many doot doots, i would be addicted to just scrolling the bar

[@kostyayatsuk2004]

A potential improvement you can make to the item bar is that when moving an ito the item bar, when an item is hovering over the item bar, you can scale the item down so that its a bit larger than the item bar that its about to be dropped in to, as well as snapping to the item bar tiles , so that the player knows that they are going to drop the item in the item bar and not on the ground.

[@DracoGalboy]

This sounds like a really useful change, I'm glad to be alongside you for this journey.

[@DevDuck]

Glad to have you with me! Thanks for the support.

[@DolphinDev]

Another great devlog as usual DevDuck! Great to see the game take shape

[@angrygeri7026]

"ALGO RHYTHM JUICE" - Pontypants

[@theYabu117]

Great progress! Thanks for your content you always motivate me to do my own work after watching your dev log!

[@libberator5891]

If you're looking for an "easy win", I would suggest adding a settings option to be able to reverse mouse scroll direction. Minor quality of life feature

[@cudomoney]

glad i read this mans comments lmao never would have ever thought to put that

[@crancelbrowser5478]

Love this series! It's so cool to watch this game develop over time. I can't wait to play it someday! No rush though, haha!

[@MakkoriBusto]

This is turning out real nice. I'm excited seeing this exist

[@cybermats2004]

your desk setup is so beautiful sheesh

[@DaveScout]

Love this progress! Can't wait for this game!

[@wubbysalmon2072]

2:23 Literally just the get stick bugged meme lmao Keep up the great work!

[@linnix8217]

I’m excited to see the final product keep up the good work 👍

[@nichegames9590]

Looks good. I think the item based progression is a good idea.

[@hellb0rnmusik236]

I am hyped about the equipment system, thats comming next devlog

[@midnight9870]

Yayyyy new devlog exiting

[@birdfromglover]

I started working on my game around the same time you released your first devlog and it's been fun to watch your game build as I build my own! (You're way further than me btw. I can't for the life of me keep the pace that you manage to hold LOL) Anyway, your game is looking great and I'm always excited to see your videos in my subscription box =)

[@yourgeekeric]

Thanks for the new video I always look forward to your up loads!

[@skotdude]

A knife would fit the theme of a marinebiologist better than a sword…

[@PlayWithFurcifer]

I like the item bar! I could imagine switching weapons on the fly.

[@ukrsolid]

Nice, great progress!

[@Oofmania80098]

This game is awesome so far keep up the awesome work

[@TheLinksOfficial]

One thing you could add is something that can either act as a healing potion (to get rid of your corruption) or as a powerful weapon (getting rid of a swarm of enemies or a boss's corruption)

[@ubgamer9702]

I’ve been following you since blink and I’ve been loving the Dauphin content! I don’t know if you’d be interested in this, but trying out a game jam could be a really cool video!

[@GamesBySaul]

Nice work! Some suggestions I have based on the new addition of the item bar: 1) It looks a bit off when you drag the items they go out of the screen a bit, could be solved by putting the item central to the cursor? Or even they go central when near a screen corner. 2) Maybe you could have it so if you click or hover over an item and press (1-X number of slots) it automatically goes to that slot for you :)

[@achillesralph3738]

Great devlog going to learn to make a game in godot now!

[@ufg_]

you game has came so far i know its gonna be a hit!

[@malorum]

When you open up the inventory and need to drag the item to the slots, you should increase the size of the item bar to fit the screen, or basically make the item slots the same size as the slots in the inventory when you have the inventory open.

[@joelchrono]

The Monster Hunter franchise is one of the best examples of the player improving without a skill tree, I absolutely love it.

[@Cree8Ball]

I think you should make the item bar thing at the bottom bigger when you switch to the inventory to make it more obvious you need to drag stuff into it

[@Nikos-iy7hi]

You could make it so the farther you go to one skill tree, you need more points. So you could have like 3 trees ( one for damage, one for defensive and one of other ). That brings a strategy to getting a few big upgrades or a lot small upgrades

[@gamedevandcoding]

Great video, good luck with your project ;)

[@Akkaren79]

Love the new additions! Just one thing: I think it would make the caves feel more... cavey of you weren't able to see the walls (or anything) outside the light radius or a radius around the MC.

[@NIGHTVISIONZ]

You should really make the highlighted item slot scale according to center instead of (x,-y). Keep up the great work! 😃

[@reelo7931]

man u improved on pixel art soo much ur awesome! my lil suggestion is to remake player movement animations(idle,walk..etc) and u can see how much u improved.!! awesome videos, Good luck!! Edit: or try reDrawing player sprite for fun

[@boogieman8232]

just some thoughts i had: - idk if it makes sense to have "materials" such as shell fragments in the item bar, since they most likely wont be used for combat anyway. so there isnt really a need to have them quickly available to you - the idle blinking animation should be just a little bit faster lol have been watching this series from the very start. love how far youve come so far :)

[@dcypher5305]

I think it would be smart to add some kind of shading over the item pickup log on the right, the white text can blend in sometimes on sand and things so maybe a light gray background could make it more visible

[@choco698]

This channel is great can’t wait for it to realease

[@dugtrioramen]

Godot already has a system of grabbing button focus and changing textures. Your system already looks nice so I guess it's not worth switching, but it's still worth checking it out eventually

[@Selrisitai]

Regarding combat, I think you have two reasonable options for optimal effect. Either you 1) acknowledge that your combat system is never going to be all that fun, and reduce the combat focus while increasing the exploration focus (substituting the progression of combat with instead increasing the size or cutomization of your ship, changing your character's clothes, building a house or research base, making a finite number of creatures that you can permanently un-poison, _et cetera_ ) or 2) make your combat WAY more fun. If you think of Legend of Zelda, the game that most resembles your system, while combat is almost as basic, it's also just a form of keeping you on your toes. You don't really GRIND in Legend of Zelda, you just fight to get rid of, or get past, enemies. Even then, that combat has a shield and different strategies to keep things fresh. In modern games, I personally feel there's no excuse for a combat system that doesn't have interesting, fun animations and artificial physics made by those animations, but that's my taste. Ultimately, if I'm going to play a game that is combat-focused, the combat _better be fun._ It might be worth it to think up a whole new way of doing combat, or at least approach it from another angle that avoids the SIMULATION of "combat" while providing none of the actual skill and movement. Maybe instead make the combat only long-range, or strategy-based, or make an "absorbing" power that just sucks the poison out of the creatures, so the technique is to stay AWAY from the enemy as much as possible while holding your "vacuum" on the enemy as much as possible. That seems like it'd be fun and match the spirit of the game. Either way, I recommend not going forward in the traditional sense unless you're wanting to really put a lot into it to make it something better. I hope you take this into consideration!

[@kitten1299]

I always wanted to make games and you encourage me a lot

[@DevDuck]

That's awesome to hear. Go for it!

[@h.i.ink.3064]

In my opinion I think that a weapons and items type system is much better than a skill tree for Dauphin. The problem I always have with skill tree games is that feeling like your missing out on a skill or something and they take forever to progress in the later levels. Although it can be really good if applied in the correct way, I think dauphin would benifit more from a weapon and armor type system.

[@vil-mo]

Video called "DevDuck explains what a hotbar is in 12 minutes"

[@ogfreak0538]

I've been waiting for this😃

[@sosasees]

The White Text on the Light orange Background of Sand and Paper is barely readable. To fix this, you could make the text black if you know that the background will always be light (such as in the notebook) or put the text in a box if you otherwise can't control the background color (such as with the item pickup feedback on the side)

[@TheClone159]

an idea for when u pick up items, maybe make it so when u hold down the pickup key it will go into a empty slot, but if u just press the key it will just go into the inventory, by doing it this way the player dont have to remove items they dont want in the hotbar each time they pick something up.

[@FullCitris]

Great work! i just wanted to say you should make it expand from the center instead of the corner or at least see if it looks better

[@JakeDevGames]

Can’t wait to play this game :)

[@shane_akers]

Cool

[@dextra_24703]

I would like to see the Itembar be like in the Mario & Luigi RPGs where it is above the head & spins in a circle, for me the screen then tells me I can go left, right, up & down. Or maybe make it like in secret of mana.

[@DevDuck]

Hm - I'll have to watch a video and check it out!

[@gambore]

YOOOOO, LESSS GOOO!

[@d0gg029]

Not sure if you’re keeping the sword, but it could go on your side when not in use, whereas the fishing rod could be on the back.

[@Incrusser]

I like bars

[@leonisadonis]

7:20 I said that under your tweet pretty cool 8:29 a door sound for entering the cave isn't very fitting in my opinion but it's a prototype so it's not a must fix

[@DevDuck]

I noticed that sound too haha I'll definitely be fixing it.

[@konnyb7659]

Hey, I would have an idea for your weapon system. What about you introduce only one single weapon which would be a crystal. The player finds this crystal during the first introduction in the game, which will be the "weapon" against the corruption. The crystal can absorb the corruption from the environment which loads the Cristal. You could build the story around it and also create a skill tree for it. The more powerful the crystal gets, the more corruption it can absorb and do different things with it. Just an idea maybe you like it. I love your devlogs! Keep up the good work :)

[@evan_game_dev]

I think that abilities should come from the items, and the more you use those types of items, the more proficiency you have in those types of items. This way, the player can fine tune their load out, while at the same time being able to switch items with things they find because they are proficient with those items as well

[@JGT-yd2wx]

death road 2 canada gives the player 3 items and no item bar, you just have to remember them or look in your inventory wich i prefer because less HUD = more game.

[@taisublack2599]

Hi, as always it’s perfect

[@carl_lenn]

6:00 a bug with the size scaling, since the sprite scales from the top left, it makes the distance from the right and the left slot asymmetrical. I assume this could be easily fixed

[@hyverian1165]

👏Dauphin Review👏

[@chance9505]

Have a sub, love your work!

[@BentStudios]

There could be a way to make it more user accessible if when you get an item it displays the item bar as bigger, or an option to make them bigger. The icons are tiny. To most it’s probably ok, but it could be nice to include a bigger bar.

[@bautistabaiocchi-lora1339]

What about shift+left click or ctrl+left click to unequip items from the item bar? Also, being able to drag an item off the item bar to drop it would be convenient.

[@RadarTutorials]

Which code is it written in?

[@exquisitebenjam]

I missed this video coming out! Glad I found it, I love this series. By the way, do you think you could incorporate a double click or something on items in your inventory to go straight to the next available space in your hotbar? It seems like that might make it a bit smoother.

[@itsME-dc4vm]

nice ;D

[@raulsantandertirado4400]

What will the crab loot do? To my current understanding it will act a resource of some kind. If it doesn't really have an active effect, you might want to consider it not going to the action bar by default. Perhaps add an options toggle button for this, in case not many people think like I do.

[@veriiberrii]

what is the thing you put youre ideas on?

[@trunkostudios]

Nice item bar, UI really makes or breaks a game - people aren’t going to enjoy something that is hard to interact with. I know I need to think through this better with my game - my UI makes sense to me, but I’ve been staring at it a while lol

[@TYANTOWERS]

I assume the reason for the collection bag AND item bar is to limit the number of items that can be equipped at once. In that case, I think non-combat items like the shells shouldn't automatically go into the item bar and there shouldn't be functionality to stack multiple copies of the same item type to the item bar.

[@TYANTOWERS]

Also, when you add an item to the item bar, it should disappear from the collection bag.

[@adicsbtw]

For the _select_next_slot() and _select_previous_slot() functions, you should use modulo instead of if else statements. In general, if else statements should be avoided as they can be inefficient. Something like _select_slot(posmod(selected_slot_index + 1, 6)) for next slot and _select_slot(posmod(selected_slot_index - 1, 6)) for previous slot. Note: The reason that you use posmod instead of % is because of the way it handles the negative case. The modulus of negative values with % causes the resulting value to be negative, posmod causes it to "overflow" to the positive value instead. Edit: removed mention of using 1-6 keys as he mentioned it at the end of the video

[@TheOriginalTim]

My understanding is that it's the "else" that causes the most issues, performance-wise. As I understand it, the efficiency loss is mostly due to CPU branch prediction, used to cache the instructions ahead of time. It should also be noted that a lot of compilers are aware of this, and go out of their way to work around the problem... thus nullifying any effort one might put into optimizing their code against it. Amusing anecdote: I once wasted several days trying to determine if for-next loops or while loops were "faster," only to learn that the compiler built both the same way when it translated to machine code. The long and short of it is this: Don't waste time optimizing your code before you know where the bottlenecks are; that's what the profiler is for. Make things work, then make the slow things faster.

[@Bergdoogen]

Can I suggest that you add a setting to invert the scroll direction for the item bar? You implemented it so that an upwards scroll moves the selected spot to the right but for me it would be more natural to be a downwards scroll. I haven't seen any games that do have offered a setting to change that but it would be pretty cool if yours did.

[@TheOriginalTim]

That was my immediate thought, as well; Scroll direction should definitely be a player preference. I have seen many games that do this, either with a toggle or by allowing input bindings to be changed.

[@thornedev1507]

ive seen some comments echo my thoughts of not wanting to hit the critters and if youre looking for cool new concepts may i suggets a water-gun-type thing where you disperse medicine to the creatures? this way u could also have med grenades n basically all kinds of "bullets" as different ways of dispersing the meds!

[@Memezy]

dude i hate youtube. i love this series so much but it never notified me when you uploaded even though i am subscribed and all notifications are on :(

[@Chevifier]

I always love your devlogs they're so calming and easy to watch. Do you have any advice on how to start mine? I'm doing a 3D game kinda like a cross between Metroid Prime and the BioShock games. Mostly my motivation is in the bin.😪

[@nitricswight]

That sounds awesome man! Keep working on it, we need more Metroid prime games

[@ldhero8]

Make it so you can click on the slots to equip it