January was important for me. I started by deciding to not participate in the Steam Nest Fest in February. From what I read, it was better to participate in Next Fest near the release of the game. 

My Steam wishlist number is still low, and the plan was to release the game in August 2024. So, it made sense for me to target the next Steam Fest in June 2024. 

Milestones, Goals, and Tasks

I have made stricter rules for myself. Every end of the month is a milestone. The milestones dictate what should be the priority.  

I want to be practical about this. I know the pace I can put in and what I can deliver. It is a matter of focus. 

Doing this will help me immensely in wrapping up Yurei, and also prepping for the next projects. 

The structure is simple. I have milestones, goals, and tasks. 

- Milestones, as I mentioned, are once a month. They are bigger in scope. By the end of February, I want all forest stages to be quality L3. Which means balanced, fun, and without any game-breaking bugs.

- Goals are bigger than tasks but smaller than milestones. For example, I have a goal of having forest stages 4 through 7 in L3 quality. Only when all of those are L3, the goal is achieved. 

- Tasks are the day-to-day things. I try to have tasks that last 15 minutes to 1 hour. Any more than that, it's an invitation to procrastinate. Doing tasks, achieving goals, and reaching milestones.

Cave Stages

For January, the milestone was about having the cave area L3. It was hard to hit. But in the end, I figured out a system that worked well.

It starts with having a task about playtesting the level. I usually playtest it for about 10 to 15 minutes. It means playing it a bunch of times and taking notes on pacing, balance issues, and bugs. Those then get turned into tasks. Which I estimate and prioritize. Once all of those are done, I playtest again. If nothing critical stands out, the stage is considered L3.

I had done passes in the past to get the stage to L2. Which means having a correct number of enemies set. The difficulty and what I want to introduce are specified. The unlockables are set. The layout of the level is final. The camera settings are set.

From L2 to L3, it's about refining and getting to the final polishing phase. It does not end at L3, but it is really close.

I am happy with the result. The one thing I might go back to is the boss. I had iterated on it for quite some time, but I think it still needs more attention.

Stamina UI

Since the beginning of the project, my stamina HUD was always on the bottom left of the screen.

It always bothered me. During the game, if you tried to attack but you were out of stamina, there was no feedback. I then added audio feedback. It helped, but it wasn't enough. I then added a visual VFX that pops up to indicate that you are out of stamina. That helped more, but it still looked like something was lacking.

That's when I decided to move the stamina UI to the center. At first, it was a bit odd. I believe that now it is easier to track your stamina this way. It only shows up after your stamina is below 70%. Once it charges back to 100%, it vanishes. 

Small Wins

New VFXs

New Death Character Art

Added End of Demo Popup with CTA to Steam

Closing

I want to keep this one short. As I mentioned, the focus is on the milestone. These devlogs help me reflect on the progress I have made. But I need to keep my head down and work on the game. 

I hope this was informative to you. If you are interested in Yurei, why not head to Steam and wishlist it? It would help me a ton! 

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Thanks for reading all the way. Keep an eye out on Twitter @brightflask.