I love seeing this kind of in-depth rundown. Optimizing for size like this is so rare in modern game dev, but it really can make a subtle but important quality of life difference to the player....
I love seeing this kind of in-depth rundown. Optimizing for size like this is so rare in modern game dev, but it really can make a subtle but important quality of life difference to the player. Makes me want to get my hands dirty making things with my own Playdate.
Really pleased you enjoyed it. I agree it's all too rare. Nobody "needs" to do it on powerful modern platforms. I think many game developers would improve their practice by every once in a while...
Really pleased you enjoyed it. I agree it's all too rare. Nobody "needs" to do it on powerful modern platforms. I think many game developers would improve their practice by every once in a while making something for a limited platform like Playdate.
One huge QOL thing that I didn't mention is that because everything is embedded in such a tiny executable, there is essentially no loading which means the game appears instantly. This made for an easier decision not to have a detailed launch animation, so it's currently two frames: one normal and one with the VCR static applied. Then the game loop immediately takes over and continues the static effect.
Oh, and I also run the game at 40fps which is higher than the Playdate default of 30fps which gives a perceptible but unexplainable feeling of "extra" smoothness to most players.
This hit the top slot on HN a few hours ago.
I love seeing this kind of in-depth rundown. Optimizing for size like this is so rare in modern game dev, but it really can make a subtle but important quality of life difference to the player. Makes me want to get my hands dirty making things with my own Playdate.
Really pleased you enjoyed it. I agree it's all too rare. Nobody "needs" to do it on powerful modern platforms. I think many game developers would improve their practice by every once in a while making something for a limited platform like Playdate.
One huge QOL thing that I didn't mention is that because everything is embedded in such a tiny executable, there is essentially no loading which means the game appears instantly. This made for an easier decision not to have a detailed launch animation, so it's currently two frames: one normal and one with the VCR static applied. Then the game loop immediately takes over and continues the static effect.
Oh, and I also run the game at 40fps which is higher than the Playdate default of 30fps which gives a perceptible but unexplainable feeling of "extra" smoothness to most players.