Programming
Program designer
Now here is an example of the heartbreak of game development. Our first program designer originally planned to animate the characters. That would have been great, but we soon discovered it was outside the scope of the project.
We are very grateful to our original programmer, the very shy C Morris, who set up the backbone of the game in good clear scripts which the next programmer, Scott, could pick up with ease.
We are very grateful to our original programmer, the very shy C Morris, who set up the backbone of the game in good clear scripts which the next programmer, Scott, could pick up with ease.
Scott Purcival
Scott Purcival
Advanced Diploma of Professional Game Development (Programming)
Advanced Diploma of Professional Game Development (Programming)
Scott arrived on the scene with a bang. We were lucky to get him because he'd just finished ten years employment and was looking for a bit of fun before he found a new job. And Scott's idea of fun, is, wait for it -- coding!
He helped make a lot of decisions about how to place the characters, how to separate the story-lines, and how to save the dialogue choices. On his own initiative, he made the best loading icon ever.
He helped make a lot of decisions about how to place the characters, how to separate the story-lines, and how to save the dialogue choices. On his own initiative, he made the best loading icon ever.
In fact, Scott is the programmer who put the cheek in cheeky. He took the romantic image of the well at twilight and put the frog having a bath in it. We loved it so much, we made it the background for the home menu.
Apart from, you know, actually making the game work, Scott has optimized it. When he started, its build size was 1.4GB due to thousands of images and audio files. Scott brought the game size down to 600MB even though Kathy quadrupled the character assets.
Scott's biggest contribution was to create custom shaders so that 1,161 vector princes and princesses can be customised, and their family members match. Everyone said it couldn't be done, and we even gave up once, but Scott persevered.
Here is Scott describing what it was like to be thrown in the deep end on a large and increasingly complicated project.
And Scott has his own blog!
Here is Scott describing how he programmed Frog's Princess: https://scott.purcival.com/2021/03/20/the-frogs-princess/
Here is Scott describing how he programmed Frog's Princess: https://scott.purcival.com/2021/03/20/the-frogs-princess/
Working, studying, and being a Dad, Scott has made time to keep up with the game (and the bugs which Kathy MAY have introduced). He really is... The Codefather.
See Scott's own games at http://scott.purcival.com/