Hello Developer Community!
I hope this is okay to share here: After 6+ months of work (more learning than doing) I’ve finally reached a point where my game is playable, although nowhere near complete and likely the farthest thing from “optimized” that folks here have seen. I would appreciate any feedback and know I have many bugs to work through.
Some back-story:
I’m a solo, hobbyist developer who initially started playing Roblox as a way to monitor what my daughter was doing online. I stumbled across Bee Swarm Simulator in its early days and could not believe how fun and addicting it was, even for an adult. I later became interested in development after my daughter attended a coding camp and introduced me to Studio. I’ve had very little coding experience since dropping my CS major in favor of a finance degree 30 years ago, which also reveals that I’m probably not the average developer demographic here. My learning has primarily been from the Developer Hub site, this amazing community forum (huge thanks to folks like ThatTimothy and others who seem to have all the answers), and AlvinBlox videos, which have been invaluable.
Skate City Simulator pays tribute to my favorite game of all time: 1986’s Atari 720 (I have one in my garage and maintain an online community dedicated to the game). It is also heavily influenced by Bee Swarm Simulator and the Roblox simulator genre in general.
The project is largely a ‘labor of love’ and is likely not the type of game that most Roblox players would enjoy (sorry, no pets, adoptions, robberies, or obbies, and I’m going for a retro – 8 bit look). It was more of a project to see if I could figure out how some of the complex systems in Bee Swarm Simulator worked, and potentially duplicate them. Spoiler: I can’t… and that game is a masterpiece, but I did learn everything from making thumbnails and icons, to creating complex scoring and questing systems, as well as a custom sticker mechanic.
Its also worth pointing out that I made a very conscious decision to move away from the traditional Roblox skateboard platform, and go with a 100% animation based skating mechanism, which retains the normal ‘feel’ of Roblox running and jumping.
Side note (rant?) I’ve just moved the entire game from my personal account over to a group. An incredibly arduous process that involved moving animations. Rebuilding gamepasses, and other fixes. So if you intend to publish from a group, do it from the get-go!
Again, really appreciate any feedback (Yep, constructive welcome)
https://www.roblox.com/games/5221648345/Skate-City-Simulator-Beta