When the jam started, I figured I'd build this game and walk away from it. But as I started working, a few things changed.

First, I started world building. I think some of the elements of Unduhagge probably seem very random, and indeed some of them are, but as my work progressed I thought more and more about what the story was, who Mina Mori is, and who her lost loved one was. I didn't get to explore this in the game as much as I could have. That world is still with me, and I want to share it.

Second, with all the time I had to create art, my skills and comfort with pixel art grew quite a bit. I'm by no means a serious professional, but I managed to pull off some things I wouldn't have even kind of imagined at the start of this adventure. I want to keep improving.

And then there was the programming. I like rm2k3 as a prototyping tool for aesthetics. It's super light weight, it imposes specific restrictions, and you can make maps with relative ease. But as I was working, I thought more and more about its limitations and how I would do things better. Obviously, it's not legal to reverse engineer the engine, but I started thinking to myself: maybe I should move on to a different engine?

Maybe I should even make one.

I want to keep making this game, and I have a few thoughts about how I might accomplish that.

1. I'm going to keep building the base game using rm2k3. There's no reason why not to take advantage of a mapping system I'm familiar with.
2. Investigate preexisting engines. I'm thinking of other rpg making tools specifically, but also more broadly, of environments like Godot, which have access to C++ and give me the sort of flexibility I crave.
3. Consider building my own engine. I wouldn't be starting from scratch, because I have a bunch of student code which isn't great but viable. I've also been spending my time with the behemoth text that is Game Engine Architecture. The game itself is mechanically simple, but there are plenty of challenges I could run into along the way. This would be a long, long process. The side effect would be that in the end I would have a light weight 2D engine that might be fun for beginner/intermediate programmers to experiment with.

There's a lot to think about, but I ultimately plan to continue this project. As my final school year approaches, I expect to be a very busy boy, so navigating multiple projects might overwhelm me.

More to come.

 - Christopher Risewick