Okay so there’s no way I can even remotely finish Dungeon Quest, the little procedural minimal dungeon crawler I’m making, in 15 days with how chaotic my life is with work and two young ones. I’ve decided to expand the timeline to be release publicly on Mar 31.
But I don’t want to release nothing, so here’s the latest build (v0.2):
I’d love it if people checked it out! It’s not balanced, it’s not finished, and it’s probably not even fun yet. But it’s getting there! Combat, proc gen, leveling, inspecting, talking are all working. Inventory management isn’t done yet. No sprites yet, just text.
Part of me feels a little like, ugh, I’m changing the rules already. But it’s been good learning that my life makes it difficult to do game jams or even consistent short pushes. Some weeks I can get much more done than others due to various factors. And I’m just gonna own that and not rush myself if it’s not feeling right. But I’m still committed to finishing Dungeon Quest by the end of the month, that seems quite possible. Even if it’s just a prototype-style release.
Here are two new screenshots:
5 Likes
I don’t have a playdate, but this looks super cool! love the minimalist presentation
1 Like
Something kind of nice about Playdate is that the SDK is free to download on the major operating systems, so you can play non-Catalog games for free on your computer with the Simulator: Develop for Playdate
While not as convenient as the actual device (e.g. cranking is weird on it), it’s a nice way to try some games out. It also supports connecting a controller and using it for input. 
3 Likes
@brettch I think you could lean into the minimal presentation and add and some high contrast vector graphics over/under the text to make this work without much effort.
1 Like
oh, this is great to know! I’m working on a game that I wanted to port to the playdate eventually as an anniversary edition (the current version has strict limitations, but I had some ideas for “behind the scenes” content that I thought would work well there.) nice to know I can start on that without the device. (still want to get one eventually fwiw)
I’ll try to get around to your game at some point soon, then!
1 Like
I think in one of the podcast episodes, Frank had expressed disappointment that Season 1 wasn’t synchronized across players, and I found my head nodding in agreement despite the recognition that with batched shipping and the manufacturing challenges during the 'vid that would have been tough.
But I’m hoping that if there are even a few folks on here with Playdates and planning to go in for season 2 that we could get a book club going with that as well!
6 Likes
I am very interested in this.
I liked a few of the Season 1 games a whole lot. Saturday Edition, Ratcheteer, Zipper, Crankin… lotta cool stuff in there. Hope we get a few of those devs back for Season 2.
5 Likes
I am fully in for season 2 book club.
3 Likes
For anyone avoiding spoilers of any kind, Season 2 starts May 29 and is $39 for 12 games delivering two at a time over 6 weeks.
I’m in, and going to try to revisit season one games I left unfinished before then
3 Likes
Pretty cool slate of announcements. I preordered because I am desperate for stuff to distract me from everything going on. It’s interesting that not many season 1 devs are back (maybe not any?). I see a lot of familiar faces from the playdate community instead. Not a bad thing, a lot of those developers are making very cool games.
Indiana-Jonas popping up is an interesting one. I quite liked Surmount.
Taria & Como looked solid. I like the art a lot.
I will be interested in CatchaDiablos. Pullfrog I thought had a lot of good stuff in it, although I wasn’t hooked on the gameplay. Pretty curious about what they’ve got here.
Between Shadowgate and Chance’s Lucky Escape, there’s an interesting bit of traditional point and click representation here. No confirmation that that’s what Chance’s Lucky Escape is, but the two devs are heavily in that space.
Some cool stuff for sure.
2 Likes
I just watched the show before bed here. All the Season 2 news and everything was great, but my main takeaway was that all the Panic staff and all the devs just seemed like they were having fun, and genuinely effusively enthusiastic about the PlayDate and Season 2. It was really refreshing to see so many happy people, especially since everyone around me seems so miserable lately (me included, and for good reason).
2 Likes
I’m on board with Season 2! My favorites from Season 1 are Hyper Meteor, Crankin, Flipper Lifter, and Omaze. It would be great if there are 3-4 Season 2 games to click with in the same way.
Fulcrum Defender and Taria & Como look interesting. But like with Season 1, part of the appeal is sampling every game in the package. So I’m looking forward to trying everything and finding out which ones are my faves.
2 Likes
