| 2025 Dev Diary #1 - Reintroduction & Build [message #298] |
Wed, 01 January 2025 16:03  |
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Horemheb
Messages: 137
Registered: October 2022
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Senior Member
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Hello everyone. A very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.
We first announced School Simulator back in October 2023 under the name School Builder. A lot has gone on from then until now behind the development scenes. For those you who followed the early developer diaries you will find that while much has changed, our overall goal for School Simulator has not: To create a simulation of a school with hundreds or thousands of characters, where smaller, disparate systems end up interacting at the larger scale - of course with an emphasis on corporal punishment and discipline.
That said it's my pleasure to reintroduce School Simulator to you all!
Perspective
Like the classic D.M. games, School Simulator is played from a 2D-side perspective. Unlike the D.M. games, however, there are no separate maps, with gameplay taking place on large campus map that players will scroll left, right and up and down. Players can also zoom in and out to show less or more of the campus map respectively on the screen at once. Players will also be able to "peel" back various layers to get better looks inside and outside of rooms.
School Simulator is also resolution independent. Whereas the D.M. games were developed graphically for and locked to a 1920x1080 resolution, School Simulator supports all resolutions from 1280x720 and above. The larger the resolution, the more of the campus map that will be displayed.
Core Elements
There are four core gameplay elements of School Simulator: Build, Manage, Simulate and Control. We will go over each of these in separate developer diaries. Today we will be looking at Build.
Build
Players will design and construct their school campus. Buildings can be up to six floors in height. Within buildings you will be able to place classrooms, offices, computer labs, restrooms and the like. You will also need a find a place on your campus for two very large stand-alone buildings: the canteen and gymnasium.
Some rooms can also be assigned to specific groups or individuals; such as a group of classes floor two are for grade two, a specific office for the Headmaster, etc.
Remember what I said about smaller, disparate systems interacting at larger scales? Many seemingly small campus choices can have a big impact. Do your students switch classrooms regularly? Poorly designed hallways can lead to traffic, lateness and more. Campus unusually spread out? Perhaps there will be more chances for mischief as the Prefects cannot be everywhere at once.
Pecuniam Infinitam
One more thing to note today is money, or lack thereof. While we originally intended School Simulator to have a financial component, we dropped it quite early in development. At the end of the day we want players to feel able to be creative and fun on their terms, and not be stressed with constant budget management.
Screenshots
See the next thread for some screenshots relating to building!
[Updated on: Fri, 03 January 2025 10:17] Report message to a moderator |
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