Make a real time, real place, multiplayer game
by jj
Software Development Journey Overview
Follow this step-by-step software development journey to see real progress updates, challenges overcome, and practical experience.
Progress Updates (5 total)
Update #1: Make a real time, real place, multiplayer game
I’ve had an idea to use real location for a while to make a mobile game. It’s a fun little side project. The idea is you actually work with you people in your city to build public works, defend, and take over other towns. Like Pokémon Go but “real”. Every city will have one ruler; coups are possible!
Challenges Overcome: I’m very visual, so the FIRST thing I did was make the city mapping functionality work. Drawing border is surprisingly hard. Using OSM
Obstacles Faced: There are going to be a TON of balance and functionality considerations. Things will have to be constantly adjusted I think. Don’t want one thing to be OP
Looking Back: Definitely doing all UIs programmatically. Storyboards/XIB are brutal!
Update #2: UI and music! ( 🔊⬆️ )
20% completeLike I said I’m very visual, so I focused on UI improvements. I’ve always been a huge fan of this thick, offset border design language. The border gives such a nice emphasis to the content. Definitely more game like! Ditched the real map look for “hand drawn” playing field. Oh, and made a background theme inspired by Streets of Whiterun.
TestFlight link: https://testflight.apple.com/join/4jxSyUmW
Challenges Overcome: First time I made an app it took me 1 year to get approved for TestFlight, 2nd time took 2 days haha
Obstacles Faced: Dealing with counties vs cities in boundary mapping is veryyyy hard. If I go to NYC, the game won’t work now because technically it’s NYC County… but just something to figure it eventually!
Update #3: Map building logic solved!
50% completeI thought this would be more difficult than it was! Fast, completely idempotent map building! It always find the direct neighbors and draws the borders accurately. We can see Cambridge tested with its famous neighbors
Obstacles Faced: Giving people something to do is the next decision. Also unifying various menu UIs
Update #4: App Store approved!
75% completeThe first app took a year, this time 2 weeks! https://apps.apple.com/us/app/kingdom-territory/id6757280025
Practice does make perfect!
Update #5: Basics done. So much war!
100% completeWell, as human nature goes, the first thing that happened is 4 wars broke out. Kingdom invasions, training for coups. I’m excited to see what the future holds!
https://apps.apple.com/app/id6757280025
Challenges Overcome: Seeing people play all day, and get mad when something breaks haha. That means they like it and care!
Obstacles Faced: Balance is so difficult. Change one thing to give more food, then people have too much food. Finding a balance for economy and resources will be difficult.
Looking Back: People don’t like change