The First Update!

Skip to the bottom for the first (very rough) video of gameplay.

I've made a lot of progress in the past week, scratching out loads of new basic systems. Most importantly, the core gameplay loop has been implemented: guard the nest from attackers by issuing orders to your bees. As before, the first two types of bees are the basic bee whose "drop" produces new honeycomb, and a second bee whose "drop" destroys honeycomb.

On Anatomy and Art

I've taken more of an interest in learning about the local wildlife in the region where I live, and as a result I've decided to go with a somewhat more anatomically-correct - albeit not physiologically correct - appearance for the bees. That is to say, the bees will look a bit more realistic, but their behavior will still be gamified.

Take the sprite I revealed last week, for instance. This sprite will be used for the basic bee that "drops" new honeycomb, and it looks a lot more like a real bee than any of the models in the old 3D version of the game. However, this sprite most closely resembles a bumblebee, and bumblebees don't really produce honey in the way that honey bees do, especially not in the hexagonal shape that defines the game grid.

The other type of bee you'll see in the video below is made to look like a carpenter bee. These bees are known for burrowing into hard plant material, which is why I chose them to be the second bee whose "drop" destroys honeycomb.

Other Progress

Here's a quick summary of all the other new additions this week:

• Selections and Orders: Bees can be selected and ordered to move around the screen, and selections can be "filtered" to a single type of bee.
• Cannons: The first, most basic type of enemy. Cannons continuously fire at a point (usually the nest).
• The Nest: This is the objective that the enemies try to destroy over the course of the game, while you protect it. It can take damage, and when defeated, the game ends. I'm using the Godot robot head logo for now, but will have a new sprite soon.
• Game State: There is now a basic, infinite score counter (+1 point per second) and a basic game over sequence, with the ability to restart.
• HUD: The hud shows the current score and the health of the nest ("colony" for now.) There is also a hotbar that allows for selection filtration.
• Pause Menu: It's not very well polished, but I've added a basic pause menu with saved settings for Music and SFX.

Gameplay Video

Below is the first, very rough gameplay video. This is just meant to highlight that the basic controls and gameplay have been implemented. Much better videos, hopefully with sound, will come in the future.