Domo Yoro

Shapes, Like You've Never Seen Before

The New Bonus Level Visuals

We’re both really happy with how this level turned out visually, and I’m glad that we now have a second final-game-ready level visual style nailed down. This visual style is intended for all bonus levels going forward. (But it will look fairly different from level to level!)

This visual style also has additional effects associa...

Development Update: April 2024

Hey everyone! Development is still going super well. I’ve been meaning to make a new post for a while, but the posts I want to make just can’t be done in a timely manner. So, at this point, I just want to put out an update so that people know what’s going on.

Firstly, let me explain the two posts I’ve been working on:

The Design of “DemoCarry” 2024-04-15 23:43:37 +0000 UTC View Post

Development Is Going Very Very Well, Actually

Firstly- thank you for your support. I wouldn't have been able to make it this far into development otherwise!

Magi Officially Joins Development!

Magi, the artist behind the new logo, the key art, and the tileset, background and decorations for Big Beginning, has officia...

Cherry Carry Cascade: Coming Soon

New effects and new interactions!

Cherry Carry Cascade is almost ready! This build features a new bonus level centered around mechanical interactions that didn't make it into the already-pretty-long junkyard level. Plus some entirely new surprises as well.

Randomberry Rush is out now! (Update: V1.1)

Go play it here!

Here's an incomplete changelog:

New Stuff

• Bottlecap collection screen (accessed from hub) (Note: names & descriptions are incomplete)
• Stats screen (accessed from hub)
• Flavor screen
• Best bottlecap chai...
  2023-12-02 23:58:21 +0000 UTC View Post

Sick x2

Hey everyone, 

The next patreon build will have to wait a little while longer. I'm currently writing this from my phone since I'm quarantined away from my computer, but the jist of it is that I got sick, recovered, and then the illness rebounded. I didn't even know that was possible until it happened. 

Hopefully I'm not out for too long! 

Announcing Randomberry Rush Flavor + Submit Your Bottlecaps!

Today, I’ll go over the next Patreon build- and talk about custom patron bottlecaps!

The Next Patreon Build: Randomberry Rush Flavor

Notice anything...

2023-11-02 19:30:42 +0000 UTC View Post

It's All About Presentation

Hey everyone!

Normally I'd embed the actual content further into the post, but GIF compression absolutely destroys the background in this one. Apparently I can only embed videos as a dedicated video post, so here we are.

Let me backup a little and talk about the first new screen I designed: the bottlecap collection screen!

Bottlecap Collection Screen

2023-10-18 18:19:30 +0000 UTC View Post

Round Robin: Mechanic Preview 4

Further extending two core gameplay systems for even crazier scenarios.

As always, this was lovingly made with placeholder sprites. The textures will be updated in the future to make it easier to understand the rotation speed, even in a 30fps gif.

Of course, you can do mor...

Why The Demo Was So Polished

The secret ingredient is playtesting!

The Playtest Process

For Soda-Powered Penguin, there’s an important point in the development of a level wherein I start the playtesting process: right after the first draft of a level is done. This is when I'll start reaching out to playtesters, one at a time, to schedule stream-calls on Discord. From there I'll watch them p...

What Is Going On With SPP Right Now?

Hey, so I've been working on a few different patreon posts to put out there- one on the playtesting process, and another on the development of the latest level- but they just aren't coming together as well as I had hoped.

So instead, I'm opting to write this post: a general update on the state of things.

Level 5, "Junkyard", Is Finally "Done"

2023-08-02 01:39:45 +0000 UTC View Post

Go play the new level! (Update: V1.1)

https://domoyoro.itch.io/soda-powered-penguin-cherry-carry-flavor/patreon-access

(Level visuals are a placeholder.)

Edit: I accidentally made it so that only the Super Soda tier could see this post, and not the Premium Soda Pop tier. My bad!

Update: V1.1 C...

2023-07-07 21:04:17 +0000 UTC View Post

SPP: Cherry Carry Flavor Needs a Bit More Time!

Hey all, I'm pushing the release date of the next build back to July 7th in order to fix some issues- some programming bugs and level design snags, as well as finish up a few visual effects.

Of course, if your sub expires or drops down a tier, I'll send you the new build via DM. Thank you for your patience!

How Bottlecaps Became One of the Most Complex Systems in the Game

A post about a very long journey to animate infinite bottlecaps.

Note: this will have some spoilers for bottlecaps in the upcoming build.

The Bottlecap Concept

Following the theming of a penguin strapped to a soda bottle, bottlecaps immediately made sense as a collectible. This mirrors the real-world hobby of bottlecap collecting: countless logos and brands ...

The Summer 2023 Patreon Build

Thank you everyone for your continued support! I do recognize that these past two months have been a bit slow, but things are finally looking to be on track again.

I'd like to announce that the next Patreon build will feature a level tentatively named DemoCarry. As you...

Tilting Away: Mechanic Preview 3

This one appears in a few other platformers, but probably not quite like this.

I don't really have much to say here- tilting platforms and scale platforms are pretty self-explanatory.

2023-05-09 17:00:04 +0000 UTC View Post

Schedule Adjustment

Back in January, I built up a buffer of posts for both here and Twitter. This worked pretty well for a consistent schedule! Unfortunately, game development is unpredictable; the entire past month has largely been unplanned work. This means that the features I had been planning on recording earlier this month to show off around now haven't been finished. We've also reached the end of the post bu...

SPP Build: April 8th, 2020 (The Prototype)

Penguin Game? Penguin Game.

I had tried recording and commentating on my own, but I had a hard time doing both and keeping it interesting... which is why I invited collaborator and friend Sdace to play! This build predates Sdace's involvement with the project.

I apologize for the cropped Discord call view- I completely forgot that the stream could be maximized until halfway through ...

Design Problems: Hard Light Bridges

This post was originally going to be a fun mechanic preview like the Toxic Gas post, but it turns out that this mechanic just... isn't that interesting?

When I was working on the Factory level, I was making a bunch of rooms with lasers when I remembered the hard light bridge from Portal 2. With a simple code edit, I was able to get the hard light bridge working, and I made a short room to...

The Original Penguin Designs

When the game concept was still just an idea, it was originally a cross between Super Mario Sunshine and Plague Knight- both in terms of gameplay, and character design. This was supposed to be a small game that could be completed in under a year, so I wasn't terribly concerned with originality.

The character of this game would've been a crow that couldn't fly, but when equipped with a pre...

Mechanic Preview 2

Super Mario World is one of the sources of inspiration for this game, and that probably shines the most through this mechanic.

I have wanted to experiment with carry and throw for years now, even before starting development on Soda-Powered Penguin. In Super Mario World, it feels wonder...

Steam keys are now a reward!

For the Super Soda tier, as well as any patron that contributes more than $15 during the development of the game, Steam keys will be sent out when the game releases!

The reason this was not offered as a benefit at the start of the Patreon campaign was due to the amiguity of whether or not it was ok to sell Steam keys outside of Steam. After looking into it, it seems that it's a-ok as long...

The development of "BonusDrill"

This level was definitely a lot less straightforward than I expected, for a variety of reasons. Here are some of those reasons!

What Even Is A Bonus Level?

I'm still figuring that out! Main levels focus on two or more mechanics and the interesting combinations they have, whereas the two bonus levels so far have focused on different applications of a single mechanic. For this first...

The first patreon build is out!

Go grab the build here:

https://domoyoro.itch.io/soda-powered-penguin-patreon1/patreon-access 

Thank you for your patience and support! I will be posting a postmortem on the development of the new drill-centric level shortly.

Patreon Build Delay; Submit your bottlecap designs!

For the sake of my mental health, I'm officially calling it: the Patreon build will be delayed to mid-to-late January. To make up for the delay, I'd like to offer a different reward: implementing your own bottlecap design in the game!

Here are some examples of requested bottlecaps:

2022-12-30 22:39:43 +0000 UTC View Post

Cut Content: Enemies

Okay, so this is a pretty broad category of features, so it wouldn't be right to say that enemies are completely cut. Really, it's just this specific approach to enemy design that didn't work out very well- and so these placeholder green moving blocks were removed from Antarctic Alcove and replaced by bomb blocks. The two GIFs above were recorded in the summer of 2021, while the GIFs b...