Six days left, here’s a look at my progress so far. Check out the TIGSource thread for more info.  Click the images for larger versions.

I’ve been working on a game called Tentacle Uprising for the TIGSource Cockpit Competition which ends next Sunday. Check out my entry thread here. It’s basically a space combat sim with some tower defense elements thrown in and uses the cartoon shader from my engine.

Nothing terribly flashy to report. I’ve mainly been busy with small infrastructure work and the big ticket item of a robust UI system. I think that’s finally to the point where it can be used is almost any future project so I am excited about that. Once I had it done it was extremely easy to add menus, HUDs, etc. throughout the game. I am a fan of keeping things data driven so, like most of the components in my engine, it’s controlled through XML. There are XML elements and attributes that specify the type of UI control, font, position, alignment, etc. along with any children with an arbitrary nested depth. All that means is that from the XML file I can define menus and sub-menus and any changes appear in game without having to change or recompile code. The XML file also defines actions for buttons, which are delegates that are defined per game at the moment. However, these actions can be changed like anything else so a button can go from resuming the game to quitting it by just changing one word in the XML file.

As far as release date goes, I know I said I’d have something to download around now but I want to make sure this game is polished before I do that. I’ll keep you guys up to date on that front, but for now I’ll just say “when it’s done”.