"I need to make the combat not suck"

This is the prevailing thought that has entered my mind for over 5 f*cking years.

I don't know where the time goes.

I need to make the combat not suck... tune prefabs for weeks. I need to make the combat not suck... work on AI abilities for weeks on end, time and again. I need to make the combat not suck, create animations, create particles. I need to make the combat not suck, tweak abilities timings. I need to make the combat not suck, endlessly revise systems values for years and years. Add pizzaz to damage #'s, tweak ai escape logics, adjust collision volume sizes and timings, add stuns, hesitation, revise their mechanics endlessly, expand on force mechanics, revize combo's again.

I need to make the combat not suck. Revamp how values function and force values work, invalidating all prior content. I need to make the combat not suck, implement more robust and diverse bonuses that invalidates the endelessly tweaked tunings to most all systems, and adds more dimensions to the tunings that must be done in the future.

I need to make the combat not suck. The animations still need more polish, the abilities need tons of tunings, particularly AI abilities. Everything is refactored, everything is reorganized, for the better, but it's going to take me a bit of time to get my bearings again on systems that I am SICK TO DEATH of tweaking and tuning. I need to make the combat not suck. Each and every adjustments influences the balance of every single other element of the game, it's an endless cycle of burning out tweaking and tuning values cooldowns, force values, detection times, attack ranges, combo windows, followed by getting fed up with imperfect systems, and revising the system in ways that now demands reentering data. It's an endless, vicious cycle. And the combat still sucks.

I'm  feeling better the past couple days, thank f*cking Christ. Everything takes on a new perspective when you feel as though you have time to finish, and energy to push forward isn't fleeting. I may be burned out a bit, but that will pass. It's good to feel the strength returning.

Took a breather today. A true break. Not an off day where I feel like shit and I just can't work, but a day where I felt decent, and I just fucked off, watched some DOTES.

Barring any curveballs, I plan on jumping right the f*ck in tomorrow soon as I get up, and we're going to claw our way out of this sh*tty state of the game.

It's maddening. I know what we need to do tomorrow. We need to make the combat not suck. And we have failed and failed and failed for so f*cking long at that singular problem. Every day, ever week, every month, every year has been devoted to that singular goal, but dare I say it, I think we may be close to the combat not sucking, and I MEAN IT this time. 

We sure as sh*t made this path a lot more difficult than it had to be. We added unique ranged mechanics, keep heading lock mechanics, innovative new charge mechanics and combo systems, and all these systems work together to add bits of nuance and skill to a game that relies on positionings and timings in interesting new ways! At least I tell myself it does, time will tell if we ever truly pull it off in a way that others appreciate.

We're knocking on the door. I'm not entirely sure what the work days are going to be like next week. My plan was to have a detailed milestone list and veer away from the seat of the pants developments. But i'm not certain that's the correct path. There are no correct paths. Only best guesses, we can never be sure of anything, we can only roll the dice and hope for the best. If the past 5 years have taught me anything, it's to not get too analytical and to trust your gut. My gut says we open up Unity tomorrow, we start tweaking abilities on the hefty sharks, and from there, WHO KNOWS! We've got a todo list a mile long and 500000 upgrades to tweak and tune, so it's not like there's any shortage of things that need doing if we run out of ideas on how to make the combat not suck.

Ate their hearts, drank their blood, wash your fins in blackened mud. Try to swim , try to hide. Heart beats faster from inside. 

Thought it was a big charade, your life is ended by Mermaids.

If enjoying Dethklok more than most all Metal bands is wrong, I don't want to be right.

Let's count our blessings. We're still passionate about the project, it's getting better all the time. Years ago I would have sold my soul for help from a publisher, for a lifeline, for external help. Today I am so glad that I have full control of the project and the ball is still in our corner. No wolves have been let in. Still taking shots day after day, they'll probably miss, but we're still in this bitch.

(Dis gon' be some real neckbeard sh*t if i'm burying it in the 7th layer of this blather hellscape)

The beast will always feed, uncontrollably. Decline is our nature. You can conjure currency and disjoint discourse. You can fake favor by manhandling mediations of particular persuasions while stealing  sanity at all fringes of authority with a smile and a grin.  

There be a horde of underhanded sh*ts out there who have an unspoken agreement that life is better when we surround ourselves with those we can exploit, bully and won't hold us to account. 

None choose to build character, our growth is stunted as our unarticulated bodies are stuffed between.

Can you feel the decline? What are you waiting for? Someone to save you? The only person who can do that is yourself. Wake the fuck up. 

The poisoned puff cakes you've allied salivate as they ponder chewing your sullied corpse, the only thoughts that distract them from their self inflicted pains. They care not about their weakness, only that others first fall, that they may fill their maws with the scabbings and festations as failure rises up and chokes up to their necks.

All is squandered, all is lost. All shat upon the excrements of the meaningless machines. All good churned to muck in the darkened mud of the sea floor.

(If I could choose any theme song for this forsaken project...)

Wish I could neckbeard out and really cleanup some of these rambles, but at some point I gotta get to tuning these supid f*cking floats, ints and enums.

Post Work Edit: Had an Ok day, still just tryin up loose ends and getting my bearings back. Had this random impulse to clean up the UI, just really distill the hell out of it, and I his most all the elements contexually.

It's funny as a developer, we love having this expanding, clunky UI. Each eye sore to us is the proof that we got one other system in the game! Things are working, it's turning into a game! Look there's proof, you can see all the crap happening! But it's all garbage, it's all noise, and chances are it's making your game not look better, just a confusing mess, something clunky, something that needs streamlining.

The UI IS CLEAN NOW!

Look at that singular, gorgeous health bar!