Player Movement

Welcome to the first weekly Dev Log for Cherrylicious! This week, I focused on implementing player movement for our protagonist, a virtual guy that looks very similar to the Among Us player.

To animate the player, I used a sprite of it and sliced it into multiple sprites. The animation that I started with was of a cute little dance that the player does when he is in an idle position. The player's idle animation is played when the player is not moving, this makes the player feel more connected to their avatar (Or you can say player is Breathing).

This animation is shown in the GIF below:

Then, I worked on adding codes to the player movement script which is attached to the player to give him the instructions. This script allows the player to run and jump. To make sure the player always faces the direction it is moving, I have added a code in the script that will flip the player’s moving direction according to the user’s input, this feature of flipping the direction was used from the Sprite Renderer “flipX”.

To control the player's movement, I defined input controls in my game. The player can run by pressing the left and right arrow keys or the A and D keys. I applied a force to the player's rigid body in the corresponding direction to make it move. The player can also jump by pressing the spacebar. I added an upward force to the player's rigid body to make it jump.

Next up, to make the player's movements more dynamic and engaging, I implemented animations for jumping and running as well. The jump animation was designed to convey a sense of weight and height, giving players a sense of satisfaction as they soar through the air. The run animation was designed to convey a sense of speed and urgency, making the player feel like they are dashing through the game world.

Animation for both Running and Jumping (Falling) is shown in the GIF below:

In addition to these basic animations, I also added some subtle touches to make the player's movements feel livelier. For example, the player cannot jump when touching a wall or a corner and when is in the air, which creates a realistic and immersive gameplay experience.

I received some feedback on the player’s movement in my game and all of them were taken into consideration, these will be actioned before moving forward with the game development. Two of my colleagues found the player movement “nice and smooth”, but they would like it if the player can respawn as soon as it falls, and they would also like it if the player can fall a bit faster, as this will help the player in hopping between the platforms (I found this feedback very important as moving forward with high levels in my game, I would need my player to be a bit fast to face all the obstacles and challenges).

I also received very brief feedback for each part of the player’s movement, summing them up, the player believes that a set walk speed without acceleration/deceleration time works well for a forgiving platformer. He appreciates the ability to change direction mid-air and adjust movement in the air to prevent frustrating deaths. He also compliments the animation and ability to jump out of glitches. They suggest allowing players to use only arrow keys and using the up-arrow key as an alternative jump input. 

All these feedbacks helped me in making a checklist for improvements to be made before moving onto the next step, like making the player respawn (to get more chances to check the game development each week), making the up-arrow work as well, letting the player fall faster and also fix a bug where the player can hide in between the terrain (Secret: it is a feature :)).

Moreover, it's also worth noting that I used Tile map to create both the terrain and background for this short platform, which allowed me to create a more visually appealing and cohesive game world. Overall, I'm excited about the progress I've made with the player movement, and I am looking forward to incorporating more feedback and continuing to develop Cherrylicious.

Before finishing the Dev Log for this week, let's have a look at the short platform developed to check the Player Movement. 

GIF for Player Movement is below:

What's next? Curious?

Credits:

Assets were imported from:

https://assetstore.unity.com/packages/2d/characters/pixel-adventure-1-155360