Grid Sage Games

NOVEMBER 22, 2023

Ever since my first design docs from Cogmind pre-alpha, written back in 2013, I always wanted a projectile deflection mechanic. This marks the first time in Cogmind history that I implemented a new mechanic before actually having a spot for it in game--I had no idea what item(s) or robot(s) would make use of this feature.

Mechanics 52

Mechanics Build Feature Alpha 52

Grid Sage Games

JANUARY 5, 2024

Revisiting many of Cogmind's windows to make adjustments enabling everything to fit into fewer rows for the semi-modal UI layout.

Dev 40

Dev 40

Grid Sage Games

APRIL 28, 2023

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Writing 40

Writing 40

Grid Sage Games

DECEMBER 9, 2021

I’ve described a few times (most recently when introducing Cargo Convoys ) how Cogmind’s world is divided into two primary types of maps: main areas and branches. In its first year of Alpha builds Cogmind gained two such varieties of what we could call “intermaps,” in the form of Waste and Garrisons.

Mechanics 52

Mechanics Content Build Beta 52

Grid Sage Games

MARCH 10, 2022

Cogmind began its life as a 7DRL , and a portion of items designed back when the game was overall a very different environment didn’t evolve at the same pace. That would be bad :P. Beta 11 added six new artifacts though, with even cooler (but balanced :P) effects, so that makes up for it ;).

Balance 52

Balance Mechanics Beta Prototyping 52

Grid Sage Games

MARCH 20, 2023

Patron activity was pretty significant throughout Beta 11 development, with 11 incremental prerelease versions to play, and since a big chunk of Cogmind player activity is by patrons (who also happen to be more likely to opt in to scoresheet submissions), technically an equally big chunk of our data can be traced to that group.

Beta 52

Beta Build Data Mechanics 52

Grid Sage Games

DECEMBER 4, 2021

Cogmind is now in its 9th year of continuous development, so as usual let’s take a look at the past year of progress in yet another annual review ! and improving the game for those of us who are playing it. Development Time. Development has been going pretty smoothly and I hope to have it out some time within the next few months.

Beta 52

Beta Feature Data Concepts 52

Grid Sage Games

MAY 8, 2022

Recently a player asked me a question regarding my game balance philosophy, and while I can often respond to queries by pointing to some previous article, despite all my writing and no doubt occasionally touching on related topics, I had yet to explicitly do any sort of summary of the philosophy behind my gamedev work. Cogmind 7DRL!

Game Design 52

Game Design Game Designer Balance Games 52

Grid Sage Games

DECEMBER 1, 2023

REX It had been a while since I’d done any serious tinkering in “Rogue Engine X” (REX), Cogmind’s underlying game engine. Notice how the tiles in this Cogmind screenshot each occupy two cells, delineated by the partial grid overlay. It’s official: REX has quad support!

Engine 52

Engine Engineering Tile Console 52

Grid Sage Games

NOVEMBER 28, 2023

Obviously this would be intended for a completely different purpose, addressing one of the more common complaints about Cogmind, that on some displays and play environments everything is rather hard to see. What about the opposite--a way to zoom the map itself?

Render 52

Render Engine Engineering FPS 52

Grid Sage Games

JUNE 30, 2023

When Cogmind’s first commercial version was released in 2015 , I simultaneously opened the brand new Grid Sage Forums as the main gathering point for the community, a way to share stories, provide feedback, and generally discuss the game. Current #cogmind channels on the Roguelikes server. The good old GSG forums!

Feature 52

Feature Content Build Dev 52

Grid Sage Games

FEBRUARY 22, 2024

Last month I shared a sizeable collection of interface mockups summarizing my vision for a playable Cogmind interface that could fit within a 45-row terminal. Game Menu A good half of the work involved in creating a 45-row version of the interface involved adjustments to the game menu and its various subwindows. It was a lot.

Demo 52

Demo Feature Code Beta 52

Grid Sage Games

NOVEMBER 28, 2022

Here we’re primarily talking about the player revisiting earlier floors on their journey, rather than backtracking within a single map (though I’ll cover that topic a bit separately at the end), and our discussion focuses on roguelikes of the dungeon delving variety, since open world games generally allow backtracking by default.

Point and Click 52

Point and Click Mechanics Open World Feature 52

Grid Sage Games

SEPTEMBER 15, 2022

Overall Rogue doesn’t really have many different item characteristics to modify or games systems to interact with, which is a primary limiting factor in the extent of randomization a game can support. Cogmind’s Strictly Static Items. the majority of roguelikes, especially classic ones).

Data 52

Data Terrain Balance Mechanics 52

Grid Sage Games

DECEMBER 6, 2023

If you recall, for my initial Cogmind map zoom demo upon adding Quad support to REX, all I did was change one thing in the game: the map font size. Things get a lot more complex if we want to support both the regular map font and quads, not to mention the ability to swap them dynamically while the game is running.

Tile 52

Tile Engine Engineering Bug 52

Grid Sage Games

MARCH 9, 2022

For years now I’ve been planning to eventually create a menu for accessing Cogmind’s lesser-used “special commands,” features not only requiring the keyboard, but even all assigned to Shift-Alt key combos. This is to leave some environmental context around Cogmind while it’s open, for reference.

Feature 52

Feature Point and Click Beta Demo 52

Grid Sage Games

DECEMBER 12, 2023

Many of Cogmind’s optional special modes also have their own UI elements, usually an interactive window in the bottom-left corner of the map, and although I don’t generally update those, failing to have them take into account a zoomed map would almost be equivalent to leaving them behind. The answer is inventory sorting.

Tile 52

Tile Animation Animation Render 52

Grid Sage Games

JULY 17, 2022

Garrisons were originally added to Cogmind in the months after the first Alpha release in 2015 (see an overview here ) as an optional location for players to visit, adding a unique extra dimension to the world to answer the question “what if I infiltrate these things where many enemy squads come from?”

Beta 52

Beta Content Balance Mechanics 52

Grid Sage Games

OCTOBER 2, 2022

Last time I wrote about item variants and randomization in roguelikes , and how Cogmind is purely based on a large set of static items, but more recently I’ve been running an experiment to play with not-so-static items. The entire mechanic revolves around a single new utility: the Scrap Engine. A new utility is born.

Engine 52

Engine Engineering Mechanics Balance 52

Grid Sage Games

FEBRUARY 11, 2024

Dynamic centering, offscreen object markers, view autoshifting. a whole range of new features to improve playing even with the map zoomed.

Feature 40

Feature Dev 40

Grid Sage Games

JANUARY 18, 2024

More engine features! Implementing automated upscaling to simplify the ability to support map zooming and larger UI options, plus other QoL.

Engine 40

Engine Engineering Feature Dev 40

Grid Sage Games

JANUARY 11, 2024

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Dev 40

Dev 40

Grid Sage Games

FEBRUARY 7, 2023

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40

40

Grid Sage Games

JANUARY 28, 2023

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Balance 40

Balance Feature 40

Grid Sage Games

NOVEMBER 16, 2023

Cogmind generally has fewer such direct escape options, but teleport mechanics are out there, if an advanced tech not usually available until the late game. As a general concept teleportation technology exists in quite a few varieties throughout the world of Cogmind, though the player only has access to some of them.

Mechanics 52

Mechanics Concepts Balance Terrain 52

Grumpy Gamer

JANUARY 12, 2018

Octavi: When making any kind of artistic work we know there's always a disappointingly huge difference between our first idea and the end result: which one of your games you'd say it's the most faithful to your original vision? Jensan: Could you see yourself coding a C64 game from scratch in 2018? If so, what type of game?

Point and Click 40

Point and Click Writing Build Dev 40