Elemental Tilt Dev Log

1. Self-Introduction:

Hi everyone, my name is Mogale Joseph Lehlogonolo Ramokgano, but I prefer to go by Nolo, Simple Being, or Simple Being Nolz. I am a lover of games, anime, comics, music, movies, dance, and most forms of entertainment. I am also a Game Developer with 5 years of professional experience under my belt. It is my dream to create a company where I can focus all my attention on making games and telling the stories I've always wanted to. I hope you can join me on this journey.

2. What is Elemental Tilt:

Elemental Tilt is a casual mobile game where you, the player, are tasked with helping Tilty, a round, lovable, and hungry creature, fulfill her desire to eat food while avoiding the mean Spikes.

I began developing this game in 2023 during my free time while working at 24 Bit Games. My main goal was simply to complete a project, as I had been struggling to finish projects I started. This game served as a way to get my brain out of that creative funk.

The game needed to be simple enough to develop quickly but still engaging. The idea of rolling a ball around using a phone’s accelerometer always intrigued me, so I built a game around that concept. This eventually led to the creation of Elemental Tilt.

3. Game Design:

When I started designing the game, I knew it had to involve rolling a ball around an arena using the phone’s accelerometer. From this foundation, I brainstormed ways to expand the gameplay.

I initially focused on the gameplay loop, goals, and challenges. My first concept involved the ball absorbing cubes in an arena while avoiding spikes. At first, I thought this simple idea would suffice, with some neon-colored elements to enhance the visuals. However, I soon realized I could do much more, and my creativity took over.

To make the game more exciting, I introduced elemental effects. The game evolved to include multiple levels, each divided into stages with distinct elemental themes. The addition of levels also brought walls to distinguish stages and make gameplay more dynamic.

I considered eight elemental themes but eventually narrowed them down to four: Ice, Earth, Wind, and Fire. Implementing these themes required technical considerations, such as how to integrate them with gameplay. In the end, I decided that only cubes and spikes would have elemental effects, with fire-themed walls being the sole exception.

I also added abilities for the ball, which underwent numerous designs and iterations. Ultimately, I settled on eight abilities, unlocked progressively, to make the game more engaging.

Despite many challenges, including temporarily abandoning the accelerometer control, I eventually created a game I was proud of.

4. Visual Design:

Visual design was arguably the hardest and most frustrating part of the project. I’m not a skilled visual artist, so I relied heavily on assets from the Unity Asset Store. This made it difficult to find assets that aligned with my vision for the game.

Given the elemental themes, I decided on a cute, cartoony visual style. While I found assets that helped achieve this look, it took a lot of trial and error to make everything cohesive.

In the end, I achieved a satisfactory visual design, though it required sacrificing features like wall effects and certain elemental themes due to my limitations.

5. Monetization:

I dislike the greedy microtransactions and ad-heavy models found in many mobile games, so I wanted to avoid those approaches. This made finding a fair and viable monetization model challenging.

Initially, I planned to include an in-game currency for purchasing abilities, but I scrapped that idea due to the limited number of abilities. I then considered selling the game for $5 on the Play Store, among other ideas.

Eventually, a friend suggested a life system where players could either watch ads to regain lives or wait for lives to regenerate over time. I found this to be the best compromise and decided to implement it. Only time will tell if it was the right choice.

6. Development:

The development of Elemental Tilt didn’t go as planned. What I thought would take a few months stretched into two years.

Working on the game in my free time while juggling job demands, life, and health challenges caused delays. I frequently revised the game’s scope and design to balance my ambitions with my limitations.

In March 2024, my chronic health condition worsened, significantly impacting my physical and mental well-being. I eventually had to quit my job to focus on recovery. It took three months to regain stability, during which I didn’t work on the game at all.

After recovering, I created a small project called Storyteller to regain confidence and momentum. Completing it in just over a month gave me the motivation to finish Elemental Tilt.

While facing financial and technical challenges, I finally completed the game. Publishing it, however, brought another obstacle: Google Play’s new requirements for game testers. With limited finances, gathering 20 testers was tough. Eventually, I opted to release the game on Itch.io before securing the necessary testers to publish on Google Play.

7. What’s Next:

With Elemental Tilt complete, I’m pushing myself to create more games. I’ve partnered with someone to develop a bigger project called Spheroids and have also been working on a framework called SimpleTools to streamline game development for myself and others.

My goal is to release enough fun games to make a living from game development, allowing me to focus on larger, more complex projects. I also hope to build a game studio for these bigger ambitions, starting here with Elemental Tilt.

8. Will There Be More for Elemental Tilt?

I have ideas for a sequel that would use my new framework to improve upon the original. I’m also considering a spin-off called Elemental Tilt Adventures, a side-scrolling adventure inspired by classic Mario and Sonic games.

For now, I’m focused on other projects, but if things go well, I’d love to revisit this property and expand on it in the future.