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Eat the Dungeon Discussion: Optimizing Load Times and File Size
🕑 Added 2020-11-13 19:04:18 +0000 UTCI've been working on optimizing load times for the past two weeks, and I've come to an impasse.
The issue is the images for the stuffing levels. They account for 80% of the game's file size. And if things keep going has they have been, ETD will be 400MB by the time I have finished the full version. This is unacceptably large to me. Optimizing the stuffing images has been my goal the past two weeks.
However, this has proven to be much more difficult than I have expected. I've spent about x3 as much time these past two weeks on this than I have intended to, and other responsibilities of mine have suffered because of it.
To be honest, I've been feeling pretty sour about the stuffing images for a some months now. They are very time-intensive and have a bad ratio of effort-to-create/positive-impact-on-the-game. They're very difficult to do well, and I've had to cut a lot of corners already just to get them done on time.
So I've been thinking removing the stuffing images entirely. This has numerous benefits, especially regarding the frequency of updates: I'll be able to put out new adventurers in a week instead of 2, and I could finish 2 new sets of weight levels for adventurers in a single week. This also reduces the final file size of ETD to 80MB, which is half of how big the game is currently.
I know removing features is unpopular, and it sucks! But you have to "kill your darlings" as they say. Removing a nice, but unnecessary, feature and maintaining focus on your core concept can be beneficial to the larger project.
Please let me know what you think in the comments!
Comments
Bewildered Angel
It would be the stuffing levels as a whole. The characters would only gain weight
Bewildered Angel
I think if I were to remove the stuffing levels entirely I'd archive them somewhere publicly
darusianboi ^_^
I'm confused, like the stuffing levels as a whole or something else?
Catts
I personally like the stuffing levels, but if they have to go to meet your file size requirements, then do what you need to do. That said, I hope you will consider preserving a version of the game (the current version I guess) that has the stuffing levels intact, so that those of us who like them can still play that version.
Bewildered Angel
Cutting back like 50% is probably the best route
Bewildered Angel
I like this idea
Bewildered Angel
I'd be lying if I said I wasn't happy to not have to do the stuffing images, they're the most tedious part of the project by far, and weirdly time-consuming
Bewildered Angel
This might be the way to go about it
Bewildered Angel
Hmm tinypng actually gives much better results that I expected. This will be useful, thank you!
Scryer
Personally, I'm in complete opposition to the removal of the stuffing images. They're great and, in my opinion, an integral part of the game. An perfectly happy to wait as long as they require, both in terms of development and loading times. Perhaps fewer, but removing them entirely would be cutting most of the game's appeal. Also, a lot of the bellies look best when they're a combination of fat and stuffed, especially regarding the Thief, Witch and Spellblade. And seriously mate, consider taking a break for either a few weeks or months. No-one's complaining and you're the only one holding yourself to the schedule. Doesn't sound like it's exactly great for you.
Tiamary
The project is yours, you should always do what you feel is best. Personally, I enjoy the stuffing images a lot, and I think they're a worthy sacrifice. But I also get it if they really drag things down for you. If you're getting burnt out with a project its always better to take a break or make a change, than lose your love for an idea.
Circlesquarer
Personally I'm way more into stuffing than weight gain, so this would significantly impact my enjoyment of the game, but I'm probably in the minority in that way. You gotta do what you gotta do to ensure the best result for the type of game you want to make.
NightlifeRaven
I feel that, yes. This may be the best move for the game for the time being. Though, with the appeal that the nicety does seem to have with some people, it could be reimplemented in the future once everything else has been set in place. This is, of course, just my suggestion, and whatever is done will be done. After all, a game with multiple levels of fat and stuffing with images for each will inevitably lead to a larger load for the game to work with. Measures can be taken to reduce the space the images use though, as others have suggested.
snilloc422
Hm, maybe only have stuffing levels for the first 1 or 2 weight levels? Or maybe just have a normal and stuffed variation as opposed to multiple stuffed levels?
Happensmaker
The question is, is it the workload that's annoying or is it the fact that more pictures equals more data to load? Because if it's the second, we could help find a way to reduce the file sizes, like scaling them, other formats or even converting them to vector graphics.
Can't you left at least some stuffing stages? We don't need 10, but 4-5 would be nice. What's the point in stuffing game without stuffing?
Kestrel
I'm usually the first to call for cutting features (and I think I've done so numerous times here), but I think the interplay between weight/stuffing is the core appeal of the game to me. Obviously you should follow your heart, but I'd absolutely prefer fewer characters/weight levels over the loss of stuffing as a visual mechanic. I'm sure you've done plenty already, but on an h-game I work on we've found https://tinypng.com gives us a pretty fantastic size reduction without too much loss of quality.
