Sometimes the Muse Mneme chains you to the foot of her loom, gives you a fountain pen with only your blood to use as ink, and forces you to write something she knows almost no one else will read. Or program something no one else will play.

So it was with Cycladic League, my civ-lite browser game.

My first prototype was just plain text in my hack of JS BASIC (see above).

My second take was a little more involved, but still plain text:

         ANDROS       
           @@      
            @@@       
KEA          @@  TINOS      
 @@    GYAROS    @@
@@       @@       @@@                   
                           MYKONOS
             @@   DELOS           @@
            @@@     @        @@@
                         
                 DELOS
                  @
        
      SERIFOS          PAROS      NAXOS    CABARNUS
        @@              @@@       @@@@        @
        @              @@@@      @@@@@       @@
                      @@@@@      @@@@
                      OLIAROS  HERAKLIA        
          POLYAIGOS    @@        @
     SIFNOS  @        
       @@                              
      @@@            IOS            
                      @@              @@@
  MILOS               @@@             @@@@
   @@@                               @@@
  @@@@        
  @@@         FOLEGANDROS  
                 @@
               @@@      
   
              @@
             @@        
                        @@
                       @@@
                      @@ @@
                       @@@

My third draft went back to my first, with characters representing the buildings on islands, but I switched development environments a few times until I ended up with QBJS.

My buddy Kyle does retrogame development, and he inspired me to create pixel-art sprites:

Fonts

  • I went way too far down the rabbit-hole of fonts and ended up implementing kerning around the Y and other letters.
  • I created a new font for the map, intended to be more evocative of archaic Greek alphabets.
  • I explored Tiny Pixel Art fonts (a great resource).

Early version of the font, with kerning:

After my redesign:

Pixel Art Monsters

I created little pixel-art monsters. Sometimes you first hear of an island because it has been ravaged by Arachne, Hydra, Scylla, etc.

Other designer diaries: