devlog #9 夜市ねこ / night market cat: month 7, 412 wishlists, lanterns that flicker

開発ログ #9。今月はランタンの光を作りました。

devlog #9! this month I made the lanterns (=^･ω･^=)

数字 / numbers

• wishlists: 412 (+38 this month)
• savings: about 14 months left, if I eat a lot of rice
• bugs fixed: 23. bugs created: 26 😿

ランタン / lanterns

(GIF: the night market street, paper lanterns swaying a little, the light on the stalls slowly breathing, the cat shopkeeper blinks)

I wanted the lanterns to feel alive, but not like a disco. In Godot 4 each lantern has a PointLight2D with a soft texture, and the lantern sprite has a tiny canvas_item shader so the paper flickers a bit. It is very small:

shader_type canvas_item;

uniform float speed = 3.0;
uniform float strength = 0.08;
uniform float offset = 0.0;

void fragment() {
    vec4 c = texture(TEXTURE, UV);
    float flicker = 1.0
        + sin(TIME * speed + offset) * strength
        + sin(TIME * speed * 2.3 + offset * 1.7) * strength * 0.5;
    COLOR = vec4(c.rgb * flicker, c.a);
}

Two sine waves at an odd ratio looks less like a robot than one wave. The offset is important: if every lantern flickers together it looks like the power is failing ahaha. I turn on "Local To Scene" on the ShaderMaterial so every lantern gets its own copy, then in _ready() I do material.set_shader_parameter("offset", randf() * 10.0).

今月のバグ / bug of the month

Cats walking straight through the lanterns. NavigationAgent2D avoidance was on, but the lanterns were not obstacles, so the cats did not care at all. I added a NavigationObstacle2D to the lantern scene. Fixed. muzukashii...

(GIF: before the fix, a cat walks through a lantern, the lantern swings, the cat does not even look)

来月はたこ焼き屋台のミニゲーム。Next month: the takoyaki stall minigame. ganbarimasu 🐈‍⬛