Blog

It's been a while since my last post here. Ever since the official revival of Pebble, I've been scratching the itch to make some apps and watchfaces for the platform! As I was working though, I realized something. The unique Pebble-style graphics that I love so much are pretty tedious to make. And they're even more tedious if you intend on making animation sequences with them. In fact, until now, there was no software out there that could do it all in one place. You would have to draw out each frame separately in something like Inkscape or Figma, and figure out how to convert all those SVG frames into the PDC (Pebble Draw Command) format, and then figure out how to bring all those frames into a single sequence format, aptly named PDCS (Pebble Draw Command Sequence). Only then (after bringing it into an app) could you actually watch what you spent all that time animating, and then go back to square one to tweak any timing or individual frames. That could be a reason why a lot of new apps nowadays neglect to include them.

Now, there's a simpler way to make and animate these graphics. Introducing: Ripple! A studio specifically designed for this sort of thing. Complete with multi-platform availability, layer editor, animation tools, and even a preview window to show what your design looks like on the watch. There's also a watchapp that pairs with the desktop app so you can see how your designs look in person!

If you still wanna stick with your vector graphics editor of choice, that's fine too. You can import a batch of SVGs into Ripple, or even drag-and-drop 'em in for the final preview and use it exclusively as a conversion tool. It's available right in a web browser so you don't have to worry about installing anything.

The version I have available at the time of writing has reached a good enough point for general use, but there's still more work to be done (stability, accuracy, appearance, and performance improvements, etc). Try it out and let me know if you have any feedback!

This seems as good a time as any to post my first blog entry. It's a very special day too: if you're by BW's Barbecue in Blasdell, you can play my new game in person!

Brucie's Arcade began as an effort to advance my hobby of game development while at the same time residing in the relative predictability of a restaurant job. The game itself was designed from the beginning to be a 4-in-1 arcade game bundle, ensuring most people would be able to find an enjoyable experience for themselves. It was also designed to be playable on a physical arcade machine, which offered its own budgetary challenges. I decided to repurpose an existing arcade machine for the job, and emptied it out to place in my own components instead. I'm not too adept at hardware tinkering, but the machine ended up functional. On the software side, I used the Godot engine to build the game, which allowed me to deploy it on a variety of platforms once it was finished.

Of course, I wasn't the only one involved in this. Various coworkers offered ideas and passionate feedback (thanks BW's Crew!), and others illustrations (thanks Carly Uzar!). Then those illustrations were printed (thanks Arcade Graphics!) and displayed on the machine with some thematically appropriate music (good stuff, Shirobon!).

So, now that it's out, you can buy and enjoy the game on its available platforms, listen to its soundtrack, and possibly unveil some of its hidden secrets. If you spot anything that isn't working the way it should, leave feedback at my email inbox.

I'll get around to populating the rest of my site too, hopefully adding some assets and information where applicable.