Making a deckbuilder for the GameBoy

I've always wanted to play a deckbuilder style game on a retro handheld like the RG CubeXX. So I decided to try to make one in GB Studio.

I'm not much of a coder though I've dabbled in PHP, Python and Lua (and BBC BASIC back in the day!). GB Studio is a nice way to work with a small, manageable system, with a lot of game functions abstracted into the engine. But it's mostly designed for Zelda-style top-down adventures, platformers, or point-and-click. So I needed a couple of things to help get this project started. 

The first was the Deck Management plugin by CURSED BOOTLEG INC. This gives an array (not a standard feature in GB Studio) and a shuffle function. I tweaked it to add a sort function, so I could lay out the full deck when I come to build functions to remove or upgrade cards. 

Next was some sprite assets, I'm not much of an artist either. So I bought packs on Itch from PiiiXL and Sodacoma, as well as a font pack by 2bitcrook. 

I'm also making use of tile-swapping, which used to need a plugin but is now a built-in part of GB Studio 4. This is used to assemble the cards themselves from tiles for the background, the central image that identifies the type, and the 'pips' which are to show the energy cost of the card. It's also used for the numbers for enemy health and the player stats at the bottom of the screen (these parts aren't fleshed out yet). But the player and enemy characters are sprites. 

There's a lot of work to come to build up a variety of cards and associated attacks and other moves. Plus a variety of enemies with different attributes. Stay tuned for updates!