Canal Boat Simulator

Summary

Dear Reader, Alcohol is a hell of a drug. It’s night. I’m sitting and drinking my Jura. Relaxing with an episode of “Narrow Escapes“, a show life on Britain’s inland canals. Tonight’s feature is about a pair of young canal boaters: Amy is a game streamer and Wes is a game level designer. Everything is going swimmingly until Wes says1: I’d definitely like to make my own small game at some point Probably narrow-boat themed So I goes PFFFFFFTTT I BET ITS GOING TO BE A GRITTY CANAL BOAT GAME!!!! And… and then… And then in my addled state I go 🧠 Pff ff ff t, I bet… it’s going to be a… gritty… canal boat game. 🧠 Days later, the idea stuck and wouldn’t leave… so I went and made the game! I’ll tell you all about it. But first you gotta play the game. Crank the volume up. Go on. I’ll wait until you finish: Now, you can’t judge the game harshly because it is a prototype.2 For the full epic story of making the game, read on:Previously, I created a stunning true-life 3D simulation of life on a Victorian London street. So I had mastered a game engine and could make the boat game real quick. Pictured: “Fancy an oyster, ‘guvna?” – an uncanny simulation of London street life I figured “how hard could it be?”Just steal some aerial photos of canals, slap invisible 3D walls on the canal’s sides so the boat bumps against them, make the camera follow the player from above and 💲💲💲💲💲💲’yknow? Except, I don’t know how to use actual 3D modeling software. Nevermind. There must be a simple way to create those 3D canal borders. Apparently “Paint 3D” is great for beginners like me. Oh, what’s that? It’s been discontinued you say? Well, I’ll go on a quest to download an old version and what is this extruded sausage nonsense? Pictured: Paint 3D’s extruded sausage nonsense It’s fine. No worries. Maybe we’ll represent the borders of the canal with these things called heightmaps so it’ll kinda make the walls happen on their own? Ummm… no? Well, lets try a whole bunch of things and oh Sweet Jesus of N...