2024 was all about my UE5 framework project called 7Forge.
7Forge is a collection of mechanics and techniques that are common to most of the games I want to make. Simply put I spent ’24 working on core techniques instead of any one specific game.
The 7Forge Framework currently features:
- A crafting and inventory system.
- An economy system with two different kinds of currency.
- Dynamic sky and time of day systems.
- A save system featuring manual and automatic (checkpoint) saves.
- Health system with two different health currencies (think health and mana)
- Several AI controlled guard NPCs
- Dialogue capable NPCs with branching dialogue trees
Code for 7Forge is entirely in-house. The only programming aid I’ve bought is a nifty tool to remove unused assets (for game jam submissions).
The Ballad of Pumpkin Jack was a successful test of the system (I made it in a week thanks to 7Forge), so that felt pretty good.
Right now I’m working on animation blueprints for the animal characters in The Fox the Forest and the Darkness – 2025 is all about FFD!