The Birth of Shape Swipa

Hi there, this text is a copy - paste from my first itch.io dev log and it describes my journey from then to now. That is me and my story ;-)

My biggest dream has always been to design my own game. Even in the early days of my IT career with the C64, I wondered how it all worked. What is it that I see on the screen, and how can I change it or create something of my own? These questions have stayed with me to this day.

I’m so glad that so many brilliant minds have driven the entire field forward. For me, this isn’t something I take for granted, but I gladly accept this gift.

After gaining about 30 years of experience and finally catching up with the present day - and having experimented extensively with Unity3D, Unreal, and Python - I came across Godot. In addition to C#, Godot is based on GDScript; I wasn’t familiar with it, but since it’s modeled after Python and I’m equally proficient in PHP, JS, C#, and a few others, it was a great opportunity to learn another language.

Up until that point, I had developed a few games and apps, but I’d never published any of them. It was mostly just for myself or for the sake of learning something new. Plus, with my day job - which, unfortunately, never really drove me toward game development - I usually had very little time left over. Back then, it was simply much more time-consuming to program a game or application.

When I first started with Godot, I checked out some of the many tutorials online as well as Godot’s own demo projects. Of course, I couldn’t skip the Godot documentation. When I began in August 2025, I think it was version 4.2 or 4.3, and we’re currently at 4.7. During that time, I always enjoyed reading Godot’s changelogs and even contributed a post addressing an issue once. It’s just fun to interact with the community.

After experimenting intensively with Godot for about two weeks, I wanted to test the engine’s physics. First in 2D, then in 3D. We’ve all been there. You build a tower out of cubes or just let them fall from the sky. We’ve all been there.

Then I had the idea to shoot at the cubes with balls. So I built a wall out of cubes and a simple mechanism for aiming and shooting with the mouse. That was fun and actually a nice game idea. Even though it was fun, it was a bit monotonous, and besides, I’d have to design a lot of such structures for the player to destroy.

Now that I’m writing this, I’m getting the urge to develop a game =)

I had other plans. Inspired by popular games like 2048 and Merge Games, I came up with the idea that you have to combine dice with the same number to score points. You start with one die and get a new one after each move. This way, the player creates their own world that looks different every time, with countless combinations.

By the end of August, I already had a first playable version ready to show to friends and family. Everyone immediately wanted the game, and I was surprised. So I created an APK file and shared it via my Google Drive. Then suggestions and bug reports started coming in, and the game grew. From that moment on, it was clear to me that it had to become bigger. So I created a Google Developer account, and my first versions in closed alpha were launched.

Shape Swipa was born, and it quickly grew!

When the idea of adding other shapes, such as spheres and capsules, came up, a problem that had arisen in the very early stages of development resurfaced.

The ProceduralSkyMaterial I used for the simple background is so computationally intensive that the game stuttered severely or even crashed. However, I was only able to reproduce this on a smartphone, which has significantly less processing power than the device I use for development. The problem plagued me for 6 months, and at first I couldn’t pinpoint it. Since I didn’t know it required so much processing power - and therefore kept optimizing in the wrong direction - the problem persisted all the way until the release on June 29, 2026. The issue had been present during Early Access, but it didn’t affect everyone and didn’t occur all the time.

However, all those optimizations were another step in the right direction. I moved more and more features into events, which made the entire game run more smoothly and was easier for me to maintain.

After further research and reviewing every line of code and every node, I finally figured it out and quickly replaced the background with a simple solid-color background. From then on, nothing stood in the way of further development. That was actually the only major problem during the entire process. I was usually able to solve everything else right away.

Throughout this entire time, I’ve enjoyed programming more than I did in the 15 years prior, and I’ve finally created something that others can enjoy as well.

But this achievement isn’t mine alone. The many testers from different parts of the world - such as the United Kingdom and India - contributed just as much as my friends and acquaintances in Germany. A heartfelt thank you to each and every one of you!

Even though I’m not making any money from the game - since I don’t offer any ads or in-app purchases - I want to keep developing it.

Shape Swipa has been born and will continue to grow.