Before working on any future updates, I wanted to describe some of the process behind making this program!

🍣 The good:

⯁ I'm quite happy with the implementation of the UI. This was my first time programming for a non-game - the development workflow felt much more fun and rewarding, which I wasn't expecting. I'm not sure if I'll ever make another non-game, but it was a valuable experience. All the playtesters responded positively overall.

⯁ This is my first completed Game Maker project. (It feels a bit ridiculous to have made a tool using Game Maker...) 
Additionally, this is the first solo project I've released in a very long time. Various personal issues made it hard to maintain focus on any programming project, regardless of how simple it was. I am simply relieved I finished this project.

⯁ During development, I gave myself time each day to write a small progress log. (Within the game files, to add - I'm too easily distracted for external organization/text tools to be useful.) Having everything about a project contained in one space helped me work much quicker, and kept me from getting distracted.

⯁ Designing the logo and character mascot was fun!

🍣 The bad:

⯁ The most glaring issue with this project is the lack of good palette generation for non-pixel art images. Currently, Sushi! scans each pixel in an image according to its original dimensions, and decides whether to consider the current pixel to be a new color. Due to anti-aliasing, colors that may not seem too different to the user will be added to the palette. This'll usually result in a pretty useless gradient-heavy palette based on the top left corner of a non-pixel art image. 

⯁ Originally, you were able to stack view effects on top of each other. I believe it could've been a powerful feature to keep, but bugs simply kept getting in the way. I should have also prioritized different effects, like saturation and contrast sliders.

⯁ I have no confidence in making UI icons, and had to rely on an external resource. While this isn't something that necessarily went "wrong", I was hoping I could illustrate all of the assets, which didn't end up happening.

⯁ Unfortunately, gathering the courage to ask for playtesters or other assistance was (still) anxiety inducing. I am still not entirely comfortable talking about my projects publicly.

🍣 The stupid:

⯁ HTML support should have been a priority, but I currently cannot afford an HTML5 license. (∩^o^)⊃━☆

⯁ I forgot to implement window resizing and realized too late that this feature is missing.

⯁ Sending playtesting copies without implementing crash logs ended up causing me a lot of headaches...

As I'm currently writing this, all Tool Jam 2 entries are being ranked. If you'd like to support this project, I'd really appreciate it if you left a rating for this program: https://itch.io/jam/the-tool-jam-2/rate/1515081

Thank you for reading!