You Can't Eat Your Cake and Have It Too is a puzzle game in the form of a platformer. It was created in two months for the SA GameDev V competition, to fit the theme, "You Can't." In YCEYCAHIT, the player inhabits the sizeable trousers of Fatty McFatterson. Trapped in a wonderful and mysterious world, the player must guide Fatty home by combining numerous kinds of cake powerups to overcome obstacles.

The levels of YCEYCAHIT contain treacherous obstacles that stand between the player his goal. Scattered throughout the levels are cakes which grant temporary abilities to the player, and the powers of the cakes will combine as they're eaten together. In addition to the technical challenges of creating a game from scratch in a month, YCEYCAHIT was an exercise in creating levels which revolve around a simple, central mechanic. I took care to introduce each ability to the player in a straightforward way, while conservatively peppering the learning curve with satisfying challenges.

I built the game from the ground up in C++, with the help of some excellent libraries, most notably OpenGL, Box2D, and OpenAL. A considerable but worthwhile portion of the two-month schedule was spent creating a level editor that would give me the full benefits of an iterative level design process. I designed the interface to be efficient for the game I was making, and having the editor integrated into the game allowed me to test and iterate with minimal delay.