Mini Game II
For this mini game we were tasked with creating a game that followed the rules of emergent game play. To create this emergence we had to figure out in abstract way to use shape and colour to emerge our players.
We were assigned groups. I was partnered up with:
- Nicolas Phan
- Oliver Tretrop
- Connor Gilhuly
My role on the group was team management, art assets, and some coding so that it was not left on just one person.
Process:
Our group started off by setting up meetings for when we were going to work on our game. Our first meeting was the Friday that we got the assignment. We met up and fleshed out some ideas of what we wanted to do. Nic, came up with an idea of being able to bend the elements. This included Earth, Wind, Fire, and Water. We all liked this idea and started mind mapping and problem solving to figure out we were going to make that a game. We then decided to use the the ring out mechanic that Super Smash Bros. uses. So then that sparked the idea to create a 2 player fighting game where the players would be able to manipulate the elements to try and knock the opposing player out of the ring. As a group we knew that time was a factor due the excessive amount of assignments that we had to do the following week so we decided that we only use two elements rather than all four. We chose to use Earth and Fire seeing as that we came up with more abilities for those elements than the others.
Our second meeting consisted of us actually making the game and designing the level. We also had to figure out how we were going to program the abilities. Nic, was our main programmer so we ran all the ideas by him to make sure that the coding was due-able in the time frame that we had.
Through more discussing we decided that we would have the player toggle between earth and fire. earth would be the more defensive side of things and fire would be the more offensive.
For the abilities we wanted the earth toggle to have earth walls that spawned from the ground to protect the player. We figure out that we could raycast to spawn the wall in front of the player. And for the fire toggle we wanted to have projectiles to fire at the opponent.
From there we discussed that rather than dealing damage to the player that the projectile would just push the enemy player back using the weight of the projectile. This then sparked the idea of trying to make the wall more "offensive" rather than just having a wall spawn. So we decided that we were going to make the walls and the projectiles interact-able. So we came up with the idea that the projectile could push the wall around the map to act ass a large moving barrier that could possibly knock the player off the map and kill them.
We then discussed on what the map was going to look like. As a group we decided that we wanted to keep the map simple due to the fact that we were creating a prototype. So we had one main platform and then two smaller platforms floating above it to give the map more depth and to give the players areas to move around to dodge enemy attacks.
The programming started and Nic led this section of creating the game due to him being skilled at programming. And also due to the fact that having two programmers was a bit over kill he said. However we did write up bits of code for him to implement. I did some art for the game including sprites for the character and a background to make it look nice to make more emergent.
While I did the art (that was never implemented) Nic added a few abilities including flamethrower and fire bomb. He then changed the projectile to be a rock toggle so that it could interact with the walls that the players would spawn.
With the flamethrower implemented into the game we thought it would be as cool to make it like a jet so that players would be able to move and "fly" in sense around the map to give our game some more depth and novelty. We wanted the abilities to have cool effects such as particle effects. So for the fire bomb we wanted it to explode. So Nic found a cool way to make the bomb explode into many squares. He also made a stream of squares to emphasise the flamethrower. We thought this made our game much more immersive than before and noting having any sort of effects on the abilities.
By this time we were just about finished our prototype but the only thing that was missing was sound effects. So we went on free sound effects and found some cool effects that we put on the abilities to give it a bit more juice and add more emergence to our game.
Postmortem:
It think with some more work this game could be very fun and playable as party type of game like Smash Bros. I think the things that went well were:
- player abilities
- theme of the game
- mechanics
I thought the player abilities were a lot of fun and novel. The flamethrower brought a new element to the game, which was flying. I also think that having the ability effects made the game more immersive and really grabbed the player who played our game.
Some things that think we could have done better are:
- boundaries
- abilities
- flying
I think that we need to add boundaries to the game so that the players are not flying around aimlessly because i think it breaks the immersion of the game. The players that played our game lost the concept of our game quickly because once you fell off the map started to fly with no boundaries it became somewhat of new game. Which is interesting but not what I wanted. One way we could go with it is making a flying game where players use jets and abilities to destroy the enemy rather than having it in a Smash Bros. style.
I think the rock abilities should be polished a lot more. I found and saw that the players enjoyed the fire abilities and used them a lot more than the rock ones. I think if we were to add some effects and made them more useful that each toggle would be more evenly used and would immerse the player more.
The flying should also be polished as well. I think the flamethrower should have a cooldown. Reason being is that if there is no limit to the flamethrower its going to be over used and no other abilities will be utilised. Adding a cooldown timer to the flamethrower, I think, would immerse player more. Due the fact that players would have to strategically use it and other abilities to knock off the players rather than just spamming one ability.
I really enjoyed my group. They were always on time for meetings and were always willing to work and put forth effort all the time. A big shout out to Nicolas Phan for being our main programmer. He did some crazy stuff andmade our game very immersive and fun with all the cool techniques he used.
From there we discussed that rather than dealing damage to the player that the projectile would just push the enemy player back using the weight of the projectile. This then sparked the idea of trying to make the wall more "offensive" rather than just having a wall spawn. So we decided that we were going to make the walls and the projectiles interact-able. So we came up with the idea that the projectile could push the wall around the map to act ass a large moving barrier that could possibly knock the player off the map and kill them.
We then discussed on what the map was going to look like. As a group we decided that we wanted to keep the map simple due to the fact that we were creating a prototype. So we had one main platform and then two smaller platforms floating above it to give the map more depth and to give the players areas to move around to dodge enemy attacks.
The programming started and Nic led this section of creating the game due to him being skilled at programming. And also due to the fact that having two programmers was a bit over kill he said. However we did write up bits of code for him to implement. I did some art for the game including sprites for the character and a background to make it look nice to make more emergent.
While I did the art (that was never implemented) Nic added a few abilities including flamethrower and fire bomb. He then changed the projectile to be a rock toggle so that it could interact with the walls that the players would spawn.
With the flamethrower implemented into the game we thought it would be as cool to make it like a jet so that players would be able to move and "fly" in sense around the map to give our game some more depth and novelty. We wanted the abilities to have cool effects such as particle effects. So for the fire bomb we wanted it to explode. So Nic found a cool way to make the bomb explode into many squares. He also made a stream of squares to emphasise the flamethrower. We thought this made our game much more immersive than before and noting having any sort of effects on the abilities.
By this time we were just about finished our prototype but the only thing that was missing was sound effects. So we went on free sound effects and found some cool effects that we put on the abilities to give it a bit more juice and add more emergence to our game.
Postmortem:
It think with some more work this game could be very fun and playable as party type of game like Smash Bros. I think the things that went well were:
- player abilities
- theme of the game
- mechanics
I thought the player abilities were a lot of fun and novel. The flamethrower brought a new element to the game, which was flying. I also think that having the ability effects made the game more immersive and really grabbed the player who played our game.
Some things that think we could have done better are:
- boundaries
- abilities
- flying
I think that we need to add boundaries to the game so that the players are not flying around aimlessly because i think it breaks the immersion of the game. The players that played our game lost the concept of our game quickly because once you fell off the map started to fly with no boundaries it became somewhat of new game. Which is interesting but not what I wanted. One way we could go with it is making a flying game where players use jets and abilities to destroy the enemy rather than having it in a Smash Bros. style.
I think the rock abilities should be polished a lot more. I found and saw that the players enjoyed the fire abilities and used them a lot more than the rock ones. I think if we were to add some effects and made them more useful that each toggle would be more evenly used and would immerse the player more.
The flying should also be polished as well. I think the flamethrower should have a cooldown. Reason being is that if there is no limit to the flamethrower its going to be over used and no other abilities will be utilised. Adding a cooldown timer to the flamethrower, I think, would immerse player more. Due the fact that players would have to strategically use it and other abilities to knock off the players rather than just spamming one ability.
I really enjoyed my group. They were always on time for meetings and were always willing to work and put forth effort all the time. A big shout out to Nicolas Phan for being our main programmer. He did some crazy stuff andmade our game very immersive and fun with all the cool techniques he used.
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