Roblog

I’m buckling down on the design for the iPhone version of Safari Sketch.  (If you haven’t played it yet, please check it out here!)  We want to support the Association of Zoos and Aquariums as much as we can with Safari Sketch, so I’m trying to get the iPhone version out as soon as possible.  Right now I’m looking at date of submission to Apple around the end of the month.  Much to do!

Tonight the task was to decide which of the features from the original I would keep, which I wouldn’t and what, if any, would be the new iPhone-specific features.  The following is the list as it stands right now.  If you’ve got an opinion or a suggestion so far, speak up now or . . . well you know the rest ; )

Feature List:

– Basic gameplay remains the same match-3 mechanic we all know and love.  Right now that part is running super smoothly on the iPhone and I’m very happy with the performance.

– I’ve decided to keep all the powerups, including the erasers that I originally thought I would do without.  If I took them out, I’d still want to reward the player for matching five.  Since the eraser is a good powerup for that, I just left it.

– After much self-debate, I’ve decided to keep the journals.  Tom‘s art is just too good to be left out.

– I’m going to strip the game down to a single game mode.  It will basically play like the old Relaxed mode, but with the art-unlocking aspect from the Safari mode.

– The main menu will be removed in favor of a jump-into-the-game approach.  Once the game loads it will immediately start the last level the user didn’t complete instead of forcing the user to go through two or three menus to get to the game.

– The pause menu will now contain the journal viewing option and the profile management menu.

– Some iPhone specific features I want to add:

• Toggle the option to ignore calls while playing
• Toggle the option to allow iPod playback while playing
• Set the big animal pictures as wallpapers for the iPhone

So all in all the iPhone version will retain much of the original Safari Sketch, streamlining it into a single relaxed game type and going directly to the action.  I think this will suit the iPhone user well, as it will allow them to pick up and play quickly and for short bouts.

~R

Currently playing: Jumping Bean, Rock Band, Prince of Persia

Tonight I present to you last week’s prototype: Jumping Bean.

Instructions:

• Arrow keys <- and -> will move the bean left and right accordingly.
• Refresh the game’s page to get a new level (each level is created randomly).
• Go here to play.

How this came to be:

Jumping Bean came about as an exercise in creating a procedural 2D platforming game.  I still want to come back to this one and create a fun Mexican jumping bean theme for the art . . . “Next time, Gadget . . . Next time!”

I started with two platforms to develop the basic collision between the platforms and my capsule character (gotta love the quick and dirty programmer art).  The “bean” has a simple script based on Unity’s built-in FPS Walker script that limits the player to moving in only two dimensions (with the arrow keys) and jumping (with spacebar).

After I felt good about the way the bean was jumping around I created an instantiation script that created a given number of platforms along the x plane.  As it created each platform the instantiator would set the platforms length randomly based on a range inputed in the Unity editor and created a gap based on a second range.  This gave me a nice line of platforms that varied each time the game was restarted.

I tweaked the gap and platform sizes a bit until I got something that felt pretty good, but realized that the game was still pretty easy.  I wanted to add a little challenge so I played with a few different ideas until I hit one where the bean just continually jumped on its own.  (To be honest, I was inspired by an iPhone game I’d been shown a while back by my buddy Tom.  I don’t remember what the app was called, but it is quite addictive.)  This gave me something pretty fun where the player only had control over where the bean jumped but not when it jumped.  It also simplified the control scheme, which I’m always a fan of : )

So now I had my jumping bean and a single row of platforms.  I wanted to make the levels more interesting so I added two more platform instantiators for a middle and upper row of platforms, too.  This made things more interesting to look at and jump around on.  I wanted, however, to make the player have to be conscious of where they were jumping, and the game wasn’t doing that quite yet.  Plus the player had no reason to be jumping around, so I added . . . duhn duhn DUHN . . . little white dots.  MMMMMM.

Since we had something good and yummy to collect, I wanted something bad and not so tasty to avoid.  Thus the little red menacing mines were created.  Both the dots and the mines were sent to the platform instantiators to decide randomly where to put them, giving the player a different experience each time they reset the game.

This one was a couple/few afternoons of work . . . I have yet to manage a full week on one, but I’m hopeful for the future!

~R

Currently playing: Prince of Persia

Ben 10 Protector of Earth

I decided last night, when I was too zoned out to keep doing any “real” work, that I wanted to do something more than just play a game or watch one of the several things on my list of things to watch (which includes some great stuff like Police Squad! and Cowboy Bebop).  So instead I thought I’d start going through my 8 year-old brother’s game collection and make notes on what I found.  I started with what he was playing before he went to bed last night: Ben 10 Protector of Earth for PlayStation 2.  Ben 10 is based on the Cartoon Network animated series of the same name and involves a young Ben Tennison who fights baddies with an alien “watch” that allows him to transform into different alien forms.  Sounds like a good premise for a game.

The game has a cell-shaded graphical style and seems to use the same voice actors from the show, giving it a pretty authentic feel for the IP.  I’d seen my little brother play it before, so I knew I was about to play a brawler.  What I didn’t realize is that the developers had almost completely reused the mechanics from one of the best brawlers on the Playstation 2 (and on almost any system to date), God of War.  Ben 10 Protector of Earth is God of War for kids!  If you haven’t played God of War, know that it is a 3D platforming brawler with some character progression and puzzle elements.  It features an ancient Greek setting and epic boss battles against creatures of immense size.  Ben 10 pulls many of the same game design elements: from the larger than life boss battles with their timing-based mini-games to the unlocking of new combos to increase your alien forms’ powers and versatility. I was surprised at how many game mechanics were pulled directly from God of War.

That was a brilliant move on the part of the developers (Cartoon Network Interactive, 3D Publishers, and High Voltage Games).  The game system is proven and would just need to be rebalanced for a slightly less skilled player.  This costs less in design time and allows the developers to focus more on integrating the IP and giving it justice.  I wonder how many other Teen and Mature-rated games could be reworked into E and E-10+ games, giving them a wider available audience . . .

Aside from the brilliance of reusing game elements from successful older rated games I think the game is pretty good.  The character progression, unlockable alien forms, and decent story kept me involved.  The brawling itself is a little repetitive and more obvious than its God of War inspiration.  Falling off the level in the first couple stages is absurdly easy to do and causes instant failure, but failure has little consequence in the game as there aren’t a limited number of lives or continues.  If I didn’t have a gazillion other things to play right now, I could see myself going through the whole game.  Not bad for a kid’s cartoon IP.

Game on,

~R

PS – The trailers for the live-action movie based on the teenager version of Ben 10 looks pretty cool.

Currently playing: Ben 10 Protector of Earth