HURRICAN
Hurrican is a fun and challenging game. It reminds me of Contra from years ago on NES. It looks fairly simple, but isn't. Enemies come at you from all over the place, and while you do have a weapon that clears the screen of enemies, you only have three rounds.
The replay value here is high, as it is immediately addictive. While it looks simple, one must work hard to figure out the timings of one enemy, while doing the same thing from evermore approaching enemies. It is hard to accept failure here.
This is both a story driven and game driven game. The story at the beginning draws you in and explains much of what is going on when you are the sole survivor of a crash landing into an alien planet. Yet, as I stated, the gameplay is immediately addictive and keeps you fighting, but also wondering what the next advancement will bring.
The games presentation is impressive for a 2d scrolling mode. It is a well colored and attractive game complete with some old school style theme music. They, while not incredibly hard to make, are done well.
The controls take a while to get used to, especially if you are used to the "w" "a" "s" "d" configuration of 3d games. However they are simple enough to get used to relatively quickly.
If I had to change one mechanic here, it would be to make the directional controls on the left side of the keyboard with the firing controls on the right (as this is pretty standard on today's games).
Sunday, August 22, 2010
Chapter Two Book Work
2)
Game Overview for Thieves:USA
The game I am creating here is called Thieves:USA, a sandbox, open world game centered around thefts, big and small. I hope to draw in much of the Grand Theft Auto fan base, as it will have some similarities in its design.
There will be a t least a few gameplay modes: 1) Players will be able to move around the city on their own and mess around as much as they want (robbing and what not). 2)Players will be able to go on missions obtained following the story line. 3) Players will be able to climb buildings to get views and recon' for missions or their own plans. This last mode should be enticing as you can set up your own "jobs" a acquire different things with the spoils.
The goals for this game are not to just create another Vice City, but to borrow from it while embarking on some new territory.
Game Overview for Thieves:USA
The game I am creating here is called Thieves:USA, a sandbox, open world game centered around thefts, big and small. I hope to draw in much of the Grand Theft Auto fan base, as it will have some similarities in its design.
There will be a t least a few gameplay modes: 1) Players will be able to move around the city on their own and mess around as much as they want (robbing and what not). 2)Players will be able to go on missions obtained following the story line. 3) Players will be able to climb buildings to get views and recon' for missions or their own plans. This last mode should be enticing as you can set up your own "jobs" a acquire different things with the spoils.
The goals for this game are not to just create another Vice City, but to borrow from it while embarking on some new territory.
Game Play and Control
Quake IV is currently my favorite game. I am a big fan of first person shooters on PC. It took me a long time to figure out how much more this game had to offer than other shooters. In the beginning I, like countless others, couldn't, for the life of me, figure out why some people moved so much faster than I did. The game seemed to out of my grasp and I thought people must have been cheating. However, I stuck with it and chatted with people in the game and they either told me themselves, or they told me where to pick up movement tips. There were even training maps where one could hone his skills to catch up with the competition. I feel this game is polished, however some of it has to be sacrificed unless you have a very expensive computer (that has better graphics cards, more RAM, etc.). Though you can still watch bodies explode when you frag them with a rocket launcher.
I never expected to have as much fun as I did playing this game. Thanks to the learning curve (which brings in hours of training and testing your progress) I fell into this game very deeply. And was satisfied even without all of its polish.
I never expected to have as much fun as I did playing this game. Thanks to the learning curve (which brings in hours of training and testing your progress) I fell into this game very deeply. And was satisfied even without all of its polish.
High Concept
Stairs & Corridors: Games' Trivia
High Concept
Educate and motivate the game designers of the future by allowing them to progress through a maze of stairs and corridors.
Features
Essentially this game is a dice-rolling, trivia asking, stair climbing, trip through a maze that only knowledge can pull you out of.
High Concept
Educate and motivate the game designers of the future by allowing them to progress through a maze of stairs and corridors.
Features
- A three dimensional maze of stairs and corridors lead players on different paths. With the goal of reaching the top stair first.
- Players will roll dice to get a certain number on a multiple question trivia card and be asked that question.
- Players will be moving character pieces that are an X-Box, Playstation, Nintendo, or PC.
Essentially this game is a dice-rolling, trivia asking, stair climbing, trip through a maze that only knowledge can pull you out of.
Introduction to the Game Design Document
The game design document is a blueprint with which complete pandemonium can be prevented. It is the working drawings, facts, goals, etc. of what you are creating. Just as an architect would create drawings for example for a complex project (which includes not only the complex details, but also the complex networking to communicate the right things to the right people in writing) so too the game designer will mark down decisions made and being made.
While it may not be necessary to create documents for a simple design or a minimal amount of team members the question remains: Am I/we sure that this is not going to get confusing later? Which is why it is important to create game documents, even simple ones. If not to keep things simple and recorded, but to prevent wasting time trying to remember these documents.
Simple or complex, the important thing to remember is to have and maintain a good solid design process.
While it may not be necessary to create documents for a simple design or a minimal amount of team members the question remains: Am I/we sure that this is not going to get confusing later? Which is why it is important to create game documents, even simple ones. If not to keep things simple and recorded, but to prevent wasting time trying to remember these documents.
Simple or complex, the important thing to remember is to have and maintain a good solid design process.
Final Project Idea
For the final project, my general concept is to make an educational and idea promoting game. On one hand, the player will be learning history and concepts in the game design field; while on the other they will be getting ideas for new games to create. This game is intended to relate to a students story of progression through the game design field, with levels of difficulty being different for the part of the path to success he or she is on.
The story, furthermore, as it is intertwined with scool and professional work (or knowledge of professional work) is a educational tool as well as a muse (a tool for clearing creator's block) for future game creation or revamping. The stairs will represent success/promotions while the corridors will represent progression on a particular level. It is in the corridors where a player will make career choices to get ahead risking failure by choosing certain levels of difficulty of trivia.
Some moves will be huge and others small, while others will be backward (such as when limitations present themselves and there is no funding for them). This being said the players will all start out with a certain amount of money to fund their path/process and will have chances to take risks with it.
At the end of the game the winning player will have a chance to create a game idea with some or all of the different parts of information obtained in the game. However if this new game is of no interest to the other player, than it is scrapped and a new one must be formulated, and so forth. The player will have 1 minute to come up with each idea.
The story, furthermore, as it is intertwined with scool and professional work (or knowledge of professional work) is a educational tool as well as a muse (a tool for clearing creator's block) for future game creation or revamping. The stairs will represent success/promotions while the corridors will represent progression on a particular level. It is in the corridors where a player will make career choices to get ahead risking failure by choosing certain levels of difficulty of trivia.
Some moves will be huge and others small, while others will be backward (such as when limitations present themselves and there is no funding for them). This being said the players will all start out with a certain amount of money to fund their path/process and will have chances to take risks with it.
At the end of the game the winning player will have a chance to create a game idea with some or all of the different parts of information obtained in the game. However if this new game is of no interest to the other player, than it is scrapped and a new one must be formulated, and so forth. The player will have 1 minute to come up with each idea.
Saturday, August 21, 2010
15 Minute Board Game
Stairs & Corridors
In this game players will have to have either a vast knowledge of video game history, game mechanics, design successes and failures; or the ability to learn from the trivia they have encountered in the game to make it to the top stair.
If you get the trivia question correct, you either move up a stair or role the dice for a better move (though this could land you all the way back down to the corridors).
To miss a question gives you a certain movement to follow or you can test your luck in the corridors (information retaining players will do better here--they must announce one of the facts that have been uncovered in the game so far. Though no facts may be repeated more than once.)
The corridors have special moves, combinations, if you will, that can lead to a quick victory.
In this game players will have to have either a vast knowledge of video game history, game mechanics, design successes and failures; or the ability to learn from the trivia they have encountered in the game to make it to the top stair.
If you get the trivia question correct, you either move up a stair or role the dice for a better move (though this could land you all the way back down to the corridors).
To miss a question gives you a certain movement to follow or you can test your luck in the corridors (information retaining players will do better here--they must announce one of the facts that have been uncovered in the game so far. Though no facts may be repeated more than once.)
The corridors have special moves, combinations, if you will, that can lead to a quick victory.
Blog Game Review
In the following review I discuss my thoughts on Quake IV, in the areas of gameplay, graphics, sound, story, learning curve, and control scheme. This is one of my favorite games and I give it five out of five Frags, not only for its many different modes of play (single player, multiplayer, and mods) but also for its learning curve in its multiplayer mode.
The gameplay for Quake IV takes two general modes, one being single player with the other being of course mulitplayer. However, the multiplayer mode has many different player created mods with different games you can play such as: Capture the Flag, Deathmatch, and Team Deathmatch to name a few.
The single player mode revolves around the Quake storyline. At this point in the story, the main character is fighting off alien enemies and eventually gets captured, given alien body parts, and saved before he is made anymore than half-alien. The single player version actually gets quite exciting at this point as you now have new abilities due to your stronger than human sum of parts.
The multiplayer version is where the true fun comes in. The learning curve here is steep as you have a much greater potential in physical movement. Chat features and the availability to join a clan, make friends, and play on training maps to hone your skills make this game way more than an average FPS. Strafe jumping is a major facet of success in the multiplayer version and can be researched online along with many other character movement skills.
The graphics on my own computer for this game, while an appealing concept at first, began to take the backseat to the game running at lightning speed as I learned new movements. Eventually, this is an easy sacrifice to picking up more frags (kills) in heated competition.
As far as sound goes, I was never dissapointed. I always liked what I heard in this game, especially the announcements in multiplayer.
The controls were by default highly functional. If you didn't like them, you could change them. It was the controls on PC that made me detest Quake IV on an console. Nothing beats the keyboard and mouse for a first person shooter.
The gameplay for Quake IV takes two general modes, one being single player with the other being of course mulitplayer. However, the multiplayer mode has many different player created mods with different games you can play such as: Capture the Flag, Deathmatch, and Team Deathmatch to name a few.
The single player mode revolves around the Quake storyline. At this point in the story, the main character is fighting off alien enemies and eventually gets captured, given alien body parts, and saved before he is made anymore than half-alien. The single player version actually gets quite exciting at this point as you now have new abilities due to your stronger than human sum of parts.
The multiplayer version is where the true fun comes in. The learning curve here is steep as you have a much greater potential in physical movement. Chat features and the availability to join a clan, make friends, and play on training maps to hone your skills make this game way more than an average FPS. Strafe jumping is a major facet of success in the multiplayer version and can be researched online along with many other character movement skills.
The graphics on my own computer for this game, while an appealing concept at first, began to take the backseat to the game running at lightning speed as I learned new movements. Eventually, this is an easy sacrifice to picking up more frags (kills) in heated competition.
As far as sound goes, I was never dissapointed. I always liked what I heard in this game, especially the announcements in multiplayer.
The controls were by default highly functional. If you didn't like them, you could change them. It was the controls on PC that made me detest Quake IV on an console. Nothing beats the keyboard and mouse for a first person shooter.
Chapter One Book Work
One game that I think could be improved a great deal is Assasins' Creed. I am choosing this game because I like the concept and a good deal of the game, however I think it needed some things to be different. The following are three of these things:
1. The game is really fun at first as you are discovering how to move around physically and learning how to manipulate your environment. As you progress, however, certain things start to become redundant such as climbing towers to open up the map. My suggestion for this aspect is to be able to gain a following and have your followers be able to take care of things like climbing the towers for instance.
2. At times the game becomes highly irritating such as when you are having difficulty completing a task or mission and you have to keep returning to the same spot and listen to the same introduction to that task or mission. Thus you may not only be frustrated by failing the mission but also by setting it up again-over and over perhaps. My suggestion here would be to have a restart mission option in the menu.
3. And finally more generally speaking, some of the character's fighting ability seems a little ineffective against multiple enemies. This is frustrating for the player, especially when considering the fact that the character can jump over a hundred feet from a tower and land in some hay without the slightest injury.
Eventhough, I have some issues with the game, it's still fun...at least for a while.
1. The game is really fun at first as you are discovering how to move around physically and learning how to manipulate your environment. As you progress, however, certain things start to become redundant such as climbing towers to open up the map. My suggestion for this aspect is to be able to gain a following and have your followers be able to take care of things like climbing the towers for instance.
2. At times the game becomes highly irritating such as when you are having difficulty completing a task or mission and you have to keep returning to the same spot and listen to the same introduction to that task or mission. Thus you may not only be frustrated by failing the mission but also by setting it up again-over and over perhaps. My suggestion here would be to have a restart mission option in the menu.
3. And finally more generally speaking, some of the character's fighting ability seems a little ineffective against multiple enemies. This is frustrating for the player, especially when considering the fact that the character can jump over a hundred feet from a tower and land in some hay without the slightest injury.
Eventhough, I have some issues with the game, it's still fun...at least for a while.
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