megaman

If you couldn't tell, I love megaman. It is one of my favorite game series. I always wonder why I love it so much. Why am I willing to play megaman 1-10 when they are the exact same game. The mechanics haven't changed much. The graphics haven't changed. Some bosses feel like they just have a new skin. Why am I playing the same game over and over?

The mechanics of megaman are brilliant. To me, it is just fun. Jumping, shooting, dodging, and sliding all to kill the boss at the end and unlock a new ability. I love when you first try a new level, you have to react to everything. You're first attempt is all about your raw skill. If you're like me, you'll fail a few times before completing the level. Which means, you are going to have to play through the level again. On these subsequent play through the game is more about memory. I love shooting at where I know an enemy is going to be before it appears on screen. This is an important aspect of the series, the game lets me challenge myself. The challenge of games makes them fun. With megaman, if it gets too easy, I can challenge myself by only using the regular buster shot on a boss opposed to using that boss' weakness. The main point I am making is that the game mechanics in megaman are fun. I would play and pay for a new megaman because the game is fun.

I almost forgot! The music!

Enjoy

Editor

This weekend I will be spending some time working on our level editor. Scott has made an incredible editor already but there are still a few features we need to add. One of my  favorite features that has already been implemented is the ability to play the level straight from the editor. I continue to be impresses with Scott's work. Scott built most of the current engine. He has a really simple design that I should explain briefly.

Basically there is a stage. The stage has actors on it. Actors have several properties. For example a physics object or an agent. There is obvious a lot more to the engine then this but this is just a basic overview.

I am working on editing the actor's agents. We want to be able to add agents, remove agents, and edit the actor's current agents. I haven't spend a lot of time studying the editor, so that is where I am going to spend a few hours before I code anything.

Heroes of Rock!

Our class decided on three games! TimeJump is not one of them. It was fun thinking and working on that game. The three games that got picked are: Attraction, Ninja Royal and Heroes of Rock. As you can probably tell I am working on Heroes of Rock!

Heroes of Rock is an awesome idea. Our team has decided the three pillars of our game will be using the guitar peripheral, action and music. The game is going to be a 2.5D action platformer that you'll want to use the guitar for controls. Personally, I think it will be challenging to find the perfect control scheme for this game. I want it to feel like you're playing the guitar while destroying creatures and exploring the world. I am excited put some work into this game.

The project I was assigned to work on is to make the save function in the level editor actually write the correct values to a file. We really want to get the editor up and running so we can start building levels easier. There have been a few challenges getting this function to work properly. The first challenge is my lack of knowledge with this code base. I'll overcome this obstacle by simply working with the code. Eventually I will learn the code and functions, it just takes time. The second challenge is a little more technical. I need to convert a quaternion to euler's angles. I haven't done this before so I am going to have to research the problem before I start hacking at the code. Overall, I was giving a pretty simple assignment.

I am working with some great engineers. I am going to learn a lot by working with them. I hope I don't step on anyone's toes.

Second Round of Pitches

We just had our second round of pitches. Eight teams pitched there game ideas, each game has a prototype and has started to find their art direction. I think our whole class has done some amazing work already. I would be happy to work on any of the games! With that being said, I really want to make the game my team pitched. Time Jump! (working title!) We have found a game that can use it's game play  mechanics to share the story. That is my favorite way to experience story in games. Shadow of the Colossus is a great game and a good example of playing the story. I'll stop rambling now. Best of luck to all the games. Hope we pick the best of the best.

Swinging Is Hard

I love the game my team and I are coming up with. I see a lot of potential with it, but it is going to take a lot of work. The work load is already difficult. Building a simple prototype of the game and its mechanics is a challenge. Especially implementing a good swinging mechanic. I have tried a few different approaches to building a good hookshot and each one has fallen short of what I consider a decent working mechanic. I am going to keep tweaking around with my best implementation, maybe I'll find the right balance there. I might have to scratch this current iteration and start over.

I know things are only going to get harder. It is a good thing I am having fun.

TimeJump

We picked our pitches and I am happy to be on the team I'm with. The game is timejump and it is basically a 2D puzzle/platformer with a robot. Honestly, it was hard to stop thinking about my old pitch. But I am really falling in love with the ideas and possibilities we have with this game.

I have been working on getting some of the platformer mechanics down. That is what I am going to continue to work on over this weekend. We want to have a prototype up and running soon. I got a lot of work and learning ahead of me, but it is going to be fun.

Pitching

Last week all the students, including me, pitched game ideas to the rest of the class.  We had a lot of good ideas and it was challenging to narrow down the list to 10 games (starting with about 30). Hopefully we all picked right and can get working on them soon. This is going to be fun.

I want to share my game idea with this blog.

My game is, possibly, titled Shycrow. Basically you play a scarecrow and explore the world. What makes this game interesting is how you move in the world. You balance on your pole and hop around, kind of like a pogo stick. That's it. Honestly I don't know much else to say about the game idea, besides how you die. Once you lose your balance and fall on the ground you cannot get back up.

It'd be a 2D side scroller because it would be the easiest to implement and polish. There would be some platforming just to keep the movement challenging. Maybe you could put some puzzle aspects, maybe...

Taking an artistic approach to this game makes it more interesting. Things like having no start menu and making the world dynamic and interactive. The game would start with Shycrow stuck to his fence, the wind blowing through the crops and trees. Crows flying around. Eventually you would try to move or push something. When you did Shycrow would move a little. After you learn that you are playing, you would try to break off the fence. Once you got free you'd began to learn to move in this game. Learn to balance. Once you got this down, you'd began to explore the world. Hopefully, you'd have become attached to Shycrow and feel motivated to take him exploring. One last thing, I love the idea of perma-death. Once you fall you have to restart the game. This makes Shycrow's exploration more dramatic.