we are all very passionate about our tools and engines
I'd like to think that we are all very passionate about making our games? Yes tools and engines are great because they enable us to make stuff, but to focus on the tool alone is counter-productive.
The only thing I think is important choosing which engine to use are: 1) Familiarity - if you're familiar with something, you'll be more efficient and effective with it. Of course. So C# users use Unity because it's already there. Same goes for C++ and Unreal, etc. 2) Support - having other people who use the same engine can give you a technical support base, which is rad. But technical support for every engine can be found relatively easily IN each engine's communities. Google is a thing. When all that fails, asking people here is great given the option.
So yes it's great to have other people who uses the engine you're using. But that is not an exclusionary thing. This is a game dev community. Not a this-engine-or-that community.
Hey folks! Seems like there was a bit of a misunderstanding. If there's still any uncertainty, we still unreservedly recommend Game Maker as a great tool for anyone, but especially beginners cause it's much more approachable than many of the alternatives. We also still maintain that you can use any tool/language/engine you want. I think this is pretty clearly stated in the OP, but anyone is welcome to PM me if they think it's still unclear and want to discuss their grievances with someone.
So we're just over half way now - only 2 weeks left. If you haven't started yet, there's still more than enough time, but don't wait too long! If you've already started, keep that scope well managed and good luck! There's some interesting games coming along already, so I'm excited to see what everyone comes up with :)
Saying "GameMaker is good for beginners" just means it has a low barrier to entry and a gentle learning curve, not that it's something only beginners use.
No need to feel like if you're using GM, you're looked down upon. :)
... Okay GDC is over. Why do I have to come back to this?
That wording is the exact wording that's been used for years in competitions previously, words that were carefully selected and evolved after countless engine-based conflicts. It's literally a clarification on a rule that says that everything you want use as a tool is cool to use - if people don't know any tools, it's a suggestion of where to start.
Withdrawing entries and 'clearing the air' aren't useful responses to helpful recommendations. I'm debating deleting most of the replies here that aren't to do directly with the competition. There might be warnings, but I'm kinda in the middle of hanging out with people that make games right now.
So we're just over half way now - only 2 weeks left. If you haven't started yet, there's still more than enough time, but don't wait too long! If you've already started, keep that scope well managed and good luck! There's some interesting games coming along already, so I'm excited to see what everyone comes up with :)
As Francois has mentioned, we're now heading towards the final sprint of the comp. Deadline is just under two weeks away, so make the most of these conveniently long weekends to polish up your games (but please don't kill yourselves with self-imposed crunch). We're up to seventeen entries, which is double the number I expected when we started this little shindig. I suspect there may be more waiting in the wings. Some surprises are pleasant!
As always, the entry list in post 2 has been updated with all the new entry threads to date. Pokes on the shoulder are appreciated if we've forgotten you. To any new entrants reading this - please be sure that your entry thread is in the Competitions category so we can find it more easily. You can change thread category by editing your original post and selecting it in the dropdown at the top.
Keep cracking at it, guys and girls, and see you all next week! I'm off to have a few whiskeys.
@Gazza_N and @francoisvn thanks for taking the time and effort to set up this comp. I haven't made time to submit anything myself, but I have really been enjoying playing the entries so far. Real quality stuff here, so glad I don't have to judge. I will however try to give feedback to all the games that have a playable so far. Think it's really cool of you to have started this, and think you're doing a great job of managing the process (where it actually matters). No one really cares about all the noise going on. Keep up the good work
Hey everyone, there's only a few days left! A few things to bear in mind: Make sure you upload the latest version of your game by the deadline, which is 31 March 2016, 23:59 (UTC+2). Also, remember to make sure you satisfy the rules. I haven't been checking through the entries intently, but I'm just reminding everyone that the theme rules are not optional. if you're uncertain about something specific in your game, feel free to DM me and @Gazza_N and one of us will give you clarification. Good luck for the last stretch!
Unfortunately I wont be able to put up a build, things just have not gone smoothly for me. I will say however that I'm glad the comps are back and please don't stop :D I'll make a better effort for the next one. Good luck to everyone still in!
Even if you've abandoned your project please write up a short postmortem on your OP. Just answer these 3 questions: "What worked well?", "What didn't work?", "What would you do different or change?". It'll help you sum up your experience and remember it for next time.
The final list is updated in the second post. For posterity I've listed every game that was formally entered, whether it was later withdrawn or not. Please check the list and let us know if we've forgotten any!
A massive and heartfelt thanks to everyone who entered a game, complete or no. I, for one, didn't expect this sort of enthusastic turnout, although @francoisvn's predictions ended up coming true. :P We hope that everyone had fun competing and that you all gained something from the experience, whether you managed to finish your entry or not. I'll second @fengol's suggestion that folks post postmortems for their incomplete entries. It's not a requirement, obviously, but it'll be of interest to sum up your experiences so that you can better reflect on them, and so that others can learn from your attempts.
Now come ye judgings. Our aim is to have the results out in four to six weeks, so tune in around then for tasty, tasty feedbacks. Until then, thanks again, and keep on devvin'!
Well done everyone, I'm really happy to see all the great games submitted :)
Just a quick update on the process. We have assembled a panel of judges and they've been allocated to the submitted entries. If everything runs very smoothly, we might be able to get the results out by the end of the month, but otherwise we'll be aiming for early May.
The current plan is to release the list of judges alongside the results, but we don't intend to indicate who judged what. In other words, a list of judges and a separate list of games with their results. That way you can know the calibre of the judges, but not who judged your game :)
We're still on the same timeline, but it seems likely that it'll be closer to early May than the end of the month. This is mostly due to holidays and other commitments that I think absorbed the judges' time.
Shouldn't the next competition be announced at the start of May?
(I know I'm putting a bit of pressure on, and there isn't much you can do about judges failing to come through on the judging, but the competitions kind of died before because judges just didn't judge, so I feel like this is serious).
@EvanGreenwood: well, the plan was to hold a competition every 3rd month, so currently we're still on track. Things have slipped a little bit from what we originally planned, but not that much. Most of the judging is done, so we probably could rush it to get it done by the end of the month, but that's not what we planned.
Whether or not doing it every 3rd month is enough to maintain momentum or not is debatable, but the thinking is that we'd rather start off having them a bit less frequent (but hopefully more reliable), and then consider making them more frequent down the line if things are running smoothly.
Be careful of building up the results too much. I'm sure they'll be great but I highly doubt they're going to change anyone's life or anything like that. Just saying. Also, you're all already winners for making games ;)
ok so results soonish this month sometime and next comp starts beginning of June ? just checking so I can attempt to minimise the cross procrastination that happens ( the comp helps me procrastinate on other tasks while they help me procrastinate on the comp and nothing gets done)
Hello again, everyone. The theme of Comp H is "Create a game where you exhaustively edit reviews for all Comp G's entries". The deadline will be just before Comp G's results are posted. No particular reason. Just a coincidence. Promise.
In seriousness, we're wrapping up the last stages of the judging and you can indeed expect the final results Soon™, where Soon™ = sometime within the next two weeks™. That puts us juuust outside the 6-week judging period we promised, but I can assure you it ain't dead. Not by a long shot. Also, Comp H is still on track for June announcement. Gird your loins.
I don't think we were clear enough in our judging guidelines, and some reviews needed to be edited down for length or content without losing the meat of the judge's thoughts. After the results are out we'll be revising these guidelines to be clearer regarding what we require, hopefully resulting in less Edit Thyme.
@fengol: Oy now. We have a set deadline. "When it's done" is sooooo 1999. :P
I think it's worth mentioning (again) that we are still comfortably on schedule with the 3 month plan. That said, there has been situations where the judging is not the highest priority in my life and has thus taken longer than it could potentially have. I'm assuming this has been a similar occurrence with other judges. Considering all the judging work is completely volunteer-based, I think having a more relaxed (but regular and reliable) schedule is a good idea. This round will also give us a much better idea of a realistic schedule so we can better communicate timelines in the future. Please be patient with us while we figure this out :)
Oh, please don't take my question as being hard on the (volunteer) judges. Was curious as to why editing was needed as I assumed you would just take what was given and pass it on anonymously :)
Without any further ado, we have the results! A total of 16 games were made for the competition, which is fantastic. We’ve been really happy with the turnout, but now comes the part you’ve all been waiting for: the feedback!
The theme of Comp G was to create a game using basic graphical building blocks - text and/or primitive shapes (such as cubes, spheres squares, triangles, etc) - and boy did you all rise to the challenge. Not only did we see a wealth of genres and approaches, but each game used the theme in a different, interesting way that made working through the entries a visual feast.
Here, in alphabetical order, are the mini-reviews of all the games:
BlastMiner is a single button arcade score game where the objective is to get a pink block to the highest possible point before it "dies". The level design in the game uses the primitives to create a static maze-like environment which has a variety of hazards to aid in the challenge presented to the player, and there are a number of pink blocks throughout the game which seem to act as "lives".
The game is quite polished and presents a highly engaging experience to the player. It has used the theme to its advantage and created an experience that is quite pleasing. The visuals are minimalistic but look great. The blast in all aspects deserves praise - the reticle with a square in the centre and an octagon as the border uses the theme in order to create a clear visual guide for the player's ability to interact with the world, and the explosion created is very visually pleasing. @Manikin understands the use of screenshake to enhance the feel of an explosion without overdoing it to the detriment of effective targeting.
However the reticle going behind the terrain does make it harder to target, and seems like a somewhat obvious oversight. Due to the nature of the powerups being singular and the player having to regress to an earlier point in the game it is somewhat advisable to simply restart than try from a rather random position of progression. Perhaps the most nitpicky critique is that the font used in the game doesn't conform to the theme. This is only worth mentioning given the otherwise superb level of polish and attention to detail using the theme as a guide throughout all of the game.
I am quite curious to see how the game develops, and must say I was quite hoping that I would be surprised by something like Billy's Redemption in Ridiculous Fishing. Since the game feels very polished, and with a bit more work and potentially some alternative play modes could quite easily be something that people could spend money on.
Bradcraft is a voxel-based resource gathering and crafting game which achieves its goal of creating a basic Minecraft clone. You can pick up and place blocks around the world, making whatever strikes your fancy.
The game could do with some refinement and improvement in many aspects. The crafting requires the use of right click in order to place objects, which is unfortunately unavailable in the Unity web-build (as it brings up an options menu).
It’s clear that this is still mostly a seed of an idea and @vintar didn’t take it further. With some work it might be possible to make a fun little prototype from this existing base.
Deeper Darker is a top down adventure/exploration game set in a crumbling castle's crypts, as the player tries to lift a curse from their family. Gameplay consists of navigating the difficult castle traps and trying not to die (in my case, not successfully).
The atmosphere of the game was excellent. It felt creepy to move around the game. The lighting was kind of jarring/buggy but it worked. Lighting up the torches felt satisfying as you waited to see more of the world. The story added to this in a great way, and the level design was great for signalling where to go as you moved past it.
Camera weighting between the avatar and the mouse would have been cool. The movement controls were also a bit clumsy at times, and I found it difficult to navigate simple puzzles, especially the super annoying jumping puzzles. The difficulty of the early game really stifled my enjoyment. It's disappointing because I feel like I missed a lot by not being able to progress past the early game. I spent a lot of time trying to do this, but resetting all the way to the beginning of the game/level was too frustrating for me to continue.
If @konman works more on this game, he should try to maintain and expand the excellent abstract atmosphere he has. In addition, I would playtest a bit more to see how players find the game's difficulty. This game was most interesting at a narrative level, and having difficult mechanics seemed to get in the way of that.
Dogfighting in space, starring yourself as the greatest fighter pilot ever - in the search for arbitrary points, high scores, and meaning in the abstract pulsing colors of space.
The game's feel is excellent. Every action feels so satisfying and the controls are smooth and fun to interact with. Destroying enemies is innately rewarding, and unloading a barrage of bullets feels so good with all those impact effects. The level elements @Kobusvdwalt9 chose to include in the game are great, and interact in interesting ways. I particularly love the ship spawners and how they interact with the surface guns - it's always a risk reward choice as to whether to destroy the guns or the spawners first. It seemed like other planets only spawned when you destroyed planets? If so, this was a nice touch because players could control the pacing of the game.
A sound that is more distinct for when you're damaged would have been great - think the current sound gets lost sometimes. Shooting is a bit annoying because of the aiming - especially at longer distances. Some minor control over this might have been cool. Something I like to do: for initial holding down of the shoot button results in accurate fire, but as you hold it down for longer it becomes less accurate. It also wasn't immediately clear that you could destroy planets. Needed more feedback here I think.
I think the only thing that could do with work is basically a content problem. The quality of the game feel extends the time you're interested, but after a while it becomes a bit boring. I beat my high score a few times, but I would have loved some more level elements that slowly got introduced into the system. Especially with proc gen, each element you add to the potential list scales the system's potential time sink exponentially. A meta-game with different load outs could also be cool. Kobus has proved that this mechanic can be fun, and it's clear he knows how to emulate this gameplay, so it doesn't even have to be a game he works on more. He's got enough out of merely prototyping it.
A physics-based “sandbox” (hah!) puzzle game that requires players to guide falling sand through a set of tools and obstacles to reach the end of the level
This game feels somewhat incomplete, but I really wish it wasn’t! I always like it when a project tries to cram itself into a teeny tiny little window, and believe that - paired with a pure black-and-white aesthetic - it really owns the minimalist spirit that a competition like this leans towards.
As with anything unfinished, there’s a laundry list of cool ideas and features that could totally be added, but I’d like to highlight the potential in particular for removing camera control from the player.
If the game slowly panned downwards (constantly), players could keep the freedom and creativity that’s inherent to the “build infinite conveyors!” concept, but also challenging themselves on the limitations of time pressure. You could even randomise level generation so that relatively quick/interesting decision-making would be an evergreen pleasure.
With some adjustments (probably grid-snapping), I feel this could legitimately work well on phones too. There’s room for a tasty and unique experience there.
The Great Train - A Bandit's Run is very well presented - the animation and juice, colourful models, great sounds, all come together in a very polished package. It's an auto-runner with just one tap to turn your runner running in a different direction, and the variety of objects strewn along your path does a good job of changing things up, but they're less than intuitive due to a myriad of factors like the same death animation no matter you run into a wall or off a cliff, and others.
The camera and lighting system could work better to convey some things, such as the shadow being not top-down makes it harder to intuitively read position and therefore collision. The addition of the shoot mechanic on a non-described key press when the rest of the game thus far ran with a mouse click was also confusing.
Given some attention into details and longevity of the game, it could be a decent mobile title. Kudos!
A first-person “base defense” style game with an emphasis on mobility, especially jumping. Regrettably incomplete.
Though unfinished, the game works beautifully in tandem with the competition theme, relying on simple 3D geometry and stark use of colour to create a minimalist, almost zen-like experience.
Of course, no game is perfect, and if I had to look at a downside, I would probably pin the inability to chain my pad jumps indefinitely, or at least for a significant time longer (say, three or four successful jumps at once). But on the bright side, I’m sure there’s time to modify this post-competition.
It's not the nail is a brief narrative. There are actually no choices to be made in it, no challenge (other than an intellectual one) but the game "system" lets the player "pick up" something along the way. The flipped colour-to-gender-norms correlation threw me a bit, and that could be read one of many ways so it's by no means a negative mark.
The simple human interaction that it outlines can ring true with many people, and could serve to get those who haven't seen things from that perspective to see things in that perspective, if they should actually give this an ol’ college try and choose to mentally engage with the content. What intrigued me the most was the "acquisition" of a skill, talent thing that affects some outcomes. If a game could be made out of that mechanic covering different "skills" that could prove quite interesting.
Here's an interesting scenario: take two old pinball tables. Slice them crosswise down the middle, and stick the rear halves together at the centre so that you have two sets of paddles facing each other, with the usual gauntlet of bumpers and obstacles between them. Next, install two players on either side of this odd contraption and have them punt the ball to each other pong-style to see if they can score points by getting it past their opponent's paddles. Inspired? Absolutely. That @jamotaylor decided to implement this as a local multiplayer game for mobile devices was even more inspired. Behold: Pinball Wars!
In terms of the "Pinball" portion, Pinball Wars does a fairly good job of it. Both players play on a single device, holding it between them while tapping their half of the screen with their thumbs to flick their paddles. The input is responsive, and the pinball physics and interactions are solid. The ball bounces and ricochets around convincingly, and it's always clear how each element and obstacle on the table affects the ball. Watching the ball kick around the table as you time your next move isn't terribly interesting right now, but that’s nothing some fancy art and effects can't remedy.
Sadly, this very watch-and-wait aspect of pinball is where the "Wars" portion falls a little flat. The biggest issue by far is that there’s no real sense of player agency right now, and scoring points feels like the result of sheer luck rather than a feat of superior skill, prediction, and timing. This isn’t helped by the fact that the ball moves very slowly and doesn't carry much momentum. Rather than a frantic clash of reflexes as the ball catapults between the players, most of the time is spent watching it roll sluggishly around the table or bouncing randomly between obstacles, with players unable to do anything until it eventually gets near enough to their paddles to get a good whack in. Oftentimes the ball will spawn and just amble towards the edge of a player's base, lazily tipping off the side and scoring their opponent a point without either participant having had a chance to interact with it. Not behaviour you especially want from a competitive local multiplayer game.
These frustrations are all to be expected from an early prototype of a new concept though, and the base idea remains solid. If @jamotaylor can take this early version and gearing the speed and table design more towards fast, competitive play, the game could be an absolute winner. Extra points if the device's accelerometer were used to let players "tilt" the table and swing things in their favour. Hopefully work continues on this - if so, I foresee a lot of good-natured shouting and swearing in Pinball Wars’ future.
At its core, Primitive Space is a game about humble migrating polygons trying to make their way to fairer lands on the left and having to use force against an evil violent polygon that’s… oh wait... nevermind, that’s you. Ahem… Primitive space is a game about destroying evil polygon mutations with your powerful weapons. It’s a horizontal SCHMUP set in space, with evildoers made up of a few primitive polygons.
The game gives you great feedback as you pummel the oncoming enemies. Angled polygons strapped to the sides intuitively act as shields and give you a very natural feeling for what will happen when a projectile hits something. You can also throw explosive charges in the path of oncoming enemies with another weapon. Overall you quickly get a good idea of the systems and how they fit together because of this intuitiveness.
Unfortunately, at the moment there isn’t much of a goal to work towards, and death is but a temporary setback that sees you instantly respawning. If you can create a bit of a goal that the play can work towards, possibly with increasing difficulty, this should give the player a lot more to do.
The simple graphics and damage system, that sees you knocking off flanking shields, is also the most engaging part of the game. If you can work more on this and really highlight it, perhaps with larger enemies that you almost need to drill into, shoot off their weapons, or deal with them in one of multiple different ways, I think this could turn into something with a lot more depth and rewarding experience.
In a compo geared towards emulating the simple graphics of yesteryear, it's not surprising that we had a couple of FPS entries. @fengol decided to try his hand at replicating a game that WAS essentially comprised of primitives: the original Quake.
In terms of replicating the feel of a classic FPS, Quack does fairly well. The basics are there - cramped corridors, swarms of enemies, jumping, explosive barrels, and so forth. The environment and enemies are made distinct through smart use of lighting, simple texturing, and basic particle effects, while a cool full-screen pixelation shader seals the deal on the retro feel. @Fengol has also tried to inject some classic 90’s craziness into the game by introducing… unconventional weaponry to the player’s arsenal, although he was only able to implement two guns before deadline. Props must also be given to @Gibbo for the sound design - while the basic weapon effects do their job, the HARDCORE ALLCAPS ANNOUNCER voiceover is a really inspired touch. Hearing weapon names BOOMED INTO YOUR EARS as you pick them up or select them really adds to the absurd feel of the game.
It's a shame that the game feels rather slow and sedate despite this. The player's movement is not terribly quick or responsive, and enemy cuboids seem content to amble slowly towards you, blocking your movement while firing the occasional laser beam. Screen shake from explosions has the unfortunate side-effect of permanently displacing the camera from the player's centre, causing the camera to pivot wildly through walls and forcing a game restart. Music was also mysteriously absent despite a volume setting in the options menu, and alas, there was only one level.
Nonetheless, this is a good start. By paying a bit more attention to movement and tightening up the enemy AI, @fengol could turn this into exactly the kind of irreverent 90’s FPS romp that seems so scarce nowadays. Besides, every shooter needs more weapons like the sheep grenade.
roboBiome is a sim-life-like game where you place three types of entities and watch them multiply and consume each other. @Japes set out to create a simulation puzzler (like SpaceChem) but with something like Conway’s Game Of Life as a ruleset.
What this prototype seems to prove is that even a simple simulation, of just plants, herbivores and carnivores can be very engaging. Like watching Conway’s Game Of Life, the simulation produces a vast array of permutations from simple input, and this can be fascinating to watch. Using physics to manipulate all the actors produces some emergent behaviours, both satisfying and not, in that the actors can collide and block each other, but also occasionally get stuck in silly places. There are some pleasing details in the minimalist visuals, with the boxes of the animals becoming skinnier with starvation, and the predators taking a small windup before charging at a herbivore.
@Japes never got to creating the puzzle challenges, and at the time of judging the game is a sandbox with three types of autonomous entities that can be placed. However it’s unlikely that this game is served by its minimalist visuals. The visuals do enough to convey the rules, but the aesthetic is certainly placeholder and would have to be changed should this game progress much further. The reliance on physics also has the problem of collapsing the processor under the weight of the simulation once the board has started filling up.
Given that @Japes' stated goal is quite different to what has been produced it’s hard to suggest what path could be taken with this. Introducing the proposed puzzles could be promising, and as a puzzler this game would have the advantage of keeping the simulation contained to a smaller number of actors (which lessens the need to improve the CPU performance). All that can be said at this stage is that the small amount of gameplay on show in roboBiome makes a strong case for @Japes to explore this further.
If there's any genre that's made the most of primitive text-based graphics, it's the venerable roguelike. Representing an entire world using text (coloured or not) is exactly the sort of thing that this comp theme was designed to encourage, and @General_Rincewind jumped at the idea of applying roguelike-style procedural text graphics to a turn-based multiplayer strategy game. You get a randomised maps, you get a set number of action points per turn, and it's up to you to spend those to build bases, harvest resources, and move troops. May the best commander win!
In terms of traditional text-only display, @General_Rincewind has nailed it, right down to the game running in the Windows terminal rather than simply emulating the style. What impresses most is that input is still largely via mouse, with keyboard shortcuts reserved for more specialised actions. You click units to select them and their destinations (with a useful radial highlight to show their maximum movement range with your remaining AP), and you pan the map by moving the cursor to screen edges as per a more modern RTS, making the game far more accessible to play than an oldschool text-prompt UI would. Unfortunately, text-based rendering is a double-edged sword - the representation of the map currently relies more on the colour of the text than the characters used, meaning that essential details like resource pockets, units, and even HUD elements get lost in the visual noise created by the mass of seemingly-random characters used to represent the terrain. There's also not a lot to do right now - you're able to move units around and construct bases, but I couldn't find any way to harvest resources or create units, nor is there any multiplayer functionality or AI enemy around to fight. This is a pity - with cleaner visuals and some basic AI, this has the makings of a compelling TBS game, multiplayer or not.
When presenting _UNDERSCORE @SUGBOERIE asked the question “How does it feel?”. @SUGBOERIE is evidently experimenting with audio/visual feedback, probably working off the guidelines laid out by Jan Willem of Vlambeer in this talk: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AJdEqssNZ-U
@SUGBOERIE has done a few things differently. Most obviously _UNDERSCORE uses a bulge and chromatic aberration effect to highlight moments of violence (like the firing of the player’s gun). This is much more jarring than the conventional screenshake effect, giving the game a queasy drunken feeling, and possibly inducing motion sickness in some players. It feels almost negative feedback for violence, not quite a punishment, but less a celebration. It’s definitely more intense than the conventional screenshake, which likely was @SUGBOERIE’s intention, delving more in this direction could have had very interesting results.
The death of the “enemies” does not go nearly as far as Jan Willem suggested. The enemies flash white upon taking damage, and soak enough damage to make killing them with the base weapon a tedious affair, and, upon reaching zero health, disappear in an unsatisfying and short-lived and silent spray of gravity-defying particles.
The treatment of the enemies, as blind, faceless, unarmed and slow to die is stark contrast to the glorification of violence that most games of this type strive for. There is no satisfaction in this violence.
The player plays as a white polygon, and the “enemies” all play as black polygons in a black world. This can be read as highlighting the player, but also as placing the player in a space they do not belong, and handing them a gun, and expecting them to enact violence on unarmed and blind characters. Every time the game resets, there is a moment when a black character is embracing the white avatar, before the simulation restarts.
Conceptually, a game that is critical of the violence it portrays is more interesting than the exercise in audio/visual feedback @SUGBOERIE was probably embarking on. But practicing creating a responsive simulation is still a great goal, and @SUGBOERIE would likely receive a lot of useful experience should they take this further.In fact, the two goals can support each other as @SUGBOERIE’s feedback to firing a gun in _UNDERSCORE shows.
Should this be a path @SUGBOERIE wishes to tread, a notable artist that successfully employed an approach of removing joy from violence is Ansh Patel, with games like Trialogue http://lightnarcissus.com/trialogue/
This is a game that is difficult to describe. Technically, it’s a pretty linear twine story about a woman’s morning routine, but in reality it’s so much more. The game gives players an insight into all the little things swirling around in a woman’s mind, and should be especially illuminating for men, who may be quite oblivious to some of these things. In this age of 5 second videos and 10 point lists, the game uses a writing style that manages to draw in the player. It uses very approachable language but still manages to add bucket loads of nuance to the text that readers should enjoy. To call it a linear non-game would be to ignore the impact that that it has on the player and its accessibility, which would likely not be present in something like a short story.
The game is still somewhat short. The relatively abrupt ending and the (very) rare typo snap the player out of the experience they were so readily drawn into. The game very much left me wanting more in the way of story and additional information - the latter could potentially be added through some footnotes or off-site links.
The idea of having a separate always-visible list of items on your mind seems like a good way to really bring the message home. It will be critical to balance this so its overtness doesn’t overwhelm the subtlety of the writing, but if this is an ever-growing list that strikes out (but leaves in place) items you “try not to think about”, it might really help to communicate its much-needed message.
It's a tale as old as time - you are the last circle standing. The walking dead shuffle towards you, pale green triangles, circles and rectangles out for bite of your circular brains. Stab them (back) to death, pick up the shapes they drop, and forge those into deadlier tools to survive a little longer. But don't let them touch you - if you pick up too much of the contagion, you'll become one of them too...
ZAP! is simple, but as @stofStorm's first-ever game it's quite well-conceived and implemented. All the core features are there and working almost flawlessly - player-swarming zombie hordes, crafting pickups, a gradual difficulty increase (zombies weather more damage as the game moves on) and infection/death mechanics are all present and accounted for. Unfortunately @stofStorm wasn't able to implement everything they wanted to before deadline - the lack of the crafting/forge mechanic currently means that you're quickly overwhelmed as the zombies start out-tanking your starting weapon. A few tweaks to the UI to reflect zombie strength increases would be tremendously useful, as well as having more differentiation between the zombie types than just their shapes. A more elaborate environment would also work wonders for gameplay - weaving in and out between obstacles as you stab zombies in the face is always fun. Nonetheless, ZAP! is a decent first showing, and hopefully stofStorm will take what they've learned here and use it to build a bigger, better second game. Then a third.
Final Results
1st: Blast Miner A simple but compelling mechanic, lovely visuals that express the comp’s theme perfectly, understated but highly effective audio, and a crisp, polished presentation all combine to make Blast Miner an all-round winner. It even has a fully-implemented online leaderboard. You could arguably stick it on a store right now.
2nd: Falcon9 Falcon9’s procedural Asteroids-Schmup mishmash feels just magnificent to play, and Kobus has visual juiciness down to an art at this point. With a few more refinements to the mechanics and some solid audio, Falcon9 will soar.
3rd: You try not to think about it @dammit’s aim with this project was to communicate the mundane trials of your average Jane Doe that most men don’t ever think to consider, and she uses Twine to great effect in doing so. A thought-provoking entry, and a fine example of how an interactive platform is ideal for getting you into somebody else’s head and showing things from another perspective.
Judges
Ben Myres
Evan Greenwood
Francois van Niekerk
Gareth Wilcock
Julian Pritchard
Rodain Joubert
Steve Tu
Well done to all the participants! It’s definitely an achievement to have created something within the constraints we presented. There were a lot of interesting games submitted, and we’d love to see some more work done on some of them. This entire process was a bit of a prototype in itself, relying on a whole panel of judges, so please let us know what you thought of the process and whether you have any feedback on that.
Huge thanks to the panel of judges that gave up their time to give feedback on all the games. We look forward to the next competition, which is scheduled to go live at the start of June. Stay tuned to the forums for updates on that!
This kind of feedback is the real reward for entering the community competitions. A big thank you to all the judges and I can't wait to start the next one.
<3 to judges for taking the time and to the organisers. We really all appreciate it and I know I'm looking forward to the next one.
Interestingly enough, before even getting this result, I've been looking up how to make the changes in twine from the feedback people have suggested. Really enjoying working with that little engine and hopefully will have a good collection of twine projects in no time :)
Wow, I really appreciate that feedback guys, thanks. Whoever wrote that blurb, thanks for taking the time. Totally agree with what was said, and you've inspired me to try and make the game what I imagined it could be when I started it!
After having had the chance to chat to a few folks over the past week (Hi retroEpic peoples! o/), I'd like to give a shout out to everyone who's thanked us for (and supported us during) the comp. It's a pleasure and a privilege to see that people enjoyed themselves as they learned by pushing themselves to create something - that's exactly why we're running these things. I hope you'll all enjoy the next ones too, and (as stated above) if you have any comments or suggestions, lay 'em on us.
Comments
The only thing I think is important choosing which engine to use are:
1) Familiarity - if you're familiar with something, you'll be more efficient and effective with it. Of course. So C# users use Unity because it's already there. Same goes for C++ and Unreal, etc.
2) Support - having other people who use the same engine can give you a technical support base, which is rad. But technical support for every engine can be found relatively easily IN each engine's communities. Google is a thing. When all that fails, asking people here is great given the option.
So yes it's great to have other people who uses the engine you're using. But that is not an exclusionary thing. This is a game dev community. Not a this-engine-or-that community.
So we're just over half way now - only 2 weeks left. If you haven't started yet, there's still more than enough time, but don't wait too long! If you've already started, keep that scope well managed and good luck! There's some interesting games coming along already, so I'm excited to see what everyone comes up with :)
Saying "GameMaker is good for beginners" just means it has a low barrier to entry and a gentle learning curve, not that it's something only beginners use.
No need to feel like if you're using GM, you're looked down upon. :)
That wording is the exact wording that's been used for years in competitions previously, words that were carefully selected and evolved after countless engine-based conflicts. It's literally a clarification on a rule that says that everything you want use as a tool is cool to use - if people don't know any tools, it's a suggestion of where to start.
Withdrawing entries and 'clearing the air' aren't useful responses to helpful recommendations. I'm debating deleting most of the replies here that aren't to do directly with the competition. There might be warnings, but I'm kinda in the middle of hanging out with people that make games right now.
As Francois has mentioned, we're now heading towards the final sprint of the comp. Deadline is just under two weeks away, so make the most of these conveniently long weekends to polish up your games (but please don't kill yourselves with self-imposed crunch). We're up to seventeen entries, which is double the number I expected when we started this little shindig. I suspect there may be more waiting in the wings. Some surprises are pleasant!
As always, the entry list in post 2 has been updated with all the new entry threads to date. Pokes on the shoulder are appreciated if we've forgotten you. To any new entrants reading this - please be sure that your entry thread is in the Competitions category so we can find it more easily. You can change thread category by editing your original post and selecting it in the dropdown at the top.
Keep cracking at it, guys and girls, and see you all next week! I'm off to have a few whiskeys.
Good luck everyone! Looking forward to playing everyone's hard work :)
Check out my entry for an example.
TWENTY ENTRIES! TWENTY. O_O
The final list is updated in the second post. For posterity I've listed every game that was formally entered, whether it was later withdrawn or not. Please check the list and let us know if we've forgotten any!
A massive and heartfelt thanks to everyone who entered a game, complete or no. I, for one, didn't expect this sort of enthusastic turnout, although @francoisvn's predictions ended up coming true. :P We hope that everyone had fun competing and that you all gained something from the experience, whether you managed to finish your entry or not. I'll second @fengol's suggestion that folks post postmortems for their incomplete entries. It's not a requirement, obviously, but it'll be of interest to sum up your experiences so that you can better reflect on them, and so that others can learn from your attempts.
Now come ye judgings. Our aim is to have the results out in four to six weeks, so tune in around then for tasty, tasty feedbacks. Until then, thanks again, and keep on devvin'!
Just a quick update on the process. We have assembled a panel of judges and they've been allocated to the submitted entries. If everything runs very smoothly, we might be able to get the results out by the end of the month, but otherwise we'll be aiming for early May.
We still need to collate all the judging feedback and do some final revisions. Expect the results in the 1st or 2nd week or May I'd guess.
(I know I'm putting a bit of pressure on, and there isn't much you can do about judges failing to come through on the judging, but the competitions kind of died before because judges just didn't judge, so I feel like this is serious).
It's only a couple hours. I could take on another game to judge if it helps keep this competition on track and keep the momentum.
Whether or not doing it every 3rd month is enough to maintain momentum or not is debatable, but the thinking is that we'd rather start off having them a bit less frequent (but hopefully more reliable), and then consider making them more frequent down the line if things are running smoothly.
From the creators of Comp G...
The most anticipated announcement of the year...
THE JAM RESULTS
"Well worth the wait."
- A Reporter
PEGI 13
just checking so I can attempt to minimise the cross procrastination that happens ( the comp helps me procrastinate on other tasks while they help me procrastinate on the comp and nothing gets done)
>_>
Hello again, everyone. The theme of Comp H is "Create a game where you exhaustively edit reviews for all Comp G's entries". The deadline will be just before Comp G's results are posted. No particular reason. Just a coincidence. Promise.
(Think they bought it, @francoisvn?)
In seriousness, we're wrapping up the last stages of the judging and you can indeed expect the final results Soon™, where Soon™ = sometime within the next two weeks™. That puts us juuust outside the 6-week judging period we promised, but I can assure you it ain't dead. Not by a long shot. Also, Comp H is still on track for June announcement. Gird your loins.
@fengol: Oy now. We have a set deadline. "When it's done" is sooooo 1999. :P
The theme of Comp G was to create a game using basic graphical building blocks - text and/or primitive shapes (such as cubes, spheres squares, triangles, etc) - and boy did you all rise to the challenge. Not only did we see a wealth of genres and approaches, but each game used the theme in a different, interesting way that made working through the entries a visual feast.
Here, in alphabetical order, are the mini-reviews of all the games:
Blast Miner by @Manikin
http://makegamessa.com/discussion/3916/comp-g-blast-miner
BlastMiner is a single button arcade score game where the objective is to get a pink block to the highest possible point before it "dies". The level design in the game uses the primitives to create a static maze-like environment which has a variety of hazards to aid in the challenge presented to the player, and there are a number of pink blocks throughout the game which seem to act as "lives".
The game is quite polished and presents a highly engaging experience to the player. It has used the theme to its advantage and created an experience that is quite pleasing. The visuals are minimalistic but look great. The blast in all aspects deserves praise - the reticle with a square in the centre and an octagon as the border uses the theme in order to create a clear visual guide for the player's ability to interact with the world, and the explosion created is very visually pleasing. @Manikin understands the use of screenshake to enhance the feel of an explosion without overdoing it to the detriment of effective targeting.
However the reticle going behind the terrain does make it harder to target, and seems like a somewhat obvious oversight. Due to the nature of the powerups being singular and the player having to regress to an earlier point in the game it is somewhat advisable to simply restart than try from a rather random position of progression. Perhaps the most nitpicky critique is that the font used in the game doesn't conform to the theme. This is only worth mentioning given the otherwise superb level of polish and attention to detail using the theme as a guide throughout all of the game.
I am quite curious to see how the game develops, and must say I was quite hoping that I would be surprised by something like Billy's Redemption in Ridiculous Fishing. Since the game feels very polished, and with a bit more work and potentially some alternative play modes could quite easily be something that people could spend money on.
BradCraft by @vintar
http://makegamessa.com/discussion/3877/comp-g-bradcraft
Bradcraft is a voxel-based resource gathering and crafting game which achieves its goal of creating a basic Minecraft clone. You can pick up and place blocks around the world, making whatever strikes your fancy.
The game could do with some refinement and improvement in many aspects. The crafting requires the use of right click in order to place objects, which is unfortunately unavailable in the Unity web-build (as it brings up an options menu).
It’s clear that this is still mostly a seed of an idea and @vintar didn’t take it further. With some work it might be possible to make a fun little prototype from this existing base.
Deeper Darker by @konman
http://makegamessa.com/discussion/3867/comp-g-deeper-darker
Deeper Darker is a top down adventure/exploration game set in a crumbling castle's crypts, as the player tries to lift a curse from their family. Gameplay consists of navigating the difficult castle traps and trying not to die (in my case, not successfully).
The atmosphere of the game was excellent. It felt creepy to move around the game. The lighting was kind of jarring/buggy but it worked. Lighting up the torches felt satisfying as you waited to see more of the world. The story added to this in a great way, and the level design was great for signalling where to go as you moved past it.
Camera weighting between the avatar and the mouse would have been cool. The movement controls were also a bit clumsy at times, and I found it difficult to navigate simple puzzles, especially the super annoying jumping puzzles. The difficulty of the early game really stifled my enjoyment. It's disappointing because I feel like I missed a lot by not being able to progress past the early game. I spent a lot of time trying to do this, but resetting all the way to the beginning of the game/level was too frustrating for me to continue.
If @konman works more on this game, he should try to maintain and expand the excellent abstract atmosphere he has. In addition, I would playtest a bit more to see how players find the game's difficulty. This game was most interesting at a narrative level, and having difficult mechanics seemed to get in the way of that.
Falcon9 by @Kobusvdwalt9
http://makegamessa.com/discussion/3878/comp-g-falcon9-final-build
Dogfighting in space, starring yourself as the greatest fighter pilot ever - in the search for arbitrary points, high scores, and meaning in the abstract pulsing colors of space.
The game's feel is excellent. Every action feels so satisfying and the controls are smooth and fun to interact with. Destroying enemies is innately rewarding, and unloading a barrage of bullets feels so good with all those impact effects. The level elements @Kobusvdwalt9 chose to include in the game are great, and interact in interesting ways. I particularly love the ship spawners and how they interact with the surface guns - it's always a risk reward choice as to whether to destroy the guns or the spawners first. It seemed like other planets only spawned when you destroyed planets? If so, this was a nice touch because players could control the pacing of the game.
A sound that is more distinct for when you're damaged would have been great - think the current sound gets lost sometimes. Shooting is a bit annoying because of the aiming - especially at longer distances. Some minor control over this might have been cool. Something I like to do: for initial holding down of the shoot button results in accurate fire, but as you hold it down for longer it becomes less accurate. It also wasn't immediately clear that you could destroy planets. Needed more feedback here I think.
I think the only thing that could do with work is basically a content problem. The quality of the game feel extends the time you're interested, but after a while it becomes a bit boring. I beat my high score a few times, but I would have loved some more level elements that slowly got introduced into the system. Especially with proc gen, each element you add to the potential list scales the system's potential time sink exponentially. A meta-game with different load outs could also be cool. Kobus has proved that this mechanic can be fun, and it's clear he knows how to emulate this gameplay, so it doesn't even have to be a game he works on more. He's got enough out of merely prototyping it.
Falling Sands Factory by @critic
http://makegamessa.com/discussion/3931/comp-g-falling-sands-factory
A physics-based “sandbox” (hah!) puzzle game that requires players to guide falling sand through a set of tools and obstacles to reach the end of the level
This game feels somewhat incomplete, but I really wish it wasn’t! I always like it when a project tries to cram itself into a teeny tiny little window, and believe that - paired with a pure black-and-white aesthetic - it really owns the minimalist spirit that a competition like this leans towards.
As with anything unfinished, there’s a laundry list of cool ideas and features that could totally be added, but I’d like to highlight the potential in particular for removing camera control from the player.
If the game slowly panned downwards (constantly), players could keep the freedom and creativity that’s inherent to the “build infinite conveyors!” concept, but also challenging themselves on the limitations of time pressure. You could even randomise level generation so that relatively quick/interesting decision-making would be an evergreen pleasure.
With some adjustments (probably grid-snapping), I feel this could legitimately work well on phones too. There’s room for a tasty and unique experience there.
The Great Train by @Pomb
http://makegamessa.com/discussion/3873/comp-g-the-great-train-a-bandits-run
The Great Train - A Bandit's Run is very well presented - the animation and juice, colourful models, great sounds, all come together in a very polished package. It's an auto-runner with just one tap to turn your runner running in a different direction, and the variety of objects strewn along your path does a good job of changing things up, but they're less than intuitive due to a myriad of factors like the same death animation no matter you run into a wall or off a cliff, and others.
The camera and lighting system could work better to convey some things, such as the shadow being not top-down makes it harder to intuitively read position and therefore collision. The addition of the shoot mechanic on a non-described key press when the rest of the game thus far ran with a mouse click was also confusing.
Given some attention into details and longevity of the game, it could be a decent mobile title. Kudos!
Island Assault by @garethf
http://makegamessa.com/discussion/3881/comp-g-island-assault
A first-person “base defense” style game with an emphasis on mobility, especially jumping. Regrettably incomplete.
Though unfinished, the game works beautifully in tandem with the competition theme, relying on simple 3D geometry and stark use of colour to create a minimalist, almost zen-like experience.
Of course, no game is perfect, and if I had to look at a downside, I would probably pin the inability to chain my pad jumps indefinitely, or at least for a significant time longer (say, three or four successful jumps at once). But on the bright side, I’m sure there’s time to modify this post-competition.
It's not the nail by @TheFuntastic
http://makegamessa.com/discussion/3938/comp-g-it-s-not-the-nail-a-very-short-thing-about-empathy
It's not the nail is a brief narrative. There are actually no choices to be made in it, no challenge (other than an intellectual one) but the game "system" lets the player "pick up" something along the way. The flipped colour-to-gender-norms correlation threw me a bit, and that could be read one of many ways so it's by no means a negative mark.
The simple human interaction that it outlines can ring true with many people, and could serve to get those who haven't seen things from that perspective to see things in that perspective, if they should actually give this an ol’ college try and choose to mentally engage with the content. What intrigued me the most was the "acquisition" of a skill, talent thing that affects some outcomes. If a game could be made out of that mechanic covering different "skills" that could prove quite interesting.
Pinball Wars by @jamotaylor
http://makegamessa.com/discussion/3944/comp-g-pinball-wars
Here's an interesting scenario: take two old pinball tables. Slice them crosswise down the middle, and stick the rear halves together at the centre so that you have two sets of paddles facing each other, with the usual gauntlet of bumpers and obstacles between them. Next, install two players on either side of this odd contraption and have them punt the ball to each other pong-style to see if they can score points by getting it past their opponent's paddles. Inspired? Absolutely. That @jamotaylor decided to implement this as a local multiplayer game for mobile devices was even more inspired. Behold: Pinball Wars!
In terms of the "Pinball" portion, Pinball Wars does a fairly good job of it. Both players play on a single device, holding it between them while tapping their half of the screen with their thumbs to flick their paddles. The input is responsive, and the pinball physics and interactions are solid. The ball bounces and ricochets around convincingly, and it's always clear how each element and obstacle on the table affects the ball. Watching the ball kick around the table as you time your next move isn't terribly interesting right now, but that’s nothing some fancy art and effects can't remedy.
Sadly, this very watch-and-wait aspect of pinball is where the "Wars" portion falls a little flat. The biggest issue by far is that there’s no real sense of player agency right now, and scoring points feels like the result of sheer luck rather than a feat of superior skill, prediction, and timing. This isn’t helped by the fact that the ball moves very slowly and doesn't carry much momentum. Rather than a frantic clash of reflexes as the ball catapults between the players, most of the time is spent watching it roll sluggishly around the table or bouncing randomly between obstacles, with players unable to do anything until it eventually gets near enough to their paddles to get a good whack in. Oftentimes the ball will spawn and just amble towards the edge of a player's base, lazily tipping off the side and scoring their opponent a point without either participant having had a chance to interact with it. Not behaviour you especially want from a competitive local multiplayer game.
These frustrations are all to be expected from an early prototype of a new concept though, and the base idea remains solid. If @jamotaylor can take this early version and gearing the speed and table design more towards fast, competitive play, the game could be an absolute winner. Extra points if the device's accelerometer were used to let players "tilt" the table and swing things in their favour. Hopefully work continues on this - if so, I foresee a lot of good-natured shouting and swearing in Pinball Wars’ future.
Primitive Space by @skinklizzard
http://makegamessa.com/discussion/3876/comp-g-primitive-space
At its core, Primitive Space is a game about humble migrating polygons trying to make their way to fairer lands on the left and having to use force against an evil violent polygon that’s… oh wait... nevermind, that’s you. Ahem… Primitive space is a game about destroying evil polygon mutations with your powerful weapons. It’s a horizontal SCHMUP set in space, with evildoers made up of a few primitive polygons.
The game gives you great feedback as you pummel the oncoming enemies. Angled polygons strapped to the sides intuitively act as shields and give you a very natural feeling for what will happen when a projectile hits something. You can also throw explosive charges in the path of oncoming enemies with another weapon. Overall you quickly get a good idea of the systems and how they fit together because of this intuitiveness.
Unfortunately, at the moment there isn’t much of a goal to work towards, and death is but a temporary setback that sees you instantly respawning. If you can create a bit of a goal that the play can work towards, possibly with increasing difficulty, this should give the player a lot more to do.
The simple graphics and damage system, that sees you knocking off flanking shields, is also the most engaging part of the game. If you can work more on this and really highlight it, perhaps with larger enemies that you almost need to drill into, shoot off their weapons, or deal with them in one of multiple different ways, I think this could turn into something with a lot more depth and rewarding experience.
Quack by @fengol
http://makegamessa.com/discussion/3869/comp-g-quack-a-quake-clone
In a compo geared towards emulating the simple graphics of yesteryear, it's not surprising that we had a couple of FPS entries. @fengol decided to try his hand at replicating a game that WAS essentially comprised of primitives: the original Quake.
In terms of replicating the feel of a classic FPS, Quack does fairly well. The basics are there - cramped corridors, swarms of enemies, jumping, explosive barrels, and so forth. The environment and enemies are made distinct through smart use of lighting, simple texturing, and basic particle effects, while a cool full-screen pixelation shader seals the deal on the retro feel. @Fengol has also tried to inject some classic 90’s craziness into the game by introducing… unconventional weaponry to the player’s arsenal, although he was only able to implement two guns before deadline. Props must also be given to @Gibbo for the sound design - while the basic weapon effects do their job, the HARDCORE ALLCAPS ANNOUNCER voiceover is a really inspired touch. Hearing weapon names BOOMED INTO YOUR EARS as you pick them up or select them really adds to the absurd feel of the game.
It's a shame that the game feels rather slow and sedate despite this. The player's movement is not terribly quick or responsive, and enemy cuboids seem content to amble slowly towards you, blocking your movement while firing the occasional laser beam. Screen shake from explosions has the unfortunate side-effect of permanently displacing the camera from the player's centre, causing the camera to pivot wildly through walls and forcing a game restart. Music was also mysteriously absent despite a volume setting in the options menu, and alas, there was only one level.
Nonetheless, this is a good start. By paying a bit more attention to movement and tightening up the enemy AI, @fengol could turn this into exactly the kind of irreverent 90’s FPS romp that seems so scarce nowadays. Besides, every shooter needs more weapons like the sheep grenade.
roboBiome by @Japes
http://makegamessa.com/discussion/3875/comp-g-robobiome
roboBiome is a sim-life-like game where you place three types of entities and watch them multiply and consume each other. @Japes set out to create a simulation puzzler (like SpaceChem) but with something like Conway’s Game Of Life as a ruleset.
What this prototype seems to prove is that even a simple simulation, of just plants, herbivores and carnivores can be very engaging. Like watching Conway’s Game Of Life, the simulation produces a vast array of permutations from simple input, and this can be fascinating to watch. Using physics to manipulate all the actors produces some emergent behaviours, both satisfying and not, in that the actors can collide and block each other, but also occasionally get stuck in silly places. There are some pleasing details in the minimalist visuals, with the boxes of the animals becoming skinnier with starvation, and the predators taking a small windup before charging at a herbivore.
@Japes never got to creating the puzzle challenges, and at the time of judging the game is a sandbox with three types of autonomous entities that can be placed. However it’s unlikely that this game is served by its minimalist visuals. The visuals do enough to convey the rules, but the aesthetic is certainly placeholder and would have to be changed should this game progress much further. The reliance on physics also has the problem of collapsing the processor under the weight of the simulation once the board has started filling up.
Given that @Japes' stated goal is quite different to what has been produced it’s hard to suggest what path could be taken with this. Introducing the proposed puzzles could be promising, and as a puzzler this game would have the advantage of keeping the simulation contained to a smaller number of actors (which lessens the need to improve the CPU performance). All that can be said at this stage is that the small amount of gameplay on show in roboBiome makes a strong case for @Japes to explore this further.
Terra by @General_Rincewind
http://makegamessa.com/discussion/3919/comp-g-terra
If there's any genre that's made the most of primitive text-based graphics, it's the venerable roguelike. Representing an entire world using text (coloured or not) is exactly the sort of thing that this comp theme was designed to encourage, and @General_Rincewind jumped at the idea of applying roguelike-style procedural text graphics to a turn-based multiplayer strategy game. You get a randomised maps, you get a set number of action points per turn, and it's up to you to spend those to build bases, harvest resources, and move troops. May the best commander win!
In terms of traditional text-only display, @General_Rincewind has nailed it, right down to the game running in the Windows terminal rather than simply emulating the style. What impresses most is that input is still largely via mouse, with keyboard shortcuts reserved for more specialised actions. You click units to select them and their destinations (with a useful radial highlight to show their maximum movement range with your remaining AP), and you pan the map by moving the cursor to screen edges as per a more modern RTS, making the game far more accessible to play than an oldschool text-prompt UI would. Unfortunately, text-based rendering is a double-edged sword - the representation of the map currently relies more on the colour of the text than the characters used, meaning that essential details like resource pockets, units, and even HUD elements get lost in the visual noise created by the mass of seemingly-random characters used to represent the terrain. There's also not a lot to do right now - you're able to move units around and construct bases, but I couldn't find any way to harvest resources or create units, nor is there any multiplayer functionality or AI enemy around to fight. This is a pity - with cleaner visuals and some basic AI, this has the makings of a compelling TBS game, multiplayer or not.
_UNDERSCORE by @SUGBOERIE
http://makegamessa.com/discussion/3892/comp-g-underscore
When presenting _UNDERSCORE @SUGBOERIE asked the question “How does it feel?”. @SUGBOERIE is evidently experimenting with audio/visual feedback, probably working off the guidelines laid out by Jan Willem of Vlambeer in this talk: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AJdEqssNZ-U
@SUGBOERIE has done a few things differently. Most obviously _UNDERSCORE uses a bulge and chromatic aberration effect to highlight moments of violence (like the firing of the player’s gun). This is much more jarring than the conventional screenshake effect, giving the game a queasy drunken feeling, and possibly inducing motion sickness in some players. It feels almost negative feedback for violence, not quite a punishment, but less a celebration. It’s definitely more intense than the conventional screenshake, which likely was @SUGBOERIE’s intention, delving more in this direction could have had very interesting results.
The death of the “enemies” does not go nearly as far as Jan Willem suggested. The enemies flash white upon taking damage, and soak enough damage to make killing them with the base weapon a tedious affair, and, upon reaching zero health, disappear in an unsatisfying and short-lived and silent spray of gravity-defying particles.
The treatment of the enemies, as blind, faceless, unarmed and slow to die is stark contrast to the glorification of violence that most games of this type strive for. There is no satisfaction in this violence.
The player plays as a white polygon, and the “enemies” all play as black polygons in a black world. This can be read as highlighting the player, but also as placing the player in a space they do not belong, and handing them a gun, and expecting them to enact violence on unarmed and blind characters. Every time the game resets, there is a moment when a black character is embracing the white avatar, before the simulation restarts.
Conceptually, a game that is critical of the violence it portrays is more interesting than the exercise in audio/visual feedback @SUGBOERIE was probably embarking on. But practicing creating a responsive simulation is still a great goal, and @SUGBOERIE would likely receive a lot of useful experience should they take this further.In fact, the two goals can support each other as @SUGBOERIE’s feedback to firing a gun in _UNDERSCORE shows.
Should this be a path @SUGBOERIE wishes to tread, a notable artist that successfully employed an approach of removing joy from violence is Ansh Patel, with games like Trialogue http://lightnarcissus.com/trialogue/
You try not to think about it by @dammit
http://makegamessa.com/discussion/3897/comp-g-you-try-not-to-think-about-it
This is a game that is difficult to describe. Technically, it’s a pretty linear twine story about a woman’s morning routine, but in reality it’s so much more. The game gives players an insight into all the little things swirling around in a woman’s mind, and should be especially illuminating for men, who may be quite oblivious to some of these things. In this age of 5 second videos and 10 point lists, the game uses a writing style that manages to draw in the player. It uses very approachable language but still manages to add bucket loads of nuance to the text that readers should enjoy. To call it a linear non-game would be to ignore the impact that that it has on the player and its accessibility, which would likely not be present in something like a short story.
The game is still somewhat short. The relatively abrupt ending and the (very) rare typo snap the player out of the experience they were so readily drawn into. The game very much left me wanting more in the way of story and additional information - the latter could potentially be added through some footnotes or off-site links.
The idea of having a separate always-visible list of items on your mind seems like a good way to really bring the message home. It will be critical to balance this so its overtness doesn’t overwhelm the subtlety of the writing, but if this is an ever-growing list that strikes out (but leaves in place) items you “try not to think about”, it might really help to communicate its much-needed message.
ZAP! by @stofStorm
http://makegamessa.com/discussion/3895/comp-g-zap-zombies-are-primitive
It's a tale as old as time - you are the last circle standing. The walking dead shuffle towards you, pale green triangles, circles and rectangles out for bite of your circular brains. Stab them (back) to death, pick up the shapes they drop, and forge those into deadlier tools to survive a little longer. But don't let them touch you - if you pick up too much of the contagion, you'll become one of them too...
ZAP! is simple, but as @stofStorm's first-ever game it's quite well-conceived and implemented. All the core features are there and working almost flawlessly - player-swarming zombie hordes, crafting pickups, a gradual difficulty increase (zombies weather more damage as the game moves on) and infection/death mechanics are all present and accounted for. Unfortunately @stofStorm wasn't able to implement everything they wanted to before deadline - the lack of the crafting/forge mechanic currently means that you're quickly overwhelmed as the zombies start out-tanking your starting weapon. A few tweaks to the UI to reflect zombie strength increases would be tremendously useful, as well as having more differentiation between the zombie types than just their shapes. A more elaborate environment would also work wonders for gameplay - weaving in and out between obstacles as you stab zombies in the face is always fun. Nonetheless, ZAP! is a decent first showing, and hopefully stofStorm will take what they've learned here and use it to build a bigger, better second game. Then a third.
Final Results
1st: Blast Miner
A simple but compelling mechanic, lovely visuals that express the comp’s theme perfectly, understated but highly effective audio, and a crisp, polished presentation all combine to make Blast Miner an all-round winner. It even has a fully-implemented online leaderboard. You could arguably stick it on a store right now.
2nd: Falcon9
Falcon9’s procedural Asteroids-Schmup mishmash feels just magnificent to play, and Kobus has visual juiciness down to an art at this point. With a few more refinements to the mechanics and some solid audio, Falcon9 will soar.
3rd: You try not to think about it
@dammit’s aim with this project was to communicate the mundane trials of your average Jane Doe that most men don’t ever think to consider, and she uses Twine to great effect in doing so. A thought-provoking entry, and a fine example of how an interactive platform is ideal for getting you into somebody else’s head and showing things from another perspective.
Judges
Well done to all the participants! It’s definitely an achievement to have created something within the constraints we presented. There were a lot of interesting games submitted, and we’d love to see some more work done on some of them. This entire process was a bit of a prototype in itself, relying on a whole panel of judges, so please let us know what you thought of the process and whether you have any feedback on that.
Huge thanks to the panel of judges that gave up their time to give feedback on all the games. We look forward to the next competition, which is scheduled to go live at the start of June. Stay tuned to the forums for updates on that!
We'll see you there. If you dare...
Interestingly enough, before even getting this result, I've been looking up how to make the changes in twine from the feedback people have suggested. Really enjoying working with that little engine and hopefully will have a good collection of twine projects in no time :)