D: Shift
Okay, so I wasnt going to post anything until I actually had a working demo, but since the deadline is looming and my pedantic nature has got the better of me, there's a good chance I wont finish anything playable by Friday.
But I dont want my efforts to be in vain, so lets see what you guys think of the concept:
Shift - Pilot the escape pod out of the mine/spacestation that is currently blowing up by "shifting" between predetermined paths.
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V0.2 - Play
**Competition submission** - The ship now runs away from a wall of flame, has randomly generated levels and the ability to shift between paths.
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Older Versions:
V0.1 - Play
V0.1 doesnt really do much other than show the ship travelling over a path.
The highly sophisticated escape rail system means you dont have to worry about steering the ship - mostly. There's a lot of debris and stuff (ahem nasty traps) that you need to avoid by jumping between nearby rails.
The escape pod / ship thing:
But I dont want my efforts to be in vain, so lets see what you guys think of the concept:
Shift - Pilot the escape pod out of the mine/spacestation that is currently blowing up by "shifting" between predetermined paths.
-------
V0.2 - Play
**Competition submission** - The ship now runs away from a wall of flame, has randomly generated levels and the ability to shift between paths.
-------
Older Versions:
V0.1 - Play
V0.1 doesnt really do much other than show the ship travelling over a path.
The highly sophisticated escape rail system means you dont have to worry about steering the ship - mostly. There's a lot of debris and stuff (ahem nasty traps) that you need to avoid by jumping between nearby rails.
The escape pod / ship thing:
Comments
Heh, it reminds me pleasantly of a game that I remember playing as a child: Tunnels of Armageddon. In that game you flew down tunnels in a first-person perspective, dodging obstacles and making quick decisions regarding which tunnels to take.
That's a rather cool ship, by the way. ^_^
But thats the point of these competitions, to stop trying to make everything perfect and to just make SOMETHING. I'm still learning this.
@Thaumaturge - Cool find! Hmm, different coloured tunnels are quite a good idea! I was struggling to think of how it would work when the player only has a couple of seconds to choose the correct path. With colours, you can rate the danger level of each one instantly.
They obviously get very very many entries and some from very well known sources (Wolfire, Notch). Do you know if a lot of the other games just fall by the wayside and are not even judged because of the sheer volume of entries?
edit: They do. ;) (Mostly.)
Re Ladum Dare: You talking about the mini LDs and other stuff, or have I been under the false assumption it's only once a year?
I love the design! It looks like it could be lots of fun, if the levels work out well :)
Temple Run (2), Subway Surfers and Agent Dash are the most popular ones, I think.
We've entered a few jams and Jaco (@RustyBroomhandle) has entered solo a few times. One of our jam entries got into the top 100 in more than one category and was ranked #58 of some 1,500 entries overall. You can see it here, and scroll down a bit to see the eventual scores we received - http://www.ludumdare.com/compo/ludum-dare-24/?action=preview&uid=10871. And if you click 'view all entries by Rustybroomhandle' at the bottom you can see the other stuff we've done and how they scored.
If you submit a game and then leave it there without interacting with the other games, you won't get noticed, won't get rated and your game will pretty much slip by the wayside. If you're prepared to play the other submissions and to feedback on games, you'll get yours noticed, and rated, more. I think it's worth it. :)
And yes, they run every few months. ^.^
So I got the player running along a randomly generated set of tiles so far.
There are 5 different tiles, each with an image and a predefined set of points making up a path.
The paths are laid out end to end to make a continuous line of random tiles.
An interesting mechanic came up while I was doing this - and that is to slow the player down depending on the sharpness of the turn. This will prompt the player to choose a faster path over a slower one.
You can see how it runs here:
http://www.mikepote.co.nf/shift/v1/
You will have to click on the Flash once it loads, before it will accept keyboard input. Right and left arrows thereafter.
You can also press tilde to see the log.
Something you may want to consider, based on what I see here and your intended mechanic, is pulling the camera out a little bit to allow a bit more preplanning of which tracks to flip to. Unless, of course, twitch play is the plan. ;)
I've just increased the play area to 640x700 so hopefully this should help a bit.
I've also got a random level generator going. It's not perfect, but at least there are other paths to jump onto now :P
Now to make some decent paths.
It feels there's too much penalty on the slowdown - the ship is constantly just slow, and the game doesn't pick up pace. I guess you just need more straights later to jump onto, but the sense of speed this game needs isn't there yet :)
Good progress though :)
But I get what you're saying. The level design is what really will make or break this game.
Unfortunately the random level generator is not the best thing for this, and right now I only have a very basic set of tiles to play with.
That said, I've switched out the tiles to new ones which are smoother to fly along.
Got the DeathWave(tm) working, and added some hud design, and the possibility of death by explosion.
http://mikepote.co.nf/shift/v2/
The level generation seems to be the worst part of this version of the game. You get brutal dead ends, lots of kinks and bends and not a whole lot of satisfaction. However it is possible to make it to the end if you are careful!
You will carry on working on this, right?
It's strange how I had such a sure idea in my head of what would be fun to play, but once you actually have a working prototype in your hands, you realise that there are tons of things that add up to make that idea fun.
A prototype is not good enough - it needs awesome graphics, sound, music, and tons and tons of "juice" and polish. These are the things that take a passible concept to success.
I'd argue that discovering why a prototype isn't fun is just as useful.
I really like the mechanic, here are some input on what I think is fun and not about it:
1) The fact that you can insta-die from a dead-end I think isn't cool - you could slow down a lot and therefore get swallowed, but if you insta die it's not fun. You should be able to get out of it.
2) The slow-down penalty is a bit to heavy - the game feels like it chugs along instead of zipping along.
3) Definitely give players the opportunity to build up a lot of speed first before tossing them obstacles - this probably has to do with the difficulty curve - if you can die instantly from the starting position (I have a few times), it doesn't feel fun.
Good luck! :D
A lot of what you say is directly attributed to crappy level design.
Part of what I was talking about above - that the concept alone is not enough - is emphasised here: You imagine up a concept and think 'oh, well we'll just plonk a level down and the concept will make it awesome'. Not so fast!
You have to sit down and think exactly what elements you're going to have in a level and how they interact. I never intended the dead ends to be unavoidable - it's just the random level design that gives you a raw deal.
In my case I originally thought of the lanes as tunnels through a large mining facility, with the beginning being a large open hangar bay with straight track and a few scattered crates and boxes to block your way.
I need to start making some decent artwork for it and a proper level editor.
And level editor I guess is good - but I'd say rather create level segments - so it's not the same level over and over again so you can read it - you can algorithm the level so that it has a selection of stuff to choose from throwing at you - the easiest segments have easier parts to choose from and occur less frequently, later stuff more and hard,er etc.
Anyhoo enjoy figuring it out :) It'll be fun :)
On the other hand, you are right that you get the gameplay down first then worry about artwork later.