Colour Master

edited in Projects
So this is an old game of mine that I want to update and make into something more fun. If you want to play the prototype that I made in 2009 click here but I warn you to do so at your own risk.

For those who do not wish their eyes to be bombarded by colour carry on reading.

What is Colour Master.

Firstly it is a game with proper English spelling.

Secondly it is a game about shifting elements of colour to match an end result by passing it through a colour changing area. The game could be thought as an abstraction of the laws of light where if I start with green then add blue I will get cyan.

The updated version of the game will reduce a the complexity from the game. When designing this I was thinking about how the game would be played on a smart phone. In the end I just ended up where @Nandrew told me I should go 3 years ago. (I tip my hat to the good gentleman)

So in the new version the colour element (which shall now further be referred to as a waveicle, since like acts like both a wave and particle) passes through a colour changing element (which shall now be referred to as a filter) to match the colour of the receiver element.

There will also be an arrow indicating in which direction the next wavicle will spawn, and what colour it will be.

The is a ring of colour at the end showing which the order in which the receivers will appear. It rotates counter clockwise for the purpose of the display images here.

image

So in the above picture we can see that a green waveicle will spawn going left on the next turn.

image

The above image shows that the player changed the filter to cyan which would cause the green waveicle to turn blue which is the colour of the receiver.

How does the colour changing work?

The colour changing is rather simple: there are three groups of colour.

Additive (Red, Green, Blue)
Subtractive (Cyan, Yellow, Magenta)

Two additive colours will equal a subtractive colour: Red + Green = Yellow.
Two subtractive colours will yield their common additive colour: Cyan + Magenta = Blue.

There are two ways that an additive and subtractive can interact.

If the additive colour is a member of the subtractive colour then it will yield it's corresponding additive colour: Cyan + Blue = Green.
If the additive colour is not a member of the subtractive colour it will yield white: Cyan + Red = White.

The exceptions function as the opposite to each other.

White and any colour will yield its opposite: White + Cyan = Red.
Black will take on any colour is passes through, or not change the colour of any waveicle that passes through it.

Comments

  • I have some feedback, that's probably not so useful to you because you have your own other ideas you need to try out.

    But my main dissatisfaction with the first prototype comes from having to know what colours do what.

    I know colour theory of course. In at least as much complexity as is in the game. But I don't know it like I do addition. And in any case that's not the problem (I mean the game could replace the colours with numbers that get add and subtracted and you have get the right number). I guess my feeling is that the game wants a specific answer and I'm playing a complicated kind of multiple choice... if that makes sense.

    I'd much prefer the game to tell me what colour I'm going to create. I don't find the choose-the-right-answer mechanic to be a great source of fun. I'd like for the result to affect something else.

    Matching things can be fun and elegant:

  • I'm totally open to any suggestions and ideas you want to throw at me.

    I mean I'm going to put in a colour prediction element because of the feed back you gave me :)
  • The thing I'm trying to get across is that in the build I've played I know the answer to the problem in front of me. The problem itself is trivial, so the challenge is to beat the unclear rules and the confusing interface interface.

    Is there a way to make something more like this:



    I mean. Is there a way to make a manipulatable system that achieves some kind of result (by which the player can be evaluated). The result can be prescriptive but it is arrived at through playing with a system (rather than beating the interface in a given time).

    I suggested Halcyon because that game gives the player lots of options at any time. Many of which work together. So there is a feeling of freedom of choice and the problems that the player fails to solve immediately, through neglect or being blocked by another problem, accrue greater urgency (which means the players choices produce pattern of risk that they have to manage).
  • Did you have to link Spacechem! I adore Spacechem it's my favourite indie game.

    So I get what you mean, but that's not really the goal of what I am doing here. It's would be a far superior game by an almost infinite amount.

    I know the game is dexterity test, but so is Tetris. Tetris is actually a rather large influence on the game.

    I know the interface is horrid in the build you played, but it is a incomplete three year old thing. So what I am doing is is trying to polish it up to be a more accessible and fun dexterity game.

    ---

    I really want to make a light based open ended puzzle game now. But I have a long queue of games I want to make :< and I want to get a better grasp of the physics I will be abusing before I do it.
  • Holy crap I don't understand Spacechem at all @_@ Is it anything like Trainyard?



    To be honest I also don't understand how colourmaster works. But that just makes it two games I don't understand in this single thread. Maybe it's just not my kind of thing.

    But I do love puzzle games. More specifically tetris-esques. Tetris Attack on SNES was THE SHIT. Also very much a dexterity game.
  • edited
    While Tetris requires dexterity, the spacial puzzles and strategy is the fun part. Each move you make affects the following ones, not just based on how dextrous you are but on the choices you make. It's got elegant risk-reward mechanics (like trying to build a structure that lets you collapse multiple rows at once but risks creating tall gaps if the desired piece does not arrive).

    I'm not certain what the current plan is for Colour Master. But getting the colour right based on colour manipulation isn't very much like Tetris (except for the time pressure part). What I'm currently seeing from Colour Master (based on the prototype) is Tetris if a shape and a hole to fill were given to you and as soon as you placed the shape it wiped the board and gave you another hole to fill and another shape. There are no consequences in Colour Master (that I've seen), only results.

    Trainyard is a lot like I was thinking. Obviously it's been done though :)

    Anyway... that's my feedback (Sorry its a bit harsh). Puzzle games are really hard to design. Not sure where you're taking this.
  • edited
    @BlackShipsFillT if that was harsh criticism then I wouldn't want nice criticism :P

    I get what you mean about the risk vs reward, and how it factors into the gameplay for Tetris but not CM, and I really wish I thought about that three years ago.

    With regards to a Spacechem type thing I was imagining something more along the lines of splitting light with newton prisms, and passinging it through fibre opics and making the player worry about things like total internal refraction and such.

    @Tuism spacechem is like trainyard, except way more fun. I'm currently trying to optimise some of my solutions in the early game, and I've really learnt a lot about the game. It's just so open and make you think.
  • I'm not sure how the current colour master would work, but I feel the original had more potential in that it could become like a tertris where you couldn't control the placement of the pieces but could choose their shapes at will (although in tetris everyone would just square and line it)and also combining a bit of bubble burst. so if outer ring tiles match colours in 4 or more they burst, the aim is to clear the entire outer ring.

    but purely dexterity challenges can be fun so finish a new prototype for us to test (some people enjoy wack a mole)
  • So in a weird twist I am posting another colour game in my thread.

    http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2012/10/04/impressions-colour-bind/

    It's rather different to the other things that have been shown.

    Also new prototype should appear soon, but to be honest I'm not as motivated about making this as I thought I would be. And weirdly enough I've had fun with the programming which is abnormal O_o

    This is starting to feel like my project of opposite of how I normally feel.
  • so... you usually feel motivated and don't have fun with the programming? Hey that's actually usually true for me too :)
  • edited
    If you're not feeling motivated, you should consider moving to a new prototype anyway. Get some breadth of experience / ideas. Hit many different avenues until you find something that sticks noticeably longer and more solidly than the others.

    At the very least, you'll learn bloody fast through doing many kinds of things. Theory and a single game project can only take you so far.
    Thanked by 1Tuism
  • edited
    Ye I think I should have realized something was amiss at the point that I felt I needed to create a thread to motivate myself. I've kind of already missed on what I wanted to do which was make a new prototype every fortnight.

    So I've tried one approach, which means I now have a better idea of how to get to the end goal. Thanks for the feedback, and toleration guys :)

    Also now I get to work on that game I've really wanted to.
  • Regarding motivation for projects. We had some experiences with Rooks Keep that taught us valuable lessons. We started it purely as a Chess game. Then we realized we don't really like Chess. We've spent a long time since, trying to make RK closer to our tastes.
    I guess, always work on stuff you like. :)
    Thanked by 1Nandrew
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