Hero Level Paper Map

Boss Battle Reference/Analysis

So for my boss battle I wanted to do something like a mix of Bowser from Super Mario World (Where he throws things at you) and Raphael the Raven from Yoshi's Island.

The elements include:
 - Throwing/dropping something at the player. (Bowser)
 - Getting faster with each hit w/ visual cue of getting faster. (Raphael)
 - Moving about the 'room' in a specific pattern. (Bowser & Raphael)

Fight Layout:
 1. Boss Appears, boss music begins.
 2. First phase of fight, the boss moves around in a simple back and forth motion. Occasionally throws out bombs to damage player.
 3. When the boss is at 50% health, he dissappears in a fake 'dying' animation and returns as the final phase.
 4. Final phase; New music starts, boss throws more bombs and moves erratically.
 5. Boss dies, player wins. Yay.

Videos:

Raphael's Fight:

Bowser's Fight:

Prepro - Arena (Island Arena)

Theme: 
   The theme I want to go with for this level is a tropical island. It will have typical tropical flora, as well as a color scheme that reflects your usual 'tropical' things.
Location: An island in the ocean. The arena is on this island.
Time of day: Mid afternoon, a bright-eyed, bushy-tail sort of mood to get from it.
Color Scheme: 

Visual Trademark: The giant volcano that has a snake sprout out of it.

Inspirations !! :

Isometric Paper Map:

 

Thumbnails: 

 

Attract Trailer - Cam Cook

Attract Trailer: Blur (2010)

So the game I chose to write and find a trailer for is a game called Blur.

Why do I think this attract trailer is great?
-It has a lot of fast paced action that follows the cars, which makes me hyped to play it.
-It shows the things you can do to mess with other people while racing, as well as car physics/mechanics.
-It shows us the levels that we can race on in the game.
-It shows us other cars that we can pick to race as.
-It shows us who even made the game as well.

As far as I know, this is made with in-game footage (just different cameras) because when compaired to game-playing footage, sans UI, the effects and battle mechanics are the same.

I think the music choice fits this attract trailer as well because it's somewhat of an earworm and it would probably catch my attention if I passed by the cabinet in an arcade.

Particles; With video!

Hello everyone, this is my blog post about my particles!

This is my first particle: A large swarm of bugs that impedes where the player is going and makes it somewhat difficult to navigate through since there's so many of them. As I said in my research, I'm basing these off of the swarms of locusts/bees that you can find in nature.

Here is the texture:

It's a very simple texture, made in photoshop with a custom bug brush for random bits of them being everywhere. If there's anything I learned from this, it's that one whole 'creature' in a clustery texture tends to work a lot better than a bunch of little bugs on one texture.

Here's the setup for the swarm particle:

It's a simple sprite emitter with a ribbon data emitter also attached to it, so that the bugs have little light-trails that follow them around, since they are glowing bugs.

Here is the second particle, the smaller bugs that swarm around the explosive barrels, as well as on the checkpoints, and also on the alternate shortcut path!:

As I mentioned with the other particle, one simple big creature in the middle tends to work a lot better with the type of particle I was going for, so it's what I'm going to do in the future.

Here is the setup for this particle, he is very very simple:

They fun things to do with this particle is the orbit and the initial rotation rate, as it makes them look very silly and friendly to look at.

Here is the video of these particles in action!:

Bug Swarm [Research ; Programming]

So for my level (and barrels) I want to do a large swarm of bugs that can slow down the player, when they're not exploding out of the barrel.

I've looked into these types of swarms before when it's something like a starling flock, but the bug swarms are much different. Many people think of locusts or bees when they think of a swarm of insects, so for research purposes I'll be using locusts as real-world reference and also showing videos/photos of them doing their swarming behavior.

I think I want this to be a GPU particle, with an orbiting module, a small ribbon data to imply the directions that the bugs are going, and also a small light emitter to somehow imply the glowyness of these bugs that are infesting my barrels/level.

I'm not sure how to work the texture into a blueprint of the swarms having the ability to push things around, but I can probably look up a few tutorials on it.

Barrels! Barrels! Barrels! (Programming)

The one, the only, big barrel testing video!

And also, the spaghetti code!

Code:

Video:

 

Abandoned Factory/Research Lab Level

Here are some of the thumbnails, as well as the rough version of the map design. 

Themes:
• I want the location of this level to be in an abandoned factory, possibly a research lab. Mostly to explain why there would be bugs infesting random barrels.
• The time of day that I want this map to be in is around dusk, creeping much closer towards nighttime. I want lights to be heavy directors for this map, and I feel the darkness might help imply an abandoned feeling to the level.
• The terrain that I'm going to have for this level is abandoned, falling apart metals and concrete, with barely functioning lights scattered around the level.
• Color Scheme:

Landmarks: 
The biggest landmarks that I want to be in my level are the splitting paths (one that collapses very quickly, and another that curves around the outer edge of the level for extra stuff.), and the massive slowing swarm of bugs towards the end of the lap.

Inspirational Images:

Boomy Bug Barrel

Here's some sketches and target/references for my barrel!

Originally was going to design the barrel to be bug shaped, but didn't like how it was turning out. So instead, I'm going with a theme of the bugs kind of 'infesting' a barrel and making it explosive, using fireflies as a reference for how they cling onto things, and bombardier beetles for the explosive part.

Game Design - Creepy Cave Level

Programming - SpikeBlock Video.

Here's the video of the spike block!
Still having trouble getting the sound to play right when it impacts, but enjoying getting it to work regardless.







So, programming this was definitely hard, though I feel it wasn't as difficult as the teleport assignment/challenge that we had had. I still can't figure out quite how to get the timing to match with the sound, and animating the face is something I still have a lot of confusion with.

I likely need to take some better notes, even though I feel like the notes I take are enough, I keep blanking out on what to do and I'm not sure how to fix things that break.

Here's my code:

GameDesign II - Platformer Theme/Environment

•Main character is Jumpman, hangs out in an underground cavern.
- Possibly just falls down into a cave area? Intro: falling into cave area.
Background: Dark cave, use spikes for stalagtite/mite references.

• Collect treasure and bonus magical artifacts (purple stars).
- Magical artifacts wouldn't be the main goal, but a bonus thing.
- Coins are the main goal in collecting, as well as getting out of the underground cavern.

• Ground enemies (Might be Alligators)
- Possibly make a simple fuzzy circle-thing for ground enemies, base them on cave bats.
- Flying enemies have a bat-like look to them possibly, if not too time intensive and weird.
- Spikes may have magical runes on them (red for danger).
- Platforms that move around to take Jumpman to various parts of the cave, new enemies and such.
- Use visual storytelling? Kitbash some skeletons or something to hint at a disaster that happened here or previous victims who fell down hole.

•Time wise: Based in the ye olde days of exploring various parts of the environment in the world.
- No teleporters? Possibly too futuristic for theme.
- Imply some kind of chain to spike blocks that fall downwards? Not a floating thing?
- Place some kind of glowing effect on moving platforms to imply magic?

Game Design II - Level; Cleaned up

Tutorial Level Design!

Not sure what to call the game/level yet, and may have to redesign the last leap area if it's not jumpable. 

Hoping to be able to make enemies that fly up/down and deal damage, but also want to make them killable by jumping on.

Super Meat Boy - Analysis

Welcome back, GA blog.

I played Super Meat Boy for my analysis, as stated above!

HERE is a video of me playing the entire tutorial world:

Analysis:

• How does the level layout contribute to the tutorial?

Super Meat Boy has a very simple layout to their levels, making sure to not clutter the screen too hard with objects. It would really make it difficult for the very perfect platforming you have to do later on.

• How is the pacing and flow managed to keep the player challenged but not bored?

The pacing of each level is short and sweet, with the longer levels always ending up being a 'test' to the player to see if they've really mastered the basic skills that are taught to you.

• How much is left to the player to figure out on his own vs. how much is handed to him?

I would say 90% of SMB is something you have to figure out on your own, but I do believe there are hints if a player needs them and they're 100% stuck on something. The super fast re-spawn system after you die really makes learning not too painful, especially when it comes to patterns.

• What kind of obstacles are presented to the player?

Pitfalls, saw blades, fire, acid, the ceiling..

• How do they ramp up the difficulty as the tutorial advances?

They introduce much more difficult platforming very quickly, as well as throwing in things like disintegrating blocks when you touch them, fire, etc.

• What kind of positive and negative feedback is given to the player?

Positive: You get a great grade, you beat your last time, a smooth replay of your level, bonuses.

Negative: You died, you can see your mistakes in the replay, your grade may go down, there's blood marking your mistakes.

• How is the story integrated (if any)?

Each time you get to Meat Girl Dr. Fetus pops up, likely punches her in the face, and flies off. Plus at the start you will get a cut-scene, and before you engage an end world boss you will get a longer cut-scene, and one after you beat the end world boss.

Level Layout, as done by me!: