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I-smel
Hey look man, my name's "I-smel". What I lack in smarts, I at least pay back in honesty. Boink!

Tom Brien @I-smel

Age 32, Male

England, MAN-CHESTer

Joined on 3/2/06

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Game design roundtable [in this post]

Posted by I-smel - June 17th, 2008


Makin a game on my own is hard, cos all the decisions come down to me. So FOR NOW, LET'S JUST IMAGINE we're this massive games development company, and we are in a meeting.

Right, so the game's comin along SLOWLY. In most games, I have a point about 3/4 of the way through that's a bit different from the rest o the game. Like the plane level in CannonCrotch. Otherwise, everyone's just gonna get bored.

With this game though, I'm KIND OF UNSURE.
It usually looks like this.
Or this.
but IN THIS SPECIAL LEVEL, I thought it could look something like this. Where you can steer a bit left n right, smash into other cars, run people over, and use the minigun, obviously. The car would be acceleratin constantly down the highway.

But is it too DIFFERENT from the rest of the game?
Would players be sayin THAT HIGHWAY LEVEL WAS FUCKIN RAD
or would they be sayin WHAT THE FUCK WAS THAT HIGHWAY LEVEL?? Y'know like confused and annoyed.

I don't know wether this is an awesome idea for a level, or if it's too complex and just doesn't fit into the game. Do I want to go from beat-em-up to shooter like that, THEN BACK AGAIN?

SO WHAT DO YOU FOOLS THINK I SHOULD DO?


Comments

It doesn't look like you can eat anything :(

I know, that's the conundrum! =(

I dont know whether the player would want to do somethin else by this point in the game, THEN go back to eatin guys, or whether I'd just be interruptin their eat-em-up

Hmmm... maybe like the boss could be trailing behind you and eventually after shooting the car so much (the car has health) it would explode and then the boss would fly out and land in your car. Then it would get interesting. On the road combat.

The pickup's too small to have a fight in.

I wanted to have some kind of ghetto mech- crazy ass robot-dog spider-tank automobile, like a hunter from Half Life, but more heavy.

That doesn't fit into the world of the game ATALL though.

So, if the game is revolved around digestion, what about having a level with a boss that gives indigestion?

Maybe a simple level where you're in a vehicle like a go-kart, and you're racing in sidescroller view with a boss, and you have to drive alongside him and start eating him piece by piece before he reaches the end to continue.

As for the indigestion part, like, have the boss send out, I don't know, earthquakes and other stuff that makes people nauseous, and whenever the attacks comes in contact with the player, a 'nausea' meter fills. If it gets filled up completely, the player vomits, losing his current ability and a bit of his health. This means that the player will have to find some kind of balance between full-out chomping away at the boss, and keeping a distance.

Fun? I don't know.... but because the game is based around eating things, you might be better off to spin the concept off further instead of having something completely different.

Cool, or idiotic idea? :D

No, that's gay.

Lol, well maybe the pickup hits a rock and then the player flies off the pickup and onto a stretch limo; an EVIL stretch limo. Then the boss climbs up out of the sunroof and you fight?

Lol, roundtabling is fun.

Better, but that still doesn't give you any room to fight.

can u say:
"random broccoli helicopter boss"?

Every time he loses a chunk of health a chunk of him falls off aswell, and you have to eat it before It bounces back from the road and he regenerates. :O random sry

That's dumb.

He should team up with koolade, they are the same shape

I agree. This game needs a koolade powerup.

In my experience most people arent going to get the normal levels either so if you like it just go for it.

That's cos you make CRAZY games.
I do want to just go for it.

Cool!
its finally being born again!
and the demo is also good!

Say what? Nothing's being born again.

uuhhh..why not have the boss be like a brumak from gears of war except the real boss is inside the "mini"boss.andyou fight your way through the "mini"bossses internal defense system or"immune"system.and you reach the final bass and its your brother*gasp*.they fight, make so he is indestructabe so you have 2 lose. then do a button sequene minigame, like from god of war,then when you win you come out the brumak-like things ASS.hilarious and enjoyful.

I hope you're not serious. Really.

Anyway, this game's got more conventional character design, I can't just throw a Brumak at you out of nowhere.

As long as it controls like the rest of the game I'd say to go ahead.
Variety is flash games are always gud.

How about like the car crashes into a hug pileup, after the shooting action, and then before you know it, you're in a pile of rubble. Then the boss flings up all of the damaged vehicle parts covering him (like the matrix, except with debris). Now there is a large pileup on either side, closing it off. You now have a crash site arena.

I like it.

This isn't the last level, by the way.

Oh! So wait are you going to have to eat the boss?

No, there's a boss at the end of each level, and you start with nothing at the start of each level. So eating a boss would be prettty useless.

Except there's a boss where you fight two guys, and you can eat one of them if you kill him.

Okay, so if you're not eating the boss of the road level, let's say that when he is defeated, he falls to the ground, and his arm kind of makes a ramp up the pileup that you can walk across to get out of that scene.

Decade says:

He should team up with koolade, they are the same shape

I agree with the kool-aid power up. Make it smash through something and in text above him make him say "OH YEA!"

Done.

variation is the spice of life y'now, and it could be a good break from a hard part(but you shouldent change the controlls or dificulty much). Ps:looks good so far

3 quarters is too far down - most peopel won't get that far, I defijntiely agree with the car scene idea, but I'd put it a quarter of the way thorugh - a third of the way through, so more people reach that point...

Yeah, it's actually more like 2 thirds

note though, that I use levels like this to give the user a break from playing the actual game. A quarter of the way through is like- after the first boss, and I don't think anyone's goin to av grown tired of it by then.

Its like that point in every Metal Gear (not played the new one :( ) where you're just about to turn the game off and go do something else, when you get suddenly knocked out, stripped naked, tied up and lose all your weapons. It shakes you awake n keeps you playing for A BIT LONGER- then the end of the game draws near and then you just dont stop. Thats what Im tryin to achieve with unconventional levels.

loads of games do it: Half Life's pimped out gravity gun, Bioshock's get-all-the-plasmids-at-once stage, and I can't really think of anymore, but anyway it stops the player from closing the window after playing for so long.

Also, if I give them the crazy level early on, they might've not got to grips with the normal game yet, and they'd have nothing new for the rest of the game

Seems like you oughta eat the min-gun then use it as yourself. And for reloadin you eat the ammo.

I would, but I'm havin trouble drawin him as a gun without him lookin like a twat

Makes it turn his arms into mini-guns then

I dont know, I rarely change his arms.
miniguns are massive aswell, I had to put it under his arms to stop im from droppin it look
http://img291.imageshack.us/img29 1/7398/dwjq2.png
so I dont know how hed handle one on each arm

just one arm wo;uld seem like a half transformation, like a bit of a shit one.
I certainly cant do it on his willy area
maybe protruding out the back of him
maybe instead of a rotating minigun it could be like a double-barrel rifle that alternate with each shot and those are his arms

fuckin- game design. shit.

Oh! Oh! Also, make it so he leans his head back, opening his mouth, and the driver guy does that back hand toss of ammo for reloading :D

okay I like that

What if I want to eat the car?

well its too big, he wouldnt be able to finish it all.

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