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Platform Game Ideas
IonBlade
Member #3,521
May 2003
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this is getting to sound like a very enjoyable game. i can just imagine these play mechanics combined with fluid and responsive controls, and an equally fluid+responsive animation system.. it would be hard to stop playing it!

what kind of screen resolution are we talking here? 320x240, 640x, 800x etc?

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"I've got to choose my words carefully so that I'm not misunderstood, but I think there are fewer developers around today who think about making a good game. As a creator, I find that sad..." - Hideo Kojima

Krzysztof Kluczek
Member #4,191
January 2004
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Hanging and gliding sounds like cool addition to jumping (and sometimes sliding) every platform game uses. You could greatly improve gameplay by allowing player to hang and glide a lot (well not too much, but enough). I would go for self replenishing stamina. :)

Michael Jensen
Member #2,870
October 2002
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requiring your players to pick up stamina, unless it's abundant, can become very frusterating, theres probably a reason most games do it that way ;) -- it is your game, however, and this is just a suggestion. If someone tells me to do something I dont like with one of my games I usually don't listen either.

Rick
Member #3,572
June 2003
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OK self replenishing stamina it is.

Quote:

what kind of screen resolution are we talking here? 320x240, 640x, 800x etc?

Right now I have it in 640x480x16. With 32x32 tiles, which works good. I'm using Toadstool (?) from mario 2 as the character, with no animation at the moment. All collision is perfect. Jumping is perfect. Screen scrolls left/right only at the moment. He can hang on edge tiles only. When you jump and collide with an edge tile while holding the space bar down he stays there. If you let go of space he falls, if you press up, he
climbs up. That hanging is very primitive at the moment. Once I get a hanging animation I can make it more fluid. Controls are LEFT/RIGHT to move, LCONTROL to jump. SPACE to hang. I'm thinking about making SPACE glid also. So if you're in the air and you hit SPACE, and there isn't a collision with edge tile, you will grid as long as you hold space down, and as long as you have stamina. You can let go and press again to fall faster and catch yourself. This can give you time for some extra stamina. Could have a really tall map where that comes into play.

Squirrely (I need a name) will make a grunt sound when she graps onto the ledge. And more grunting as she climbs up. Not sure about the gliding sound? A windy sound maybe?

[EDIT]
Michael Jensen, I'm very open to suggestions. That's why I put this post here. I want to her what people like.

[EDIT2]
I'm hoping to have a Demo (early version) within the next few weeks, demonstrating these features, to get some feel feedback from you guys. Once I get the feel down, I'll start on the Level Editor so I can add features and make a real game from it.

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Actually I think I'm a tad ugly, but some women disagree, mostly Asians for some reason.

Torbjörn Josefsson
Member #1,048
September 2000
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Name: Lorna, strikes me for some reason.. maybe it's just a nice name
If she's Going to have a name - it would be nice it it wasn't 'gimmicky' or.. 'smart' :) - like "Nutella", or something

Mission: She could be chasing her lazy hubby who doesn't want to work gathering nuts :)

Gliding-sound: You might find something you can edit and use from some 'parachute opening' sound - there should be some sound like that around..

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Specialization is for insects

Rick
Member #3,572
June 2003
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I want her to have the tuff girl attitude, but still a lady, like Lara Croft (exploror type), so Lorna is to close to Lara. I agree a gimmicky name would be bad.

I like the idea of a parachute opening sound. I'll see how that works.

Not to thrilled on the mission. I really want the game to be a story, where twists and turns happen. I want her to be an explorer who is always looking for the next treasure. I want her to struggle, and have her personality come out. I want people to relate to her. Feel sorry for her and kick butt with her. I don't want a mindless jump and run platform game. In my editor I plan on having still frame cutscences, that I can put in, like in Max Paine, to feed the storyline.

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Actually I think I'm a tad ugly, but some women disagree, mostly Asians for some reason.

Torbjörn Josefsson
Member #1,048
September 2000
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As I sped down that rotten old oak-tree; still with the
smell of cordite in my twitchy nose, I could feel a hundred
invisible eyes fastening upon my like dirt onto an honest cop.
I paid them no heed - this was My forest, and at least in This
corner of it, I was the uncontested ruler.. something that 
someone was trying to change.. which was something that this someone was 
going to regret very dearly; like that time they mixed tequila 
with strawberry cream, and then with some more tequila

As I sank my hungry claws into the bark for slowdown, I pictured my gun
a vengeful God, screaming for revenge with its flaming maw

Heh - just imagining the Max Paine:ish monologue - could be really spiffy ;)

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Specialization is for insects

deps
Member #3,858
September 2003
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Quote:

like that time they mixed tequila
with cashew cream, and then with some more tequila

...or some other kind of nut. not strawberry, they don't eat that! :)
And if she is going to have a name similar to Lara, she must have big boobs! ;D

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Layers are good, all good things have layers, like onions. Good things also stink. - Trezker
I now have a page and a blog!

Rick
Member #3,572
June 2003
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A character similar to Lara, not the name. And yes, she will have a nice bust. Along with hiking type shorts and hiking shoes with gray scrunched up socks. Her shirt will be tank tops mostly. She will have tight abs and a tight butt. This will all add to the apeal of the character. Still thinking if she should have a french bread or not, like Lara. That might be getting to similar, for her to be her own character. Maybe slicked back wet looking hair. Nice big fluffy tail. Light brown fur, with white on the chest.

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Actually I think I'm a tad ugly, but some women disagree, mostly Asians for some reason.

IonBlade
Member #3,521
May 2003
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the parachute opening sound is exactly what i was thinking. a suggestion for the gliding however... don't allow the player to glide up, or move upward by "flapping" or whatever. it should just be: get up high enough, or jump, then hold the glide button and you will glide forward and down. this isn't a bird, it's a squirrel.

EDIT: i'm very interested in this game ;). i'll follow it all the way through

------

"I've got to choose my words carefully so that I'm not misunderstood, but I think there are fewer developers around today who think about making a good game. As a creator, I find that sad..." - Hideo Kojima

Rick
Member #3,572
June 2003
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Yeah I was thinking the same thing IonBlade. But I have a question. Once they release the glid button, should they be able to press it again and glid again as long as they didn't hit the ground?

Quote:

i'm very interested in this game . i'll follow it all the way through

Thx, that's cool. I think I'm going to start a journal thread about the game. Let everyone know what I'm implementing and so forth. Also asking what people think about certain ideas. If they sound fun or a pain.

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Actually I think I'm a tad ugly, but some women disagree, mostly Asians for some reason.

IonBlade
Member #3,521
May 2003
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Yes they should be able to continue gliding, but since they are falling when they do it, some sort of downward velocity penalty should be added at the beginning of the glide, and then it evens out overtime if they manage to keep gliding (fairly quickly).

------

"I've got to choose my words carefully so that I'm not misunderstood, but I think there are fewer developers around today who think about making a good game. As a creator, I find that sad..." - Hideo Kojima

Rick
Member #3,572
June 2003
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Now my big question is falling distance. Should there be a max safe distance they can fall, and anything over that distance they die, or at least loose a heart. I think this might add a sense of caution on higher up levels. What do you all think?

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Actually I think I'm a tad ugly, but some women disagree, mostly Asians for some reason.

IonBlade
Member #3,521
May 2003
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Assuming the squirrel stands up on two feet...

it should take a variable amount of health away depending on the distance fallen. However the distance at which damage starts should be pretty high, since the squirrel can fly and is obviously comfortable in vertigo situations.

[EDIT] when the squirrel lands on the ground from a normal distance, play the standard "foot landing" sound and act as normal.

when the squirrel lands from a high up distance, but still a safe one, it should make an "oomph" sound, and maybe play a "harder" landing animation, and be forced to stand still for about half a second before being able to run again.

when it lands from a very high, damaging distance, it makes a bone crunch (or similar) sound effect, an amount of health is lost, and plays an "extremely hard" landing animation (like a cringing pain movement, maybe flashing red to show damage) and stops the character for a second and a half.

------

"I've got to choose my words carefully so that I'm not misunderstood, but I think there are fewer developers around today who think about making a good game. As a creator, I find that sad..." - Hideo Kojima

Rick
Member #3,572
June 2003
avatar

Gliding is in place. Surprisingly simple to implement. So now I have jump, run, hanging, & gliding. I'll be putting in stamina bar sometime this weekend, along with game timing, and improve the ledge climbing with the timing. Right now when I'm hanging and I push up, it just sets the player y to the edges y+player.height, and x over a little to put her on the platform. I'll use the game timing to slowly change the value of y and x to make it feel more real.

I will then create a small demo with no animation, so I can give it to an artist and see if he wants to work on the project. Once I get the running, jumping, hanging, and gliding animations, I'll give out a demo here.

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Actually I think I'm a tad ugly, but some women disagree, mostly Asians for some reason.

Trezker
Member #1,739
December 2001
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When landing at high speed you could let the squirrel automatically activate gliding before hitting the ground to land safely, or at least have that as an option for players that don't want to do it manually.

Rick
Member #3,572
June 2003
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I think I'll make players do it manually. If you're falling to your death, I want you to have to do something to save yourself. ;)

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Actually I think I'm a tad ugly, but some women disagree, mostly Asians for some reason.

Carrus85
Member #2,633
August 2002
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I'm dumb!... and make sure they have to plan it carefully, so if they "brake" too late, they still hit the ground at high speed.

Glenn Prince
Member #3,081
December 2002

Lorna Stone: Acorn Raider ?

Michael Jensen
Member #2,870
October 2002
avatar

I like the sound of Acorn Raider, but Lorna just sounds like an ugly name to me... it's sounds like you're doing a take-off style of tomb raider, I think it's almost required that the name be a rip off of tombraider only slightly modified, sorta like myst, and pyst, altho I never played either -- and thinking about this game now, I really don't think seeing a chipmonk babe with big boobs is going to make me not want to play as it's kind of gross and disturbing...

edit:
also if you're going to be doing a tomb raider style take off on the character, you really need to go that way with level themes/feeling too, it needs to be an indoors type thing for a lot of the play if this is what you want to do -- inside of the tree maybe? perhaps owl like holes that you can go into...

Torbjörn Josefsson
Member #1,048
September 2000
avatar

I'm agreeing on nixing the big boobs - or you might as well call it "Furry Fantasie" ... of course; that would probably sell very well ;) I'm wishing for 'cute but mean' instead

You are thinking about a Tomb-raider kind of feel?.. How would that work in a normal platformer? A lot of the attraction of Tomb Raider was the impressive and moody scenes in 3D.. do you want to try and give it a cinematic feel? In that case Another World and Flashback might be good inspirations; but I don't know how well that 'cinematic' feeling would work with a scurrying squirrel :)

EDIT: HA!
Check this squirrel-lady out :)
[url http://rigby-jones.net/es/amy/]

-An old Amiga demo-scene character

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Specialization is for insects

Trezker
Member #1,739
December 2001
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Nice squirrels there, but remember that those are not glidersquirrels!
This lady needs skin from arms to legs to form a kind of wings.
That makes it a little bit trickier to make an attractive look, but it shouldn't be a problem.
I'd like to see one with some muscles, but not bodybuilder!

Rick
Member #3,572
June 2003
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Quote:

Check this squirrel-lady out

The bigger bust pictures look better than the flat chested pictures.

Quote:

I really don't think seeing a chipmonk babe with big boobs is going to make me not want to play as it's kind of gross and disturbing...

It's a squirrel with very human like characteristics, so there's no need to feel gross. Let's say she won't have huge boobs, but you'll be able to notice them, so gender is obvious.

Quote:

That makes it a little bit trickier to make an attractive look, but it shouldn't be a problem

This was the main problem when I put the gliding idea in. I was thinking about not making a flying squirrel and have her use a tail spin to glide.

Quote:

How would that work in a normal platformer?

The story line was the most impressive thing about Tomb Raider for me. That and wondering where she would go next. (The big chest helped a little too I guess ;D) That's kinda what I want to put in. Travel to jungles, tombs, artic areas, caves, deserts, etc... I plan on having rain,snow, and dust part of the game as well to add to the level effect. I mean I don't want to copy Tomb Raider, I just want to get as close to the feel as a platformer permits.

========================================================
Actually I think I'm a tad ugly, but some women disagree, mostly Asians for some reason.

Torbjörn Josefsson
Member #1,048
September 2000
avatar

In the vein of TA; have her make small sexy grunts whenever she bumps into something, or falls down ;)

Have you got anythin try:able ready? It would be fun to check out, just to see how you're thinking :)

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Specialization is for insects

X-G
Member #856
December 2000
avatar

And whenever she jumps. Because as everyone knows, that little constipated sound is the only way to tell whether your character is jumping or just decided to float off the ground.

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