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Credits go to Audric, BAF, CGamesPlay, HardTranceFan, Indeterminatus, Kauhiz, kazzmir, Kikaru, Michael Faerber, OICW, Onewing, Thomas Fjellstrom, X-G, and Zaphos for helping out!
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[concept] Pong ARENA
Dennis
Member #1,090
July 2003
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So even though I didn't manage to finish a good game in yesterdays' MinorHack, it still inspired me to this cool game concept(see image below) for a multiplayer ponglike game.

What do you think about it?

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Kauhiz
Member #4,798
July 2004

Sounds pretty cool. I think that it should count frags, as in, the last player to hit the ball before it kills someone gets a point. I liked the power-ups too, especially the sticky paddle. I'd play this. :)

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Zaphos
Member #1,468
August 2001

Wow -- I like this a lot. It's always fun to see Minorhack entries inspire bigger things, and this one looks really unique.

How do you intend the control to work? All keyboard, or will you use the mouse for aiming or moving? It might be fun to have power ups that affect player base and paddle movement as well as ball movement. I'm a fan of 'press space for a short sudden burst of speed' mechanics, as well ...

I suppose there's a lot of potential ideas to think about, here -- probably best to just start putting things in and seeing how they work! Looking forward to playing whatever you end up with :)

OICW
Member #4,069
November 2003
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Sounds fun, I'd definately play that. This has a big addictive potencial ;D
For the controls I'd advise to use keys to navigate the player and mouse to rotate the paddle.

Edit: Oh you could also add some arkanoid-like breakable walls.

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Michael Faerber
Member #4,800
July 2004
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Looks good, but I see a problem: Players will probably move away much more than trying to deflect the ball from their own paddle, so the paddle could become pretty useless. What would be left would be a simple try-not-to-be-hit-and-escape game.

In my opinion you should avoid that by somehow restricting movement to encourage the players to use their rotatable paddles.

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OICW
Member #4,069
November 2003
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Well this could be achieved that the last player who hit's a ball that kills somebody gets a frag. Just like in UT, otherwise it would change into what you're saying - and I must say that UT doesn't look like that.

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X-G
Member #856
December 2000
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Go stand in a corner and just rotate the shield.

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Zaphos
Member #1,468
August 2001

The "last player to hit the ball gets the frag" idea that Kauhiz and OICW mentioned seems really key for adding a layer of strategy where it won't pay to just rely on either dodging or deflecting -- you'll want to be moving around and deflecting to attack other players from unexpected angles, and that should add a whole new layer to the game.

But aside from that, mixing it up with plenty of power-ups (and "power-downs") should go a long way toward making sure that there aren't any simple fixed strategies for the player to use.

edit: to counter X-G's strategy -- add ways to break down the shields. Use the fact that the guy who's just sitting in the corner won't be as able to take advantage of the powerups that are appearing over the rest of the game space.
It's hard to think about all the game-breaking strategies at this point in development, but I think there's enough freedom in terms of different game mechanics you can introduce that you'll be able to fix the problems as they arise ...

Dennis
Member #1,090
July 2003
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edit: the two posts that were made, while I was typing this one haven't been recognized in this post yet
edit2: now they are

Kauhiz said:

I think that it should count frags, as in, the last player to hit the ball before it kills someone gets a point.

Yep that would be a good scoring model that I also thought of. First only as an alternative to the "don't get hit" model but the more I think about it, it should be the default scoring model.

Zaphos said:

How do you intend the control to work? All keyboard, or will you use the mouse for aiming or moving? It might be fun to have power ups that affect player base and paddle movement as well as ball movement. I'm a fan of 'press space for a short sudden burst of speed' mechanics, as well...

I thought of either all keyboard (to limit the rotation speed) or keyboard for moving and mouse for rotating (still the rotation speed would be limited and the paddle would always try to rotate around the shortest angle so that it faces the mouse again). There could be powerups and powerdowns that affect movement and rotation speed. I also like that idea of the limited speed boost powerup.

Zaphos said:

I suppose there's a lot of potential ideas to think about, here

Yeah, it's quite frightening how fast this seemingly simple concept is going to explode into a very complex game. Simple to play but complex in its' possibilities.

OICW said:

Oh you could also add some arkanoid-like breakable walls.

Very cool idea. There could be breakable and unbreakable blocks in the levels and they could either float around on given paths or they could be static.

Michael Faerber said:

Players will probably move away much more than trying to deflect the ball from their own paddle, so the paddle could become pretty useless. What would be left would be a simple try-not-to-be-hit-and-escape game.

What OICW said. As soon as the scoring model is so that the player that deflected the ball(s)(with split ball powerup there can be more than one ball at a time) last owns it and scores when it hits another player, people will try to hit the others. The sticky paddle will be a very powerful powerup for that purpose as it will allow the player to decide when to let loose the ball again.;D

edit2 [appended]

X-G said:

Go stand in a corner and just rotate the shield.

Good point. I have yet to think of something to prevent players from doing that.
One first idea would be to have the bounding lines of the level be farer away from the area in which the player is able to move in. Like, the level itself is a platform with a canyon around it and behind the canyon there are walls that keep the ball inside the playfield. The player could even fall into the canyon and lose points. Maybe there could also be a powerup that would hit players back a bit (deplace there position) even if they deflect the ball with their paddle, so that campers could be pushed into the canyon.;D

Zaphos said:

But aside from that, mixing it up with plenty of power-ups (and "power-downs") should go a long way toward making sure that there aren't any simple fixed strategies for the player to use.

Yeah with enough clever ideas, I think it should be possible to annihilate such strategies.

Zaphos
Member #1,468
August 2001

Quote:

Maybe there could also be a powerup that would hit players back a bit

I like this idea a lot :D

Kauhiz
Member #4,798
July 2004

Quote:

Quote:

Maybe there could also be a powerup that would hit players back a bit

I like this idea a lot :D

Yeah, me too. I think the power-ups should affect how fast a player can move, how fast he can move his bat and how fast he hits the ball. The recoil thing could either be a separate power-up as suggested, or just depend on how fas the ball is travelling. The size of the bat could change when you score, but it shouldn't change too much.

Another cool idea for power-ups would be stuff that changes the ball when the player who collected the power-up hits it. You could have a freeze-ball, fire-ball, thunder-ball etc. The ball would stay like that for some time, then change back. If a player hits a special ball, something cool will happen, like if you hit the freeze-ball, you become frozen for a short while.

I also liked the idea about the breakable walls. You could hide the best power-ups behind the walls, and do all kinds of cool stuff. Oh, and you need an invincibility power-up that gives you a 360° bat for a short time ;D

Oh, and a level with the canyons, slippery floor and the recoil effect would be crazy fun :P

Wow, I'm getting all worked up :P. You have to make this game!

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Dennis
Member #1,090
July 2003
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Kauhiz said:

I think the power-ups should affect how fast a player can move, how fast he can move his bat and how fast he hits the ball. The recoil thing could either be a separate power-up as suggested, or just depend on how fast the ball is travelling. The size of the bat could change when you score, but it shouldn't change too much.

All good ideas. It should definetely be like that.

Kauhiz said:

Another cool idea for power-ups would be stuff that changes the ball when the player who collected the power-up hits it. You could have a freeze-ball, fire-ball, thunder-ball etc. The ball would stay like that for some time, then change back. If a player hits a special ball, something cool will happen, like if you hit the freeze-ball, you become frozen for a short while.

Yeah more great ideas! And the fire ball could ignite the players paddle so that it would slowly burn shorter and shorter for a given amount of time. The thunderball might electrify the player and negatively affect his movement smoothness (he'll be jittering around a bit).

Kauhiz said:

You could hide the best power-ups behind the walls, and do all kinds of cool stuff. Oh, and you need an invincibility power-up that gives you a 360o bat for a short time

Aye! Hiding the power-ups is another cool idea though it will probably be hard to get them that way if there's only one ball in the game that won't be easily brought to destroy the walls at a specific place. The 360° bat would be the equivalent to the shield that I thought of.

Kauhiz said:

Wow, I'm getting all worked up :P. You have to make this game!

I totally have to! Alright, my plan is as follows: Over the next week I will assemble the first concept and all the brainstorming from this thread into a complete design document. I'll then declare feature-lock (for the first version) on thursday evening, will release the revised design document on friday evening(as a PDF file) and hopefully will start hacking the thing into the computer on saturday.:)

Kikaru
Member #7,616
August 2006
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Good luck! Sound really cool. :)

Kauhiz
Member #4,798
July 2004

Nice! 8-) Hope to see this one soon :)

---
It's Ridge Racer! RIIIIIDGE RAAAAACER!

CGamesPlay
Member #2,559
July 2002
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Quote:

Maybe there could also be a powerup that would hit players back a bit (deplace there position) even if they deflect the ball with their paddle

Yeah! You don't have to even come up with an excuse for the players dying when they hit they edge... They went OOB. Like, the power up could "charge" the ball so it will knock people back, and it will do so for the next 3 or so times you deflect the ball.

Make sure you add support for bitmap levels ;D And pinball bouncers (circles the ball touches and shoots off away from them)

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BAF
Member #2,981
December 2002
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Also countering X-G's strategy, you could always make the shield shrink/disappear after the player has stood still for a set amount of time. This would force you to keep movin to avoid losing your paddle.

X-G
Member #856
December 2000
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I don't like that particular solution, though. It feels too much like it was made specifically to force the player to move, which is not good game design. You want to make him want to move anyway. That way he won't feel forced and it won't feel stilted and artificial.

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OICW
Member #4,069
November 2003
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Sooner or later it will become boring for a camper and if you plan to incorporate multiplayer, nobody would want to play with him. Same applied for Last Man Standing in Unreal Tournament.

Still you can find players who enjoy it, but that's their problem.

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CGamesPlay
Member #2,559
July 2002
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I like the idea of placing power-ups, and making those integral to winning. Then intelligently place them simultaneously as close to the ball and as far from the players as possible.

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Zaphos
Member #1,468
August 2001

Quote:

you could always make the shield shrink/disappear after the player has stood still for a set amount of time.

You could alternatively make the shields shrink at a fixed rate regardless of player behavior, so the players have to at least occasionally chase a 'shield replenishment' power-up that spawns away from corners.
It should have roughly the same effect but avoid (I hope) the 'artificial' feel that X-G is worried about.

Kauhiz
Member #4,798
July 2004

Some more random brainstorming on the power-ups:

  • Bomb-ball: The ball explodes after X seconds or after it has bounced off of something X times. Players who are close to the ball when it detonates get killed, players further away get stunned for a moment (the time could depend on distance from the explosion)

  • Homing-ball: The ball homes in on the closest player.

  • Mirage-ball: Like split-ball, except the other ball is fake.

  • Warp-ball: The ball warps to a random location/close to the best player, and shoots off into a random direction/toward the best player at a high speed.

</li>
You could give the ball a slight deceleration, and give it an acceleration according to the players hitting power when it hits his paddle. The hitting power could be upgraded with power-ups. If you made the walls bouncy, you could get the ball moving really fast. And in homing-ball mode the ball would have a constant acceleration toward the nearest player, which would create a really cool effect IMO.

Here's another idea I had: power-ups that make the ball into a power-up. The challenge would be shooting the ball so that it comes back to you before anyone else gets it, and before it turns into the regular ball again (because being hit by the regular ball would be bad). You could do the same for power-downs, but then the ball would have to give the power-down even if the player blocks it (since you'd rather kill them than downgrade their powers). This could be cool, since you could get unsuspecting players waiting to deflect the regular ball. And if they tried to dodge, they might get killed.

Anyway, this is stuff I thought of. Some of it might be good, but I won't be offended if you don't want to use it. I often get a lot of ideas and projects end up becoming too bloated. You should stick to your original idea, that's usually the best one.

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Onewing
Member #6,152
August 2005
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Corners wouldn't be a problem if you had destructable walls. ;)

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Kikaru
Member #7,616
August 2006
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An idea for bitmap levels: use black for empty, this is actually walls. Use red for out-of-bounds, and white for normal. Or make black radiate a certain amount of OOB area on to the surrounding field, to keep it consistent. :)

kazzmir
Member #1,786
December 2001
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Powerups are ok but how about the goal of the game is for each player to collect items, like diamonds of the same color of the player. Every time a player collects their color diamond a new one appears somewhere on the screen and they have to get it, dodging the pong ball all the while.

Every time someone gets hit by a pong ball they lose a point, but no one should gain points for killing people.

Kauhiz
Member #4,798
July 2004

Naw, I prefer the senseless killing TBH. :P

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