Month: January 2022

It’s the fourth DevLog about the 6 prototypes, mainly talking about the last prototype which is a game with only 18 cards.

Prototype 6, a game with only 18 cards.

The idea of this game is to get drunk. Different alcohols contain different levels of alcohol, and different alcohols can be drunk in different ways. The same thing is that they can all make us drunk. It’s not just pure drinking of alcohol, cocktails or some combination that makes people unknowingly drunk when they meet people’s taste requirements.

The game contains only 18 cards, 1 menu and 17 drink cards. The menu shows different combinations of alcohol and soft drinks. The recommended number of people for the game is 2-4 people. Players draw one card from 17 drink cards each round. If there are 2 players, draw cards until 1 card remains. If there are 3 players, each draws a total of 5 cards. If there are 3 players, each draws 4 cards. Each card represents a kind of alcohol or soft drink and shows the base score it carries. For example, alcohol is basically scored from 1 to 3, and soft drinks or ice cubes are scored 0. Among them, different combinations will bring bonus points. For example, Yamazaki whisky is 2 points and ice cubes are 0 points. When a player has both cards at the same time, they can be combined into “whiskey on the rocks”, resulting in a total of 3 points. At the end of the game, the player with the highest score wins.

The

The name of the combination, the recipe and the corresponding points are written on both sides of the menu card. The front of the drink card consists of 3 parts, the logo on the top, the name of the drink on the bottom left, and the basic score corresponding to the drink on the bottom left. The back of the drinks card is blank.

The playtest mainly reflects two problems. The first is about the combination of alcohol and drinks in the game. In the game, a drink card can often only be combined with 2 to 3 other drink cards, and the game also contains a combination of 4 different cards. This makes players spend a lot of time navigating menus at the end, looking for combinations to check if they may already have one. Especially players who are not very familiar with alcohol will spend more time on it. The second is the balance of scores. Especially in the case of a 3-4 player game, since each player has a small number of total cards, it is difficult to make a combination between the cards, which makes the score gap between players large, and it is easy for players to obtain a decisive result lead. Ways to improve this problem may lie in balancing the score or reducing the number of players.

It’s the third DevLog about the 6 prototypes. Mainly talked about the 5th prototype. It’s a 12 Second Unity Physics Engine Game.

Prototype 5, A 12 second Unity Physics Engine Game.

The inspiration for this game came from my denial of my own project. At first, this physics game was about jumping off the building, because when it comes to physics, I think about gravity and avoiding obstacles, so landing from a high altitude might be a good idea. However, I was dissatisfied with the project and was hesitating whether I should continue working on the project and submit an assignment that I am not satisfied with or I should delete the prototype and find a better idea. At this time, I decided to use this idea to make a physics game that allows players to choose to “upload” it or “delete” it.

In the game, the player will control a stickman. Players can use horizontal keys to make the stickman move, use space key to make it jump, use mouse clicks to grab a unity icon, and move it around the computer desktop, and eventually drag the unity project into the bin or submit it on the moodle page.

The playtest results mainly reflect three problems. The first is that the animation of the stickman’s movement is a bit strange, which may be due to the problem of the parameters of the internal physical components of the stickman. The second is that the colour of the stickman is white, the icon of unity is black, and the background of the game is dark, and there are also a lot of white backgrounds. So it makes stickers and objects appear inconspicuous in some places. The third is that the hints about the game method are not clear. Since this physics game requires no more than 12 seconds to complete, there should be clear guidelines that should reduce the time players spend finding ways to play and where to go.

In future studies, I need to learn more about the Unity physics engine, pay attention to the colour matching in game design, and pay attention to the importance of game guidance for a time-limited game.

It’s the second DevLog about the 6 prototypes. Mainly talked about the 4th prototype. It’s a avoid and collect game called “XO TOUR”.

Prototype 4, XO TOUR

XO Tour is a tour performance by the record label “XO”. Lil uzi vert, an American rapper, was invited to perform on the tour. Then, he made a song called “XO Tour Life3”.

XO Tour life3 is one of my favourite songs, and it has been continuously inspiring for the past few years. However, this song and this rapper have always been controversial. So I decided to make this game, from the perspective of an incomplete note, to experience the whole song, to experience bad comments.

Shout out to Lil uzi vert, the Weeknd, and RIP Virgil Abloh.

Design

This is the draft for the game. The player controls an incomplete note at first. Players are able to collect the components of the note while avoiding being hurt by the bad comments. The idea is, music could be innocent and the artist could be conceited. I design the game as touring as a note. And there are always hates. It’s OK that some people don’t like your work because it depends on individuals. But I have to pass through all of these, to jump over them. And by doing this, I can make my own art.

Prototype

Play controls the note by “left”, “right” and “space” (jump). Black alphabets are the platform that helps players to jump to a higher place or avoid the “bad comments” in red. Once players touch bad comments, players have to restart from specific places. There are in total of 3 parts of the notes to help players complete the note. At the same time, every part could help players jump higher or run faster. Once the note is complete, players are able to the top and meet the end of the game.

Playtest

There are some bugs that remain in this prototype. One of the most serious bugs is that the note may get stuck when walking on flat platforms, and need to continue walking by jumping. When this problem occurs, it will greatly affect the player’s avoidance by jumping, and sometimes cause the player to touch bad reviews. This bug has not yet been resolved. Also, because the inside of the treble symbol is relatively uneven, the note may also be stuck in the recessed place. However, there is no possibility of death in the treble symbol, so this bug will not greatly affect the player’s game experience. But still needed to be fixed.

At the same time, the test also feedbacks that this game does not convey my theme very well. And the gameplay is relatively monotonous.

Some people think the idea of incompletely note is interesting. some people think that the pictures and the map are well-drawn, which makes the game more vivid.