#mushroom11

[abepoetra]

#mushroom11 #bestgame #itaykeren #gamesdev #developerquotes #appstoregames

[crossroadsalpha]

Mushroom 11 captures the fun of Play-Doh and turns it into this wildly original puzzle game. We've discovered that there's three layers to understanding what Mushroom 11 is about. There's hearing about it, which is almost worthless. There's seeing it, which might give you a good sense of what it's like, and then there's getting [...]

[itayke]

Mushroom 11 Launch Trailer

After almost 4 years in the making, we’re excited and nervous to announce our release date - October 15th!

Mushroom 11 will launch on Steam, GOG and Humble Store for PC/Mac/Linux. 

More info here!

[goodcleangaming]

Mushroom 11 Gameplay - A puzzle-platformer with unique control mechanics. Guide an amorphous organism across brain-twisting obstacles, overcome swarms of bizarre mutated creatures, and understand the true nature of the devastation from which you emerged. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2zaZ9VeWv9I Gameplays Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ajvcaoyLS_c&index=1&list=PLyj9o-jOVyzTuhs6Pu6Nsr15BOXrxtC9l

Subscribe instantly by visiting our new website: goodcleangaming.com

[omarbanzai]

Gamasutra: The Theory and Practice of Cameras in Side-Scrollers

Gamasutra: The Theory and Practice of Cameras in Side-Scrollers

Screenshot of Mushroom 11

A very good read on how the camera is handled in side-scrollers by Itay Keren for Gamasutra. Camera handling is a feature usually overlooked by gamers, but is often responsible of how comfortable the player feels when playing the game. As stated by the author at the beginning, this article is a tweaked version of a 52 minutes talk on the topic. You can watch it by…

View On WordPress

[itayke]

Mushroom 11 at GDC and EGX: Experimental PR email

[A couple of weeks ago we sent an experimental PR email, explaining a bit more about what Mushroom 11 is all about to publications that are likely to be unfamiliar with the game. The results were remarkable, so we thought we'd share the post with everyone!]

Subject: Meet the Mushroom 11 team at GDC/EGX (You won’t believe what happened next!)

Here are 11 thing you need to know about Mushroom 11 if you’re attending GDC or EGX:

1. Game mechanics unlike anything you’ve played before.

Mushroom 11 is a physics-based platformer with skill and puzzle elements, but unlike other games, players have no force over the character and can only use the mouse to destroy their own cells.

2. Control mechanics that makes you rethink platformers.

Players have to relearn what it’s like to move, when the organism they’re destroying grows on its own. At first it feels like a big departure from normal platform conventions, but after a minute the control becomes intuitive.

3. A post-apocalyptic game without humans.

Mushroom 11 provides a more probable outcome to the post-apocalyptic genre in video games: a world after humans. When the next species takes over, what will become of our great accomplishments, our battles, and our cultures? Does any of that matter in the end?

4. Destruction is the only way to grow.

The unique symmetry of destruction and growth in the mechanic is echoed back into the game’s world as you move through a destroyed land with various lifeforms trying to establish a foothold among the devastation.

5. Award-winning.

Mushroom 11 has won many awards for its unique mechanics and theme, including best-in-show from various publications, PAX10 2014, EGX Leftfield Collection and of course, 2014 IGF Finalist for Excellence in Design, where we lost (like everyone else...) to the amazing Papers, Please.

6. Great critical reception.

Mushroom 11 has received funding from esteemed indie collective, the Indie-Fund. While still in development, it has gained a great critical reception and was named as one of the most anticipated indie games of 2015… as well as of the two previous years. From the press: “Mushroom 11 is the next great puzzle-platformer” -- Destructoid “Mushroom 11 is unlike anything else I’ve ever played, but it still manages to be intuitive and instantly understandable" -- IGN “The level design pushes the unique movement concept to its extremes, forcing players to think outside the box to manage the creative destruction of this odd creature” --- Ars Technica

7. Music by Electronica supergroup The Future Sound of London (FSOL).

Even before we approached The Future Sound of London, they’ve been a huge influence on the design of the game. Being able to get them on board and work with this legendary duo in person is an incredible honor.

8. Aiming for a June 2015 release (PC, Mac, Linux).

Mushroom 11 is planned for release around the end of June 2015 for desktops (PC, Mac, Linux), with more platforms to follow.

9. Pre-order available, with the first chapter instantly playable.

Pre-order is available now on mushroom11.com, providing instant access to the first chapter of the game. The Future Sound of London exclusive soundtrack is also available when pre-ordering the Fungal Bundle.

10. Created by a small team of four.

The Mushroom 11 team is as indie as it gets, comprising of two married couples working out of their homes, overcoming physical distances and marital dilemmas: Itay Keren - Design, Programming (@itayke) Simon Kono - Art (@sillikone) Julia Keren-Detar - Additional Design, Art and PR (@quiltingcrow) Kara Kono - Production (@knutbear33) 

11. Meet the Mushroom 11 team.

The Mushroom 11 team will attend GDC (Indie Megabooth) and EGX Rezzed. We’d love to meet with you!

So here’s how Mushroom 11 looks like:

Additional info and screenshots on our press-kit. Press builds available upon request. Let me know if you’d like to schedule an appointment during the week to meet with the team.

Looking forward to hearing back from you, - The Mushroom 11 team

[itayke]

Troubles With The Boss: Part 1

Maybe it's being your own boss, but it seems that indies like bosses. I have a special interest in boss battles and I've been designing bosses for imaginary games back in elementary school, well before I knew how to design or code. I wanted to share a bit of the thoughts and process of making boss battles in Mushroom 11.

A boss serves as an end-of-level living obstacle. It is usually bigger and stronger than its minions, and is contextually connected to the level as its ruler or the last line of defense. The boss's strength is usually countered by a well balanced vulnerability, and it is often brought down by its own powers.

For designers who enjoy elaborate mechanical system, designing a boss is pure joy. Though the work invested in a single boss is often disproportional to the amount of time spent on it by the player, these short experiences are usually retained and even define the entire game. 

With Mushroom 11, I set to make each boss its own challenge of skill and logic. It also needs to serve as the final practical test for the challenges and mechanics introduced in that level. Additionally, the boss must be narratively connected to the surroundings, often passively revealing another part of the story. While the final bosses really get elaborate both in story and mechanics, the first one serves as the simplest demonstration of this link. I'd like to quickly show the thought process behind this relatively simplistic challenge.

Prototyping

The first level's main challenge is essentially understanding the strange movement and controls presented in the game. The challenges throughout the level are carefully designed and ordered to enable basic understanding of its novel concepts: Erasing, Splitting, Molding and Balancing. These concepts are laid out one at a time, slowly getting more complicated, then finally combined into one mega-challenge that is the boss.

Boss 1 ("Firelily", here in a sketch I made two years ago and then in Simon Kono's interpretation) was originally designed as a skill test to quickly maneuver across the gap, walk over the petals and collect the seeds on both sides of the trunk. It narratively represents a remnant of this lava-ridden, mutant infested, decaying metropolis.

   This boss was indeed built to test the skills introduced earlier, but also suggest another concept that is never explicitly told: seeds, as is any organic tissue, can--and in this case, must--be consumed.

Trade-offs

As the boss keeps launching fireballs, defeating it requires timing the climb over the trunk, as well as the movement across the petals when they're open, allowing advanced players to leverage the bulb closure to catapult to the other side.

Since a boss is a mini-game in its own merit, it should provide a system of rules and trade-offs, with room for creativity and self-expression (like any game should). This notion is held for all the bosses in the game, which may account for the extended development timeline: making bosses takes as much as 50% of the production time!

Skeletal Animation

So, this prototype revealed some issues that in fact dictated a major mechanics change to the rest of the game: keyframe animation just doesn't fit here. Any attempt to combine sprite changes with physics was doomed to fail. The natural expectation is for Skeletal Animation, with fluid interactions between the images representing the physical elements in world, so a sprite change is perceived as a distracting jitter or warp. In order to fix it, the petals were changed into a skeletal arthropod-like tentacles.

These fit the ambience well, but made less sense as creature limbs, as their visual design suggests. Also, since balancing the mushroom is a major teaching element in this level, it seemed that simply trying to reach and walk on the tentacles was a satisfying (yet short) experience. However, trying to time the climb on the trunk, or using the tentacle as a catapult, was frustrating and quite random. I decided to try a different approach, where climbing and balancing is the challenge.

  Adding multiple tentacles opened up many play opportunities as players climb across the plant to get all the seeds. It enabled versatility of boss motion and gestures, from flailing in panic to composed seed protection. However, with the removal of fireballs, the creature seemed passive, almost inviting. The sharp cell-scraping nails didn't seem legitimate as an effective defense, since cell-removal is essentially the only way to move in the game.

Difficulty Curve

Another issue left from the original design was the large pool of lava. Getting the bottom seeds was by far the most difficult challenge in this boss. It is legitimate to have a hard challenge right off the bat, but falling into the pit trying to get the bottom-left seed was just too frustrating when the end was in sight, forcing the player to climb again all the way.

The new design changed the lava into a small cavern, making the first and last seeds practically hassle-free. This works well by maintaining a difficulty bell-curve, with the challenging parts right in the middle. It also reinforced the idea of beating a boss by taking its seeds.

More notably, converting the tentacles tips to fireball-launchers achieved multiple goals. It reintroduced the timing element, making players wait to climb between shots, and stay protected between the tentacles as the boss throws its tantrum. It also narratively tied the attack to the lava pit and of course, made the boss seem more fierce.

Outro

In many games, when bosses are beaten, a door magically opens or they drop a key or some other portal. This too didn't fit Mushroom 11, as it felt detached and inconsequential. The bosses needed to present a more direct barrier, preventing the player from freely proceeding to the next level. While at it, I wanted to leverage the post-battle exit phase ("Outro", as we call it), and turn it into a final mini-challenge on the way out.

In this case, the plant bulb physically blocks the way to the exit, and eliminating the boss is clearly the only way though. After getting the first couple of seeds, the bulb gets visibly thinner, further suggesting an imminent sink to oblivion. When the plant is out of the way, all that's is to sneak into the tunnel, avoiding the fiery drop.

While this boss is relatively simple, the new design does encourage creativity, with different battle approaches. Furthermore, the combination of challenges in this boss (timing, balancing, understanding the advantage--and vulnerability--of keeping small) prove as a successful crash-course in mushroom control, enabling more elaborate and challenging designs to follow.

I'll follow up with more bosses in the future! Thanks and have a great 2015, -- itay

Mushroom 11 is available for pre-order, with Chapter 1 (including the above boss) immediately playable on PC/Mac/Linux.

[3d-jenni]

Mushroom 11 Teaser