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[tetley1173]

Meteor Miner

Asteroids Elevator pitch by Shannon Tetley

The pitch:

Meteor Miner is a classic asteroids type game where you must survive an endless horde of killer asteroids and hostile spacecraft to gain the highest score. Resources can be claimed from the destroyed asteroids to allow the player to upgrade and customise their ship. Combinations of upgrades form different loadouts and its up to the player to decide which combination will help them survive.

Aimed at young adults this game is inspired by horde survival games like the Call of Duty zombies game mode and arcade shooters like Asteroids. The game will feature waves that increase in difficulty and award the player with fanfare and access to upgrades when completing waves. Upgrades provide the payer with interesting opportunities to customise their survival strategy. Upgrades could include faster manoeuvring, more powerful weapons or unique abilities. The combination of these abilities are what will make or break the players survival run.

The game would be set in space with a futuristic theme. Taking inspiration from Sci-Fi films and classic arcade games could give the game an exciting feel and build the tension for the upcoming attack waves. These themes could be incorporated into the shopping screen used to buy upgrades by making it look like a hanger bay or the interior of a space station. This shop interface could take many forms, it could be used as a paused, safe space for the player to catch their breath between waves, or it could let the game run in the background, putting the player under pressure to make quick decisions.

A lot of options are on the table for this idea but it would stick to some core mechanics. Survival and decision making are central to Meteor Minor. The player will be rewarded for playing with excitement and a sense of achievement for reaching a higher level, and by finding new and interesting strategies that they find fun.

[tetley1173]

Platformer Postmortem

By Shannon Tetley

In this post I'm going to talk about my thoughts on the platformer game I made now I've moved on from the project for now. It served its purpose which was to teach me how to use Gdevelop but I don't think its very good as a game. People who have play tested it for me have a less harsh opinion but from my point of view its very obvious that it was a rush job. This doesn't mean it was a failure though as I did learn a lot from making it.

What aspects of my required reading did I apply to the project?

Not a lot if I'm honest. Not that the readings didn't inspire me though. I was very focused on the basics so I didn't implement much of what I learned from readings but it did give me plenty of ideas. The readings taught me lots of game design practices that I would apply to the game if I were to work on it some more.

I've had a few ideas of what I would change now that I've read up on the topic of game design:

I would add a title screen to the game to invite the player into the world and to build their interest.

Playtesting revealed that having a linear path through the world helped lessen the mental burden on the player allowing them to better engage with the jumping challenges.

I would pay close attention to the 'feel' of the jumping challenges. I learned that a challenging obstacle isn't the same as a good obstacle. I made some interesting and challenging platforms to navigate but because there was a little jank with the way you jump through them the players didn't like it.

Overall polish the game more. I think some better animations would improve the feel of jumping and dying. Balancing the game more would help as the game is a little trivial as is. Playtesters didn't die once and they missed out on seeing my death animation which I believe would have added to the feel of the game for them.

What's one thing I'd change about my development approach?

I would plan the rules, objectives and challenges that the payer faces in the game before I sat down to make it. To borrow a quote from the creator of the Civilisation series of games Sid Meier, "Games are a series of interesting decisions". As is, my game doesn't present the gamer with many opportunities to make interesting decisions. The way I made the game was to go with the flow and just make whatever I felt like at the time. Having a loose plan may have not only sped up my development time, but also help me to incorporate interesting decisions for the player. It would also be easier to apply other game design concepts I learned into the game, as it would no longer be an afterthought to do so.

[tetley1173]

Platformer Postmortem

By Shannon Tetley

In this post I'm going to talk about my thoughts on the platformer game I made now I've moved on from the project for now. It served its purpose which was to teach me how to use Gdevelop but I don't think its very good as a game. People who have play tested it for me have a less harsh opinion but from my point of view its very obvious that it was a rush job. This doesn't mean it was a failure though as I did learn a lot from making it.

What aspects of my required reading did I apply to the project?

Not a lot if I'm honest. Not that the readings didn't inspire me though. I was very focused on the basics so I didn't implement much of what I learned from readings but it did give me plenty of ideas. The readings taught me lots of game design practices that I would apply to the game if I were to work on it some more.

I've had a few ideas of what I would change now that I've read up on the topic of game design:

I would add a title screen to the game to invite the player into the world and to build their interest.

Playtesting revealed that having a linear path through the world helped lessen the mental burden on the player allowing them to better engage with the jumping challenges.

I would pay close attention to the 'feel' of the jumping challenges. I learned that a challenging obstacle isn't the same as a good obstacle. I made some interesting and challenging platforms to navigate but because there was a little jank with the way you jump through them the players didn't like it.

Overall polish the game more. I think some better animations would improve the feel of jumping and dying. Balancing the game more would help as the game is a little trivial as is. Playtesters didn't die once and they missed out on seeing my death animation which I believe would have added to the feel of the game for them.

What's one thing I'd change about my development approach?

I would plan the rules, objectives and challenges that the payer faces in the game before I sat down to make it. To borrow a quote from the creator of the Civilisation series of games Sid Meier, "Games are a series of interesting decisions". As is, my game doesn't present the gamer with many opportunities to make interesting decisions. The way I made the game was to go with the flow and just make whatever I felt like at the time. Having a loose plan may have not only sped up my development time, but also help me to incorporate interesting decisions for the player. It would also be easier to apply other game design concepts I learned into the game, as it would no longer be an afterthought to do so.