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[Aprils fool] New game feature

PostPosted: 01 Apr 2012, 14:07
by Edward_Lii
Hello all,

You might have noticed that we're running out of possible levels we can make with the current blocks.
One option would be to create new blocks, but that won't help very much.
A better solution is to extend the current game mechanism to allow better, more challenging puzzles.

That's why it's almost inevitable to add a new character: your highlight.
April.png

As you can see the new character also means that there will be highlight blocks and moving blocks.
This drastic change of course requires a lot of rethinking so here are some of my suggestions.

Movement
You can't control your shadow directly, so the highlight needs to be controlled in the same way.
But this means that it will be a exact copy of your shadow, so it will be better if the highlight inverts your recording.
Moving to the left will move your highlight to the right, jumping=activating and activating=jumping.

Name change
Another problem is that the name doesn't cover the complete game anymore.
The new name will be: Me, My Shadow and My Highlight, I've already sent a request to Sourceforge to change the name to mmsamh (only 16 chars allowed so we have to abbreviate it).
A new logo needs to be designed but that's not too much work.

The swap block
You're probably thinking how will the swap block work with a third character.
I think we should change it to a shuffle block, the order will be something like (player->shadow->highlight)

I've already coded most of the things and I'm going to commit it to svn very soon.
There's still a bug where the highlight could walk through moving highlight blocks, but I think I have found a fix for that.

Happy Aprils fool. :D

Re: New game feature

PostPosted: 01 Apr 2012, 14:43
by ctdabomb
I like the idea!

Re: New game feature

PostPosted: 01 Apr 2012, 17:44
by MCMic
I believed it…

Re: New game feature

PostPosted: 02 Apr 2012, 05:42
by acme_pjz
Hi,

Edward_Lii {l Wrote}:Happy Aprils fool. :D


:o :lol:

As for the new feature, I have an idea which is a collectable item which can stop the time (stopping moving blocks and the shadow), similar to a game I had previously played: http://www.miniclip.com/games/chronotron/

Re: New game feature

PostPosted: 02 Apr 2012, 15:08
by odamite
Hello,

After reading this I got a quite nice idea in my opinion. What if in some levels the shadow movement was actually reversed. This would give more challenge to game. Also shadow's (or player's) gravity could be turned up-side-down. And there could be some trigger for it too. These could create some interesting puzzles. :)

My only concern about this is the effect on player's learning curve. We don't want to "bloat" the game with too many features. Now the game has a nice and simple idea and gameplay. Maybe it's best to keep it that way...

Re: New game feature

PostPosted: 02 Apr 2012, 16:37
by Edward_Lii
Hello all,

acme_pjz {l Wrote}:As for the new feature, I have an idea which is a collectable item which can stop the time (stopping moving blocks and the shadow), similar to a game I had previously played: http://www.miniclip.com/games/chronotron/

odamite {l Wrote}:After reading this I got a quite nice idea in my opinion. What if in some levels the shadow movement was actually reversed. This would give more challenge to game. Also shadow's (or player's) gravity could be turned up-side-down. And there could be some trigger for it too. These could create some interesting puzzles. :)

These are all good ideas and can be used to create more interesting/challenging puzzles.
But I think we should be careful with adding new stuff just like odamite said.

One option would be to implement a very flexible scripting language that is capable of such things.
But that will almost certainly make it harder to understand some levels if for example the gravity is lower.
Take for example XMoto, some levels auto-kill you when using your right wheel without saying so. :think: