May.
I've avoided writing up my progress because of, essentially, being too wrapped up in it to really study.
That was wrong, and without this I feel I've missed the essential summation of work every week or few days like I did previously all those months back.
Essentially creating a piece of work(s) and putting on this glorious blog of mine for discussion, reasoning and analysis as to what the work represents within the project and within my current mind frame. With the latter, I mean how other work's consistently influencing and re-molding my SpaceBoy project week after week, game after game.
But enough of that.
SpaceBoy's last outing on my blog was in February; an analysis of level design styles and methods, of which I'd have potentially adopted to fit the gameplay and pacing of what I wanted SpaceBoy to play out like.
Tile-based level design is great - a wonderful reflection and reference to old-school game design, of which has served almost perfect examples of platform games with it's mathematically 'correct' tilesets and sizes for old 80's and 90's video games.
This I worked on for a while, though I was struggling to convert a natural, modern looking environment with old-school block-specific design.
So I decided on the Limbo/Braid-style, of which rectangles within the game engine could be shaped, copied and pasted to create basic platforms, of which the player would perfectly assign to - as collisions are perfectly assigned from the moment of the shape's creation - as opposed to self assigning collisions through tile designs imported in through Photoshop.
Above is the video game Limbo, a work-in-progress selection of screenshots designed the game's level designer; Jakob Hansson.
With these screenshots Jakob writes;
Below are some work in progress screenshots of levels I created using our level editor.I stopped at Limbo after the basic game play, level design and puzzles were created,so most of the graphics layers were created afterwards.
And some artwork that closely resembles in-game screenshots;
With the art style visible, the designer then showed technical aspects to the level designing approach;
And with this; established level design for SpaceBoy is confirmed - natural looking environmental pieces created with multiple, alternately-sized rectangles is a much more sound method in creating SpaceBoy.
With the above, Jakob runs through and slightly discusses the intentions and use of colours, giving the user a grasp of the level flow and pacing through trigger and mechanic placements.
He suggests that the aesthetically pleasing elements; such as the designs of the artwork above suggest, like completed grass, rocks, trees - are added after all these basics are created;
And with this I have taken to the game engine - Construct 2 - to mock-up basic 'tests' of consist of platforming and mechanics needed for the final demo.
The creation of in-engine rectangles, and the copy and paste - there of - is essentially an easier and much quicker way of mocking up basic and soon-to-be fully realized level designs, that encapsulate the freedom of differently layered surroundings, as opposed to 32x32 grid-like tiles.
This, in reference to newer styles of level design, counters traditional and often primitive tile-based design. However, not to diss this tactic; as a lot of well established video game franchises - old and new - still implore these design ethics and as such produce some of the finest platforming games ever made.
For SpaceBoy - so far - this cannot be done, if I'm looking for a Rayman-like, modern platform-puzzle game based around organic environments and backdrops.
If anything, the tiling will come to fruition with the artistic layers over the basic rectangular platforms, such as the image above suggests - tiled grass can be copied, pasted, rotated; to fit/blend in with the solid ground; giving the illusion that the player is running atop a grassy path.
Animation-wise, SpaceBoy is in it's 'final' stages of design, were 'rough' and 'better than rough' (terrible alternate) served as blueprints and implemented ideas that showed how he would run, jump and generally interact when the user interacts with the controller/keyboard.
With black&white being a primary colour scheme, SpaceBoy and indeed most of - if not all - the environments will emplore this style, with potential occasional colour within some parts of the proposed release.
The story has developed somewhat, originally playing out as a 'get from A to B'-type iPad game involving puzzle solving speed around light and dark, the project then evolved into a traditional platform game, with it's black&white visuals - white outlines of characters, props, environments - becoming a staple and perfect style choice. The game was originally set around SpaceBoy, roaming from planet to planet, saving each by restoring light through specific landmarks. The light within these planets had been taken so abruptly that they all quickly evolved into mere outlines of their former selves, and thus only SpaceBoy remained colourful when in light.
Although most of this is still relevant, SpaceBoy now has somewhat of a sidekick, in the form of a large super computer named S.O.N. (Super Operating Network), who serves within a small identifiable ship that they both originally arrive in.
SpaceBoy is Master Chief-ed up (frozen) until thawed when landing on a mysterious planet. SpaceBoy then begins to realize - as you play through the desolate ship - that things are indeed odd, and slightly a miss. Learning the basic controls and mechanics as you play, SpaceBoy encounters and powers up S.O.N. who then reveals that the planet's riddled with 'glitches', and the ship has essentially been dragged down and ceased to operate, until SpaceBoy solves and demolishes these problems.
Glitches are essentially now the main antogonists of the game, and serve as boss-like encounters within glitched environments leading up to their reveal. These glitches have also demoted S.O.N. to a mere DOS-like interface, and with every glitch destroyed; so S.O.N. can upgrade and aid SpaceBoy further.
Darkness still plays a major part within the game, tarnishing SpaceBoy's body heat health - of which heals when in light - but it's now glitches that dwell within the darkness, and if within the wrong area for too long, SpaceBoy himself can get infected and appear to become glitched - THUS my previous posts from Feb and Jan - animations there of.
That's it for now. I like to close things off abru....
