Designing Invasion of the Slugwroths


To put the ideas from this chapter into practice, we'll walk through the process of designing a game. Because this game is a teaching tool, it will be much simpler than a real game. Nevertheless, it will have all of the basic elements of a real game. Also, the game will be a full enough implementation to demonstrate the design process.

The Brainstorm

The first step in designing a game is to come up with the idea for it. The idea must fit within the limitations of this book. Therefore, it must meet the following requirements:

1.

The game must first and foremost be a teaching tool.

2.

The game must be simple enough so that someone who has never written a game can implement it.

3.

The game must be real enough to be worthwhile for you, the reader.

4.

The graphics must be in 2D so as to make use of LlamaWorks2D.

To come up with the idea for this game, I spent time thinking about the 2D games I played in the 1980s and '90s. I was able to dig out some old disks containing these games, and I installed and played them. In addition, I made a list of the old games I liked best and why. Eventually, I decided on a sidescrolling platform game. Sidescrollers are games in which the character moves continuously to the left or right as the level progresses. Platform games are games in which the character spends the majority of the level hopping, swinging, or jumping from one platform on the screen to another. Most old sidescrollers were also platform games to one degree or another.

After a lot of ruminating, I finally settled on a game called Invasion of the Slugwroths. In this game, the world is invaded by a nasty, slimy race of sluglike creatures that are here to steal our entire supply of radishes (gasp!). Our erstwhile hero is Captain Chloride, defender of the defenseless, helper of the helpless, and generally regarded as the gum on the shoe of evil.

The Slugwroths, which is what the invaders are called, have long, trumpetshaped snoots that they can shoot boogers from (this game was designed with my 10yearold son in mind). The player starts with three Captain Chlorides. When Captain Chloride gets hit by boogers, he gets stuck in goo and looks out at the player with a sad expression. He doesn't exactly die, but the player loses one Captain Chloride. Also, the Slugwroths leave a trail of slime behind them when they move. If Captain Chloride touches it, he looks sad and the player loses a Captain Chloride.

The Slugwroths have set up many bases around the world. Captain Chloride must move from base to base, cleaning out the Slugwroths as he goes. He can increase his number of lives by eating the perfect food (pizza) whenever he finds it. Inexplicably, there are many slices of pizza scattered around the world. When he eats enough pizza, Captain Chloride gets another life.

Also scattered around the world are large pellets of salt. No one knows how they got there, but it's lucky they didfor, you see, Captain Chloride carries the most devastating weapon the world has ever known. It's the one weapon feared and dreaded by all Slugwroths. Yes, I'm speaking of the worldfamous salt shooter. When a Slugwroth gets hit by Captain Chloride's salt shooter, he shrivels up and gets a sad look on his face. When he is scrolled off the screen because Captain Chloride has moved away, the Slugwroth disappears forever.

That's the basic idea for the game. We'll write as much of it as space in this book allows.

The Goal

The goal of Invasion of the Slugwroths is to teach. If I was implementing this as a real game, the goal would be for the player to work through all of the Slugwroth bases and clean them out. The player would have to learn the techniques and acquire the tools needed to eliminate Slimeordeous, the leader of the Slugwroth forces on Earth.

The Experience

If this were a real commercial game, the experience of Invasion of the Slugwroths would be fastpaced and fun. There would be a lot of corny, campy humor and fun surprises built into the game.

Because this is designed to be a teaching tool, the experience you'll hopefully take away from writing a portion of Invasion of the Slugwroths is that it is really easy to get started in game programming.

The Look

The look and style of Invasion of the Slugwroths will be similar to the arcade games of the late '80s and early '90s. It will not use 3D rendered into 2D as many games did in the mid and late '90s. It will be strictly 2D and cartoony.

The Hooks

If this were to be a commercial product, Invasion of the Slugwroths would use several hooks. The most important would be exploration. The player must explore the world to find hidden bases, powerups, and weapons.

In addition, Invasion of the Slugwroths would use the mastery hook. The player must get proficient at running, jumping, dodging, and strategic thinking in order to beat the levels. Because some players are concerned with scores, this game would also use the high score hook.

Another hook that can make a game distinctive is its humor. This tends to be a less compelling hook. But in the case of Invasion of the Slugwroths, humor can add a lot to the experience of the game. If I wanted to sell this game, I would put in as much goofy (or even stale) humor as possible.

The Design Document

For a real game, I would write an extensive design document. It would contain the basic game description presented previously, the statement of the goal, the description of the experience, some sample drawings to indicate the look, and the statement of the hooks.

In addition, the design document would have a much more detailed description of the game. It would have drawings of each level with descriptions of where the traps were and how they all work, where the powerups were and how they work, and the locations of hidden levels with a statement of how each one is accessed or activated. If this game were going to have bosses, the design document would describe them, state their locations, and tell how they are defeated.

Although this sounds like a lot of information for the design document, it is actually rather sparse compared to the design documents in professional game companies. Because game design is so involved, it is often split into a different job than game programming. However, it's something of a truism that the more game programmers know about game design, the better they can do their jobs.



Creating Games in C++(c) A Step-by-Step Guide
Creating Games in C++: A Step-by-Step Guide
ISBN: 0735714347
EAN: 2147483647
Year: N/A
Pages: 148

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