Introduction
For this year's GDW game, we decided that we will be creating an arena fighting game in the same vein as games like Fat Princess, and Ragdoll Kung-Fu. The core gameplay mechanics simple in concept and will be simple in implementation as well. We have chosen to do an arena fighting game to stay within the limits of our time and scope constraints, as we will most likely have only a month and a half to work on the implementation of our first prototype. Our game will be most similar to Fat Princess in terms of the melee combat gameplay and possibly the aesthetics as well. For our first prototype we will most likely only support team deathmatch.
Gameplay
My main concern regarding the gameplay is with balancing our game. By balance in this case I mean how fast players should die. Should it differ based on the game mode being played or should it be constant regardless? In either case, how much health do we give players such that they can play for a good amount of time without becoming frustrated and still feel challenged.
In terms of gameplay modes, we hope that our final prototype will feature multiple game modes past the simple team deathmatch. We want to include new game modes we haven't seen played before as well as other traditional competitive multiplayer game modes. Getting interesting game modes implemented is my secondary concern. We are trying a couple new game modes that are inspired by combinations of other genres and game modes. They are simple to explain, however these game modes simply increase our scope and in turn workload. We want to include something different and unique to set our game apart from traditional multiplayer games, but at the same time we'd like to get our game done.
Aesthetics
In terms of aesthetics, our main concerns are with the functionality of animations and models. We will have characters swinging weapons, jumping, sprinting and blocking. This means that our animations and even physical sizes of objects and characters will directly impact the gameplay. This is a major concern for us as our artists will have to focus on balancing these elements. None of us have worked with this type of pipeline where the artists' work can affect the gameplay functionally. Everyone will be involved in the balancing of the game, and deviating from the plan will most likely result in imbalance. We hope that through prototyping aesthetics, we can avoid these problems.
Kinaesthetics
The controls for our game will be similar to most 3D platformers. We would prefer that players play with a traditional gamepad such as the XBOX 360 or PS3 controllers although given that we are releasing the prototype on PC we will have to include keyboard and mouse support. Our main concerns regarding the controls are with the keyboard being used for locomotion as it is no where near as accurate as a joystick, which will be used for locomotion on a gamepad.
We want a very lightweight HUD, and as such the HUD will only include health and scores. Characters' names will hover above their heads along with an icon beside their name displaying their weapon type, although the weapon type should be discernible without the icon. We have three categories - slash, blunt, and pierce - and we plan on making it obvious what weapon falls into its corresponding category.
Technology
This is the greatest concern we have. This year, as opposed to working from scratch, we have to use 2LOC, a custom engine written by one of our TAs. Unlike previous years, where we may have been building an engine, we are working with someone else's code base. The biggest problem with this is that we actually have to learn how to use and code in that specific engine before we can begin production of our prototype. We have to explore the limitations and features of the engine and then once we have learned how to do the basics, we move on to integrating our own code with it. At this point, we know very little about the engine still, and it will require a lot of experimentation before we can begin working on our prototype.
Our game is designed to be as simple as possible, so as to avoid suddenly running into a technological limitation, however we could very well be forced to redesign our game if we find we are unable to carry out our plans.
Conclusion
For this semester, we will be focusing heavily on gameplay and technology. We have to make sure we have our main game mechanics work, that the controls are accurate enough to test the gameplay, and also make sure that our prototype code works. We will also have to make sure our 3D models are all functional within the game itself, they don't necessarily have to look good this semester. In other words, we have to give attention to all prototyping areas as they are tightly tied together.
I hope that we are able to at least complete a functioning prototype by the end of this semester, and next semester focus on the polish.
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