This week we had a guest speaker, Sophie Artemigi, who ran a workshop on game loops and pitches.
Game Loop Practice
Me and Jess were given Tic Tac Toe and tasked to pitch its game loop to the class to see if we could explain it well enough that the class would be able to guess it.
Thankfully the class was able to guess that it was Tic Tac Toe/Noughts and Crosses, but we made one big mistake in that we said ‘9×9’ grid instead of ‘3×3’, a silly mistake as we were thinking of a grid containing ‘9 sections’, but Sophie made a good example of how important it is to be accurate and very thorough at explaining things, especially if you’re pitching to your team.
For example, below is an example that Sophie made of how someone who didn’t already know Tic Tac Toe might interpret our game loop as:
She drew (what is meant to be) a 9×9 grid, which me and Jess already knew we got wrong, but also made a point that both her and the other player could both choose ‘O’ or both choose ‘X’, and that they could place shapes on the same section on the grid.
This was an incredibly valuable workshop in which I learnt how important it is to be very clear about your idea and intentions.
Summary of Workshop: When pitching, start with elevator pitch, then gameplay loop.
Summarising our Game Ideas
Using Miro, the class made notes and mood boards of our core game loops, themes, elevator pitches, design pillars, tones, styles, etc.
Research: Rhythm Heaven Silver
Someone recommended in the feedback I received last week that I play Rhythm Heaven Groove, and because I don’t have the means to play that specific game, I had a look at a similar game, Rhythm Heaven Silver, which is a free remake of the popular Nintendo release Rhythm Heaven Tengoku from 2006.
Below is a screenshot from the second level of the game, in which players must tweeze the hairs from the onion in time to the beat. Short hairs you must press A, and long curly hairs you must hold A. The game also plays the beat once before you need to press any buttons.
Things I took away from the game:
- Players must be incredibly accurate when pressing the buttons, not a lot of wiggle room for error if the game is to remain satisfying.
- Game has very obvious beat.
My main take away from the game is that it’s value is in how satisfying it is, and if my game is to have rhythm mechanics, I will have to have both very good music, and beats that match it perfectly well.
In my game, you will need to miss some beats on purpose to avoid going in to obstacles, which may actually take away from the satisfaction of having rhythm mechanics in the first place. Something to think about…
Feedback
https://www.nodenogg.in/1610lisa?view=spatial
In summary, people want to see the actual rhythm element, and for the spotlights to work (send players back to the beginning).
Prototype Progress
I began by trying to implement peoples feedback; adding the rhythm game element and getting the spotlights to work.
Unfortunately, even with the help of YouTube tutorials, I couldn’t get the HUD to work. The tutorials I used were both for 2D rhythm games, and so when I tried to implement them into my 3D space using a canvas layer, Godot became confused and didn’t know what scripting to follow, and crashed.
So, whilst I was trying to figure out a different way to show people that mechanic in my final pitch, I worked on making the spotlights reset the player. Thankfully this was a much easier task, and just required collider shapes in a child node and some simple code.
Below is a video of the prototype with some minor changes. Unfortunately, I just couldn’t get the HUD to work, but I’m still quite happy with the changes I did manage to make:
- Used Audacity to add ‘Baby Crying’ and ‘Coughing’ sound effects to soundtrack.
- Spotlights now have colliders.
- Players can now spam buttons to move faster and avoid spotlights.
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