by date
Plan for Dan MacDonald
Plan for Dan MacDonald
| Name: | Dan MacDonald |  |
|---|---|---|
| Date Posted: | Jun 19, 2004 | |
| Rating: |  4.0 out of 5 | |
| Public: | YES | |
| Comments: | YES | |
| RSS Feed: |  or Subscribe with  . | |
| Profile Page: | View profile page for Dan MacDonald |
Blog post
Summary of works in progress, Katsu and Little Soldiers. Screenshots inside.
I must say the quality of content in the .plan's lately has really inspired me. It's great to see so many members of the community working on so many cool projects. I've been following the GG community for some time now and after seeing all the great .plan's I felt I just had to share what I've been working on as well.
My big project is a game that was originally called "Katsu's Journey", a project endeavored on by myself and two long time friends. The game can be likened to a Zelda type game with stealthy, high and sneak game play. You take on the role of a young ninja in feudal Japan trying to accomplish your quest. The story is not anything new or innovative, but it serves to give the player some context and a reason to go from point A to point B. As you (the player) go about your quests you are constantly trying to avoid patrolling samurai guards who are on the lookout for you. The core gameplay mechanic in the game is trying to keep Katsu out of the enemy guard's lanterns. To aid him in his journeys Katsu can collect items that can be used to interact with the guards in various ways, either by going invisible, putting out their lantern, or knocking them out.. etc
I've been working on this project for almost 3 years now, since before the first IGC. It really needs to get done. For the most part the game is coded it's just waiting on tile art. I've been having a really hard time keeping my artist from disappearing on me. I think we've gone though more then 5 on this project already...
Anyway, here are some screenies, they show the guards, and Katsu being seen by two guards. Once spotted by a guard, Katsu has until the guards progress bar fills up to get out of the guards view, otherwise he will have to start back from the last save point.
Because of the various headaches on Katsu, I have taken the last 2.5 weeks off to port a mostly finished flash game by two friends of mine to PC, Mac, and PocketPC. So far the game is almost game play complete and the first few levels are entirely playable. The game is called Little Soldiers and is a puzzle strategy game. You must move one or more "little soldiers" though a hostile environment using an assortment of actions that can create interesting chain reactions in the levels. For instance, if you dig away a dirt block supporting a falling brick, it will fall. If it lands on a dynamite crate, the crate will blow up and take the surrounding blocks with it, changing the layout of the level...
Here's some quick screenies of Little Soldiers.
My big project is a game that was originally called "Katsu's Journey", a project endeavored on by myself and two long time friends. The game can be likened to a Zelda type game with stealthy, high and sneak game play. You take on the role of a young ninja in feudal Japan trying to accomplish your quest. The story is not anything new or innovative, but it serves to give the player some context and a reason to go from point A to point B. As you (the player) go about your quests you are constantly trying to avoid patrolling samurai guards who are on the lookout for you. The core gameplay mechanic in the game is trying to keep Katsu out of the enemy guard's lanterns. To aid him in his journeys Katsu can collect items that can be used to interact with the guards in various ways, either by going invisible, putting out their lantern, or knocking them out.. etc
I've been working on this project for almost 3 years now, since before the first IGC. It really needs to get done. For the most part the game is coded it's just waiting on tile art. I've been having a really hard time keeping my artist from disappearing on me. I think we've gone though more then 5 on this project already...
Anyway, here are some screenies, they show the guards, and Katsu being seen by two guards. Once spotted by a guard, Katsu has until the guards progress bar fills up to get out of the guards view, otherwise he will have to start back from the last save point.
Because of the various headaches on Katsu, I have taken the last 2.5 weeks off to port a mostly finished flash game by two friends of mine to PC, Mac, and PocketPC. So far the game is almost game play complete and the first few levels are entirely playable. The game is called Little Soldiers and is a puzzle strategy game. You must move one or more "little soldiers" though a hostile environment using an assortment of actions that can create interesting chain reactions in the levels. For instance, if you dig away a dirt block supporting a falling brick, it will fall. If it lands on a dynamite crate, the crate will blow up and take the surrounding blocks with it, changing the layout of the level...
Here's some quick screenies of Little Soldiers.
Recent Blog Posts
| List: | 09/02/06 - The Complexity Barrier 08/08/06 - Happy building Jay 12/19/05 - Do independent developers make indie games? 11/13/04 - Plan for Dan MacDonald 10/12/04 - Plan for Dan MacDonald 07/11/04 - Plan for Dan MacDonald 06/19/04 - Plan for Dan MacDonald |
|---|
Submit your own resources!| Josh Williams (Jun 19, 2004 at 10:30 GMT) |
| Dan MacDonald (Jun 19, 2004 at 16:23 GMT) |
Katsu was actually demoed at last years IGC, it looked a lot different then, mostly developer art etc. Features and tweaks have been added since then to make it more accessable and easier to pick up as well as revamping parts of the gameplay that were causing frustration for players.
Little Soldiers is "playable" now, and has about 4 levels that you can play though. I'm working on getting gameplay complete before I go in and make the refinements to the rest of the game. I'd say it will be to a demoable state in about 2 weeks. A public demo that is... If your interested send me an email and I can hook you up with a "behind the scenes" build :)
| Jay Barnson (Jun 19, 2004 at 16:31 GMT) |
But I've known about it for a while now! T
| Matt Sayre (Jun 19, 2004 at 17:34 GMT) |
| Dan MacDonald (Jun 19, 2004 at 17:42 GMT) |
Another big change was that the game went from 8bit palletized mode to true color. It made a big difference with the graphics and the art pipeline...
| Ben Garney (Jun 19, 2004 at 17:57 GMT) |
Keep it up! You're close to the finish line!
| Bill Keller (Jun 19, 2004 at 18:57 GMT) |
| Dan MacDonald (Jun 19, 2004 at 19:02 GMT) |
Edited on Jun 19, 2004 19:03 GMT
| Steven Jackson (Jun 20, 2004 at 03:58 GMT) |
| Brian Ramage (Jun 20, 2004 at 04:49 GMT) |
| Patrice Krysztofiak (Jun 20, 2004 at 06:36 GMT) Resource Rating: 5 |
| Tony Pottier (Jun 20, 2004 at 23:16 GMT) |
I hope we'll be able to play a demo soon.
You must be a member and be logged in to either append comments or rate this resource.
