New Year, New Blog, New Game...
by Leroy Frederick · 01/05/2007 (10:44 am) · 2 comments
New Year:
First off, Happy New Year to all and one! And I hope it was a blessing to see through 2006 in one piece (or at least in as few pieces as possible!). 2007 already! Scripturally speaking, 7 is the number of completion, so this year should be a great year for finishing stuff off successfully, at least that's what I'm believing and hoping for ;0)
New Blog:
This is my first blog as you may of gathered from the title and you may of also guessed from the title I'm not just here to unselfishly wish you all a great 2007. It's a new year, but I don't wait for it to make new year resolutions, I do that on a daily, weekly or monthly basis. Nonetheless, I do have many plans, goals and ambitions set for the 07, so God willing, this will be the year of the E! And the year of 'insert_name_here' for you!
New Game:
So, now to the game in question. Well, where best to start? I began developing this a few weeks ago now (around 16th Dec 2006). My aim was to get it complete (in a releasable, playable and possibly purchasable state) within a month of that date, and thank God, I'm pretty much on target :0)
The game itself is being developed in the excellent Torque Game Builder (no, I'm not on a payroll), but it started life in another dev environment a few years ago if I remember rightly. Up until now, it's just been gathering digital dust on my hard drive!
Before I get into any more text heavy material, here's a quick screenie to relieve your eye reading and hopefully wet your appetite, then I'll give you some info and a brief description of the game itself.
The game is called 'MiMic' and the aim is to mimic the click actions of the computer or a human opponent by means of what you see or / and hear. As you successfully progress through the levels and stages, the click actions will increase as well as the speed of those actions. Also the size and layout pattern of the click objects will grow and vary!
At this point I'm at the main course of the game (main gameplay elements) such as getting the mouse input working, attempting to move the cursor for the computer to the position of the object it chooses to click at varying speeds and allowing 1-2 players to repeat the action and check that the objects clicked are in the correct order.
Some ideas are still a little experimental at this stage and therefore bits and pieces may be more theory as oppose to definite (trying not to do a Peter Molyneux). For instance there are a few things that can change the difficulty or challenge of the game (modules), such as whether the player is told when they make a mistake instantly or after they've matched the amount of click actions. Or perhaps serving harder difficulty by forcing the player to start all over again if a single mistake is made! (harsh)
Another example is currently game modes are split into the different sense (Sight, Sound and Both) areas, this could change if for instance the sound element doesn't make enough sense or is just too hard.
Modules and ideas like these may or may not make it into the beta/final release version, but nonetheless this won't be known until I hit a few more milestones and have a few games myself.
Here's the brief features (off to top of my head, not definitive) list:
* Train your Brain and have fun doing IT!
* Play up to 2 players against each other or team up against the Computer
* Great selection of dreamscape backgrounds (well I thought it sounded good)
* Cool custom Click Object layout patterns
* Challenging and varied computer AI
Other stuff to come:
They are many other new and great things to come from the E after the release of this game including more games and products, a major website revamp, a dedicated gaming (Entertainment) site giving ESHQ breathing space, a few other new divisions and some new in-game/product technology that's still only in the mock-up / write-up stage, but lets get this game done first huh?
Links and more info:
To keep a close eye on the development of this (as well as future) projects, regularly check out the ES Development Laboratory at www.esdevlab.blogspot.com/. The plan is to post updates tri-daily (every 3 days) or less, but mainly when a milestone has been complete. There will also be exclusive screenshots and the like there too so you know where its at! Of course I'll posting around the GG site, just not as regularly (might be seen as spamming). Anyway, Thanks for reading and Happy New Year!
More links:
--- GG 'MiMic' Forum Page - www.garagegames.com/mg/forums/result.thread.php?qt=56189
--- Official 'Dev Lab' Page - www.esdevlab.blogspot.com/
--- ESHQ - www.eternalsyndrome.com/
First off, Happy New Year to all and one! And I hope it was a blessing to see through 2006 in one piece (or at least in as few pieces as possible!). 2007 already! Scripturally speaking, 7 is the number of completion, so this year should be a great year for finishing stuff off successfully, at least that's what I'm believing and hoping for ;0)
New Blog:
This is my first blog as you may of gathered from the title and you may of also guessed from the title I'm not just here to unselfishly wish you all a great 2007. It's a new year, but I don't wait for it to make new year resolutions, I do that on a daily, weekly or monthly basis. Nonetheless, I do have many plans, goals and ambitions set for the 07, so God willing, this will be the year of the E! And the year of 'insert_name_here' for you!
New Game:
So, now to the game in question. Well, where best to start? I began developing this a few weeks ago now (around 16th Dec 2006). My aim was to get it complete (in a releasable, playable and possibly purchasable state) within a month of that date, and thank God, I'm pretty much on target :0)
The game itself is being developed in the excellent Torque Game Builder (no, I'm not on a payroll), but it started life in another dev environment a few years ago if I remember rightly. Up until now, it's just been gathering digital dust on my hard drive!
Before I get into any more text heavy material, here's a quick screenie to relieve your eye reading and hopefully wet your appetite, then I'll give you some info and a brief description of the game itself.
The game is called 'MiMic' and the aim is to mimic the click actions of the computer or a human opponent by means of what you see or / and hear. As you successfully progress through the levels and stages, the click actions will increase as well as the speed of those actions. Also the size and layout pattern of the click objects will grow and vary!At this point I'm at the main course of the game (main gameplay elements) such as getting the mouse input working, attempting to move the cursor for the computer to the position of the object it chooses to click at varying speeds and allowing 1-2 players to repeat the action and check that the objects clicked are in the correct order.
Some ideas are still a little experimental at this stage and therefore bits and pieces may be more theory as oppose to definite (trying not to do a Peter Molyneux). For instance there are a few things that can change the difficulty or challenge of the game (modules), such as whether the player is told when they make a mistake instantly or after they've matched the amount of click actions. Or perhaps serving harder difficulty by forcing the player to start all over again if a single mistake is made! (harsh)Another example is currently game modes are split into the different sense (Sight, Sound and Both) areas, this could change if for instance the sound element doesn't make enough sense or is just too hard.
Modules and ideas like these may or may not make it into the beta/final release version, but nonetheless this won't be known until I hit a few more milestones and have a few games myself.
Here's the brief features (off to top of my head, not definitive) list:
* Train your Brain and have fun doing IT!
* Play up to 2 players against each other or team up against the Computer
* Great selection of dreamscape backgrounds (well I thought it sounded good)
* Cool custom Click Object layout patterns
* Challenging and varied computer AI
Other stuff to come:
They are many other new and great things to come from the E after the release of this game including more games and products, a major website revamp, a dedicated gaming (Entertainment) site giving ESHQ breathing space, a few other new divisions and some new in-game/product technology that's still only in the mock-up / write-up stage, but lets get this game done first huh?
Links and more info:
To keep a close eye on the development of this (as well as future) projects, regularly check out the ES Development Laboratory at www.esdevlab.blogspot.com/. The plan is to post updates tri-daily (every 3 days) or less, but mainly when a milestone has been complete. There will also be exclusive screenshots and the like there too so you know where its at! Of course I'll posting around the GG site, just not as regularly (might be seen as spamming). Anyway, Thanks for reading and Happy New Year!
More links:
--- GG 'MiMic' Forum Page - www.garagegames.com/mg/forums/result.thread.php?qt=56189--- Official 'Dev Lab' Page - www.esdevlab.blogspot.com/
--- ESHQ - www.eternalsyndrome.com/
About the author
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#2
Also, simplicity allows the project to be (hopefully) finished sooner rather then later ;0)
Regarding the Gui's, thanks again, it just takes loads of observation, practice and imitation! In between that process you should in time find your own style (or at least enough for your game's style). If you do that, you'll be able to do the same if not better after a while!
01/05/2007 (3:56 pm)
Thanks J Sears, I'm trying to keep it as fun and simple as possible, yet challenging at the same time with varying difficulty levels to make the entry level wide open for all types of players.Also, simplicity allows the project to be (hopefully) finished sooner rather then later ;0)
Regarding the Gui's, thanks again, it just takes loads of observation, practice and imitation! In between that process you should in time find your own style (or at least enough for your game's style). If you do that, you'll be able to do the same if not better after a while!
Torque Owner J Sears