Project G.E.R.T for Xbox Live, using TorqueX
by Will O-Reagan · 06/28/2010 (8:09 pm) · 0 comments
With a month down, we have alot of work to finish this game, but so much in the bag, it really feels like we'll be able to nail it all down quite handily.
Our main concern has been, what is this character, what does she do, how does she interact with her environment, and what makes her fun to play? The answer to this is character. Gert at her heart is really two character's, embodying one body. Two twin sisters who have to occupy this body, to complete missions. For game play, this leads to one character having two sets of abilities. But thats not all this character can do, she can "Combine" her personality's, to occupy all these abilities at once. Well most of you are probably wondering, what is all this non-sense, so I'll break it down into it's simplist terms, in terms of stats, and what we have in game.
Gertrude Abilties:
Laser Firing Orb: Fly's around Gertrude, lighting up objects and firing at bad guys
Super Shoes: Equip-able shoes which allow for double jumping, and enhanced speed.
Forcefields and Shields: Glowing aura's, which help light the world, and protect against bad guys, and projectiles.
Cassandra Abilities:
Magical Wisp: A wisp which flys around, and lights the path.
Weapon Augmentation: Particle effect style fireballs, and sonic blasts
Hightened HP: Powerful braclet's which highten the HP of the character.
If the players collect enough "Memorys" they can combine all these powers, and become a super force, otherwise, the player must embody only one personality at a time.
Technically this game engine is featuring networking, and a huge item equipment system, along with a huge dialog playing system. The functionality is mostly there, but the networking and bad guy's still need work, as we need to add states for "Stun" and "Knockback" and "Catch on fire". Of course, video is still a long way off, but trust me, alot of this is already in the engine, just waiting to be unleashed with good art.
The team has come together nicely, and is mostly driven by myself and my new partner Mark, who has been, well, just awesome. He does alot of really good art, and puts the whole game design into PSD files, and things, which makes programming easy, because I can see the idea, and get the thing programmed right the first time, because its been hashed out and thought about by two people, and flaws are usually exposed immediately, and addressed, before programing starts.
Well, its all fun and good to try and write about all this, but in reality, I want to get a good video in for the next blog, maybe at the end of July. And that may require some rest. Programming in TorqueX is awesome, and the Platformer starter kit is really a huge asset for this project.
Our main concern has been, what is this character, what does she do, how does she interact with her environment, and what makes her fun to play? The answer to this is character. Gert at her heart is really two character's, embodying one body. Two twin sisters who have to occupy this body, to complete missions. For game play, this leads to one character having two sets of abilities. But thats not all this character can do, she can "Combine" her personality's, to occupy all these abilities at once. Well most of you are probably wondering, what is all this non-sense, so I'll break it down into it's simplist terms, in terms of stats, and what we have in game.
Gertrude Abilties:
Laser Firing Orb: Fly's around Gertrude, lighting up objects and firing at bad guys
Super Shoes: Equip-able shoes which allow for double jumping, and enhanced speed.
Forcefields and Shields: Glowing aura's, which help light the world, and protect against bad guys, and projectiles.
Cassandra Abilities:
Magical Wisp: A wisp which flys around, and lights the path.
Weapon Augmentation: Particle effect style fireballs, and sonic blasts
Hightened HP: Powerful braclet's which highten the HP of the character.
If the players collect enough "Memorys" they can combine all these powers, and become a super force, otherwise, the player must embody only one personality at a time.
Technically this game engine is featuring networking, and a huge item equipment system, along with a huge dialog playing system. The functionality is mostly there, but the networking and bad guy's still need work, as we need to add states for "Stun" and "Knockback" and "Catch on fire". Of course, video is still a long way off, but trust me, alot of this is already in the engine, just waiting to be unleashed with good art.
The team has come together nicely, and is mostly driven by myself and my new partner Mark, who has been, well, just awesome. He does alot of really good art, and puts the whole game design into PSD files, and things, which makes programming easy, because I can see the idea, and get the thing programmed right the first time, because its been hashed out and thought about by two people, and flaws are usually exposed immediately, and addressed, before programing starts.
Well, its all fun and good to try and write about all this, but in reality, I want to get a good video in for the next blog, maybe at the end of July. And that may require some rest. Programming in TorqueX is awesome, and the Platformer starter kit is really a huge asset for this project.
About the author
I have a degree in dramatic art, and literature, from UC Santa Barbara. I've worked for a few studios, also at Animax Ent in 2008, and some smaller studios. Currently studying Computer Science at CSU Channel Islands.
