Game Challenge #7: Final Entries

Why don't we get some constructive criticism as well?

I felt that I did a good job with the technical side of my game, all considered it was a pretty ambitious genre for the time span but I had a hard time building a really fun game around it. There really wasn't much more to a top down space shooter than running away while holding down the mouse. The thing I liked the most was the electricity shooting and targeting. It looks pretty cool and was cheaper both in coding and performance than keeping track of a bunch of bullets.

^I found it quiet fun. Especially zapping arund 20 cells at once. >:)

•Best graphics/eye candy
RenderHJS
Looked great, good work. Also worth a mention here are both Mentuat's and 691175002 games.

•Most fun game
Mentuat
Really sweet unique control method, and the game I've played the longest.

•Most original game
Captain_404
Mainly 'cause it was the most mental. All the games showed lots of originality and / or twists to existing genres.

•All around goodness
691175002
An amazing achievement in such a short space of time. Good work mate.

It's such a tight comp, where nearly any of the games I've played could have picked up the vote in any of the categories.

Well done everyone. Now it'd be nice if a couple more people on the board could take the time to play some of them and vote, there are actually more entries than votes atm :)

Squize.

I have prepared some general comments around the participants, please dont feel offended with some of what I wrote- think of it as a honest and personal comment on the actual game.
My feeling is that a competition like this deserves more critism booth positive and negative - and for once I wrote more than a usual "I finished yet another game thread" reply here at FK per game.

All in all I must say that even though perhaps unexpierenced yet well executed pseudobot did a very good job - and like just like squize suggested at first it was a wise choise putting him up for the task. Pseudobot is already THE competition guy in my adressbook - good work mate

squize:
uses big images (title, end game, intro) I am not that sure but from a filesize and display ratio perhaps a bit to big sometimes. The brain image in the background is blurred and compressed to that extend that I would assume it was found on the internet with that resolution or less. The added sound and music is nice it gives it a more complete feeling.
Gameplay wise pretty simple and propably endless- controls are easy to get into: all in all simple and fun game.

TOdorus
No html embedding makes it look cheap, its farily oversized thus in my browser. He seems to have given the tutorial or introduction more credit as most others did but it has to much text - so most will skip it anyway (oh and some of the graphics look like boobs with nipples).
I tried the game for a while and almost had enough cells produced but then suddenly alot died and in the end I would say it took to long and was to difficult.
As for the graphics- like I said if you scale the flash movie things dont look that nice because you can easier see the quick doodle quality. There is not much of a color palette and white background is another indicator of a quick created game. All in all I think that some sounds and more balanced colors would as well as a more fast paced gameplay would do good to the game.

Mentuat
Very big fonts for my taste- half it would do just fine imo. The background stripes look like a room wallpaper- overal the screen area is mostly empty and I think that it could be reduced because it doesn't use much of the screenspace. The game seems to be fairly simple though I dont get satisfaction of the less impressive shoothing even more as I have to shoot each enemy twice with different weapons. Some more explosions, particles or other instant visual feedback would help here (perhaps some score pointometer or alike).
When the brain said 0% nothing happend - not sure if intended but that's of course also a way or intepretation of the term "death".

PhobiK
Quite a long preload, till the main menu appeared - I assume big and lots of images. The font on the main menu is default (arial?) and boring - a few of these would do way better:
http://www.dafont.com/theme.php?cat=303
the colors remind me of alien. All in all I like the colors though I think that the text shouldn't be necessarily as it doesnt blend at all with the rest of the colors - so some tinted pink, red or other color imo would do better.
The points: textfield has aliasing and most likely is a input textfield - things like that should always be avoided if possible because people like me always instantly recognize such things ;)
I played it a few times and I noticed that if I dodge in the corner nothing happens- maybe the distribution function should incorporate that more instead of just plain random().
The music gets annoying but it was nice at first. I didn't succeeded further as the first level but if my impression is right you created more levels (parts of the brain) - and that's a plus imo. as well.
All in all: nice colors, nice presentation (except the fonts) but very simple game

Rachil0
To bad he wasn't able to put it online the propper way- it took me almost 1/2 a minute to download, extract, find the root swf and then play the game. So presentation way minus points here- a online swf embedded in a html would be the best way so no xtra user interaction or installation is required.
The game is farily impressive for something that has been written from scratch in a pure code enviuronment- I at least have respect for that because it usually requires that someone is rather organized and has a somewhat strict plan in his head.
I did not saw yet a goal in the game other than surviving - but controls and the overal feels thanks to the the simple but good enough graphics and sounds was nice.
Some sounds were a bit loud for my taste - but all in all very nice code only game development.

renderhjs
I am going to write about mine as well but only critic points I see myself. All in all the game has not yet a real game - goal- there are some elements that would fit in a complete game but the core mechanics are missing.
At some point it also feels a bit random because it is not clear why things are the way they are in the game- perhaps some less abstract graphics would make roles and goals more easy to read.
Like how a enemy should look like, the good one, a wrong hit and many more aspects could have been better designed. Missing sounds make it also look less complete.

691175002 / number guy (btw. is that you pin number? :p)
Nice splash screen- those scripted motions in the background are also a nice addition. In the first level moving zig zag seems to work fairly well without shoothing at all. The 2nd level is already to difficult for me + the levels feels a bit oversized.
I also dont get much satisfaction of the shooting- it feels lame and under-powered. A single shot with feedback like explosions or alike would be nicer.
The colors are simple, blue and white which is perfectly ok but just as a suggestion: some fine color gradients could do some nice effects. The environments in the game are very boring (a traced image - with sloppy vector curves)- more details procederal or manually placed would be nice. The enemies on the other hand look detailed and nice - some more impact effects on them would be nice but its ok as its now.
All in all: nice presentation and interesting idea.
0
Captain_404
I like the scanline effects :p - the gradient in the brain gives it also this microscopic look. The font at the bottom is not propper embedded (ugly aliased times new roman here) - controls and gameplay are a bit hard to grasp due the lack of visual feedback other than moving.
Some feedback for selecting, hitting and or getting hurt would be essential to give it a better direction. But if I am not mistaken Captain_404 mentioned that his submission was not really done.
But what I can say so far is that I like the visual direction he has taken so far.

__________________________________________________ _____________
so my final nominees are (me/ renderhjs excluded):

Best graphics/eye candy
691175002 (it feels actually like a environment with enemies)

Most fun game
Squize (it has more of the litle xtra elements a game should have)

Most original game
- (I dont feel like nominating any for this category,- because often the games are to simple or to clichè inpsired of what we already know, maybe next time)

All around goodness
Rachil0 (even though it has not much direction, but I like the overal feel)

technical archivement (my xtra category)
Rachil0 (impressive execution of a code only and external media game)

"The brain image in the background is blurred and compressed to that extend that I would assume it was found on the internet with that resolution or less"

:)

If you search for "Brain" on google images it's on the front page:
http://www.morphonix.com/software/ed...wet_brain.html

A filter was added to soften it up ( Nasty gif image ). I was planning to have multiple copies of the image to make a faux 3D effect as you moved around, then figured that I'd rather not be working on the w/end so didn't bother.

Very honest and good post mate.

Squize.

Ah feedback! Let's reply.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by PhobiK

-TOdorus: awesome game and very creative! I enjoyed a lot playing it. I couldn't pass it though :( I only got like 7 cells. Liked the story too :)

---

I'm flattered. More of a spur of the moment thing, but the concept turned out ok. Still needs some tweaking though, especially on difficulty (as you mentioned, but more on that later).

And ofcourse thanks for my first (and only?) vote! :D

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by renderhjs

No html embedding makes it look cheap, its farily oversized thus in my browser. He seems to have given the tutorial or introduction more credit as most others did but it has to much text - so most will skip it anyway (oh and some of the graphics look like boobs with nipples).

---

Actually the introduction was a bit slapped on in the end, as it just came to me. I noticed the booblike qualities of the cells (which actually aren't braincells/neurons, but it's easier to animate the celldivision with round cells). I disagree on the amount of text: it's more of a small collection of oneliners. I intended it to be easy to digest chunks.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by renderhjs

I tried the game for a while and almost had enough cells produced but then suddenly alot died and in the end I would say it took to long and was to difficult.

---

Your're totally right. If you concentrate on freshly created cells, or cells that just spawned another cell, you concentrate on cells that are already well fed. With that strategy you would be able to overcome the goal with some challenge. If you were unaware of this strategy the goal is really really hard to reach.

As I wanted the game to be a simple one level game, I had to choose between two options: adjust the goal to the optimal strategy or to the "n00b" strategy. I chose the first, but really I should make levels.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by renderhjs

As for the graphics- like I said if you scale the flash movie things dont look that nice because you can easier see the quick doodle quality. There is not much of a color palette and white background is another indicator of a quick created game. All in all I think that some sounds and more balanced colors would as well as a more fast paced gameplay would do good to the game.

---

I have to credit this to my inexperience with publishing games. I was unaware of the scaling issue. Graphics are my weak point as you point out so extensivily.

The background is actually a shade of pink. I experimented with it a bit, and found darker colors made it to hard to make out the sprites. I do intend to make some more out if it, but I'll wait for other comments before I start polishing it.

I totally agree with the faster gameplay, but I need to add some lines that guard what sprites get spawned, as now each sprite just has a certain change to get spawned. This can create gaps in the gameplay when certain sprites are absent for some time. Giving the player some of the stuff he needs would keep the game going and keep it interesting.

I hope you dont mind but your honest reply was motivation enough making this quick tutorial as an example how one could create without much effort higher quality images out of bad ones from google images or alike:

http://www.renderhjs.net/bbs/flashki...suggestion.gif

it could then end up like this (25% scale in my case as I worked huge)
http://www.renderhjs.net/bbs/flashki...on_example.jpg

Nice :)

In my defence ( For being lazy ) I figured I wouldn't pick up the best graphics "award", so I decided to cut my loses with it and go with quick and dirty.
( I hoped my little synapses firing anims would be more than enough ;) ).

Squize.

•Best graphics/eye candy
- Renderhjs

•Most fun game
- Squize

•Most original game
- Not sure about this one, none of them felt super original

•All around goodness
- Mentuat

yo! finally had a chance to sit down and play all the games properly!

I gots some comments:

Pseudobot:

good organizing dude! love the open-source aspect to it, very important - hopefully will retain for future things like this, totally sits well with the community ethos of flashkit!

squize:

overall: amazed you managed to make a proper top-to tail game with sound, music, game-play build up, sparky effects and old-skool text effects when I know full well you would've been slouching on the satin chaise-longue in your hugh hefner dressing gown, half an eye on the match and a 4 litre box of rose chilling gently on the dry-ice

downers: it's still not fecking paradroid is it? when are ya gonna make it eh?

best for: safest pair of hands in the bizniz (unless your niece is in the room)




toderus:

overall: love joe's non-committal expression in the intro. The game is by far the freakiest psychadelic experience of the lot. It kept the tension high nicely and I managed to get a good rythmn of collecting and dropping off keeping 5 of the little beggers alive for a good time.

downers: still confused whether Joe's pastime was cooking or collecting teeth

best for: keeping those fingers busy




phobik:

overall: looks proper slick, music went well with the pace of the game, games got the heart-beat quickening. Impressed with it being a multi mini-game type thing considering the 2 day limit dude!

downers: a tad too dificult for me

best for: impressive use of the word 'erythrocytes'




rachilo:

overall: looks like a lotta love went into it. Nice stress level induced by the chasing meanies. Loved the area-cut-off gameplay aspect, nicely balanced. The game with the most replay factor for me - gotta be the best sign of a good game

downers: more levels! bigger levels! more levels! bigger levels! make it work on my ipod thingy so i can play it on the bus!

best for: replay factor




RenderHJS

overall: looks like a proper cool little ds game, love the movement and effects, obvious you have a real eye for it. Slick intro screens and nice little corner graphics in-game

downers: not actiony fun enough for action looking game, not puzzly fun enough for a puzzle feeling game

best for: super slick looks




691175002:

overall: great looking from the get-go, real nice moody feel and music. Properly impressed you can build this in 2 days. For me it was the game that I had most emotional connection with kinda thing - Loved the feel you were really in dark cavernous place with everyone out to get you. You should be proper proud of this.

downers: tough to get into at first

best for: mood and tone



captain_404:

overall: liked the look of it. made me feel proper medical playing it, never really figured out what I was doing right/wrong though - I'd send a blue thing over, a little white line would appear underneath it and it would come back depressed.

downers: would like to see it finished

best for: confusing me



so, in conclusion:

•Best graphics/eye candy
RenderHJS

•Most fun game
rachilo

•Most original game
toderus:

•All around goodness
691175002


wooha!

Thanks for the comments render, you are one of the people I look up to.

Same thing to mentuat, it's great to get some feedback on what works and doesn't work and the 48 hour games are a really quick way to get the experience of making a full game.

And ratings:

Squize: Simplestic game but the idea is a lot of fun. The graphics let it down a bit.

TOdorus: Great idea but I had a hard time even maintaining more than 6 or seven cells. Amusing introduction but the graphics all around looked too "Flash"ish.

Mentuat: Nice clean graphics, nice simple and fun game, the entire thing feels complete. The relationship between the movement of the two paddle things added just the right hint of depth to the game.

PhobiK: Like render I am going to have to say the fonts let you down. The multiple minigames is a nice idea but you might want to add a way to choose which order to beat them in since I'm not sure many people will have gotten all the way to the end.

Rachil0: Its a shame you tied yourself to the Vector class, but it's impressive to do a game the code only way in such a short timeframe. Controls were nice and refined, I liked how you could move between "tiles" without being constrained to them.

renderhjs: Of course the best looking of the lot, and a lot of potential too. If you had managed to finish I have no doubt it would be a landslide.

Captain_404: A shame you scrapped so many ideas. The graphics are a good start but I really have no idea how the game works or how to beat the AI.

Best Graphics:
Render

Most Fun:
Mentuat

Most Original:
Todorus

Overall:
renderhjs


Contest turned out pretty nicely, some more clarity about the timing would have closed all the holes but this was quite successful. If I have time and inspiration I will be sure to participate in the next one as well.

And yes, we really do need some more votes.

Squize

Very nice graphics, definately a few notches above untitled.swf ;) Pretty basic avoid-em-up gameplay, although I do like the fact that the enemies don't clump together into the size of one enemy, as is often a problem with these games.

TOdorus

I think you had a good concept, but I wasn't completely sure what made a cell grow and divide. I mean, I know it involves bringing the different types of 'food' or whatever to the cell, but there were a few games where I did just that and nothing seemed to happen. Perhaps you images could have you a few more visual clues as to what to do and your instructions a few less words.

Mentuat

Good clean graphics, I liked how the cannons shook when they shoot. At first it was a bit odd to control and to figure out how to control, but it was easy to use once I got the hang of it. I liked the twist of the usual 'defend the center' game in the fact that you had to shoot everything twice, it ads a bit more difficulty, but that difficulty is almost undone when you figure out you can put both cannons in basically the same place. It might have been more interesting if they were locked on opposite sides.

PhobiK

Your graphics felt a bit too harsh, like the edges between things were too defined. I liked the quickfire minigame set up a lot, it really sets it apart from most of the arcade-ish entries. The music got on my nerves a bit, but blaring techno isn't really my thing, so...

Rachil0

for some reason I couldn't play your game, I think it was just an internet hiccup though, so I'll try again later.

Renderhjs

One of the most polished entries, graphics are smooth and clear, the frame rate seems nice and high too. I liked the concept of your game, I think it could really go somewhere, but it was lacking in definition and difficulty. I think red probably would have worked better for enemies as green is more universally associated with growth, spring, good things, etc. and red is more of a danger color, but I'm just nit picking. I did think it was lacking in difficulty, it was very easy to complete a game without hitting a single blue. Maybe this could have been fixed by making some blues actively pursue the player?

691175002

Out of all the games I played I think yours felt the most complete. I never got to the end though. The graphics were nice, but I felt the game speed was a little slow, the framerate could have stood to be faster. Ultimately, I got a bit bored with the game, but this tends to happens in shooter games for me, so I don't think it's really by any fault of yours.

Captain_404

It's too bad you didn't get to polish your game a bit more, I see what you were aiming for with the class-based, strategy shooter (seeing as, well, I AM you...) but your indecision early on definately came back to bite you. The objective is unclear as well as the control method. Some easing on the character movement would have been nice too instead of just incrementing the position by a static speed. So, it has potential, but I don't think it's realized.

•Best graphics/eye candy
- Renderhjs

•Most fun game
- PhobiK

•Most original game
- PhobiK

•All around goodness
- 691175002 or Render, can't really decide.


Although I'm not sure how much my votes should count for since I wasn't able to play Rachil's.

Good job everyone! I look forward to competing with you all in the next challenge :)

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Captain_404

Squize

Very nice graphics, definately a few notches above untitled.swf ;) Pretty basic avoid-em-up gameplay, although I do like the fact that the enemies don't clump together into the size of one enemy, as is often a problem with these games.

---

I meant to ask you Squize, are you using some sort of flocking algo for this or a distance calculation to ensure minimal distance from each baddie?

As, you can't edit, I'll have to post again...
I went thru and played the games again, and whilst my general opinion didn't change, I did manage to play Rachil0's game and I thought I should add a little detail.

•Most original game
- Rachil0

Which I thought was a nice take of an inverted pac-man game.

I should say that I really liked most of the entries for something, and that I was kind of sorry not to be able to enter...

very nice challenge, well done pseudo and all entrants :)
I like each of the games and think there´s some really cool stuff there, not just regarding the short timespan it was made in.
Most of what i´d say on the games has already been said, i like render´s look most and mentuat´s gameplay; Phobik and 691175002 get my vote on most complete and fleshed out game experience. I agree with charlie_says: When playing Rachil´s game the first few seconds i thought: oh man, yet another pacman, but then i noticed that it actually has some unique gameplay twists added to the classic pacman formula; seeing how many pacman variations there already have been that is indeed quite an achievment so he gets my vote for most original game :D
Captain´s one had some special mood to it, i´d like to see that in a bit more advanced version, its a similar thing with TOdorus one, really nice concept, with some more refinment it could be great (already had some fun with it, just didn´t really have the feeling of progressing a lot :(:) )

"are you using some sort of flocking algo for this or a distance calculation"

Check the code mate, it's what it's there for :)
( http://blog.gamingyourway.com/conten...x_codeOnly.zip )

Basically the baddies just wait x number of frames and then take a "snapshot" of the players position. They then add a random value to both the x/y of the snapshot so they're not actually moving directly to the player's position, but around it.
Because each baddie will have a different offset and take a snapshot at a different time they're all just moving to different locations, so they won't ever clump too badly ( Well unless you stay still for a while, but the player should be dead by then ).

Also as a side note, in the BaddieHandler is how to do quick and easy object pooling, which although it's in as3 can be written exactly the same in as2.
May be useful to someone.

Squize.

Squize - I really enjoyed the simplicity of the game combined with a bit more polish than average. It was nice to play a game that clearly hadn't been designed to be impressive in the amount of content it had for the time it was made in, yet at the same time was impressive due to the overall quality. At first I didn't notice the power ability and thought it was kind of boring, but once I discovered that I played it for quite a bit :).

TOdorus - I loved the cell animations :D. The game itself was well thought out and the difficulty level seemed good. I found myself getting quite into the task of keeping the cells filled up with each thing. I think with a few more hours put into polish it would have been really nice. I did feel that after a while I needed something else to keep me motivated to play, but overall very nice production for the time.

Mentuat - Loved the presentation and graphics style. The whole game was very appealing to me and I was very impressed by the level of quality it had for the time it was made in. I wasn't overly keen on the control method, it did the job, but to me it just felt like I didn’t have as much control as i would have liked, even so I found the game very fun and played it for a while!

PhobiK - Nice to see a variety of types of game all coming from the same theme. I think that this stood out from the rest as being a little bit different. The presentation was pretty nice, and I liked the idea of playing the different sections of the brain! The different game types was also impressive, I don't think that I would have wanted to try that in 48 hours! Nice job.

Rachil0 - Seemed to be very well made, nice job getting that done in the 48 hours! I found it really hard, but hey, maybe that was just me. The presentation wasn't as nice as some, but the game felt solid enough to make up for it. Nice twist on a classic game :).

Render - What can I say? This is right up my street :D. Absolutely loved the style, especially the explosions. The presentation was top notch, possibly the best of the lot. The gameplay itself I found really interesting. It didn’t seem complete to me, but at the same time it was a really nice idea that just felt fun to play. Some sort of chain reaction mechanism perhaps and some added strategy would have really completed this for me. Excellent job.

691175002 - Once again, a really nice presentation. I've been very impressed with the level of polish on most of these games. The amount you achieved in the time was really very impressive (probably most out of them all). I can't say I played to the end, but the variety of enemies and different levels was great for such a short development time. It just needs some powerups/different weapons and you would have a very nice shooter on your hands. This is probably the most "full" game of the lot. Very nice :).

Captain - Very much liked the visual style :). Some nice scripted background details would have just completed it I think. I found the game itself confusing at first, I had to look up your description of it to find out how to play. For four hours work it's great, and a pretty original idea! I think with clear instructions and maybe some nice graphical effects this could be a winner. It's a shame you didn’t have a lot of time to play with!


Ok my votes.

Best Graphics: Renderhjs

Most Fun: Mentuat

Most Original: Captain_404

All around Goodness: Renderhjs


To those I didn't vote for, I must say I had a hard job choosing on most of those, it was very close! All of the games were above and beyond what I expected :).

Ali

Here's mine

Best Graphics: renderhjs

Most Fun: Squzie

Most Original: Captain_404

All around Goodness: renderhjs

When does voting stop?

•Best graphics/eye candy
- Renderhjs

•Most fun game
- Mentuat

•Most original game
- Renderhjs

•All around goodness
- 691175002

Finally got around to playing rachil0's game, so here are my votes:

•Best graphics/eye candy
- Renderhjs

•Most fun game
- Squize

•Most original game
- TOdorus

•All around goodness
- Renderhjs

It was really tough choosing these considering the near-equal quality of all of the games. Awesome work for such a short time!