[disc] Flashkit Minigame Marathon - proposal and discussion

[Ihoss]

dont u dare take over the world before me!!!

how r u going to let the timer control the movie? that should be standardised too. e.g. _root.currentgame.play(); then all games should stop before the game over screen and all the playing is in mcs in that frame. then the game should also have an unload statement, or at least something which lets the holder know it can unload that game and load the next one.

[Chopsticks]

Okay the ball is rolling( Terry's Chocolate Orange stylee ).

Excuse spelling - just come back from pub.

- UI needs to be universal.
i.e. intro screen before game needs to use same graphics to depict style of control etc.

- parameters passed into and out of game needs to be consistent( but the holding clip would account for total_timed_played, total_score etc )

- we need some kind of sheriff whom will pass judgement over the viability of each game. Whom ever oversees everything won't have time to vet each entry, so if they don't work according to the requirements spec, they'll just be told "sorry, try again"( this requirements spec should include reference to FPS on target machine ).

- sheriffs and martials responsible for UI functionality and general production matters( not sure if putting every aspect up to a public vote would work )

- suggest someone puts up separate web page that contains list of agreed specifications, e.g. movie size, publish framerate etc ( I can create and host if desired ).

- project should be set up in such a way that people can submit just SWFs( because they might wish to protect code etc )


I can code random games and help out with the game holding shell.

Suggest methid of establishing game sheriffs and matrials, e.g people put themselves up for nomination and from that list, others vote them in( seems fairly democratic )?

chopsticks

[xMCNUGGETx]

you guys get some standards set and the basics started, count me into contributing!

Sounds great. Sounds almost like a mario party single player game, but with less time on the mini games.

[thehumanchimp]

lol, yeh...if someone can get a final[ish] constants: size, both pixels, and KBs, and variables which can be used..then the games can start being made.

[Chopsticks]

I don't think the parameters are gonna be too hard to define.

We're all competent programmerS (if not spellers). As soon as the parameters are set, we can all just work within them( in fact, the more abstract, the better ).

Also - I only have access to Flash MX - is this an okay minimum?

chops

[WilloughbyJackson]

I'm not sure what kdsh7 is planning... but here's my plan..

The main movie would be structured like my illustration... After the player starts the game, a selects a character, a game board like Mario Party or Dragonball Z: Budokai 2 would appear in the staging area. The player's character would walk on the board (which would be randomly tile generated) to a spot, and start a "I'm here" animation.

DIRECTLY BEHIND THIS MOVIE, would be a empty movie clip, where everyone's game would load. The "I'm here" animation would repeat until the current game(or games) are loaded... Then the gameboard would go invisible or animate out, and the game below would start playing.

Once finished with the game, the person would either move on, on the game board after a victory animation or have a "ouchie" animation, and then move on...

Repeat...

The timer would call a function on the root level which would unload the current game movie clip, set up the next one, and then COVER THE PREVIOUS GAME WITH THE GAME BOARD...

I just think it's a neat way to avoid preloader animations in a way...

Data would only be sent between the two movies onLoad (or is it onData.. I forget...) and once the time runs out, on onUnload... (or whatever it's called in Flash.... I forget again...)

-pXw

(NOTE: I'll be offline for the rest of the night since a good friend of mine is going to New York City, so we're having a video game orgy before she leaves... Virtua Fighter eVo, Puyo Puyo, Bust-a-Move (Puzzle Bobble), Guity Gear XX, Fire Pro-Wrestling, etc..etc..)

EDIT: If you're going to have elections.. Someone, please nominate me for something... Maybe the overseer.. I don't know yet...

[thehumanchimp]

yeh, same...only Flash MX here

[Chopsticks]

p.s. before I start - is anyone already ferreting away at some game shell?

p.p.s Just have to say that we have a new company site - and it's beyond minimalism( or is that before? )

[WilloughbyJackson]

Hmm.. I only access to MX as well..

Also, I think Kdsh7 maybe working on a rough shell right now...

(And this is my last message... good night y'all... When I wake up tomorrow, I hope to have a lot of posts to read.. :P)

[Chopsticks]

After the player starts the game, a selects a character,

...would it be easier to stuff characters in a shared object that everyone can load into their game?

[WilloughbyJackson]

Originally posted by Chopsticks
...would it be easier to stuff characters in a shared object that everyone can load into their game?

Due to the nature of the games, the "game board" element I'm purposing would have little to do with the content or characters in the mini games...

It was just a little jazzy element since Wario World has a screen-rapper between the games...



-pXw

[Squize]

Personally, I don't think we need a seperate site, or anything else to add to the complexity.
The 48hr comp works cause it's simple. As soon as anything gets complicated on here, it seems to fall apart ( Even the recent voting didn't get the response it should have imho ).

As I see it, it's kdsh's baby, and if he wants to do the front-end all well and good. If not, someone else puts there hand up.
As soon as the specs are posted, everyone who wants to write a game can. The front-end > game api can be added later, it should only take 2 minutes.

Squize.

[Ihoss]

my game is done, jsut have to fix variable names. what, its not finished yet? god, that sucks.

ok, so these r the standards:

§size: 450(wide) x 350(high)
§size: max 32 kb
§timer: 450(wide) x 40(high) at bottom of screen
§time: 5 seconds
§version: Flash MX
§FPS: 30
§gameInfo: this function should be in the first frame of your file:

code:

---

gameInfo = {creator:"your name",name:"game name", info:"how to play",keyboard:false };

---

§endGame: this function is called when your game is finished:

code:

---

function endGame(){

	return victory;//a variable which can be true or false depending on if the player won or not

}

---

§Template: this is the template: http://www.flashkit.com/board/attach...postid=2749090
anything else i should add?

[random10122]

Count me in on some micro games...

The loading of the next game should definatly done in the 5 seconds that the user is playing, then its instantly there... you only need a success/failure screen for 2-3 seconds and the next game jumps right in.

Keep it simple and quick.

Whoever is designing the shell should get some variable names up in the next day, so even if the shell isnt complete people can start designing games with the right variables in place

Sounding good!

[random10122]

dont forget, we need an FPS to work to, obviously they will be converted when loaded into the host movie - but for people designing animations its fairly important.

I suggest 30fps as a reasonable standard.

[Ihoss]

there should also be some point awarding system, so that all the games give about the same points. e.g. if one game gave around 10 points and another gave 1000 points. the average points awarded should be around 1000. anyone disagree?

[iopred]

I'll be in for a few games.

If it will be like WarioWare, we have to have the loader do all the work, all it will do is load in the SWF, giving it the current speed of the game (games speed up the longer you play), which also affects the length of the game.

ALL the SWF does is return a boolean.. true if you won, false if you lost.

Aswell as loading in the SWF, the loader should do what WarioWare does and show a small description of what you have to do (dodge, land, jump, aim etc.)

If all the games are < 32kb things should be sweet.

As for scoring, it should be done EXACTLY the way it does in WarioWare, you get 1 point for each minigame you beat, the game gets faster the longer you play, so at the end it is based entirely on skill and reflexes (and at that time, more games will be in the Browser's Cache, and they will load quicker). Not doing it this way means scoring CAN be biased depending on which games are randomly chosen.

Finally, I dont think making the loader will be a big problem, infact I'll offer to code it if noone else can be bothered (it will be easy to code, but it needs to be done before any hardcore minigame programming should be done)

ps. I'm glad someone wants to do this also, I have alot of little games that I have made already (I had a similar idea after playing WarioWare religiously for days)

[thecombat]

Hey guys,

This sounds like a great idea, I'm definetly in, I'm currently working on my game...

While I was reading this I began thinking that this would be really cool if the graphics were pixelized....

[kdsh7]

Right, I'm absolutely shattered. I've just had a go at coding the front end and it almost works. I'll post the .fla in progress in case anyone wants to continue while I get some sleep, or use the basic setup to create something from it.

Here are my thoughts:

Ihoss, any chance you can make your stage size 450 x 350 with a 40 pixel space at the bottom (for the timer)? It would make it easier for people doing vertically orientated games where you need space at the top and bottom of the screen. Just putting black borders in would be fine also.

Willoughby, your board idea sounds great - something in the background to display scores and lives remaining between levels

Pred, you're right - the games only have to return a true/false and the holding MC will do the rest. I think it would be easier though making the speed of each game dependent on the current level number - it would allow everybody to easily set their own difficulty curves.

Here's what I've worked with:

Dimensions:
450 x 350 stage size - leave a 40 pixel gap at the bottom for the timer. Game should run at 30fps

AS:
first frame must be empty with a stop command. Also in the first frame will be a control=keyboard/mouse variable (so the main movie knows whether to introduce the game with a keyboard or mouse graphic) and a description="shoot/jump/attack" variable, so the game knows what word(s) to overlay on the introduction screen.

Victory/Failure Screen
Screens lasting 2 seconds each depicting victory or failure in the game. The Main Movie can therefore let the game display these instead of quitting straight out when the timer hits zero. These are in Wario Ware too, although contributors can use these to put their credit to their minigame.


The way I've worked the system so far is like this:

-The game starts and loads an XML file containing a list of all the games.

-the XML is parsed and a queue is created for the next 10 games the player will play. the 10 games are random and non repeating - so it's impossible to play the same game within a gap of 10 games. These are actually two arrays feeding data in and out of each other.

-each game loads onto the level you're currently playing. eg// level1 loads to _level1. it makes things easy to organise!

-after every level, the level just finished is unloaded, and the next game in the list is preloaded into it's _level. A random movie that is not currently queued is then selected to go next in the queue. (Willoughby, your idea is actually better presentationwise - it would look a lot nicer, but you have the risk of movies not loading on time)

-the main movie launches an 'intro screen' MC which loads the variables from the preloaded games, and displays the game instructions and control method. The last frame of this MC then launches the game.

This is as far as I've got - it works but it's terribly ugly

Squize - I wish I could have done it in two minutes

[Chopsticks]

kdsh7, or maybe Ihoss( as you seem almost there ) - might be an idea to create a template game FLA as soon as we have a game that meets all criteria!?!

chops