Microgame

Researching Microgames

Sugar Sugar is a example of a micro game that I have experience with.

It has a simple but addictive concept to it, the player needs to create a contraption in which would allow the sugar to enter cups at various positions in each level, the player uses the mouse to draw lines on the level which the sugar will interact and create paths using gravity to complete the game. This will be a good example for me of a simple concept done well can seem innovative and fun.

Bowman is a good example of simple physics being the core of very addictive game, the premise of the game is the player plays as a stationary bowman taking turns to shoot at another Computer or Player bowman, the thing that carries the game is the reaction to arrows hitting the characters and the mastery of the angle which the arrows head towards the player.

I am going to take inspiration from the arrows being thrown and see how something similar can be added to the game we are going to create.

Fruit Ninja is a good example of satisfying gameplay effects through sound and visual reaction to the fruits being hit, basic premise of the game is to chop fruits without hitting none fruits, i am going to look into the fluidity of the animations and the sound design and take inspiration as i think this is a good example of it being done well, i will also take some gameplay inspiration like the speeding up of the game by spawning harder and more frequent things, as well as adding some hazards to make it more interesting to play.

Todays date is 08/09/2023

We create a mood board for our game with inspiration on designs and gameplay.

The Basic design of the game that we have came up with is the player get a random piece of trash and have to decide which bin it needs to go into, once decided the player throws the item straight in the bin or off a wall and in to score points and restart that gameplay loop. the player can move left or right and aim the direction in which the player wants to throw the item.

Here is a Storyboard of the gameplay which will be the basic gameplay loop we will build around.

This includes Moving left and right, throwing the rubbish into the correct bin, gaining points and you can hit it off walls and in the bins.

 Created the first draft of the trello board which we will flesh out when we start drafting ideas for the design of the game.

Assets List

1. Player
2. Paper (Throwing Item)
3. Metal (Throwing Item)
4. Plastic (Throwing Item)
5. Paper (Bin)
6. Metal (Bin)
7. Plastic (Bin)
8. Background
9. Throwing sounds
10. Throwing animation
11. Wall react sound
12. Bin hit sound
13. Fail sound 
14. Complete sound

We Created a storyboard for the game which is the basic gameplay loop, a mood board to demonstrate the theme of the game, asset list of everything we need to create for the gameplay and added a little bit to the trello.

12/09/2023

We Created the Games Design Document for the game we are creating. 

Creating the game design document went well as its a simple task with a good guide on how to complete.

13/09/2023

We Finished fleshing out the Trello board so everyone knows what they are doing we added everything that we can think of needed. 

I started development of the micro game with first creating a blank project as we will be only creating our own assets and blueprints to feature in the game.

Once everything was set up to start the blueprints I created a player blueprint and programmed walking left to right as this the the only method of moving that will be in the game.

I then moved onto making the basic gameplay mechanics blueprints.

I created the inputaction throw which will be the core of the gameplay mechanic.

I then created fleshed out the throwing mechanic to allow for a item to spawn in and be effected by a velocity input which sends the item up and forwards in a throwing action.

I then fleshed out the aiming mechanic to draw a predicted projectile path to simulate a aiming arc so the player can aim and fire the throwing item into a bin which is the main goal of the game. 

I then created the mouse aiming mechanic to allow you to move the mouse to change the velocity and aiming of the projectile which was done by translating the mouse position in the viewport at a specific location, into a world location.

once the basic blueprints was created i moved onto compiling all the assets that will be in the game into the scene to see how they turned out, i will be talking to the others and changing somethings as they do not work well within the game.

Here is the present progress on the game.

https://youtu.be/Vczw8r0oPac

Looking back on the project I feel like I could have done a lot more with the game but due to attendance constraints I was unable to get the finished product I would of liked to, we had a lot of issues with importing assets into the game as when they was created it got made in one project and the materials was jumbled up making the assets unusable in the game, which caused a lot of time issues.

I would like to be able to add better assets in the game, as well as spend more time fleshing out some of the systems making them a lot better as i feel like its still in the basic form.