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As you've seen Sense is starting to shape up but is currently pretty mindless. Here's my idea for goals and replayability, feel free to add your inspiration! - The goal is to get the highest score on an online leaderboard by killing as many enemies as possible during a set time, say 10 minutes. To make this a little bit more interesting i thought of splitting these minutes into waves where the amount of enemies, the amount of types of enemies, the size of enemies and the music intensifies for each wave. Finish off with a big enemy. My first idea was to only have one level but utilize it for as much as possible to keep development time down and include a simple editor where people could make new maps, much like Sentry and maybe add more later. Other gameplay modes: So what do you think? |
Submitted by SolidBenny
Sun, 11/22/2009 - 17:56
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I like this! 10 minutes
I like this!
10 minutes sounds a bit long I´d guess 3 min -> 5 min is probably better but this has to be tested...
The game feels very survivalish to me... stay away from the dangerous enemies and kill of the smaller ones before they get to many.
I like that the bullets ricochet off the walls so skill shots could be rewarded either by points or damage...
my first idea was 30 minutes
my first idea was 30 minutes
I was thinking how long a starcraft game took but i guess i can't make this as varied during that time.
I thought the wave idea would extend the life of a match though?
Exactly and with the tools that will be available you can find different strategies.
Other planned weaponry/skills are:
- grenades (colored?)
- different types of traps, bombs, sentries
- mass driver could be a chargable weapon
- waiting to fire causes the first shot to be more powerful
- rewards to firepower that increases as long as you kill but don't get hit
- increased firepower / talent at low health
I will of course have to choose if i'll ever want to get done.. what do you think will be more fun and fit the game the best?
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Solid Core Entertainment
Developer of Roadclub and Sense: Survival Prelude (Developer blog)
I agree with Toll
The time should definitely be below 10 minutes, 3-5 sounds best, 10 minutes or above should be reserved for multiplayer gameplay.
I'm not a big fan of having the score be dependent on weapon type, but perhaps a small bonus for "trick shots" as long as this bonus does not become overused. Perhaps accuracy could be involved instead of the standard spray and pray?
I personally like these 2 suggestions that you listed:
- rewards to firepower that increases as long as you kill but don't get hit
- increased firepower / talent at low health
Having the firepower increase while not being hit should scale fairly well to the health of the enemies in later waves in my opinion, so that it becomes a lot more difficult if you do get hit late game. Maybe let it recharge faster up to the point you were at though so that it doesn't become impossible just because of one mistake.
Maybe speed up the music(if any?) or add heartbeats or something similar at low health to make the player feel the "oh crud"-feeling.
I haven't tried this iteration yet so I can't give concrete feedback, but I'll give it a go during the week.
A suggestion if you want some inspiration would be to look at Dawn of War 2, the "last stand" gameplay mode is one of the better survival modes I've played in games. You can probably find some videos on youtube and combined with reading up on the mechanics it might give you some nice ideas.
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There's no kill like an overkill!
beware of not being able to catch up
With increasing difficulty it is always hard on the player if their capabilities have evolved in tandem with the difficulty increasing, and then a death or some other event resets the players caps and not the difficulty.
UfoPilot II Arcede Mode was a test to see if I could simply graft on another playing mode onto the existing levels and gameplay, and though the upgrade system works in a lot of ways it DOESN'T quite work when the player is reset on death. There is no real way to get back into the flow.
Bad design om my part here...
Gravity Force (on Xbox Live Arcade and Steam) tends to clear the entire playing field when the player dies, which is a nice touch and a chance to get back into the flow.
Come to think of it, I had problems with this in AstroCreeps as well (on player death), and that's why I iterated to the current solution of pushing asteroids away from the spawn point as well as killing any creeps within a liberal radius. This allows the player to get his/her bearings in a cluttered playing field.
/johno
"you can't stop the change"
the 30-minute match was
the 30-minute match was intended to be played by several players yes. maybe 10 minutes * amount of players could be the default. it will have to be tested and configurable in the future.
score modified by hits / shots could be a factor to encourage accuracy. a multipler based on an "accuracy level" that changes in realtime could be a visual representation.
i definitely agree that in some way you have to get the power back. i hate when you lose too much stuff in other games. it ruins the game.
definitely need some aural and visual feedback for low health. i probably wont even have a health bar in the final game.
ive had some similar ideas to johno for death where you explode as youre resurrected so an area is cleared. if matches are short and teh game isnt too hard but more about score it could be possible to only have one life. when youre dead youre dead. i personally dont like that idea too much though even if its just one click to get started again.
thanks for yuor input guys. keep it coming!
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Solid Core Entertainment
Developer of Roadclub and Sense: Survival Prelude (Developer blog)