There have been sometime somekind fashion to create games with advanced physics engines especially in the commercial world. Slowly physics have sneaked to the indie scene too in games like Gish. Physics can create some interesting concepts and new twists to gameplay. Large and complicated physics are still very hard to program for hobbyists but it doesn’t block using them in your small budget games. In most times you don’t need full physic engines to achieve needed realism or neat effects. Lately I have played little with these ideas which originated from my recent physics studies. In this article I’m going to share some thoughs about some relatively small ideas how to implement physics in your game.

Formulas and math

First thing before starting to implement physic features to your game, you will need proper information about events to make them realistic in the game. I highly recommend you to study your possible physic lessons from new angle, as a element of game design. If there is new and interesting formula, you can try to imagine how you could implement it in game and what kind of gameplay elements it would make possible. You would be surprised how easy it’s to implement certain relatively easy physical formulas to GM games (and other games too). Depending the effect you are after, it can take some work to transform formulas to gameplay elements but I can recommend you to try make simulations from them to help you find out potential gameplay feature.

Genres and physics

After you have found interesting formula and maybe succeeded to simulate it, it’s time to start thinking how to implement it in game or what kind features you can build around it. Most often physics in 2d games are used in platform games to bring them a new twist to their old basic jumping. I think that reason for this is that in sideview games there is usually gravity which affects to player and is physical force itself, and it is pretty natural to start expanding from it to more complex effects. Gravity can also be used in topdown games such as space shooters and SHMUPs, maybe in planet scale. Closely with gravity is physics of motion, which will become handy in racing games, platformers, and shooters. You can think yourself different possibilities as it’s you who want to invent new game, right?

Just for realism or as gameplay element?

After you have some general idea of the different possibilities, you should start to think how you should use these new features. From rough perspective, they can be used as a gameplay elements and to add feeling of realism. Choice is always yours, but I personally would focus on gameplay elements to try to invent some new game concepts around single or two physics. To achieve realism you may need larger physic engines to simulate realistic world. Instead of this there is many creative games which focus around some law of physics as a gamemechanic. Next there is two short inspirations from me, which could be built around some pretty simple formulas. These are straightly from my imagination and probably need many extra features and adjusting to make playable. They are just example ideas, not actual concepts

Battleships

Player would control a small battleship in ocean fighting against different seamonsters and other battleships. For a fighting player should control cannon and shoot enemies down. Physics step in when calculating landing point and flying course. In the game player should control shooting direction and shooting power to deliver succesful hits to the enemy boats which will sail from the right edge of the screen in this sideview game. You could make program easily to draw the flying range of the bullet and add some strategy to the game. Actually I think it would work pretty well as a turn based game where there would be flying enemies alongside boats etc. From strategy point of view player should try to hit as many enemies with single bullet because of limited ammo or energy for shooting and kill only the deadly enemies approaching him. In every turn there will come a new wave of enemies and old ones would move too and attack. As the main theme of this game is try to snipe only deadly enemies with limited reources, the expected flying course would be  important element. Actually you could add features like hit percent and pinging bullets from surfaceof water (yes, it’s possible in real life too :D)

Orbit fight

Second possible idea could rely on the 360 degree gravity in space shooter. In the game all objects have certain mass and gravity field which affects to another units. In the beginning your ship haves only the core with relatively weak weapons. After you defeat enemies you get new parts to your machine and in the game these parts orbit around your spaceship increasing your strenght and mass. With larger mass you also may collect another objects around yourself like small asteroids or trap enemy spaceships. After your ship is large enough, maybe you could get even planets and use them as weapons? Cool huh? Your life energy is relies to your size. When part of your ship gets too powerful bump, it will flee from your gravityfield disabling it from your use. Actually you could collect lost parts from destroyed enemyships. With this kind system your ship would transform constantly resulting interesting gameplay possibilities. There should also be someway to control your gravity field, example weaken or power up it for short amount of time. Use your imagination

Conclusion

• Physics can play a major part when coming up interesting new gameplay features.
• They can be used to increase realism or to as a gameplay features.
• Different genres profit from different physics. Can be effective with both strategy and action games.

In short, you can use physics in games many ways and I recommend to start expanding from one or two basic forces and explore possibilities around them. Gravity is much more than just falling things example. Main key with this is imagination like in every other art form and if you can’t come up good game idea, well maybe you get atleast better grades from your possible physic lessons

-Tumetsu

PS: I will soon release one simplified example of calculating flying course for your inspiration

PPS: You can download the example from here

Well, it’s been some time, eh? Sorry for not posting anything for so long time. Believe it or not, I have been busy and have many things to care about. However, this is not about excuse of absence, it’s meant for some news about Paradox.

For those who don’t know about this project, it’s my longest game project. Been under development since early 2007. Game got 7 complete levels and demo release got many good ratings from sites like 64Digits. Sadly, the project froze due slow story planning and unsatisfactory for graphics and lacks of engine.

But the project have returned and it’s time for first peek to it…

Why start it again and why it’s so special?

Well, this is very dear project for me and it have gone through very long process of development. There is 4 notebooks full of notes about story, leveldesign, puzzles etc. Especially storyline have developed greatly since last release and there is very detailed plans about how to move story forward in game itself. This was main reason for the first version’s abandonment. More reasons for starting project again is the very positive feedback and current lack of good adventure games in Game Maker scene.

What’s new?

The new Paradox will contain some significant different features compared to it’s first version. All graphics have been updated and fined better, engine have been edited to support easier development and what the most important, the storyline is this time planned carefully. Here is list of some fixes and features which will be in new version of the game:

• Better graphics
• So called dynamic objects, which react to mouse and other events. Part of them are important in puzzles, rest just for fun like real time clocks, minigames etc.
• Lighting system. Game uses LehdaRi’s Light system to create dynamic lighting which will be used in puzzles and creating atmosphere.
• Better planned story
• Cutscenes
• Original soundtrack
• A lots of easter eggs and references to games, books, movies and such
• Some online functionality. Don’t expect multiplayer though
• More flexible and powerful engine.
• FPS from old 30 to 60 frames per second allowing smoother effects etc.
• Multiple languages. The number of languages depend on if I find some translators. English and finnish are supported though.
• 10 levels instead of 16. This is due more carefully planned puzzles and storyline.

When it’s complete?

Well, I can’t promise anything in this time. Second level is currently in development. But let’s hope that project will be completed this time. Your support is important

And what this was all about…?

And for those who don’t know anything about what I’m talking, here is short description of the game. Paradox is point & click adventure game which consists set of rooms. In these levels player have to use items and their brains to solve different puzzles to continue exploring mysterious building trying to figure out what’s going on. Game is also planned to be fitting for people who normally don’t play adventure games but it doesn’t mean that it’s not for adventure players too! For more information about the game, you can check the page of the original project

See you later!

Description

This is first and so far my last example It’s example of various things often needed in platform games. It pretty simple and I think pretty neat.

• Slope movement (though I forgot to add slopes in test field )
• Ladders
• Trampolines
• Moving platforms
• Falling blocks
• Character itself
• Water with current going left (easy to modify)
• Character itself

Note for unregistered GM users

This should work with unregistered GM version after you remove steam generators and other steam related stuff. Example won’t work with unregistered because of particle effect in steam.

Credits

• Basic engine: Tumetsu
• Slope movement: Kiwi
• Moving platforms: djrellik
• Music: Golden Sun 2  - Aqua Rock     -So don’t use it in your game ^_^

Download

After gettting some complaints about dark template and other minor issues, I have decided to change AF’s template. Because of that, there may be some weird layouts and things going on some time because I update site in live but these things shouldn’t block you to read site’s content.

After layout issues have been fixed, there may be some new content in the site. Just maybe…

-Tumetsu

This is one of my first abstract illustrations. It is made with shell, certain water/splash stock photos, blending modes and lots of adjustment layers. I also used Photoshops wave-filter a lot with burn and dodge tools to create the abstract “tail” to the shell.

If you’re interested in any kind of photo montage, you should go and take a look at stock.xchng which is one of the largest free stock photo sites. That’s were I found allmost all of my stock photos and it sure is worth to take a look.

Thought I’m little busy with summer jobs I’m working with Arctic Flowers newest game project so time won’t propably be enought for photoshopping outside of our project which means I may not publish any new art here in some time. Of course I put my older works into here now and then…

-Ussa

I’m person who likes to plan things out before starting something. It’s pretty useful skill in various things including art and yes, game design. Why planning is important? And when it’s needed and when it’s rather useless? How to plan? I’m going to cover these topics in this article about planning when developing games.

General planning before starting project

Before starting to code or draw anything, it’s very important to generate even somekind plan about what kind game you are going to make and what player can do in game. Some small games may be done completely extemporise but when developing sligthly bigger games it’s needed. I usually start by writing down the very basic idea of gameplay and theme to paper. After that I write more about basic features and moving towards smaller features. In this stage, you don’t need to write everything down, just core mechanics and features straighly connected to them. Leave all little graphic effects out for now. They come later. After you have somekind general plan, you can produce little prototype to test basic ideas. If concept works, you can start extend your plan for more details.

Advances of planning

Planning is very important because it keeps you in track about what you have to do. Often I get discouraged when I don’t exactly know what I should add next to my game. This can be avoided by good planning. I often make list of things what I have to make. First there are bigger and more important features and after them come little details and fixes and improvements for more important features. Good planning also helps you to come up new features and choosing right of them to your game. Often if you work completely extemporise, you get some “cool” ideas which later turn out to be completely out of the place. To avoid these kind accidents it’s recommended to write also down every feature idea and then ponder each of them throught before adding them to the to-do list. You should atleast think how they affect to the general gameplay, how they enhance the playing experience and do they complicate things too much. One of the most important advances of planning is that it keeps my motivation up. I can clearly see how much I have advanced and that game is advancing steadily.

Dangers of planning

Eventhough planning is generally good thing and I recommend to plan every project you have, there is some things you should notice and avoid. Eventhough planning helps to keep in right track and helps to figure the features which should be added to the game, do not take it literally always. You may find some interesting features to add and notice that certain features you have planned won’t work so well in real game. Feel free to develop your plan along the game. Plan should affect to the game, but it works another wat too. Your game should also affect to the plan because many ideas work well in paper but poorly in game itself. Another danger of plans is over planning. At the start of the project, don’t plan everything. Your plan probably will change when you advance with project and it can be just waste of time to plan everything from start. It can also be little discouraging to start project when you have 127 pages text about everything. I myself prefer this kind of order

1. Plan general idea and gameplay
2. Plan details and enhancements for core mechanics
3. Plan the graphical look and effects
4. Plan story and events

Why I recommend this order is because by planning them individually, you don’t take too big chunk at the same time. Most often story or details of graphics and core mechanics may be first too far fetched, so it’s recommended to first create your actual engine to avoid taking too much at once. Story and graphics come later and at the start you need only vague plans about them.

When needed?

Like I said, bigger projects need planning usually more than smaller minigames and such. However, in my opinion, plan about very basic concept is always needed. You can of course plan just everything, but if you aren’t much writer you can skip the smallest things like effects and such and deal them extemporise. This needs some kind “wit” about game design or visual eye to make perfect so you should think carefully which features you decide to plan first. Very detailed planning is rather useless in graphical effects like glitters and such in my opinion, because most of them look nice only after tested in game. Same goes for little user interface features. Eventhough I recommend to plan carefully interface, especially if it’s rather complicated, testing it might show you some good little features like button shortcuts which you should add eventhough it’s not in your original design.

Game design documents

You can find many “official” and unofficial game design document templates which offer certain perspective to the planning. Some of these may prove to be helpful, personally I don’t like much them. For me they are often little too formal and include just very basic things which makes them rather useless for me. From my experience, it’s more recommended to make your plan something more like journal and evolving document to keep up your notes and ideas. Game design documents prove their meaning often when game is somekind team project where all members have to know what’s going on. In larger teams clearly written prove to be very helpful. For solo designer who designs games mostly himself, this kind documents are pretty useless though.

Conclusion

• Plan everything out one piece at time. Don’t plan everything from start.
• Good planning helps you to keep motivation and vision of the completed game.
• It helps you to balance things and make gameplay better.

Careful planning usually don’t pay you much and might save you from useless coding especially when combined to efficient prototyping. However, don’t take it too far and focus on most important things. Smaller things come later or can be added extemporise. Give comments if you think I should add something more to article or just leave your thoughts!

Tumetsu

I have some news for you my dear readers. In upcoming week, I’m away and most likely I don’t write anything new unless my mobile phone can connect to the internet there. However, I wanted to share some things related to Arctic Flower.

Template modifications coming

Lately I have got some comments about how dark current template is. Seems like it really is VERY dark in older monitors or if your screen’s brightness is very low. Site shows fine with my laptop but is very dark in my desktop computer which haves pretty old monitor (from 2000 if I remember correctly ) Because of these darkness problems, I’m going to lighten current theme someway or replace current one completely. If anyone haves any knowledge about modifying or making Wordpress templates, help would be appreciated. I will start work template when I have more time so you have to wait atleast week and probably a bit longer. Until then, if template is too dark, you can still read content from RSS feed which is available in your browser’s URL bar.

New pen tablet

I bought new pen tablet Wacom Bamboo. Really nice little tool. This will mean new artwork from me and hopefully some useful graphs for game design and other articles to help figuring concepts.

New project

AF have now new project targeted to the YYG’s third competition. It’s code name is somewhat unadventurous; Turtle game. As you may have already guessed, it contains some turtles and concept which connects turn based strategy to fast paced action.  More about project will be revealed when work advances and we will get some screenshots to show you.

Tumetsu

Most of us have creative blocks occasionally when it’s hard to come up any new game ideas. This kind of problem led me to ponder some different ways how game idea can born. Developer can start their idea from theme, game mechanic or story. What are benefits of these different ways? How to feed your imagination? Some of my thoughts about these subjects I have written for you to think about.Themes

Many games have started from certain theme. Usually developer first thinks different themes before venturing to design actual gameplay. In my opinion, this may be the easiest way to come up new game idea because many themes have potential for interesting gameplay. Themes are also easier to find than pure game mechanics. You can find themes all around you; just keep eye everything around you. Did you notice those ants in your backyard? Or how water drops move on window glass when it rains?

Good thing with themes are that you can find them everywhere but it often requires much thinking how to make game from certain themes and will they be fun to play. In order to come up really original concepts using this approach you have to have imagination and not just think “Theme: Aztecs, Genre: Platform” Of course Aztecs is good overall theme, but try not to choose too easy solutions when developing it further. Try to invent original gameplay features which still are strongly related to theme itself. In other words, try to build gameplay around the theme and notice what it requires to work and which aspects you should leave away.

Game mechanics

This approach is more difficult than theme. When themes are pretty practical way to start planning, game mechanics are more abstract. Instead of thinking what there is in game, you should think what you can do in game. You could example first think you how player can move blocks or gems in puzzle game to clear them out. After you have created basic game mechanic, you can move to find good theme for your basic mechanic. In other words, you have to build theme around basic gameplay.

I personally like this method eventhough it’s little harder way than theme approach. I think that when this is harder, it also often creates something more unic because you start from scratch. When you think theme first, there is often some “obvious” ideas. When designing first the gameplay without thinking too much theme, you can more likely create something original. Many puzzle games are probably developed this way.

Story

Third way to start a game is to think it’s storyline and characters and then build theme and game mechanics around it. I have used this method only with my project Paradox and I think it works best with RPGs and adventure games where gameplay itself is often more or less same. You should use this method only with bigger games or if you have good writing skills. Story can hook player efficiently if done correctly, but if it’s rather poor and gameplay and theme are pretty generic player will get bored quickly.

When using this method I would recommend also pay attention to game mechanics and theme. Good theme can provide some interesting material for story and good gameplay keeps player playing until story graps s/he or it can make poor story more tolerable. Starting from story is probably hardest to make correctly because many -especially new- developers tend to make it too big or complicated and don’t pay enough attention to planning gameplay.

Feeding your imagination

Above I have talked about different ways to start new game. Now you might think how to come ideas themselves? Well, you should first educate yourself in various ways. Read books, watch movies, play games (try especially indie games to find inspiration, shareware games are good for this purpose), and leave your computer alone and go out to look nature or city whereever you happen to live. I myself get many new ideas when walking in nature and looking different things. Just look around places and you may find something interesting which will stir your imagination.

Conclusion

• There is atleast three ways to find new game concepts: themes, game mechanics and story.
• Each of these ways are good in certain areas and game genres.
• Keep your eyes open and don’t just sit next to your computer. Go out to see how world works and you may find something really interesting ideas.

And there it was. Hope it helps you to come up new ideas and concepts. Feel free to comment and make suggestions to add this article.

Tumetsu

This is my latest published picture this far and it can be found on a full size on Advanced Photoshop with some of my other works. I’ve used about ten different stock pictures from stock.xchng and from my own picture library.

I’ll post more of my works here now and then so keep an eye out.

-Ussa

In First impression is important -article I covered some important things which developer should take account to ensure player’s interest to the game. In this article I’m going to talk little about releasing your W.I.Ps and completed games. How to get as much attention as possible? I have noted some common things in well released games and made many mistakes myself and earned precious knowledge. So I will share some of my experience to you.

Test your game

This is very important. When you are nearly finished your game, it’s tempting to get everything ready and publish your game as soon as possible. Hold on. In your hurry you will probably make some very bad mistakes which are going to ruin your game’s reputation. During my earlier projects I fell to this mistake and released accidentally one of my test version which started from later levels with very hard enemies. This caused many negative comments and was very damaging because my game looked enough good to attract many downloaders. You may also make some small modifications for your game just before publishing which lead to error messages or other weird things. Eventhough it’s very boring to test everything before release, do it! Or hire someone else to do it like I do

Screenshots

Many people have rule “No screenshot, no download” . If you want people to download your game you have to provide them some information about your game. Screenshots provide this information efficiently. Take some good screenshots from exciting places in your game and try to include many different situations which might awake potential player’s interest to download your game. There should be more than one or two screenshots from game. These screenshots should also be viewable “without” downloading (believe or not, many people host their images to the file services such as host-a-net which require to download file to the hard drive). They should also be large enough to give good idea from gameplay. You can also provide video of the gameplay using services like Youtube but in my opinion you should provide screenshots along with video.

Descriptions

Your game needs good description. In forums like GMC it’s best to compose topic which has brief general description of the game, little more detailed description of the gameplay and some other notes. Don’t write much though. Try to cram all needed information to small space because many people doesn’t like to read walls of text. Instructions should be introducted in game itself not in game’s topic. Good guide to compose effective topic can be found here made by Rhys Andrews. I also recommend to use good grammar and spelling in the description text. People who aren’t native English speakers can make some mistakes like I still tend to do, but native speakers should take care that their text is free of these kind errors.

It’s harder to compose effective description in YYG kind of sites, where you have only limited space for text. I have noticed that very short descriptions works well like “Hunt your escaped frogs in this challenging and fast paced game” . Okay, maybe little bad example but you got the point. In sites like this hangs around more people who cannot read even so much as people in forums, so you have to take that in account. It’s good idea to provide all necessary information in game itself.

Submit your game to the various places

In order to get as many players as possible you have to submit it to the various locations so many people will found it. Some good places for GM games which now come to my mind are

• YoYo Games
• GMC
• 64Digits
• Acid-play

Those were just some of the sites but should provide you some feedback and attention. You can find more with Google.

Other helpful tips

There is some other helpful things to do. You can example keep development blog of the game when you are developing something bigger game. If you succeed, you will generate some interest even before you release actual game or even demo.

Another thing is to try to make your project seem professional. People like professional looking things, right? Create good looking logo and banner for your project and put they to your signature in forums with link to your site or development blog. When you release your game you can make one of those so called userbars with text “I am proud supporter of Froghunt” and if people like your game, they may add bar to their signatures and so spread the word of your game.

Conclusion

• Test your game carefully and stomp every bugs you see.
• Provide some good looking screenshots including exciting events.
• Make clear and rather short description and remember good grammar.
• Submit your games to many locations to achieve more attention.
• Try to make your project seem professional with some further advertising.

Keep these things in mind when you are up to publish your game. Bad publishing may cause some serious damage for game’s reputation even if the game itself is good so plan carefully how you show your game to the world!

Tumetsu