Arctic Flower

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