My Contribution

Before you start reading know that there’s only one part I would like to take from this, so if you can’t be bothered reading all this please jump to the bottom where it says NOW.

This is an idea that I came up with before I joined the course (a good 2 years ago) so please take it with a pinch of salt….a lot of salt, I’m talking about a proverbial mountain of sodium chloride here.
I know we’ve decided on using Unity, but I’m hoping we can take something from this.
It may sound a bit juvenile because I meant it for children, I’ve also though about it a lot so there’s plenty to read :S

BASICS: It’s a 2D side scrolling adventure platformer (ringing any bells?) that makes heavy use of physics within it’s game mechanics (similar to how LIMBO works, before it existed).

STYLE: A 2D cartoony, bright, childish, colourful and “wobbly” aesthetic with little black. Visuals are shown on three planes: The Background, Foreground and player space.

STORY: I’ll explain this as a short narrative: The players takes the role of an alien space trooper and is at first present at a trial of their latest prisoner: An evil alien overlord. The overlord escapes however and the player takes off quickly in their ship to try and apprehend them. During this chase the player is granted control of 3 different player characters (representing 3 different class roles). This enables them to familiarize themselves with how each character works.

At this point the player chooses which character they would like to play as based on their short time playing as them. The two characters that weren’t chosen fall back leaving the chosen character to continue the chase.

Eventually the overlord shoots down the player and they crash on a seemingly uninhabited planet scattering their ship’s parts over various islands. The overlord seeing this decides to set up a base on the planet at it’s pole.

From here on the player, determined to bring the villain to justice, sets out to recover his lost ship parts and capture the overlord.

There are 3 different main environments and 2 minor ones.

(Tutorial Level) The Island: Just a small beach island were the player learns the basics.
(World 1) Jungle: This world consists of 5 levels each introducing a new element (enemy, puzzle etc). They are:
A Cliff Level: A basic level involving a few jumps and introducing the player to crumbling terrain (more on that later).
A Waterfall Level: Introduces mossy terrain, floating platforms and water.
The Ruins: Involves several physics based puzzles involving jumps, rolling boulders and collapsing terrain.
Thick Jungle: A tougher version of the first level introducing swinging vines and monsters.
Beach: Boss Level: The player must defeat a large robotic piranha created by the overlord and collect the ship piece it is guarding. Once this is done they can progress to the next world. They are all fairly similar in structure.

NOW, This is what I mainly like about this idea, it’s the only thing I really like and it can be applied to any platformer.

In traditional platformers you always have that one platform that either slowly or quickly crumbles, leading to your characters messy demise. What I never liked about this is that there’s no room for the player to be careful or exercise much skill, the moment they touch the platform it will fall for certain. So, I would like to see a platform that you know can crumble if you aren’t careful or clever about your movements, not by chance. Think of the platforms as held together like an upright jigsaw puzzle or a half completed Jenga tower. It has it’s weak points and if the player steps on one of these weak points it will begin to collapse as simulated by in game physics. Players will have to assess the path ahead and choose their steps carefully. It’s hard to explain this idea so I hope it wasn’t too hard to understand.

Anywho, that’s my idea contribution. I’m still massively for the circus idea btw.