Game Design Megathread

[simpletonnn]

how amazing is FunnyHonk

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[thegoodperry]

green and yellow dudes are player units, purple is the enemy

[/dev/sr0]

this is really looking like fire emblem

[thegoodperry]

Fire emblem is pretty bad. The game I'm working on will have more depth than fire emblem mechanics

[thegoodperry]

but then the game becomes just like xcom and im trying to make a unique experience. anyways ive dropped that idea in exchange for a more favorable one



here is a very early mock up of 4d turn based. right now only one plane (the bottom plane) is functional as a turn based game. basically its like advance wars but all gameplay mechanics/objectives/enemies/units are designed around these three planes. each plane would ideally be different from the other and have its own terrian/cover/enemies

levels would introduce their own mechanics. one level i had an idea for would be a level where your characters exist on all 3 planes at once, but you can only move along objects on one active plane. the active plane changes every turn. so say the bottom plane has a flat battlefield with high cover, the left plane has pitfalls and traps and various hazards, and the right plane has floating catwalks hanging above a chasm. attacks and fights happen on all three planes at once, so if you're on the bottom plane and there's an enemy on the left plane, your attack in its respective position will hit that enemy, etc. as if all attacks mirror the planes.

so basically you have to move around the map that is changing every turn and at the same time fight enemies that transcend all three planes at once, and if you're on like the bottom plane part and it changes and you get moved to the left plane and you just happen to be over a trap, you'll take damage. or if it changes to the right one you might fall off by accident. or when it switches back if you're inside a wall you'll die. its hard to visualize with words right now but i might make an animation to simplify it

too long didnt understand; advance wars and mighty flip champs have a baby

i have a good plan for difficulty pacing. the use of an extra dimension adds a lot of depth to the once-simple turn based game but i dont plan to utilize the depth to the fullest (if i did most people including myself would struggle to understand it) and even if i do it'll be left for the final levels

an example would be combining switching planes with a gravity mechanic where gravity changes directions. its perfectly possible and could possibly work if i utilize it on a small simple level, but for the most part i cut that idea out because it would be way too difficult to have to brown townyze 3 planes at once AND brown townyze the pattern in which gravity would change
everything is placeholder right now. im not going to design assets and art until i have the solid mechanics nailed. but dont worry, i have an aesthetic in mind, mostly in level assets, that will look good. it'll be like this



not copying it exactly but i do want to design ancient castle-in-the-sky like greek architecture with gravity defying fountains and stuff like that
its not 4d in the context of the universe, its technically 3.5d because a truly 4d game like this would take place between the inside of a tesseract and you'd have to manage 6 planes at once.

consider it 4d mathematically. all the map data would be stored on a four dimensional array. the x and y axis is the 2d axis, the z axis is the 3rd axis, and the t axis would be the 3 planes. every successive axis is basically duplicated as you get to the higher dimension. in this game, you have 3 3rd dimensional playing fields which if i utilize correctly can make the game fun

advance wars actually did the extra dimension subtly with the use of land, air and naval units. they each exist on a 'dimension' in the game, naval being the lowest, land being the middle and air being the highest. and they also are able to interact with each other, such as battleships attacking land units, or anti air attacking air, bombers attacking land and sea, etc.

thats kind of what i want to expand upon, but instead the naval and air dimensions have their own terrain and restrictions that must be taken into account. your units 'interact' across all three dimensions enemy-wise but terrain wise, they can only interact with one at a time, which alternates

[Nix the Glaceon]

i like the aesthetic of greek stuff like that

[St. Francis Xavier]

i changed the way the game loaded certain files

instead of being one executable altogether



the game can load certain sounds and backgrounds in different chunks so that the filesize for the EXE isnt too big

IMPACT1
Date Modified: 9/29/2001

9/11 Impact sound??? :thinking:

[FelipeO_O_]

Often people think game designers are those who program the game...

Programming and Designing a Game are two distinct challenges.

While Programming requires you brain to think, Game design requires you brain to be creative

[St. Francis Xavier]

Often people think game designers are those who program the game...

Programming and Designing a Game are two distinct challenges.

While Programming requires you brain to think, Game design requires you brain to be creative

??? There is most definitely a creative aspect to programming as well as a 'thinking' aspect to game design

[Electrk..]

Often people think game designers are those who program the game...

Programming and Designing a Game are two distinct challenges.

While Programming requires you brain to think, Game design requires you brain to be creative

truly inspiring

[Adrenaline]

Often people think game designers are those who program the game...

Programming and Designing a Game are two distinct challenges.

While Programming requires you brain to think, Game design requires you brain to be creative

epic quote

[FelipeO_O_]

There is most definitely a creative aspect to programming as well as a 'thinking' aspect to game design

Of course both require creativity and "thinking".

I'm just saying that game design emphatizes more your creativity.

[crazies alt]

Often people think game designers are those who program the game...
Programming and Designing a Game are two distinct challenges.
While Programming requires you brain to think, Game design requires you brain to be creative

not like programming requires plenty of creative work-arounds to issues, no, not at all.

Of course both require creativity and "thinking".
I'm just saying that game design emphatizes more your creativity.

care to explain how? you keep saying things but not backing them up

[.:FancyPants:.]

While Programming requires you brain to think, Game design requires you brain to be creative

i actually agree with this, although i see why others are challenging how you stated it. they're definitely two distinct things

programming is a logical creativity, because what you have to work with are tools like if-statements, variables, values etc. that are as fundamentally concrete as say... mathematics

game design can be thought of as something larger that captures programming, as well as something much less concrete. it's a general creativity, because you have to consider how the code, the art, the sound, how everything ties together



for example, there are tons of different ways to program player movement into a game. you might decide to you want the player to slide, jump, roll, and all this other advanced tech. or maybe you only need to be able to walk left and right and nothing else. deciding what type of movement to use is part of design, but once you've designed the movement system, you get down to programming it.

the wikipedia pages related to all these areas, like game design, help make the distinction even more clear. remember that "game" doesn't just apply to what you play on a computer. game design exists for board games, card games, and even sports games, where programming would never be a part of the development process.

[OfficerZach7551]

my first ever doom wad

i'm pretty proud of it honestly