Plenty of Ammo

2 Weeks since I've been back from Cologne, Germany, after my 4th GDC Eu / Gamescom.

Managed to get a spot as a Conference Associate again, and it was a blast seeing my friends and making new ones. Went on swag runs, took advantage of free food at parties, expanded my network, and yes, even played some games.

Brought a few games with me this year. Bought Orleans for myself and enjoying losing, Tier Auf Tier for my brother/nephew and even got a free game for free - Gremlins inc.

The conferences were a little disappointing. Most GDC sessions didn't seem that interesting, The games I was most excited about had exclusive videos rather than hands-on gameplay, and I didn't have my friend Alex to get me inside places.

I know I'm going to have a lot of inspiration and ideas from what I did experience, so maybe this blog will see the frequency of posts go up.

Having gained some insight on what makes League of Legends such an exciting e-sport, the first thing that comes to my mind is the lack of turn based entries for professional gaming.

The idea I'm currently mulling over is an arcade flight sim, with timed turns that play simultaneously, with challenges coming from choosing an aircraft and weapons to suit the play style, then carefully maneuvering the aircraft into the correct position, and predicting where the enemy might end up during his turn,

Who knows if something like that would be appealing enough to be as popular as Star Craft or LOL, even if I do make it, but that's the way it goes.  

Post Conference Ideas

Bigor, the Israel convention for roleplaying, miniature, and board games was earlier this week, during the still ongoing passover holiday.

I've played some games I was familiar with, as well as a few new ones, including Yinsh, Cavemen: The Search for Fire and Kings of Israel.

Some were better than others, but the most influential so far has been the Pathfinder card game.

The idea of a co-op game where you can not only customize your deck to match your own style as play but help your teammates during the post scenario trading phase seemed different to me, and I started thinking about implementing and expanding this idea into video games.

I guess MOBAs have some of these elements of helping other people build their characters and form strategies to defend and attack on multiple fronts, but I think it could be pushed even further - if killing mobs gave out experience points to the entire team, which needs to decide on how to distribute it.

What if different characters were suited for different tasks, which would unlock equipment best used by team members going after different goals?

How about players unlocking abilities for their teammates but not themselves?

A game based on combat and magic linking all these abilities seems like the easiest and obvious choice, but I've also given some thoughts to some more unusual themes such as city building, or flying an airship.

Spiritual Successors

Played XCOM: The Board Game a couple of weeks ago. Fairly entertaining experience, especially when we barely eked out a victory.
This got me thinking about the game, which made me start a list of games I'll need to pay once I feel I've progressed enough in my career choice that I can relax at home... Might take awhile longer :/

It also made me think of the spiritual successors and clones for the original game, and whether this remake will spawn new ones. Maybe it will, or maybe it just isn't as innovative as the original and mobile games are where such things pop up now.

I've played quite a few number of these games, and rate them much higher than most reviews.
While analyzing what made these games appealing I started coming up with my own ideas.

The aerial combat of sending interceptors against UFOs always seemed on the slim side compared with the squad level combat - what if it had more depth to it?
What if there was ground combat element of using armored vehicles against a massive alien invasion, while still having squad based combat for terror missions or clandestine operations?
What if I used elements from the "chariots of the gods" theories and give an ancient Egyptian or Mesoamerican theme to such a game, shrinking down the geoscape but expanding base management into more of civilization building game?

Polar Opposites?

After finally going through the game trade publications I picked up at GDC Eu / Gamescom, a few new ideas started floating around in my head.

The one I am currently pondering most about is the possibility of mashing up the sandbox and point and click adventure genres.

In the former the player is given a universe and some tools to play with. Testing the boundaries, coming up with creative ideas and generally letting the players find their own way to have fun is what it's all about.

The latter has a very rigid and linear construction, and when the rules aren't followed, the player will find himself stuck.

I'm currently favoring an episodic approach to a possible genre bender: On one level the player will have a world to play with, but will unlock certain pixel hunting, inventory combining at designated points. 

One example might be a part of a pantheon of gods: Part of the game would involve building, populating and molding a world of your own, but to gain further skills you must perform fetch quests for the other gods working with you.

Post-KGC Thoughts

The theme of this year's KGC was "Hello World Beyond Korea," and many of the talks that were either in English or simultaneously translated had been about localization, and a lot of that had been about art styles.
One of the keynote speeches was about the Oculus and how much potential it has for exposure when compared with the flooded PC and mobile markets.
I also sat through a session talking about the production of Tearaway, a game with a very fresh papercraft art style, developed by Media Molecule, the guys who made Little Big Planet, another game with an unusual crafted look to it.

All these elements came together for me in the form of an idea of a Super Sentai game for the Oculus rift, putting the player in command of a sword wielding mega robot, trying to defend a city from giant monsters.
I think that taking the cheesy route isn't something that we see a lot and could have a lot of international appeal. Monsters would look a suit built around a person with a central theme, buildings looking like models with camera angles to make them look larger, colorful and nonsensical explosions all the time, and more.
While most of the Movies and TV shows that inspired this - the Super Sentai / Power Rangers series, Ultraman, Godzilla, Voltron, use cool themes for their monsters such as animals and vehicles, I'm trying to think of weird ideas to make my game more unique - such as a mutated chair. ;)

I'm also giving some thought to the control scheme - I don't really see myself strapped into an omnitread  to walk around a virtual world, so they should revolve around a game pad. I've been thinking of giving it "loose" controls, like you find in Octodad or Surgeon Simulator.
I think it fits the Power Rangers theme, in which a group of teenagers jump into a giant robot and somehow they all coordinate their attacks together via gesture.

Looking to the Stars for Inspiration

First, a confession: I forgot my game idea. I remembered it was a good one, so I came back to this very blog, and reading my posts sparked inspiration for a new round of ideas.

Been thinking about Race for the Galaxy and how they didn't introduce combat rules until the 3rd expansion. I hear it's a bad mechanic, but I like the idea of having a game in which you build your engine toward your goal without someone else tearing it down, though they can obstruct your way as they build their own.

To this end I have been looking at the Star Wars universe as my main source of inspiration, and chewing on whether there is enough in if I remove all the combat.
Political intrigue, trading via legal and illegal means, bounty hunters, and more go along in the background, so I think there is something to work with.

I've also been thinking of some of the 4X video games I've played, such as Master of Orion and Civilization and looking for ideas - possible victory conditions in particular.

As I was typing this, I actually thought to look some things up, and an idea sparked - what if instead of playing a supreme leader type of role players took the role of some sort of galactic criminal. Like Firefly, I guess? (Not a huge fan of the series.)

Stray Thoughts

Can't escape from working all week at the day job, missing out on board game night. It's not worth it, I hope I find something better soon and it fades into a story to tell strangers.

A few thoughts about games have come up. The first is in the board game space, in which I'm currently thinking of creating multiple different games, but each a part of the same world, using the same characters and visual style to tell different stories connected together.

The Silicone Valley and the Reverse Galaxy Truckers come to mind as an example. What if one of the "Neckbeards" you can use in your recruitment agency turns into one of the crew members you can draft for your ship.

The second idea I'm occupied with is inspired by the success of Multiplayer online battle arena games. I never tried playing DOTA or LoL, but I suspect I would suck. I would feel much more comfortable with a turn based strategy game. I think this idea is an extension of older ideas for an online TBS, with the current incarnation involving building a team belonging to a faction (similar to miniature games.)  This team could be broken up and used in several simultaneous asynchronous games.

Oni Touge

Been thinking some more about the endless drift concept, which I'm currently leaning towards calling Oni Touge.

What if instead of a single right or left button I would use three for each side.
Looking at the following example, a player would need to start a left turn by pushing the "D" button, making his way towards the "A" to increase his turning rate as necessary, even going over to "L" through "J" at a hairpin turn, with the space acting as the break to keep him/her from flying of the road.

Releasing the keys would return the wheel to center. Not sure if pushing a button out of sequence (like starting a right turn by pushing "K") should have any effect, a penalty, or a similar result as if "J" was pushed first.

Endless Drift

I'm currently reading through the Developer Magazine's Career Guide I picked up at GDC Europe. There's an article on how to make your own endless runner in Unity. A rocket avoiding obstacles and collecting bonue points? Lame.

So what sort of idea can I come up with that isn't quite so generic? An endless tōge to race down, drifting around the corners, trying to avoid dropping down the cliff or smashing into the mountain, skidding over loose debris.
A pumping eurobeat soundtrack, cars and achievements to unlock, scenery changing around you from typical Japanese mountain to fire and brimstone in hell... ;)

Left, right and brake, the only 3 buttons you would need as the car builds up speed without any player input.
A camera which gives exciting views and enough information so that the player can react to what's coming up.

Time For Myself

It seems as though the stress of work has been impeding my thinking, and I haven't been dreaming up game mechanics while I was working everyday.
With the new guy coming in I've finally had some time away from the office, and as I let off some steam the game ideas came back to me.

The first direction I went was to my hi-tech recruiting / Silicone valley game. I came up with some ideas to streamline gameplay and come up with a clearer goal.

At the start of the game, players will take turns placing a CEO to give them their first special ability, place a worker at the lowest rank at a tower of their choice, and start with a worker in the pool/
Each player will have a set number of cards they may turn per round (with one of the bonuses possibly being an extra card,) with the final goal being to be the first to have a control a certain amount of CEOs.

After thinking about this game, I started thinking about XCom and how the base building aspect of the game wasn't as strategically deep as the combat, and how I might that could be amended.
This lead to thinking of a different theme, and I came up with harvesting souls in hell, not that that hasn't been done before such as in Disgaea or Dungeon Keeper, but I might continue exploring that.

Back From A Week in Germany

Found myself in Cologne once again, a volunteer at GDC Europe 2013 with a trade visitor pass to Gamescom which  I made full use of.

Some things were different this year, like my stay at a hostel or the fact that I had no shifts on Wednesday. Other things were similar, like the foot and back pain and the lack of meals.

Parties were better this year, in general, both from the networking aspect and from the free drinks / swag / comfort in room aspects. GDCE sessions a bit more boring than last year, and I had fallen asleep in practically each one I attended, the only exception being one of the sessions I was scanning for (a familiar role from GDC Online,) not that it was super interesting, it was more because I had been working and later had to sit on the floor.
Met some friends from last year, made a few new ones from the volunteers.
Grabbed more freebies than last year, regretting I hadn't brought a bigger bag and being forced to leave stuff behind.
Only scored a couple of VIP passes, one for Square Enix the other for Bethesda (given to my by a fellow volunteer who didn't have the time to use it) and didn't get to fully use them. Wasn't all that interested in checking all Squenix had to offer (I think RPG demos don't work well in a trade show environment, they require a slow build up and can be text heavy, being in German certainly doesn't help.)
Experienced the Oculus Rift, playing a demo of CCP's Valkyrie, played Forza 5 on the XBOX One, but didn't think the long lines for the PS4 were worth it. That'll have to wait for next year which I'm already planning for and thinking of improving. I'll probably spend Wednesday at the entertainment area if possible.

Still in the process of following up on all the leads I gathered. I had 25 business cards to work with, I thought I needed to save them for solid leads, ended up coming back home with a few, so there's some fear I may have missed some chances, but there's no helping it now.

Back in my daily grind of not knowing when I work my minimum wage shifts, falling even further behind in my app development class, and wondering if I'll finally give in and sign up as a freelancer.
On the positive side, it didn't seem that long ago that I thought it was going to be a long time before I get another holiday yet here we are celebrating the Jewish new year, and I've been back to board game night. Played 3 new games this week, and enjoyed them all: Summoner Wars, Battlestar Galactica (won as a Cylon sleeper agent,) and Courtier (won my second game.)

As far as game design ideas that sprung from these shows, there is nothing defined: just thinking how bad game pads are for finer control in FPSs, and how one might come up with truly innovative gameplay.

The Deck That Plays Itself

Another game night behind me, and some new ideas coming from my experiences.
Among the games I played were the familiar Dominion, father of all deckbuilders, and my first play of Troyes, a game with an "automatic" neutral player.

Thinking of these "artificial intelligence" systems in which a set of rules is designed into the game to dictate the movement of neutral pieces for the players to deal with, gave me an idea.

My idea is to create a game in which players need to create their own AI systems, hoping to achieve their goals in the most efficient matter, similar to the PC game Majesty: The Fantasy Kingdom, in which players could build building and hire adventurers, which would then go adventuring without direct player interaction, though the player could set rewards to entice his adventurers to go to certain locations.

The way I see my game working is in 2 phases.
In half the game, players would acquire cards. I have a few ideas floating around on this, from playing cards for their monetary value to purchase cards that are worth more, to bidding on cards using money chips gained during the second phase of the game, to placing workers to acquire certain cards, create certain combos and block other players.

In the second half, players would shuffle their purchased cards, and flip cards over one at a time in turns, moving their piece or pieces according to whatever is indicated on the card. In a well thought out deck, the instructions on the cards would work well together to get more money to help the player develop his economic engine even further until some set goal is reached, such as a turn number, monetary goal or something else.

I have some more thinking to do about theme. Fantasy was the obvious choice, but I like to explore less familiar, and writing this post made me think of an idea - perhaps playing as parents sending children on errands.

I also need to think about how the instruction system would work: one idea is to have a grid and have turn left twice and go straight one square instructions, while another idea would be to have instructions based on landmarks, such as going towards the nearest enemy or a location on the map.

Enjoying Star Control 3

I know this game gets a lot of beef, especially from fans of Star Control 1 and 2. There's no denying that Accolade mistreated Toys for Bob which is a shame. I'd like to see what these guys would have come up with as a sequel.

Maybe we'll see a new Star Control in spirit if not in name yet.

Star Control 3 may not be considered canon by the hardcore fans. It may have problems, such as from sitting around in the same spot waiting for fuel, weak AI on enemy ships, and the Syreen losing all sex appeal, but I'm having a hard time not playing it.

After playing little else outside of social games, I no longer have to worry about waiting an hour or two to regain my energy so I can go back to the game to click on a few more things. Instead I struggle with quitting the game, as I tell myself I'll only go to one last planet before I go to sleep.

I enjoy the story, the voice acting (set my phone notification to "We are the Mycon, we respond,") the funky puppets, and the wining the fights when the computer provides more challenge than just trying to stay as far as possible.

I wonder to myself if I'll ever be able to spin quite a delightful yarn, while thinking of the different directions I could take.
I think when I finish the game, I'll start playing Shadow of the Colossus, which I never got around to, before I check out the Ur-Quan Masters and what the fans have done with the source code.

Entertaining myself at the grandparent's place

As a child my parents would sometime, such as on long holiday breaks, leave my brother and I at the care of our grandparents, with both sets living fairly close to each other, but an hour and a half drive from home.

Neither my maternal or paternal grandparents had computers, so other ways of entertaining myself had to be found.
TV was one such way, but until the mid-90's we only had 2 stations to choose from, which didn't always have child appropriate shows.
A VCR was available, and walking down to the video rental store and picking something out was as much fun as watching what we chose, it seems we have seen all the classic Looney Tunes and Disney cartoons that way.
My maternal grandparents also had some video tapes passed down from the American branch of our extended family, degraded copies of such classics as Chitty Chitty Bang Bang or Alice in Wonderland.
Grandma had some girl magazines from when she was a girl (dad's mom is a holocaust survivor who didn't have much left from her childhood, but she survived them all.) which didn't quite suit my taste, but beggars can't be choosers and they were marginally better than grandpa's gardening magazines - there are only so many ads for sprinkler systems I can look at.

Another hit from that time was going to the supermarket to buy freeze pops and something banned from the US and no longer imported to Israel - Kinder eggs. These things had amazing toys inside (unless you had the bad luck of getting a statue) which were a joy to assemble, and fun to play with for about ten minutes.

When I discovered arcades I found there was one in a nearby shopping center, and would spend countless hours in there, even just to watch demo modes going on. Later I found a few others to haunt, longer to walk too and full of cigarette smoke, but with new games to look at.
I even started getting money to play, even though I hadn't asked for any, probably because my brother got bored just tagging along.

In closing, I think these experiences had a lot of impact on my creativity these days, even if it isn't always obvious exactly how.

Space ship design language

Above is an image from Master of Orion 2, showing one color option for the ships which you can choose.
I am currently working on some of my own ships designs, following the long standing tradition of designing such vehicles with a unified design language.
The benefits of using such a system are as clear as figuring out who is friend or foe.

Thing is, when you look at current and past transportation technology things don't quite work out that way.

Fighter jets look quite different from commercial airliners. Different colors and camouflage patterns are used for the same aircraft even when used by the same people.
I think extraterrestrial intelligence may end up working along similar lines: form will fit function, yet we won't mistake it for anything we've built here on earth, just as they won't mistake our vehicles for their own.

I'll continue to design my ships for the human player, but this is food for thought. Maybe I'll stumble onto something.

Thoughts going out to space again

Been walking on the beach, thinking how I couldn't extract a decent sound from X-Com UFO defense to serve as a notification on my phone. I managed to extract the bubbly button sound I wanted, but it's full of hiss and sometimes doesn't play correctly (that might be the phone or the conversion from .wav to .mp3)

Then the "We are the Mycon" bit from Star Control 3 came to me, and I thought I would try to get my hands on that (proving even more difficult to find, now that I'm home,) which got me thinking about this wonderful series of games again.

If I did something similar, I would like to make ships much more difficult to obtain, with a lot of questing and politics to go through to add one to your fleet. They, in turn, would be much more powerful, customizable and unique to each species. Combat would need to be changed as a result, so the quick melee battles where you bounce like crazy around the screen would have to be replaced with a turn-based or a slower real time system.

I'd also find a way of incorporating research, because research in games in the bomb.

GDC Fever

The GDC Europe volunteer application form has come up a week ago, and there is a lot of action going on the facebook group for past volunteers. Everyone is excited about this year's event, anxious whether they will be picked, worried about sleeping and transportation arrangement, and anything else that needs to be taken care of.

As I wait for a response for my own application, hoping to hear a yes, wondering what I'll find this year in Cologne, Germany, I also think of my past experiences, and I thought I would share.

GDC Online 2011 in Austin, Texas, was my first GDC and I was delighted to have been chosen as a volunteer.

Small when compared to GDC and focusing on online, mobile and handheld, it nonetheless presented ample opportunities to gain new insight, network, and collect the all important swag.

GDC Online had the best parties in my opinion, with free food, open bars, more swag and enough room for everyone.

I wasn't able to enter as a volunteer at GDC 2012, but had plenty to do with my expo pass.

This show was huge: The career fair alone was about the size of GDC Online's expo, and I visited most of the booths with my business cards, portfolio and resumes. I went to the main expo floor and collected swag, spent some time in the Play area before the press got in, talked with the conference associates I met before or followed on social media, sat through the breaking in sessions and showed up at some parties.

GDC Europe 2012 was another conference I managed to get into as a volunteer. Similar in size to Online as far as sessions go, it had a tiny expo, although it was through here that I got my first art test.

My fellow volunteers at this show were more diverse than in Online, which I enjoyed (where else can a German, Swedish, Dutch, Briton, Greek, Turkish, American, Australian and Israel hang out in a bar and talk about video games?)

Lunch at the convention center was a definite bonus, although the parties weren't quite as good as the American counterparts, held in expensive places with insufficient space.

The best part about this show may actually be Gamescom - the computer game trade show which follows. While the main halls were open to the general public, volunteering at GDC gave me access to the business area, where I collected even more swag, got VIP passes to cut through lines which could reach 3 hours long for a hot game like Assassin's Creed 3, and made even more contacts. At the main halls I checked out some of the hottest new games (and a few duds,) took photos and yes, collected swag.

Can't wait to do it again, and with enough luggage space to take all my swag home. 

Worker Placement Deckbuilder for Facebook

Still thinking about my solution to the ultimate facebook game, with neurons firing on all cylinders.
From the mechanics of the game, such as how the cards and board will interact with each other, how I'd like an experience that is has more interaction and less "multiplayer solitaire," to whether I want the board game elements hidden under the interface.

I'm also giving a lot of thought to the theme, trying to figure out something outside the usual fantasy or sci-fi, with such things as building a voodoo village, Somali pirates or monsters hidden in plain sight a la Monsters inc.

Thinking about how everything you can buy with real money could be had with enough hard work, and how it needs to be functional but not give a massive advantage.

SimCity Social is Dying

SimCity Social, the facebook game I am currently putting the most time into will go offline June 14th.
One of the first quests I played in said game was connected to the London Olympics, so it's not quite a year.
I had played Restaurant City for much longer, before it went down (another EA/Playfish game) while some other games, such as Pet Society (coming down the same time as SCS) I played because it felt like a waste of time, while others, like Monster Galaxy have become unplayable as facebook and browsers updated.

Is all this trouble an indication of the state of social games? Will more studios be as troubled as Zynga? Will the model of ingame microtransactions change to something else?

Guess I'll be waiting to see how it folds out (including what game I'll be addicted to next) think about new financial models, and keep dreaming I'll find a job in which all-night gaming marathons are an important part of research.

Back to Outer Space

The latest on my game oriented mind:
I think it was a side banner about Scarlet Blade (A MMORPG filled with CGI boobs? What were they thinking and why do I want to play it?) that lead to me check out the latest on MMORPGs. Found a video on one called ArcheAge, in which I saw a bunch of characters running around doing the usual fighting fare, but then went on to build a house and a sail boat.
Also saw a video about EVE online ship sizes, and I'm currently reading Elisabeth Moon's Victory Condition.

So, I've been thinking about a game where guild leaders build massive ships, recruiting members to fill various rolls aboard it. I guess I've seen attempts at it before, and it would be hard to pull off (everyone wants to be at the top.) but it might have some merits.