Ice cream game - Request for feedback
Community Forums/Showcase/Ice cream game - Request for feedback
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| First off, this is not the project I've been working on since the middle of May. That project is complete, and a demo will be forthcoming shortly. It's not up to me when the demo goes out, so you'll just have to wait to find out about that. :-) This is my next project, which I am funding myself and developing with the assistance of an artist I've hired, tentatively titled "Ice Cream Mania". That name doesn't really fit the theme of the game however, so I plan to change it, and suggestions for alternatives would be appreciated. This is a mockup of the main game screen:  The art for this is in a very early stage and much about it will change, but suggestions/critiques would be appreciated. The people you see there are actually created like a paper doll. All the face parts, hair, clothes, etc, are interchangeable, so that the customers will vary in appearance. That's the only version set up as a sprite right now, so I just cloned him to see how multiple customers would appear. Cloning him revealed that the door and window are too small currently so those are going to be fixed to match the perspective. These are the main characters:  This art is pretty close to final. Here's some background on the game: The two characters you see above are rivals. I haven't decided yet if they will be brother and sister or not. If so, then the player would not find out about that until the end of the game. The game mixes ice cream with a western theme. Hence the reason I need to change the name. The two main characters will own shops at opposite ends of town, and there will be a saloon like building in the center of town which each has their eyes on for setting up shop in. That builidng will be labeled the O.J. Corral and it will be a "soda shop" that sells fruit drinks. It will be up for sale, but neither ice cream shop owner will have enough money to buy it initially. This is where the game begins. After choosing which character you want to play, you will see a side view cinematic of the two shop owners staring eachother down from opposite sides of town, arms at their sides like a gunfighter, and then the game will switch to the in-shop behind-the-counter view you see above. The gameplay will involve taking orders from the customers and filling them correctly as quickly as possible. Thought bubbles will appear over the heads of multiple customers indicating which color ice cream they want, and in what order. They may change their mind as well. Once the customer has ordered, they will progress to the cash register. And once you have finished the cone they ordered, you will click on them to hand them the cone, take their money, put the money in the register, and give them their change. If you've made the order correctly, then this will go without a hitch, and if you've done it quickly, they'll be happy and will give you a tip. If however you have gotten the order wrong, the customer may show his anger by refusing to pay, or giving you a lower tip or no tip. The customers will also display their emotional state while standing in line, so if they start to get impatient you'll know you'd better speed things up. As you progress in the game, improvements will be made to the shop. At the end of each round/day some of the money you have made will go to fixing up damaged portions of your shop and resupplying. And after a certain number of days/rounds, you will move into a bigger, better shop, which you will then proceed to improve just like the previous one. Over time other changes will also occur. While initially you might start out with only the three basic flavors of ice cream, over time you might gain as many as 12. In addition you might gain the ability to produce such items as a bananna split, a sundae, or a float, or gain additional toppings. I'm still working out the kinks in the gameplay though, and just writing this has helped me iron out a few gameplay elements I was unsure about. One thing which is still troubling me is how I should go about handling the mouse and the player character. On the one hand making the character slide side to side with the mouse would be cool, but on the other hand I can't have them blocking the items which the player needs to click on. The character is also rather large to use transparency, (might kill the framerate) and they don't look as nice with transparency either. Another big problem is the music. I am having a hell of a time finding music to license which will fit the game. I'm pretty sure I want some sort of country music to fit the western theme, but finding the right music has been a nightmare. The low quality samples they provide on many sites, the lack of country songs on most of the freindlier to use licensing sites, and the need for music which is not annoying and can be enjoyed by people who don't generally listen to country music, are killing me. If anyone has any suggestions for where I can find music that's right for this, or any gameplay suggestions or art related comments, it would be appreciated. :-) Oh and if you're wondering about when the game will be out, I don't have a hell of a lot of time to finish it. I've only got enough saved to get me through January, and I would REALLY like to have the game done by the end of November. It just took me five months to complete another game I was working on, but I learned a lot about how I should set up the code for gameplay and menus while working on that, and created new libraries for handing fonts, images, and animation, and all that will help me get this coded quickly. Also a lot of the delay on that project was simply waiting on the artists to get the work done, and I had no control over that on that project and they were really slow to get stuff done. So I hope that this will be a realistic goal. Well, let me know what you think, and throw any ideas you have my way! :-) |
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| Looks nice -- although the store window and the logo on it looks out of place, you could really use some anti-aliasing and/or reflection/glare there. |
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| The background still needs a lot of work and that text on there is something I drew by hand with the mouse in photoshop just as a placeholder. It's going to be replaced with something much nicer with maybe a sundae in the middle, and the window will have the name of the shop if I can think of one. And there'll probably be some glare. |
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| Hi sswift, have you tried, http://www.shockwave-sound.com/ for your music needs? They have a pretty decent range of different types of music. It is run by the old Amiga musician Bjorne Lynne. I look forward to your game, sounds like a neat and original idea, good luck with it. Which Blitz are you using? 3D, Plus or Max? Jason. |
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| Quick: Yes, but their selection of country is pretty much lacking in anything that is upbeat. I'm using Blitzplus. I don't have time to fool around trying to learn Max and rewiritng libraries that are already written to work with it. If the game is popular I can always port it to Max later. |
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| Looks interesting. From the look of your characters they are antialiased onto the background (whereas the window logo isn't as you said) is this the case? Did you write code for that or what? maybe you are using swiftbobs? I must confess your bobs demo gave me the idea of how to do alpha blending of logos onto backgrounds by using an alphamap bitmap. I'll give proper feedback when I can play it ;-) |
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| The gameplay may be appealling to the very young and I guess its aimed at that market - I can't see many older gamers going for this though - which is really a twist on the @#!*tail waiter type games that abound. The flat 2d graphics, although very good quality, limit you to a view from behind the main characters- unless your planning on different views - in which case 3d would be easier anyway. |
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| The graphics are good quality but they look a bit too much like they belong in a kids "edutainment" game, for my liking. That's just personal taste though, I guess. I like the idea of the "Western" theme running through the game but I wouldn't get to hung-up on including an allusion to it in the game's name. It'll probably just end up sounding a bit corny, IMO. Personally, I'd go for a short, snappy name that fits the (presumably) frantic gameplay, and the fact you're up against a rival. The name I came up with is "Scoops" - or maybe just "Scoop", or possibly "Scooper". I've highlighted the dictionary meanings of the word below, to show you why. :) scoop // n. & v. n. 1 any of various objects resembling a spoon, esp.: a a short-handled deep shovel used for transferring grain, sugar, coal, coins, etc. b a large long-handled ladle used for transferring liquids. c the excavating part of a digging machine etc. d Med. a long-handled spoonlike instrument used for scraping parts of the body etc. e an instrument used for serving portions of mashed potato, ice cream, etc. 2 a quantity taken up by a scoop. 3 a movement of or resembling scooping. 4 a piece of news published by a newspaper etc. in advance of its rivals. 5 a large profit made quickly or by anticipating one's competitors. 6 Mus. a singer's exaggerated portamento. 7 a scooped-out hollow etc. v.tr. 1 (usu. foll. by out) hollow out with or as if with a scoop. 2 (usu. foll. by up) lift with or as if with a scoop. 3 forestall (a rival newspaper, reporter, etc.) with a scoop. 4 secure (a large profit etc.) esp. suddenly. The reason I've highlighted the one about being published in a newspaper is because I thought it would be a good idea to have a mock newspaper spin into view (like they do in the old movies) at the end of each level. The headline on the newspaper could give info about how you're doing against your competitor, etc. Kind of like they did in the "Paper Boy" game. Just an idea. :) |
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| "The gameplay may be appealling to the very young and I guess its aimed at that market - I can't see many older gamers going for this though - which is really a twist on the @#!*tail waiter type games that abound." Those @#!*tail waiter games sell like gangbusters to women... so I hear. I agree that it might not draw in the hardcore gamer crowd though. It's most definitely not aimed at the very young. I know the gameplay sounds simplistic on paper, but so does the gameplay of tetris. "Player rotates falling peices of varying colors to fit them together." Sounds boring, doesn't it? Only way to know if it's fun is to actually code it. Grey: The shot is just a mockup in photoshop, so any antialiasing you see is merely a result of that. While my BOB system can do antialiasing, you have to use it sparingly. Using it for every character onscreen would probably cause too much of a speed hit and won't really improve the game's appearance that much except in screenshots. I need to save that speed for making the main character transparent if neccessary. |
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| Make sure you have Spock around to mindmeld with that creature on the ceiling... I assume you become a mindless slave if it manages to drop onto your back ;-) |
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| The artist has already improved upon that as per my specifications so it looks more like the water stain it is supposed to look like. :-) |
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| Hey, Betty's Beer Bar for Kids. Or Diner Dash for Ice Cream lovers. This could do well if presented well. |
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| Betty's Beer Bar? /note to self, try Betty's Beer Bar and steal ideas from it. Diner Dash was actually the inspiration for this, but as you can see it'll be quite different from that in many ways. |
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| Alright, seeing as my ideas went down like a lead balloon, what about "Super Scooper"? No? Ah, forget it then. :P |
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| Super Scooper make me think of Pooper Scooper. No. :-) Whatever the title is it needs to make it clear that it is a game featuring ice cream. I don't think the word "Scoop" conveys thay clearly enough. The game title needs to be clear so that people who see the name and would be interested in that type of game will investigate further. Think "Puzzle Pirates", "Diner Dash", etc. It may be that I won't be able to come up with a name that includes the western theme. If that's the case Ice Cream Mania fits the criteria of describing the gameplay adequately. I'm just not sure "Mania" is appropriate though for a game with a western theme. Aha, I've got it! Ice Cream Showdown! |
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| Regarding music... with 'western' you mean like country music? fiddles, pedalsteel, banjo, guitars, harmonicas etc., with all the cliches there are? |
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| Shouldn't that be Ice Cream Meltdown? ...no, I'm not being serious, nor was I about Super Scooper but anyway... :) |
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| "Regarding music... with 'western' you mean like country music? fiddles, pedalsteel, banjo, guitars, harmonicas etc., with all the cliches there are?" Yes, I mean country music, with country instruments, but I can't really give you specifics because I don't really know what it is that would be right for the game, nor do I know a lot about country music or what instruments would sound good rather than annoying. I think all those industuments you listed are the right sort though. I'm not sure what pedalsteel is though. And cliches? Cliches are good. Though I did hear one song which tried to make a fake version of the famous whisling and harmonica theme you hear in a showdown (Doo dee doo dee doot! WHAA WHAAA WHAAAAAAA) and it was annoying because you knew what it was supposed to sound like and the messed up notes just made it sound like a cheap cheezy imitation. Speaking of which though... I think for the scene where the characters face off I want something with a guatar... I think it's more of a spanish sound? The guitar goes like "Dugga dugga dun!" and then has some kind of complex thing after that where it goes up the scale and then back down I think a few times. I think something like that would work nicely. |
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| It's got to be Banjo, surely!? :) |
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| Pedalsteel is what you hear in for example the first measures of "Top of the World" by The Carpenters.. It's that fluid soft sound pitching around like nothing else :) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pedal_steel_guitar |
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| Does the game need fast or slow music? |
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| Is it a commercial game btw? (indiemarket or shop, don't care :) |
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| "Does the game need fast or slow music?" I'm not sure. The earlier levels will be at a slower pace than later levels, so I had planned on having three to five different songs, with them picking up pace as the player progresses through the game. "Is it a commercial game btw?" I'm funding and programming it myself, and it will be sold as shareware. It's possible it could be published by a value game publisher, but I haven't talked with any publishers about that and won't be until the game is done and on sale online. So you're interested in doing some music for it? You're welcome to give it a try, and I'll be happy to hear anyhting you come up with, but I can't make any promises about using it, not knowing what it will sound like. The music is really important to get right. It can make or break a game. Also, anything I do use in the game I'll need full rights to use/edit how I see fit. |
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| drop-by @ email for more details/talk.. |
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| Email sent. |
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| BlackJ: When I first saw the star trek "Face hugger" episode it really scared me (I was a kid) but as an adult I laughed my head off. |
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| I wonder if I should have a level where the customers coming through the door are all zombies and you have to fling ice cream at them to drive them off. |
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| You should also look at "Wild West Wendy", no that's not a wind up. |
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| sswift: Actually according to the Zombie Survival Handbook, Ice Cream may actually be ineffectual especially as zombies don't feel heat or cold. What would be more effective is sharpending the ends of chocolate flakes and putting them in the freezer so they are hard, and then driving them into the eye sockets of the zombies so that the brain is pierced (brain damage being the only effective way of killing a zombie). If you got really good you could throw them from a distance, House of Flying Daggers, style. Hope my info is useful. I'm quite happy to be a zombie consultant on your project if you need more help. |
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| You should also look at "Wild West Wendy", no that's not a wind up. Seems that game is using the newspaper idea I mentioned. It really is hard to come up with original ideas these days, I guess. :) |
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| Yes especially when you steal those ideas from paperboy that you yourself admit you stole from it. :-) |
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| I got a really original one, just don't have the time to develop it at the moment. It has gameplay elements like those Beer Diner West Bar Frenzy Ice Cream thingies, ie. you need to do things quickly and in a reasonably good order BUT it's better CAUSE it's MY IDEA! Actually I think I'll make a post and see if anyone fancies helping out on it. |
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| I wasn't suggesting the newspaper idea was original but reading my post it does kinda sound like I am. Ooops. :) |
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| i would like to see some bananas, prefereably thrown at customers as a special attack/treat (whatever suits) as for country music, all i can suggest is looking for those up-and-coming talent sites to find those folks who might cover this end adequately. looks like a fun game though (in a whack-a-rat kind of way). |
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| Well, I tried Betty's Beer Bar, that wasn't very fun. Diner Dash was much more fun. The problem I think is the game doesn't seem to force you to do anything other than refill the glasses when the customers want them refilled. You can wash the glasses, but it's not necessary. Also the display is really busy and the thought bubbles only appear for a moment and as a result it's hard to keep track of what the customers want. Wild West Wendy on the other hand was pretty fun, once I figured out I could stack actions. The gameplay really wasn't that different from Diner Dash or Betty's Beer Bar, yet Betty's Beer Bar somehow managed to not be much fun. I hope that the difference between being fun and not being fun isn't that the customers are spaced around the shop so you have to run around a lot. That might not bode well for my game. Of course, my game is a bit different from Beer Bar in that the customers will move about and you'll mever serve the same guy twice. And the layout will be much clearer as to where the items are. This does get me thinking though about how I might want to include the ability to stack actions. But then again, in my game you won't be able to serve more than one customer at once, or weild two objects at once. And there is the focus on memorizing the orders. So there are some major gameplay differences. Stacking actions might not make sense in the context of my game's style. Hm... Well... maybe it would. It could be helpful if you could click on more than one ice cream flavor without having to wait for the character to finish animating the scooping of it. Hm. I found anothe rgame while looking for those suggested above, called Pizza Frenzy. While it doesn't play like the others, it was a lot of fun and had really nice graphics. In that game, there were several play modes. I played a simon says mode, where you have to fill orders as they come in. You see a top down view of a city and you click on each person and the appropriate pizza factory to fill their order, and then a little pizza truck goes to their door and monye appears for you to click. Then there are bonus games where you get scored based on how closely you can place toppings on a pizza to match an example pizza. And as you advance you get to choose which toppings get added. |
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| stacking actions could make it too easy. Also stacking sometimes gets you into crap situations (at least in KOTOR). Having said that it can be cool too. |
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| This isn't exactly KOTOR. :-) As for too easy, well I guess I'll see about that. I'm gonna do it without stacked actions first, and only add them if it seems like it needs it. |
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| good plan |
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| Pizza Frenzy did not do as well as Diner Dash, maybe that says something. |
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| Who told you that? Well if Pizza frenzy didn't do as well, I doubt it is because it has nice graphics and an easy to use interface. :-) More likely it is because the viewpoint and game style is very different. And there is no one character to root for, or whom you actually play. You have a pizza family, and you basically work for them, but delivering the pizzas is unrewarding because you're basically just looking down on a whole city and clicking on houses. |
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| Granted this is a game and not reality. But as to your characters, no guy that muscular looking would ever work in an ice cream shop. |
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| What if he was gay? |
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| Hm... I never noticed before that he does look kinda buff. He's actually supposed to be younger than the girl and kind of dorky looking, and awkward. Like this:  |
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| oh no its the attack of the kid clones of Dennis Rodman. Attack of the Cones with a scoop of red an black sith ice cream with carbonite chunks. Soylent Cream is people!! Showdown at the ColdStone corrale How about customers come in the door one after the other You have a pallet of say 6 ice creams on the first level visual cues on the customer tell you which scoop of ice cream they get and you have to have mad cone before they get to you. the customers speed up on the single scoop levels then you go to the two scoop levels from then three then you add 2 more flavors and back to one scoop then two then three and add 2 more flavors and so on If you don't have their cone ready by the time they get to you then they run away crying. you get points for happy customers. Too many unhappy customers and the big hairy ice cream man dumps a bucket of ice cream on you and chases you out of his store. as you send more customers away crying he gets more angry until he blows his top. |
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