Pushy and the Magic Blocks
Community Forums/Showcase/Pushy and the Magic Blocks
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| Ive released my first game in a couple of years! Its a puzzle game called Pushy and the Magic Blocks. The idea is to push blocks, which slide until they hit another block, so that they come to rest next to a block of the same color. here's a screenshot:  The demo has 20 levels and the full version has 100 plus a level editor. Coding, music (apart from the level editor music) and art is all by me! The demo can be downloaded from here. Let me know what you think... |
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| I think I'll try this, these block pushing games are too addictive. |
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| Coolies, let me know what you think :) Im definitly going to add to it, so any feedback is appreciated! |
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| Is it possible to get past lvl 18 in the demo? It might just be me but it seems impossible. The only thing I'm gonna comment on at the minute is the music. It's kind of annoying after a while so maybe a way to adjust the volume / turn off the music in game is worth considering. |
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| Muzzer, level 18 is definitly possible want a solution? yeah the music thing...well, i was planning on having different tunes through the game eventually, its something im working on now (amongst other things!) here's a solution for level 18...dont read on if you dont want to! Move the lower green block down one and to the right one. Move the lower blue block left one and up one. Move the top green block to the right move the top blue block to the left. Any other suggestions so far? :) thanks for trying it! |
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| Thanks for the solution. Nothing much else I can think of except the text for 'Restart Level' and 'Quit Level'. I think it would look better if it were the same (or similar) to the scores. It looks a bit out of place as it is. |
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| Right? The only problem with doing them like the scores would be that its not clear they're clickable...how about a more solid button style? think thats worth a try? |
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| How about a mouseover effect or something like that? |
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| Played and beat the demo, seems like a really fun game :). If I wasn't laid off last Aug and had money I'd probably buy it :). I also think the text could be better, and the music, but those things were already stated |
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| I really like the start-up music, The in-game music doesnt have the same Zing! That reminds me, I need to shove some tracks together myself. Great game, I bought it :) |
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| Joey, thanks for the encouragement, nice to know you'd consider it at least... Cygnus, thanks! :D You know how much i appreciate it! Out of interest, of the people who've tried it, what is putting you off buying it (not forcing anyone here!) -Overall Style -Lack of levels -Lack of features -Lack of music -Other? |
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| It's very ugly, thats it's chief problem. |
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| Thats a point of view certainly. However, not very constructive :P I did all the artwork myself since I have no spondoolies for an artist. |
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| Your buy now button on your web site just changes my url to about:blank and nothing is on the page. You might want to check it. |
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| I understand Aymes is reworking a lot of the GFX and found himself a publisher. Perhaps that is why the purchase link is down. |
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| Yep, thats exactly what it is. Ive put a little temp page up now to explain stuff. Check back in about a week or so for an updated version! Thanks for the heads up though, it might have been something accidental! |
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| Congrats, Pal! and Good Luck. |
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| cool good luck, hmm 3 guesses as to who the publisher is? |
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| You need 3? |
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| no not really... |
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| Well it's not me :p |
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| Any chance you'll be changing the name at all? Only "Pushy And The Magic Blocks" is hands down the most boring name I've ever heard. I'd rather buy "Filey And The Alphabetised CD Collection" or "Walky And The Long Stroll" before something with such a tedious name - it's like Ronseal, it does exactly what it says on the tin and something really boring sounding. |
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| Interesting point... I couldnt really think of anything else to call it really. I just refer to it as "pushy" myself, but i think there was an old dos game called that. On the other hand Thomas and the Magic words does ok for itself, not that I copied that naming convention, but it is similar. Any suggestions then? |
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| Indiepath: oh, well I do need 3 guesses then! Aymes: What about Pushy Blocky? or Magic Push? Go on start a name thread, it's great fun. |
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| "Thomas and the Magic words" - erk, equally naff, IMHO. As for a good name, tbh I'm not that great at them as I either go for something overly long or something abstract which isn't terribly descriptive like "GleeHoarder" (a platformer I'm making soon). The problem with indie stuff is that it needs to tell the user about it but hopefully without sounding kinda' boring. But I still reserve the right to pick at other people's names. ;) |
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| How dis going? |
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| Its moving on a fair bit. Ive been making some changes to the main in-game screen to do with the blocks and text. I'll probably post a new screenie at the weekend showing this :) |
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| Excelent. *greases hands* Hold on a minute- Do i get a free upgrade? |
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| Free upgrades will go to all peeps who've bought the game so far, imo it would be unfair not too imo...unless my publisher threatens me with a large haddock... |
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| what if *I* threaten you with a large haddock? :P Anyway, good work, I'll kep an eye on this. |
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| Pushy gets the treatment :- http://www.cloverleafgames.com/webbed.php The retail product will ship on Monday. |
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| hey, I thought you said you weren't his publisher. You lied! or are you acting as just a portal for this? Anyway well done all. I'm gonna play it now. |
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| Well it's not me :p That's what I said, notice the stickyout tongue :D And yes, xmas bonus will be getting the treatment as will Easter Bonus. |
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| damn those smileys! Glad to hear mine will be getting the threatment too. There isn't a full download of Push Blocks yet, I spose that's on the way. I completed the demo (around 5-10 mins?) I only got "stuck" on level 7 of easy mode. I actually had to play this quite a few times, levels 8,9,10 were much easier. Gameplay is good. Some areas need polishing I'd say. they could be polished yet still retain the cartoony/hand-drawn look e.g. top of main page has a pixelly edge to the font. general font itself has little bits of it that are grey or something liek the edge aren't trimmed perfectly. (Are the graphics being scaled and thisis the reason for the anomalies?) On the level select screen the squares that you select level with have little black dots in the corners, would look better without imho. That'll do for now. But good work. Oh one more thing, when my pushes ran out first time, I didn't really notice, I kept clicking and nothing happened (this was level7) then I saw for the first time the "Pushes" stat, I hadn't really seen it before. Maybe a message should appear before an auto restart as after all you can't do anything else. |
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| Woah, 10mins? that all? You do know can play 10 levels from each difficulty type in the demo? As for when you run out of pushes... there should be a sound which plays when you have no pushes left! (sorta like trumpets?) Also, new screenie posted at top! |
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| Woah, 10mins? that all? well it was probably less actually. You do know can play 10 levels from each difficulty type in the demo? No I didn't, this certainly may increase time spent playing the demo. Perhaps this needs to be clearer somehow on the selection screen. Also after doing 10 why not say, now try the others, or if you said that already, make it clearer!Yeah I heard the trumpet sound, but didn't associate it with anything, then later on I thought oh it's a low pushes warning and goes off at 1 push left (which doesn't seem to be true according to you). So the point is I wasn't being super observant but neither will you customers be, so there may be room for improvement. Trumpets aren't enough. Ah one more thing before I forget, when the bubles pop, you are simply playing the pop noise in mutiple channels (I think) and this builds up to a super loud pop that distorts. Perhaps you shoudl consider a) having only one pop i.e. restarting the sample, or maybe just two channels b) when you start a new sample, drop the volume on any playing samples so that the overal volume is still the same. This is a common technique in pro games. I ran into similar problems with Xmas Bonus. When too many things popped at once it was really loud, so I had to try out a number of techniques. Just an idea :-) |
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| Heh, shall I mention that I have a module for BMAX that allows you to do all that nice sound stuff :D Na, I won't mention it. |
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| Might be worth looking at that sound module ;) Maybe it needs to be called a "30 level demo" or summin so that everyone realises. It doesnt look like I say anything like that at the end of the first 10 levels, so I'll change that. Before I used the new font, it turned red when you ran out of pushes. I didnt want any huge message come up though because, once you've used up your pushes you might have completed the level correctly. Some kind of "oh dear, you've used em all up" would make me think ive done somthing wrong... |
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| I have mentioned that I didnt notice the trumpets at all until they were mentioned- They go nicely with the music. :) |
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| New web version uploaded. |
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| 30 level demo somewhere would be good + more text as you've said. The new font is better than the old posh one as it's more in keeping with the game. However, personally I prefer it if the numbers are a different colour from the text as it's easier to read them Re: the mesasge coming up, well you need to only make the message come up when everything has stopped moving. Check for end level first, then check for 0 moves, then error. Easy! (depending on your code structure ;-) Cyg is right the trumpets go with the music so aren't noticeable. |
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| OK just checked again, the trumpets DO go off when there is ONE move left not NONE! |
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| Added some messages in there to notify you how many levels are available for each difficulty level. Also, a little message on the menu saying "30 level demo" and also on the end of each level set. The problem with waiting for everthing to stop moving is that sometimes there is always something moving...ie there are a few levels where you have a conveyer belt system which moves a block continuously until you stop if yourself with another block... Been trying to think of another method short of some kind of solving algorithm to check the possible final state(which im really not thinking of doing) but not come up with anything yet. I didnt want to make the sound too annoying becuase you'll be hearing it a lot. Maybe something appearing down the bottom or in the corner? some kind of warning sign? Or would that be annoying too? |
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| message on the menu saying "30 level demo". Saw that, shame it's black and hidden in the top corner. conveyer belt system yes, that'd make things difficult to work out when it's stopped!When there are no more moves, just make the "pushes 0" text flash or glow or something. Did you see this "OK just checked again, the trumpets DO go off when there is ONE move left not NONE!" How come it does that? |
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| Yeah, thats how I meant to say it earlier, its purposefull. I never really wanted it to go off when you have no pushes, since it seems like a warning is sort of redundant then. making the pushes text flash would probably work well, i'll try it. Saw that, shame it's black and hidden in the top corner. As well as that it tells you (in the difficulty select screen) how many levels from each difficulty setting you can play... |
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| cool, well it's an improvement. Gotta keep on improving, haven't we all! |
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| absolutely! I appreciate the time you take to suggest everything you know! :D Just added the flashing when you reach 0 pushes, and it looks good i reckon. Ive kept the trumpets in though cuz i kinda like where they come in... |
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| nothing wrong with trumpets if the player learns the noise, you've just added another cue for the user as well which is great. |
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| Game just went live : http://www.cloverleafgames.com/ Why not download the full version whilst you play the web version? |
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| Hows this going? :D |
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| Its going good, very pleased with how it is now :) Its not even been out for a day yet though :P |
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| We are holding back on promotion for a couple of days since we are about to integrate the Cloverleaf subscription system with IGB. |
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| I'm having a problem getting IGLoader to boot up the game in Firefox 1.5- Works in IE though. Just so you know, Indiepath :) [Edit] Fixed! |
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