Game Well Dried Up

[Nick]

I'm out of ideas for games that I could make by myself (spare for some help with music and art). I plan to do all the coding. I've made a simple Cocoa game (though prefer SDL and OpenGL) and a simple engine for a sidescroller. I can't think of more to make the sidescroller work better (physics) nor can I think of a good story to use it with so it's just sitting on a shelf right now.

Does anyone have any simple game ideas (puzzles or such) that I could use just to make some more games? I'm thinking I might try some old board games but I'm not sure just yet. The idea of AI is kind of scaring me right now.

[skyhawk]

I'm out of ideas for games that I could make by myself (spare for some help with music and art). I plan to do all the coding. I've made a simple Cocoa game (though prefer SDL and OpenGL) and a simple engine for a sidescroller. I can't think of more to make the sidescroller work better (physics) nor can I think of a good story to use it with so it's just sitting on a shelf right now.

Does anyone have any simple game ideas (puzzles or such) that I could use just to make some more games? I'm thinking I might try some old board games but I'm not sure just yet. The idea of AI is kind of scaring me right now.
you've made games? :blink:

:p

but seriously, um.... try polishing your games. Finished games >> non finished games.

[JustinFic]

I recall that OpenGL sidescroller engine being a pretty cool start- why not slap some textures on your primitives and work from there?

But if you're totally out of ideas already- play some more games. Dig up some early coin-op and 8/16 bit console titles. Think about what's fun in whatever you play.

[rossum]

Yeah old games are a good reference, especially old obscure ones. But maybe try the opposite and get inspiration from non-game things, like a book on the symbology of the ancient egyptians, make all the ships cartuches or look at a book on biology and make the ships different types of flying molocules and when you upgrade with new protons you change into a different molocule, like you start out a hydrogen molocule and pick up a couple of oxygen molocules and you have water attack abilities. Just some random thoughts.

I think 2-d side scrollers are fun as hell but most of the time 90% of them look and act the same, IMHO. Try something radically different.

or instead of ships use people i was just playing a vertical shooter with people instead of ships on the dreamcast the other day and was wondering why it hasn't been done more often. Something to think about anyway.

[Malarkey]

I recall that OpenGL sidescroller engine being a pretty cool start- why not slap some textures on your primitives and work from there?

But if you're totally out of ideas already- play some more games. Dig up some early coin-op and 8/16 bit console titles. Think about what's fun in whatever you play.

Back in my day, the Commodore 64 had tons of great games. None of this silly 8-bit console crap where you get more than 16 colors and two TWO! fire buttons. :) But yeah, if you're out of ideas, you're not playing enough games. Try playing some of the online flash games for some inspiration on fun projects or some of the Classic MacOS games; I've been dying to do a remake of Chiral myself.

[kemalyun]

do have really good ideas. They lack good gfx and sound but the gameplay is really great. Play old games and get the point, find out what's fun in them. Then do a remake, but don't get caught in the gfx-hype. Just a few titles with really interesting ideas:

Necromancer
Drelbs
Rainbow Walker

I'd also love to see a good lady-bug clone ...

[Carlos Camacho]

>I'd also love to see a good lady-bug clone ...
What's wrong with Gaichu?

If you want to work with Cocoa, grab the Hooptie code. Go through it. Maybe add features and expand it.

If working with SDL, look at all the SDL games on the SDL page and see if there are any that need a hand in finding their way to Mac OS X.

The feedback from the uDevGames voting has a field for the type of classic game that gamers want to see on the Mac. I recall seeing Q*Bert.

If I were you, I might look at games that require minimum graphic assets, so that you can concentrate on finishing the game. For example, "Tempest." (Vector game)

By the way, if you have a side shooter. It would be nice to turn it into MoonPatrol. Last year, someone was going to enter such a game in uDG, but dropped out. Scramble is also a game that could be re-made.

Also, rather than set your side-scroller in space... why not have it underwater? In deep underwater caverns?

[JustinFic]

Other good places for inspiration are movies and tv. Don't rule them out :)

For instance I just saw the remake of Dawn of the Dead for the first time around Halloween. Towards the end, when they take the vans out and start running down zombies by the hundreds and there's heads exploding and propane tanks blowing up and everyone's getting wasted by chainsaws and... I need a moment :love: :cry:

[igame3d]

Other good places for inspiration are movies and tv. Don't rule them out :)

For instance I just saw the remake of Dawn of the Dead for the first time around Halloween. Towards the end, when they take the vans out and start running down zombies by the hundreds and there's heads exploding and propane tanks blowing up and everyone's getting wasted by chainsaws and... I need a moment :love: :cry:

God damnit, thats our udevgames entry next year sssssssh don't let the cat out of the bag 10 months early for crying out loud!!!

[Leisure Suit Lurie]

Make Klax, Nick. To my knowledge, nobody has made a Klax for Macs.

[Malarkey]

Other good places for inspiration are movies and tv. Don't rule them out :)

For instance I just saw the remake of Dawn of the Dead for the first time around Halloween. Towards the end, when they take the vans out and start running down zombies by the hundreds and there's heads exploding and propane tanks blowing up and everyone's getting wasted by chainsaws and... I need a moment :love: :cry:

So can we expect to see a chainsaw in the next update of Kill Dr. Cote? :)

[aaronsullivan]

I just lost a huge post with lots of games. Here's a shorter one:
Space Harrier
Fantasy Zone for SMS (using the trackball made it great)
Duck Tales for NES (or was it Rescue Rangers? - if I remember right it had cooperative stuff.)
Metroid has never had a good clone made of it.
Root Beer (or just beer) Tapper is a great simple game with deep skill set to learn.
Sinistar was made for pc's but it lost all the kinetic energy of the original.
There hasn't been a really good Gauntlet style game in a long time.

I love Xybots, but it might be weird on computers that are so accustomed to first person shooters. The key to this one is cooperation.

Use a board game. I've always wanted to see a good computer version of Carcasonne (the Ark of the Covenant version is the most fun) or Settlers of Catan. Please take advantage of the interactivity of the medium though! Gold Geier is a pretty cool game, but it doesn't know it's on a computer. ;)

[Shivers]

Will P. (Akisha) and I nearly did a version of Carcasonne. I wish we had, its an amazing game.

[EvolPenguin]

How about something like Final Fantasy Tactics, except for mac. If i remember correctly, there was something like that for 21 days, it looked cool. Does anyone remember the link?

Alex

[ThemsAllTook]

Will P. (Akisha) and I nearly did a version of Carcasonne. I wish we had, its an amazing game.

Sorry to go off topic, but have you heard from Will lately? He seems to have vanished as of July or so. I've tried sending him e-mails, but gotten no response (no bounce, either). His web address now points to someone's printer... :???:

- Alex Diener

[JustinFic]

How about something like Final Fantasy Tactics, except for mac. If i remember correctly, there was something like that for 21 days, it looked cool. Does anyone remember the link?

Alex

Are you referring to World to Conquer (http://www.apple.com/downloads/macosx/games/role_strategy/worldtoconquer.html)? It was one of my faves in uDG 2003.

I'd really like to see Metroid's gameplay reborn on the Mac. And I'm talking the original few that really forced you to explore, not the later ones that hold your hand through the whole game. While we're talking platformers, I'd like to see Contra, Castlevania, and Megaman too.

[Shivers]

Sorry to go off topic, but have you heard from Will lately?

- Alex Diener

No, I haven't heard from him either. Unfortunate too, as we were planning a uDG entry.

[aaronsullivan]

I was working on an homage to Contra at one point. :)
It's what got me back into making games. I started with SDL (just 2D) went up to SDL+OpenGL for the game I stopped making for uDevGames 2003 and then made Space Barrage.

World To Conquer was excellent. I wanted to see that more complete.

I've seen some people copying Nintendo DS games already like that Incredible Ink game (GameHouse games.) There's many fresh ideas there and most of them would work pretty well with a mouse. :)

[JustinFic]

I was working on an homage to Contra at one point. :)

Any chance of resuming the project?? :love:

I've seen some people copying Nintendo DS games already like that Incredible Ink game (GameHouse games.) There's many fresh ideas there and most of them would work pretty well with a mouse. :)

And vice versa. Dreaming about Kill Dr. Cote DS... :wow:

Here's one from the do-it-before-I-do-it-myself department: Bionic Commando. Why aren't there more bionic arms in games? Swinging from stuff rules.

[skyhawk]

Here's one from the do-it-before-I-do-it-myself department: Bionic Commando. Why aren't there more bionic arms in games? Swinging from stuff rules.
I loved and hated bionic commando so much. I could never beat it, but I blame that on my being so young then... and it is impossible to find now...

[rossum]

yeah bionic commando was one of my favorite games on nes, i got lucky and picked it up at a thrift store last year for a buck. Still just as fun now. Here's a link to a pretty good fanpage if anyone is interested. http://www.elitecoder.com/bionic/bionic-commando.html

[aaronsullivan]

About the contra homage: Not in the near future, sorry. :( But, if I did, the character would have to get a bionic arm. ;) If I was going to make a serious effort at a platform game, now, I'd probably go for a game in the style of Metroid (original.) I have an old idea for this that could be lots of fun. The only problem with these types of games on computers is that... they aren't that great using a keyboard, and most people don't have game pads.

Bionic C is also one of my faves. It's SO hard now! It was so much easier when I was a teen. It is true, Justin, that there is nothing like swinging on a bionic arm. :) It was such a unique technique that took time to master, but when you did, it was terribly fun. :wow:

I wonder what one could do with a keyboard/mouse control... maybe use the mouse to aim the arm and swing... hmm...

Cool site, btw, I like that they play the correct music for the stages in the level section. :)

[blobbo]

I was thinking it would be fun to do a side-scroller a lÃ* mario soon... But then I found this:

http://super-tux.sf.net/

And now I can't get anything done ;)

[JustinFic]

The only problem with these types of games on computers is that... they aren't that great using a keyboard, and most people don't have game pads.

I saw a shareware game recently (want to say it was called Pow Pow's Adventure) which sold for $30, but was bundled with a gamepad. Interesting idea.

I wonder what one could do with a keyboard/mouse control... maybe use the mouse to aim the arm and swing... hmm...

We were this () close to seeing this for uDevGames. I was torn between Dr. Cote and a sidescroller with this sort of control scheme. It was a ninja game, and you would run with four movement keys (WASD or whatever,) aim with the mouse, throw shuriken with left click, and fire a ninja rope with the right click. It ended up being way too ambitious for one person over three months. Definitely let me know if there's a bionic arm in your future- I have some cool ideas :)

And on Metroid, I've been glued to Symphony of the Night lately. Just bought it used (PSX, 7 years old, no box/manual, for 20 bucks. That's how awesome it is.) It's Castevania 1 meets Super Metroid meets Final Fantasy. Rules.

[phydeaux]

Nanocrisis is essentially pieced together Zelda + Symphony of the night. I think people who weren't hardcore old-skool console gamers found it too complicated, though, which makes me think I probably should have made something simpler, at least for uDG.

[MarkJ]

Lacking in inspiration? I suggest grabbing a good Commodore 64 emulator from emulation.net (http://www.emulation.net/c64/) and then checking out these great C64 Games (http://www.64apocalypse.com/bestever1.htm).

[lightbringer]

Contra? Oh boy, that would be awesome to do a modern version of that on the mac (fancier, more-modern graphics would be easy). Maybe also doing something similar to Ikaruga (sp?). Brian just didn't get far enough with his entry to provide enough entertainment for me in this style of game.

Maybe a couple guys would like to team up and take on either of these challenges? Shareware or freeware, it'd be a great addition.

[Max]

Contra? Oh boy, that would be awesome to do a modern version of that on the mac (fancier, more-modern graphics would be easy). Maybe also doing something similar to Ikaruga (sp?). Brian just didn't get far enough with his entry to provide enough entertainment for me in this style of game.

An Ikaruga clone would be great, with fancy Open-GL environments. As for Contra... I'm not sure if players would like a clone. The latest Contra games suck. It's a disaster. Strange enough, game critics praise the funny side-scroller/shooter "Alien Hominide". Go to Newgrounds.com and try the Flash demo.