“The best way to learn games is to play games. The best way to make games is to work.” – Alan Emrich
Game Maker Tutorials:
1. If we did not complete Game Maker Tutorial 8 (The Platformer Game) in class, the first part of your homework is to complete that tutorial lesson on your own. You should have downloaded this lesson (along with all of the other Game Maker Tutorial files) from Mr. Emrich’s space on the school web site, but if you didn’t, send Mr. Emrich an email requesting this lesson and he will send it to you.
2. Build at least 3 gameplay
Levels for The Platformer Game:
In addition to adding any new ideas that you want (see the list below), you
must create at least 3 gameplay levels
(i.e., not counting the Splash and Cheese screens at the beginning and
end of the game). I want to see some real
work produced by you for this an honest-to-goodness game. You
should apply the information from this week’s lecture on Player Feedback,
Fulfillment and Rewards to your homework this week.
Important:
I expect so see some serious game design thought in your homework this
week as your levels gradually get trickier and slowly introduce new features.
You can make more game levels, if you want, and this will be considered
when this assignment is graded.
Over the past
several tutorial lessons, you’ve learned a lot of techniques for making the
basic building blocks of a Platform Game in Game Maker. By combining Time
Lines and setting timers, creating oversize Rooms and using Views, and many of
other tricks and techniques you’ve learned, you now know enough to flex your
creativity muscles and this homework assignment. It’s time to pursue a bit of
excellence by showing off what you’re learned to date in your homework efforts
this week.
Some ideas for adding new features and building levels in The Platformer Game, might include:
Keys that the players must find to open doors to prizes or the exit.
More and interesting monsters and traps; perhaps even some that shoot.
Bouncing balls that don’t kill the player – just hinder the avatar’s movement past them.
Mines that detonate when you (or a monster?) step on them.
Power-ups for weapons, ammunition, health, damage repair, bonus points, or an extra life.
Water to swim in. This will completely change the motions – there will be no gravity anymore, or perhaps water will have a mild upwards gravity until you reach the surface. There might be a limited time before you run out of air, air bubbles to grab, etc.
Walls and floors that you can destroy by shooting them or jumping on them with “force.”
Trampolines that make the avatar jump higher.
Platforms that appear and disappear.
One-way travel zones.
Moving platforms (this is not easy).
Adding a better front end (Splash Screen) and a back end (Cheese Screen).
Some documentation the <F1> is needed for this game. You can copy and paste the documentation that you find in file platform_6.gm6 as a starting point. Note that Game Maker has automatic Save <F5> and Load <F6> game features, so be sure that’s in the documentation.
But most of all, you need to make Rooms – lots of ‘em: about 20 to make a good Platformer Game. Just be sure that there are more and more surprises introduced and tougher challenges to face each level to pull the player along. Important: Build each Room carefully, one-by-one, so that they orchestrate into a fine overall gameplay experience and storyline (i.e., Sequence of Events). Make sure that you’re happy with each individual Room; you don’t want a “weak link” in your game.
Those levels could be on different themes with a story woven into the game. This can be accomplished with different background images and thematic Sprites and Sounds, exposition (“narrative”) screens between certain levels to advance the plot, and so forth.
You owe me at least 3 original gameplay levels for The
Platformer Game
(although more
than 3 can improve your grade for this assignment).
Make sure that your email includes 1) the game’s .gm6 file; and 2) an
explanation in the Game Information display (i.e., the <F1> key) or the
body of the email explaining to me any new features, major modifications or
story elements that you’ve added to the game (so that I can focus at those
features in particular when I grade this assignment for up to
15 points).
The Game Maker’s Apprentice Textbook:
Chapter 8, Levels and Features: Read pages 149 to 163. Be sure to use the CD-ROM included with the book to examine the .gm6 files in the Games / Chapter 8 folder! There’s more than just reading involved in this chapter as you look at 20 carefully crafted levels of the tutorial game, Koalabr8 demonstrating the material. This chapter goes hand-in-glove with the course lectures and points you to a successful Course Project, so be sure to make a good study of it and take that material to heart.
The Midterm Exam is next week:
Next week features the midterm exam. It is worth 15 points and covers the lecture material from this week (including general knowledge of Game Maker), plus the above textbook chapter and the required reading sections for this week on the course web site. This will be a comprehensive exam with questions from the entire first half of this course.
