Title Screen – Work in Progress
February 21st, 2010 - filed under Input Requested
v2, better gems!
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February 21st, 2010 at 11:10 am
MAN, that is cool! And being the geek I am, I especially love the fact you tossed in the Jetpack schematics from the original version of Jetpack, too.
Might want to put the original year Jetpack was released, though, instead of the current year — IE, “circa 1993″ instead of “circa 2010″.
Now on the other hand, “1993-1998, 2010″ could go on the mode menu screen, which would logically follow this title screen. I’m not sure if it would work as well if the mode menu popped up OVER the title screen or not.
That’s just my feedback, of course.
February 21st, 2010 at 1:29 pm
This screen looks fantastic. Like Joseph, I like the original jetpack schematics. I also like how there’s the map of a level and a path going through it, kinda hints that there are puzzle-y levels that you have to think out. One thing I would change/improve would be the gems. They kinda look like plastic, or something, but I love how they’re just scattered on the sheets. So far, this is looking to be a really sweet title screen…
February 21st, 2010 at 2:18 pm
That looks awesome. I’m trying to learn to use DS Game Maker to work on the DS port of Jetpack. It’ll probably take a while though.
February 21st, 2010 at 5:11 pm
nice draft in general, but
- the gems are too saturated imo
- the big “jetpack” in the upper left does not really fit. especially with the perfect double underlines, it doesn’t fit the “old map” look of the rest of the gfx
February 22nd, 2010 at 8:32 am
Looks good, but I’m not sure if this old paper theme fits such high-tech, somewhat futuristic jetpack. I mean… something feels wrong.
Somehow, Jetpack is similar to Tomb Raider: high-tech devices carried by a hero looking for treasures inside ancient ruins.
Old paper might be good as a “map to some treasures in a level”. But the jetpack itself needs something more recent, more high-tech.
February 22nd, 2010 at 9:46 am
The theme of Jetpack 2 will be futuristic, but the theme of Jetpack 1 is ancient and retro-futuristic. This is kind of like rediscovering a lost technology from the 1930’s.
I definitely need to fix the gems and the title.. the problem is I suck at drawing so computerey straight lines are easier, when I hand-draw it ends up looking like a 3 year old did it.
Maybe I’ll put 1993-2010, I don’t want them thinking the game is old though.
February 22nd, 2010 at 11:13 am
Possible style conflicts aside, I think the “I came upon…” is redundant. The references to the game aren’t really mysterious enough to need an explanation, and it’s ruining the illusion that *you* are a daring adventurer in search of precious gems.
February 24th, 2010 at 9:13 am
What do you think of removing the concept of “lives”? You would basically have unlimited lives and never face a “game over” situation. My main problem with the idea is what to do with the “extra life” treasure.
February 24th, 2010 at 10:46 am
@Adam – I definitely like that idea. Game overs/lives, to me, seem like a bit of a dated game concept.
Maybe just have each statue as unique collectable item. You could have a ‘trophy room’ kind of thing at the end of the game (or viewable any time, under a menu) which shows each statue you’ve obtained. They don’t have to be visually unique, just listed uniquely, so in the trophy room you’ll see a grid filled with statues, each representing an in-game statue. So for example, if you didn’t collect the statue in level 13, then the 13th item in the grid will be greyed out because you didn’t collect that particular statue.
There should be achievements too
About the title, looks good, but the font looks inappropriate and the emeralds seem a bit strange. I suggest studying some more images of emeralds, especially in relation to colour, shape and its reaction to light. Maybe also remove the text in the bottom left entirely; I think it’s best to either have no story whatsoever, or a very strong story. Having a story consisting of two sentences seems a bit silly to me. Personally, I would rather see just the map by itself, which would imply a story but leave it up to the players’ imagination.
February 24th, 2010 at 11:21 am
Well, maybe there could be different difficulty modes, whereas the “beginner” mode doesn’t have the “lives” thing?
February 24th, 2010 at 11:47 am
I love the collectible statues idea – every level will have 1 statue, and a meta-game will be to collect them all.
Anyone have other ideas for acheivements? I could base one on beating par level times, getting all the gold in a level, and a few specific ones such as defeat level X without fuel, or without phasing.
My thinking for the story text is to have an intro page before this one, with the following:
—–
[darkness]
The secrets of this unending maze are too well guarded,
its defenders too determined, too cunning.
I would need the power of flight to evade these infernal robots.
To avoid the traps and pitfalls, a man would have to pass through solid rock.
I fear I must abandon my quest.
[strip of sky, shadows of enemies passing, with sounds]
Today as I scavenged these upper caverns for remaining gems, I came upon a secret room.
I was astonished to discover obscure documents pinned underneath a skeleton.
Have I finally discovered the key to unlocking this mystery?
[cue the music, fade to title page]
—–
There’s still plenty of mystery, but a few clues about how we got here and our purpose.
February 24th, 2010 at 12:57 pm
Other achievement ideas:
Trapping at least x enemies during a playthrough of the game.
Completing all of the tutorial levels, provided tutorials are optional.
Setting off at least x spike traps whilst invincible.
Destroying at least x crates.
Checkpoint achievements, such as getting to level 25, level 50, level 75, finishing the game.
Possibly an achievement for dying and viewing each different death animation. Although I’m not really sure this would be a good idea, as it would reward the player for dying/failing.
On a semi-related note: have you considered trying to sell this over Steam? I know Machinarium was also developed in Flash and sold over Steam. I think it would at least be worth trying to contact Valve to see if it’s possible.
February 24th, 2010 at 3:13 pm
Steam takes 30%, while selling direct is only 5-10% overhead. But its a possibility.
February 25th, 2010 at 3:31 am
Adam, I would like the idea of letting the level designer choose the differences between easy/hard etc. For instance, every item/tile/monster can have a flag to indicate that it is only visible on some modes.
So for example, a level could have a fuel item that only appears on modes: “easy” and “medium” and he can add an extra monster for modes “medium” and hard”.
Other interesting ways to use this would be adding extra emeralds on hard modes, moving a switch to a more difficult location, placing (or removing) a brick in a place that makes the level harder.
All other choices (speeding up the level, changing the fuel drainage rate etc.) will cause some levels to be impossible on certain modes, this however provides for much flexibility.
February 25th, 2010 at 3:37 am
Some other things on my wishlist:
* Time records (with a specific target time).
* Saving your own replays (hopefully automatically saving the replays of each level’s fastest completion).
* Online high scores, where you can watch the replay of the person completing the level.
Regarding the option of removing lives, I like the way games like donkey kong country does it, in that game you have lives, but when they run out you can return to your last save point, and save points are only available every 5 or 6 levels. This means that running out of lives has some consequences, but not as bad as starting all the way back at the beginning, usually only 3 or so level completions are lost.
February 27th, 2010 at 5:37 pm
Those new gems are indeed a lot better!