A Post-Mortem of Sword & Sworcery

Original article from IndieGames.com:

I think iOS has taught developers to try and make games for everyone, but by focusing on everyone it means that you’re really not focusing on anything at all.

We hope in a way that Sworcery is a proof of concept that you don’t have to make a game for everyone on iOS.

We desperately wanted to create something that was successful as an experience, as art; as something relevant to the medium, not just a feeling of beating a game or mastering a mechanic, but something to think about.

A game is forever cursed by being called a game. Mechanics are not the be-all and end-all of a project. I believe that Sworcery would have been just as successful if it had no puzzles or combat and was less linear. Those things are almost strictly there because we felt we had to put that kind of thing in the game.

If your game is made for players, it’s probably not made for anyone else.

Nathan Vella – Capy Games.

IS & SP- Linking It All Together

This last week I’ve been finalising a topic for my Investigative Study and what the content will be. I started off by looking at Indie games that I especially like and picking out interesting things about all of them, trying to group games together with similar themes. The strongest themes I decided were the use of audio and genre using examples such as Limbo and Machinarium, and strong narrative themes in games like Ruins and A Closed World. I originally had narrative and genre together as one category, but found these two to be too far from each other (which is why in the picture, the narrative plan doesn’t really make a lot of sense!).

Since Superbrothers: Sword & Sworcery EP is the main inspiration for everything I’m doing at the moment, I thought the game would be a good place to centre my essay. I want to be able to define the Input-Output Cinema genre by looking at various aspects of the game which make it unique, instead of looking at similarities between a collection of games. This will finally provide a 4000 word explanation for confused players! And should also clarify what it is that I’m working towards!

In the image above I tried to think of all the things which set it apart from everything else, and tried to structure these into essay sections. The essay will consist of quotes, definitions and observations, as well as some of the same old critical theory which I can throw in-listed at the bottom. I’ve started off my research for the IS by re-acquainting myself with the game on a long car journey up North over the weekend. One thing I noticed straight off from my second play-through is that it’s not as interesting if you don’t have to work out what the game’s going on about half the time. I would definitely recommend not following a walkthrough while playing it, as this takes away most of the game experience. What makes it worth playing again is the immersive game-world, which feels good to revisit. I wonder if there will ever be a sequel?

GDL – 19/10/11

I’m really happy with the tree level structure, no changes to be made there. The next steps are to use the tree test in game maker to work out how to create the level. Some things to work on:
1. Scale
I’m happy with the amount of screen space the image currently takes up, but I haven’t worked out what the window size will be for the finished demo. If I wanted the game to played full screen, this may have to involve scaling the image up even more, so that there isn’t too much of the image on the screen at any one time. There are also quite a few boring areas which I will consider adding more leaves/flowers/fruits to. I’m worried that the level may be a little too “samey”. The character also needs to be slightly bigger in relation to the level, and I will probably change the camera settings so that the character is always a little more central.
2. Layers
Most of the leaves on the tree currently seem to be on the correct layer, however some of the extruding branches need to be pulled into the foreground. I will probably create these as game objects rather than a foreground layer, so that they react when the player walks past or climbs onto them.
Current Layers:

3. Paths
Obviously in this example, the player is freely walking around a flat image with no limitations. I will use this to work out where my invisible walls will be placed so that the character can only walk along a set path, and can’t wander off into the background as I do several times in the video! I’m not sure yet whether I will set gravity to this part of the game. I’m not sure it’s necessary to have, as I don’t particularly want the character accidentally falling to the ground or any other part of the level.
4. Finishing Touches
Once the other items listed here are dealt with, I can begin thinking about a background for the level, some lighting, whether there will be other objects in the level, and sound effects and music. Some of these won’t take effect for quite a while, I’d imagine!

Making a Sprite Move

In the tree exploration example, I’ve used keyboard controls to move the character around the screen. I probably won’t use keys when it comes to making the finished game, as this limits the distribution possibilities! Controlling the character with the mouse is much more universal when it comes to porting to touch screen devices.
To make a character move, different sprite sequences are needed for each direction the character will face (with the exception of symmetrical directions which can simply be mirrored, such as left and right.)

The object is given a main sprite, in this case the facing forward sprite, but keys are set which not only change the sprite direction but change the sprite shown. As long as the orientation of sprite is the same, the sprites should change over seamlessly without the appearance of the image sequence switching over.

Step Event Code

This code goes into the “step” event for the object, which codes the object’s changing state.
if keyboard_check(vk_…) asks if a key is being pressed
sprite_index=… changes the sprite displayed
image_speed changes the speed that the image sequence plays at, not the speed that the object moves
x=,y=… represents the object’s position on the x and y axes. Either positive or negative
image_xscale/image_yscale determines whether the image is facing forwards or backwards. An x/yscale of -1 will flip the image to face the opposite direction.

This code is all that is need to be able to control the character!

Test Tree

This is my final tree sketch, drawn on three layers. The middle layer contains the trunk and tree branches, and I used the other layers either side to apply leaves in front and behind the main structure. The background image which I will make for the game will work in a similar way. Part of the image will act as a background, and part will act as a foreground image, so that the player walks behind the image at various points. As well as this, I hope to create sprites from certain areas of the design so that they react when the player walks over them. To help work out which parts work, I applied the image to a Game Maker project and added a playable character to explore the level design:

The familiar character sprite is a palette-swap version of the Final Fantasy V sprite I used in my last video! The first part of the video is just to get a feel for wandering around the image. The second half reveals the two paths I will set in order to get to the ground. It seems like an easy task, but as you can see at about 3:06 I got lost even thought I was secreting following the trail in the background!

Being able to explore the image in this way helps uncover the natural path the character would take, which parts would be in the foreground and which parts will interact. I will use this to help me work out where to place the invisible walls and create a set path for the character, as well as work out what scale to work to.

Digital Trees

I took my tree design and recreated it digitally, just roughly at first. I used the outline I had already design to add blue circular “leaves”, at this stage thinking more about aesthetics than level design. The advantage of getting this digital now is that this is easily editable, and doesn’t take long to draw and redraw. I traced over this with my next image, to make it a little clearer.

From here, I started to think about how this image could be used as a playable level. The player begins near the top of the tree, and works their way down. Originally I only wanted to have one possible route down the tree, but with the amount of branches I’ve added facing different directions, I’ve settled for two routes. The level is open to plenty of exploration, but the player will probably find themselves in a few dead-ends on the way. This is not meant to frustrate the player, but allow them the opportunity to explore and enjoy the world they have entered.

There are parts of the level which I have deemed “too steep” or “too far” from other branches to cross, so the next step is to scale everything so that these judgements are more obvious. When constructing the level, I will be using plenty of invisible walls to stop the player from going places they shouldn’t.

GDL – 18/10/11

I haven’t been thinking any more about the concept of the game today, as I’ve been concentrating mainly on the mechanics. I’m mostly happy with the 360 gravity system, although you can tell from the video that the character isn’t always rooted firmly to the platform. This shouldn’t be an issue in the game, but perhaps my maths could do with improving!
Tomorrow I’m going to move back on drawing trees, and get working on the visuals again.

Basic Gravity Test

Moving away from conceptual art temporarily, I felt I should re-acquaint myself with Game Maker before I forget everything I knew about it in the summer.

This test used simple place-holders to work out a good formula for the gravity system I want to implement. I made a large room with containing a circle to act as my “level”. I then added a character object, for this example I used an NPC from Final Fantasy V on SNES. The character is made of four images. One is stationery, two are used alternately for walking, and the other one is the “surprised” sprite, which I just threw in there because I like it!

I found these images at Spriter’s Resource.com

In the character object’s step code I added a point in the circle to act as the gravity that would affect the character, as well as the strength of the gravity. The rest of the code mainly works out what will happen when the keys are pressed, and which sprites will activate.

What shown in the video is the “room” settings, which state that only a small section of the room is shown at a time. This is the 640×480 window which the room is played in. The camera is set to follow the sprite, but remains upright even while the sprite is upside down. While this happens, the key-commands remain the same, so when the left key is pressed, the character moves to his left, rather than the left of the player. I quite like this as a gameplay element. The player will have to concentrate to manoeuvre whilst all the commands are reversed!

GDL – 17/10/11

Today I thought I should start the Game Design Log rolling, as with many things, I think starting it off will be the hardest part. It’s still early, and I don’t really have any testable material yet, so this will only be a short entry. Instead of play testing, I’m going to monitor my progress of the GDD, which I started today. There are still some gaps in the game’s story/concept, brought to light while following a simple GDD guide from the bookThe Computer Game Design Course. These are the things that still need resolving:

1. Names of characters
Though this doesn’t feel that important at this stage of the process, it was difficult writing about the various characters without having proper names for them. In the case of the main character of the game, I was also really vague on what he actually was.

2. Game Synopsis
This feels as though it definitely should be an important part of the development. I know the game’s background and what I want the demo to consist of, but I’m not entirely sure what the overall point of the game is.

3. Art- look and feel
This isn’t something important to the development of the game, but would be nice to include in the GDD. The guide says to describe inspirational artists and films etc, which helped influence the look and feel of the game.

4. Game Script
This is something I will work on at a later stage. I’m mainly concerned about visuals for the time being.

5. Game Walkthrough
This will come with the completion of the tree design, which I still need to scale properly in order for it to be a playable level.

6. Sound Design
This is something I have thought about, but haven’t developed much yet. I’ve been looking at sites like Jamendo which offer license-free music. If anything, this site has helped me realise what type of music I would like as a background element to the game. I was originally thinking of having a very simple acoustic guitar track playing, something like Comme Avant by Cherrycoke, but after listening to a few other songs on the site I’m quite swayed by the electro-chillout/ambient genre. A great artist for game music is Butterfly Tea, one of the tracks I especially like is A Simple Life. Another great artist I’ve discovered is Ambient Samurai. Alot of their music has a very far-eastern feel to it, which compliment the Banzai influences in the opening level.

Learning Agreement: Synopsis of Study

When Craig D Adams, founder of indie studio Superbrothers, created his first game: Sword & Sworcery EP, he described the experience as a “psychosocial audiovisual experiment”, and that it would fall into the category of “input output cinema.” What exactly this meant, he did not explain.

For the specialist project, I will be creating an interactive demo, which will act as a trailer for a game for Windows. The type of game created will be inspired by Craig D Adams’ cryptic “input-output cinema” genre-a user-controlled experience with emphasis on narrative, dialogue and visual importance rather than using typical game-play elements. The concept of this game is to provide an enjoyable experience to gamers and non-gamers alike, which is simple to control and aesthetically pleasant to view. The game will rely heavily on its visuals and in-game interactions to gain the emotional commitment of the player.

In content, the finished “game” will resemble indie developments such as Flower for PS3, Ruins for PC and Superbrothers: Sword & Sworcery EP for iOS. In image style, my game will represent a modernisation of the classical pixel-art found in old video games. Pixel art has become increasingly popular as an art style, where it has previously been considered “outdated.” This is largely connected to the nostalgia factor of the artist. For them, the style represents past experiences and the emotions connected to them. To avoid simply looking old, the style will be brought up to date to create large-scale sprites and background imagery that would never have been possible on 8 or 16 bit consoles. This will then be combined with modern effects and vector imagery to form a new “art” style. To achieve this, I will use a combination of traditional methods and modern software image generation. The final imagery for the game will be based around sketches and photographs inspired by organic structures such as trees, flowers and weeds. I will use sketches to draw up initial plans of in-game objects, characters and level design. I will then mainly be using Photoshop and Graphics Gale to create the pixel-art elements of the game, and Illustrator for the vector based objects.

The project will obviously involve the use of a soundtrack and sound effects. This is a part of the project which I will not be executing personally, and will be looking into royalty free sound-effects and music created by others in order to produce a finished result.

The game will be brought together using a piece of software called Game Maker, which can be used to create executables for Windows as well as versions for iOS devices, android and PSP. The software uses its own code called “Game Make Language” or GML which I will be using to create the interactive elements of the game. Because there is the opportunity to convert the code for a number of devices, I will eventually consider publishing my finished product on the Apple app store. For the Specialist Project however, I will concentrate on simply creating a Windows demonstration which is fully playable in order to gain feedback on the direction I am taking this particular genre. The gameplay selection for the demo will be from the beginning of the finished game, and will only take a few minutes to play. This will be coupled with stills of other areas of the game, or possibly footage of the game to create a teaser trailer effect.