Post Mortem: Fat Men Can’t Jump

This is the first of hopefully many blog posts in which I dissect a game of mine after receiving feedback on it. The subject of this particular autopsy is my very first Flash game called “Fat Men Can’t Jump.” This game has the dubious distinction of being only one of two entries to the Game in Ten Days (GiTD) contest that did not get a single vote. Anyone who wants to try this game can find it here.

Most of the people who voted in the GiTD did not leave any feedback on my game. The few comments I received are like gold to me because they gave me clues as to what went wrong and what I could have done to improve the game. Below are the comments my game received with the names of the voters withheld.

A GiTD with an AI? Wow. Even if dumb. I wonder if plain holding space would remedy for “exact timing” :D

Hurray I won. But there is no replay value.

IDK how to bounce…

They may not be able to jump, but they can stick to the walls indefinitely. The collisions seem…broken in this game at the moment.

From what I can glean based on the above feedback, it seems that there are three main issues with this particular game:

1. The game physics is broken. I must have spent only thirty percent of my total development time on the game’s physics and mechanics. Much of my time was spent on making art resources and figuring out how to customize the avatar’s appearance. Considering that the physics and mechanics of a game comprise its very essence, I should have spent seventy percent of my time on them instead.
2. The mechanics of trying to hit the space key at the avatar’s precise point of collision was confusing to players. In my own play tests, I often found myself hitting the space key repeatedly in the hope that one of my key presses would coincide with the moment of impact. This does not make for good gameplay.
3. The game is over fast. There are no additional levels or opponents to go up against beyond the first one.  Considering that the gameplay itself is bad, this may actually be a merciful blessing for my players, but the fact remains that people expect more from a game.

So there you have it – the three reasons why my first Flash game did not get any votes. If there are other reasons for it being bad, I’d love to hear them. I invite all readers who chose to try my game to post their feedback here. Your comments may help me improve my game development skills.

A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum

Last month, someone posted a request on the Kongregate forums for an artist to collaborate with him on a Flash game he is developing. Despite already having my own project in the works, I liked his demo so much that I volunteered to work as the artist on his game.

At around the same time, another person posted on the Kongregate forums a request for a programmer to help her develop a tower defense game she designed. No one volunteered to help her then, although someone else gave her a link to a tutorial on how to make tower defense games in Stencyl. As she went through the tutorial, she would post a question on the forums about problems she sometimes encountered, and I would post my solutions for her.

After two weeks, one of the forum moderators announced an upcoming contest called GiTD # 27. “GiTD” stands for Game in Ten Days. It’s a game jam where interested parties may create Flash games within the prescribed period as soon as the contest theme is announced. After the deadline, forum members may vote for the two games that they liked the most, with the first choice getting two points and the second placer getting one point. After a short period, the votes are tallied, and the winner gets a prize as well as bragging rights. Participants who post their work-in-progress on day 7 for others to critique would automatically get two free music tracks that they may use in their entries and any other game they make from then on. Although I have never completed a Flash game of my very own before, I messaged the moderator, telling him that I was interested in joining this contest.

One hour after having sent the moderator my message, I received another private message from the tower defense designer, who asked to chat with me over Skype. When I logged on, we discussed her game for a while, and I briefly looked over her game design document and artwork. Now I don’t know what possessed me at that point, but I told her that programming a tower defense game was so easy that I was tempted to do it for her. Perhaps it was my natural tendency to want to help people in any aspect of game development. Or maybe it was a moment of insanity. Whichever the case, I actually wound up volunteering for the job. I warned her, though, that I already had two other projects ongoing, so her project would be third on my list. She said that as long as her game was completed by December, she would be okay with that. GiTD # 27 had not yet officially started then, but when it eventually did, I wound up with four ongoing projects. Count them, four. I really am a mad game developer.

Well, the GiTD was over in ten days, so now I’m down to three projects. The sad part was that my entry did not get a single vote. I have no regrets about joining the GiTD though. Trying to cobble a working game together in such a short time frame was an amazing experience. Being accustomed to thinking things through before acting on my plans, I was completely yanked out of my comfort zone and forced to adopt a fast and disciplined way of working. At the end of it all, I can now honestly say that I’ve actually completed a Flash game. I would love to join another game jam, although I really ought to finish the projects that I’m helping others with before I do.

My Main Man Max

I got pretty far with Michel Roger’s tutorial on making a human model in 3DS Max. Pictured here is my progress as of ten days ago. Unfortunately, Monsieur Roger did not explain how to make proper feet with toes. I’m sure I can figure that out on my own, but at this point, I realized that I need not go through all the trouble. There is a free and open source application called Make Human that allows you to configure human models to a variety of shapes, sizes, and ethnicities. With it, I can create a medium-res base mesh in minutes then adjust it in 3DS Max and ZBrush. From there, I can make clothes and accessories to suit whatever character I need.

My time spent in following the tutorial was not wasted, however. I learned a number of techniques that I have since applied to make other models. Even though Make Human is available for free, I highly recommend Monsieur Roger’s tutorial to anyone who wants to learn more about 3D modeling.

I Wanna Mold Your Hand

The two most difficult parts of the human body to draw or sculpt are the head and the hands. Having completed the former entirely within 3DS Max, I proceeded to do the latter. Truth to tell, the tutorial that I followed does not show how to model hands per se, but it does show how to model gloves. Pictured here is the fruit of my labor. Without the wrinkles and other surface bumps that characterize real hands, the model that I created looks like it fell off a mannequin. Regardless, what’s important to me is to have a base mesh that I can texture later. This hand model that I produced is more than adequate for that purpose.

Making a Man in Max

For the past three weeks, I’ve been trying to make a base human male model in 3DS Max. I had always used ZBrush to make human or humanoid models in the past, but I was never really satisfied with the geometry I came up with. They were always a haphazard mess of ill-placed vertices, especially in tight places such as between the fingers or toes. Consequently, I decided to make my base model using only 3DS Max.

I have a couple of books in my personal library that show how to make human models, but I had difficulty following them for various reasons. It wasn’t until I came across Michel Roger’s Joan of Arc tutorial that I finally made progress. The tutorial is still not all that easy for me to follow because it was originally written in French, and the English translation isn’t all that clear. Also, the tutorial explains how to make a manga-style girl, whereas I wanted to make a realistic-looking man. Nevertheless, it is a testament to how good the tutorial is that I was able to come up with the head shown in this blog post.

That reminds me… Time to change my avatar.

Jupiter: Character Design

Meet Jupiter, the ultimate boss in my upcoming game. Whereas the character design that I made for Ra took me a few days to finish, my design for Jupiter was done in a matter of hours. I had a pretty good feel for what Jupiter would be like as an opponent, which is evident in my concept art.

Like all the Roman gods, Jupiter appears as a marble relief, which makes him tough to destroy. Being the end-game boss, Jupiter is especially strong and sturdy. His head is small, relative to his body, which gives the impression that he is a giant of a man. His thunderbolts, forged for him by the god Vulcanus, are the most lethal weapons in the entire game.

Even when fighting, Jupiter retains a merry disposition. After all, the word “jovial” was taken from Jove, another name that Jupiter is known by. His appearance and demeanor were inspired in part by Brian Blessed, whose roles in Flash Gordon, Henry V, and the Blackadder comedy series left an indelible impression in my mind.

Jupiter’s huge arms are clearly discernible in his silhouette. His overall shape is like a pillar, which evokes strength and durability. For all intents and purposes, Jupiter is immune to direct attacks. Players will have to figure out how to defeat him. (And since I haven’t designed the boss battles yet, so will I.)

Ra: Character Design

The eponymous hero of my upcoming game, Ra, needs an appropriate image to depict him. Being based on a god who was worshipped in ancient times, Ra has many pictures on the Internet that I can use as a basis for making my own version of this character. After trying out different variations, I finally settled on the design shown below.

Though it may not look it, the above picture took days for me to complete. In this blog post, I explain my character design process and the reasons for painting Ra the way I did.

My first step was to decide on what I wanted Ra to be. The back story of the game is that Ra and his fellow deities ruled comfortably over the spiritual lives of Egyptians until Octavian, the adopted son of Julius Caesar, conquered Egypt. At this point, Octavian was strongly inclined to abolish the worship of Egyptian gods, a move that his advisers warned him against. Nevertheless, the Roman gods were only too happy to give Octavian a nudge in the desired direction by kicking the Egyptian gods from their places of power. Only Ra, the strongest of the Egyptian gods, found the strength to drag himself up after his fall and to try to impress the local mortals sufficiently to have them worship him again. Only then will he find the strength to defeat the Roman gods and restore all Egyptian deities to their rightful thrones.

I want Ra to be an avenging hero, sort of like The Count of Montecristo and Sam Raimi’s Dark Man. I don’t want the game to be serious, however, because I have a soft spot for comedy. If a game idea makes me laugh, I’m inclined to implement it. Instead of portraying the gods as actual living beings, I’m going to depict them as wall art trying to vandalize each other. This design decision has the advantage of allowing me to put in floating obstacles, as I explained in my previous blog post.

Without worshippers, Ra is so weak that he hobbles like a man at Death’s door. When he happens upon Egyptian mortals, they will softly chant his name, giving him the strength to stand upright and walk normally. By striding before his worshippers, Ra can get them to chant louder until he gains the ability to run extremely fast and jump impossibly high. When hanging on to a nail on the wall, Ra can swing himself ever faster until he flies away like a gymnast, his body whirling and blazing like the sun. At the height of his power, Ra can crush Roman soldiers without coming to harm. Against their gods, however, Ra will need both his smarts and his strength to defeat them.

With this description in mind, I wanted to build Ra like an athlete, more of a gymnast and sprinter than a wrestler or bodybuilder. When I painted him, I started by drawing his silhouette with an eye toward hinting at his athletic prowess.

The broad shoulders and narrow waist suggest that Ra is the athletic type. His arms are muscular but not overly hypertrophied, and his calves are long and well-defined. These convey the idea that he relies more on speed and quick bursts of power than brute strength and tank-like endurance. His head is oddly shaped, like an eagle in profile. This is a departure from how Ra was depicted in ancient times. The top of the original Ra’s head, along with the overall shape of his face, was round, which suggests a love for comfort and relaxation. By giving Ra a more angular, aquiline profile, I depicted him as a dynamic and dangerous character.

When painting the rest of Ra, I relied mostly on the ancient sources to guide me, although I decided to make his arm bands light green instead of red to add variety to the mostly warm colors. It was with Ra’s face that I made some subtle but important differences. Instead of making his eye round, I made it narrow and slanted to give him that pissed-off Clint Eastwood look. I reshaped the black mark on Ra’s face to make it look like an avenging superhero’s mask. Finally, I gave Ra a furious frown on his beak. This is one angry bird that no pig will want to take on.

The color of Ra’s skin was picked to closely match the red ochre pigment that was used for painting skin tones on Egyptian wall art. All the other colors were precisely chosen for their harmoniousness with Ra’s skin color.

Despite the stiff pose of this character, I was satisfied with the design that I came up with. It took me a few days to complete, but I feel that all this effort was worth it.