And So it Begins...

I am a gamer. Games have powerfully captured my imagination since my earliest experiences with Oregon Trail, Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego, and King's Quest on the Apple II. Games represent to me a rich storytelling canvas that engages both the mind and the senses. Games like The Legend of Zelda, Metroid, Flashback, Marathon, Oddworld: Abe's Oddysee, and Half Life have given me rich "literary" experiences that co-exist with the best films, novels, and poetry in my life.

As I've grown into my adulthood I have realized there is an important dichotomy between the attitudes of creativity and consumerism. As much richness can be added to you life by "consuming" experiences in art, music, culture, food, nature, travel, there is a land of growth and maturity that can only be accessed through acts of creation. These acts can be great or small but the creative spirit, that which empowers us to add to the world what was once only in our hearts, is the key to the gate that guards that land.

And so I embark on this project called AMOEBA. Playing games has always been a passion of mine, but creating games is a new step that will, no doubt, challenge my intellect, art, persistence, salesmanship, and humanity.

Amoeba

Amoeba was conceived as a 2D platformer built around a single core mechanic. The player takes on the role of a sentient blob of goo that is able to absorb enemies to mimic their behavior and attributes. For example, absorbing a security guard might allow the player to take humanoid form, operate technology and carry a weapon while absorbing a reptile might grand a higher armor rating and a poison attack.

This core mechanic pushes the game firmly toward a puzzle-platformer style of play in the vein of Flashback or Abe's Oddysee. And like both of those games, my goal is to create a rich and compelling setting in which an interesting narrative can take place.

A good strategy for complex projects is to iterate constantly and to work top-down and bottom-up simultaneously. This is how I've been organizing my development on Amoeba. I've got my basic platformer mechanics working (running, jumping, attacking, etc) as well as a simple environmental system (walls, floors, doors, etc). My core absorption mechanic is also working at a basic level.

At the same time I've also been working extensively on finding an art style that works well with the concept and communicates the sense of place I'm looking for. I've gone through two fairly extensive mock-ups complete with character animations and environmental tile-sets, but I still don't feel like I've found what I'm looking for yet.

Current art style feels flat and lacks atmosphere.

Short-term Development Goals

My coding goals (bottom-up) in the short term are these:

1. Generalize player forms as much as possible to eliminate duplicated code.
2. Generalize enemy code.
3. Create 2 more enemies (lab tech and soldier) in addition to the existing security guard.

My gaming-systems goals (top-down):

1. Create tiered gameplay goals (mandatory, secondary, tertiary, etc).
2. Develop framework for player advancement on the power curve (upgrades, power-ups, collectibles, etc).
3. Explore absorption mechanic and enemy synergies that lead to compelling gameplay.

My refinement goals (iterative):

1. Design a consistent hitbox paradigm that simplifies environmental collisions.
2. Add more interesting AI behavior to security guard enemy.
3. Refine enemy list so each enemy both feels unique and has a purpose.

See you when I've made some progress!