Simple Game Design

Discussion in 'Gaming Discussion' started by selkie, Jan 9, 2017.

  1. selkie

    selkie [kuragehime] [jellyfish lover] [swish swish]

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    *commencing geek-out*: :LOL::LOL::LOL:

    In high school I really liked RISK, to the point that I liked to draw my own maps with modified rules and play games with my friends. If I knew how to code back then, I would have loved to make a web app to manage it all.

    5 years later in fact I minored in CS in uni, so I can code now... but making a RISK clone isn't as interesting to me anymore. But every once in a while I toy with the idea of trying to make something interesting.

    So does anyone have any intriguing simple game ideas?

    The "simple" part is extremely important because I'm looking for a self-contained project that doesn't have too much of a scope and one person can reasonably do by themselves given enough time (an MMORPG or RPG is not "simple" in scope, for instance).

    I guess I'm looking for ideas that are simple, well-balanced, and intriguing.

    Like I think something on the level of a flash game like Solarmax 2 would be fantastic (simple in design, but interesting to play).
     
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  2. MaidChan

    MaidChan 『Battlemaid』 『TRAP』 『Homeless Maid』

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    Been a NEET for nearly a year now... And guess what? This maid nearly forgot everything he learned in college. XD
     
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  3. sofiaauditore

    sofiaauditore Well-Known Member

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    Game interface + premise * randomness - everything else = game
     
  4. Linbe

    Linbe New member

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    How about a game about keeping animals in small cages and making them fight each other....wait that's already been done...
     
  5. Prolux

    Prolux [Specifically Lazy] [Weirdly Motivated]

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    Asking for ideas from random people isn't really going to help much, because when it comes down to it, you're only going to work on something that you're interested in, so if random people give ideas and you start working on it, you will stop halfway through or you will end up with a crappy half assed game that doesn't mean anything to nobody, including yourself.
     
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  6. Xravia

    Xravia 『Chaos Wizard Of Procrastination 』

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    how about a chess game where you hunt down opposing pieces using ranks to correspond to different rewards and players can only move through certain pathways depending on what they are and assassinate the opposing side where character development can truly shine :D
     
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  7. Nyarlathotep

    Nyarlathotep The laziest and the King of Procrastination

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    This doesn't really seem to fit the definition of simple
     
  8. NinjaEnvy

    NinjaEnvy M Assassin

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    I like it.
     
  9. Kotachua

    Kotachua Active Member

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    For your first game, I will suggest you to look up on browser based games, sites like miniclip. They have many small scale games which you can draw inspiration from.

    One "shortcut" to make a good game is to refer from a good one and analysis what made it great, then improve on its weakness.

    As said by a previous poster, it is hard to be motivated to work on someone else concept unless you are really convinced by it. You will only be truly motivated if it's something you want to make.

    I hope this helps.
     
  10. Yuma

    Yuma Well-Known Member

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  11. SublimeWay

    SublimeWay Well-Known Member

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    I actually dabble in game development as a hobby despite working in the asset management field. Back in under and for grad school I was really into computer graphics, and now I'm really into VR/AR.

    I'm actually not going to give you any game suggestions as that is something that I'm working on right now as well. Rather I thought I would share some insights into the game dev process itself as I've experienced in the last couple of month.

    1. Pick a game engine and try not to be distracted. Almost no one programs a game from raw graphics APIs any more. I've been trying to learning Unity but I also have Gamemaker, Construct, Clickteam Fusion, CryEngine, RPGMaker, etc. which I've bought but have never really used. For simple things you can also get away with HTML 5 and flash.

    2. Depending on your artistic aptitude and technical skills you may be tempted to do your own graphic arts. I have the aspiration but not the aptitude when it comes to game art. Spent a lot of time trying to learn blender for 3D modeling, texturing, rigging and animation but frankly I'm not very good at it so I burn a lot of time and end up with little to show for it. Here is also where it's easy to become distracted by other software like Spriter, Spine, Live2D, various graphic editors. In the end I decided it was more cost effective to just buy various assets... so about $600 later I have a large collection of mismatched assets. There are also many royalty free assets if you look but it's even more difficult to achieve a consistent look and feel. Advice here is to stick with a core concept when looking for assets as opposed to trying to build a library of assets that may be useful later. If I could only take my own advice. Currently I have several landscape, forest, town, sci-fi buildings, characters, sound libraries, utilities, etc.

    3. I tried learning via online classes, YouTube tutorials and books but the most useful was of course hands on building a game myself.

    4. It's worthwhile to read about game dev and gamification. Sometimes little things matter greatly. If you've taken HCI in school for CS you may realize this already.

    5. Motivation is fleeting and distractions are abound. I was going to create a battle scene during lunch but ended up writing this post :(
     
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  12. SoulZer0

    SoulZer0 Heaven Refining

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    Simple games..?

    What about pacman fighting with the ghosts? Isn't that good?
     
  13. keklel

    keklel Well-Known Member

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    What's wrong with writing your own game engine? The Brood War game engine was pretty sweet. Of course if you want realistic 3D physics then you'd probably want something ready made but there's no reason to go that far if you're just programming a simple platformer.
     
  14. OverlyFriendly

    OverlyFriendly I should do something about

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    Platformer like mario but with cats
     
  15. GamingIce

    GamingIce 『Holder of the Ring of Promise』『RPG Nerd』

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    If that's your only requirement, just download some old mario source code and change the sprites....
     
  16. Simon

    Simon [The Pure One's Chief Steward][Demon Beast]

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    A simple Idea would be to make a clone of a game and make some changes.
     
  17. SublimeWay

    SublimeWay Well-Known Member

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    Even a simple 2D engine requires sprite animation logic, collision detection, input handling, and graphic update events. Why spend the time to code and test this when most game engine (many free) gives you this out of the box? Spend your time on the interesting bits while leaving the grunt work infrastructure to those who are good at it.
     
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  18. SublimeWay

    SublimeWay Well-Known Member

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    My cat looks a lot like yours.

    Have you seen Catlateral Damage? It's not a platformer but rather a first person cat simulator. There's even a VR version of it. I went to a post mortem talk the creator gave a couple of month back. It was an interesting look at a successful indie developer. Evidently he quit his QA job and spent the next 2-3 years to make the game.
     
  19. Carm

    Carm Drip drop, when will time stop

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    Never played cat Mario Ice?
     
  20. 1st Tribulation

    1st Tribulation Well-Known Member

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    Make a tower. Fill tower with people. Fill sky with flying ducks.The windows are open. If you click them they close for a few seconds.If a duck gets into the tower they murder someone and you lose a life. If they slam into the window they fall on the ground and there's one less duck to worry about. You win if you outlast the ducks.
     
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