Movie Madness

Here's a scene from my movie, "Basket Case".



Never seen the whole thing?  Don't worry, I didn't ruin it for you.  See it.  It was done with a very low budget by a bunch of unknown folks about 30 years ago.

In my video game version of this film, the player is in control of the beast in the basket, Belial.  Here he is sitting on some steps...

You drag yourself around 1982 Manhattan, while your once-conjoined brother, Duane looks for you.  He'll put you back in the basket.  You don't want to be in the basket.  Got it?  

Through a series of challenges, you must figure out unique ways to enter buildings and use human devices (phone, electric razor, fishing pole) seeing as that you don't have all the normal appendages and digits us regular folk have.  You're finally on your own and want to show Duane you don't need him.  You must eat humans when you're hungry or if they threaten you in any way.  If Duane locates you, you might be faced with the chilling notion of attacking and eating him.  Or just part of him.  You're pretty darn good at lying low, so I suggest waiting under chairs and beds for the right time to attack.  Can you drive?  Maybe.  Try not to attract attention to yourself and give it a whirl.  Want to explore the seedy Times Square theaters of early 80s New York?  Go ahead.  You, might want to wear a  poncho, though.  Horseback riding through Central Park?  Not impossible.  Quite fun, actually.  You're free.  Enjoy life and all it's mysterious foibles.  

This game would follow the third-person shooter format, with a choice of various viewpoints to better enable you to see what the heck's going on above everybody's knees.

CHAPTER SIX: Book Work

Play a game that features "combat".  Okay.  I searched the internet for some sort of cool looking fighting game for about an hour.  Swordplay or karate.  Old west or laser beams.  No luck.  Everything's cheesey and too confusing.  Dear Lord, there must be a billion games out there.  Who made them all?  Are they all famous and rich?

I finally stumbled upon what I assume is called a catapult game called "Crush the Castle" in which you fling stuff at a castle, trying to knock it down and kill everybody inside.  If that ain't some sort of combat, well call me Dame Judi Dench.  Sure, the folks in the castle can't fight back, but that doesn't guarantee that you'll always be victorious.  It's all about how you fling stuff.  How fast you release it.  The angle at which it travels.  As you progress, you're given more things to launch.  Then you move up to bigger things to launch.  Finally, you're given bombs.  Flaming bombs.  Yeah.

I am proud to say that this game made an addict of me.  I haven't had this much fun on my computer since...(checks watch, gazes off into the horizon)...well, I have fun on my computer...a whole lot...let's say I haven't had this much fun playing a video game on my computer in quite a while.  The game's simple.  No backstory.  Just click the mouse.  Easy.  But frustrating.  Organic.  Basic.  Sometimes random and chaotic.  Some castles crumble easily.  Some don't.  Some should, but don't.  I dig it.  I plan on playing again one day.  Maybe not this upcoming week, but soon.  I need a job first.  Anything.  I'm poor.

These games are probably a dime a dozen.  I don't know.  So, the few hints I have for improving it might have already been applied to another version or an entirely different game all together. 

How 'bout being able to move the ol' trebuchet wherever you want?  How about trying NOT to kill the princess?  How about suggesting we try a certain ammo after we've spent 38 minutes on one level and can't figure out how to advance?  What if they were flinging stuff at you, too?  Whoa.  Wait a minute.  That changes everything.  No.  They aren't allowed to do that.  I like how they're just standing there like their fortress isn't being besieged by huge boulders. 

Buried Alive

Goal 

To have the least amount of dirt (cards) in your grave (possession).

Contents

2 dice, 1 deck of regular cards (no jokers)

Players

4 

Instructions for Playing

1. Divide your cards into suits.  Each suit becomes the player's hand.

2. Each round, a player will roll both dice.  Once the movement of the dice stops, all players throw down a card that matches that number as fast as possible.

3. The last player to throw down that card will put all the thrown cards into his/her "grave" - a stack of cards separate from his/her hand.

4. The Ace, Jack, Queen, and King are wild cards.  Throw them wisely.

5. If the player does not have the exact card or any remaining wild cards, they can throw down the card closest numerically to the dice roll.  Accuracy always trumps speed.

That's the 5 rule version of the 8 rule version of the 10 rule version of the game that Rex, Mike, Nate and I made from scratch in Saturday, October 23rd's class.  Quite a pickle to dill in my opinion.  For a brief moment we considered removing dice and cards from our game idea all together.  The class has come to rely on them as "basic game making  ingredients".  Actually, the entire world has.  Next time, I'd be up for doing a brain teaser type game.  Like "I Spy" with your eyes closed.  Or something that utilized the dry erase board.  I'm all for getting folks out of their chairs and animated.  In a game where speaking isn't allowed like "Pictionary" or "Win, Lose, or Draw", I find that the most hilarious thing is the how frustrated people get when they have to remain silent.  The artist does all sorts of pointing and jumping and face gymnastics trying to clue everybody into what they're drawing.  It's even better when the artist sucks at drawing.  It's a squiggle and a box and a big alien cat head looking thing.  That's supposed to be "Stephen Hawking's A Brief History of Time"?!   No way! (tilts head, squints eyes)  Well...okay, I....kinda see it, now.  Sorry.

We did make the act of throwing down your card as fast as possible an integral part of the game.  Nobody in the history of gaming has ever done that before.  Although, a bunch of prisoners playing Buried Alive in Sing Sing might be at each others' throats over "who threw what first", we remained civil and calm.  We had fun, but soon realized that writing down how to play in a short, simple, easy-to-understand manner was not fun.  We wanted to include "Exercise your common sense" as a rule, but refrained.  I'm sure game makers since the beginning of time wanted to include that rule.  Or "Don't be dumb".  But, you'd end up offending somebody somewhere and get sued for causing mental distress costing the game manufacturer hundreds of thousands of dollars in a long, messy televised court case.  You'd become the butt of gaming industry jokes and turn to a quiet, anonymous life of office data research.  Or you'd become famous.

All in all, we came up with a good game quickly.  Much better than this "Tetris" type game also called "Buried Alive" I found.  Go ahead.  Click on it.  You know you want to.  I won't tell anyone if you stay up until sunrise three nights in a row trying to beat it.

(if you get past level 4, leave an anonymous comment and tell me how you did it - I'm stuck)

Character Development Revisited

Again, my knowledge of current video game characters is pretty thin.  I played "Medal of Honor" a few times in the front offices of a screen printing company I worked at many years ago.  About 7 or 8 of us would be on computers walking around and shooting each other.  I think my character's name was "Pierre".  He shot people and got shot at.  And I watched a guy play "Assassin's Creed" once about a year and a half ago.  I never caught that fella's name.  He had a hood on and nobody in town really talked to him as he jumped on roofs and stuff.  The guy in the game, that is - not the guy playing the game.  He was wearing a t-shirt and jeans.

So, I must turn to the days of my youth and recall the games with characters I liked.  There's that dude in "Berzerk"...

He's stuck in some minimal, futuristic supermarket with big-shouldered robots.  He's probably still there, for all I know.  Somebody go check.

Ooooh - I know somebody.  The paperboy in "Paperboy".

You're only aware of his evil eyes by the artwork on the arcade console itself.

The only time you see his face in the game is on the title screen...

Seems like a happy, hard working lad there.  In the actual game, you only see him from far above - like you're following him in a hot air balloon.

The player can decide whether to believe his heart is full of anger and he despises all the good for nothin' rich people in their filthy rich houses on his route - or - he's a good, decent boy rising early to bring the news to everybody's doorstep, hoping to earn enough money for a giant gong.  I like that.  You're allowed to bring your own mood to the character.  You're not told how to be.  Deliver the papers as you wish.  

Your environment is American suburbia circa 1984 - meaning it's pretty much exactly how it is now, except there aren't any SUVs in driveways.  It's not a wacky, alien world that our hero's never seen before.  He sees it everyday.  This is his job.  It's the only game I can think of where the main character is simply doing a normal job.  Not one of a sexy secret agent or an oily volleyball pro - just an average kid doin' an average 1984 kid's job.  Sadly, kid's in 2010 don't know what a newspaper is and can hardly ride a bicycle past the end of the block they live on without feeling nauseous.

The environmental hazards of suburbia are the "villians" of this game.  (if you have no idea what I'm talking about, please click here to see a clip of somebody playing it) Things that harm the player in any game are always a part of the environment.  Unless you're dealing with some major inner turmoil in the player's psyche such as a childhood trauma, a phobia, a Red Bull addiction, or just your basic, old-fashioned bruised ego like Pac-Man had.  

This game would be cool if it was set in downtown Tianjin, China because Chinese newspapers weigh about 8 pounds each.  He could get caught up in the seedy underworld of the Chinese mafia and quite possibly work his way up to become head of the entire Asian heroin ring.  That would surely make the front page of "The Daily Sun"!

Basic Artificial Intelligence

Just got back from a class in which we made and played several different variations of the Us vs. It game.  My head has been rendered into mush and I find it hard to even decide if I'm hungry or not.  My mind went on strike about 30 minutes before class ended.  I didn't care about what the robot could do now.  I didn't care if I lost.  Winning was meaningless.  The neurons and synapses in my brain simply switched to "sleep mode".  No thoughts being registered.  No thoughts being created.  I was floating in a silent womb, quite contented.

While still cognitive, I learned that artificial intelligence is what's going on in a game that you can't control.  It's magically doing things for desired results and can be directly effected by what the player does.  Or not.  You observe and interact with it until you can solve the task at hand.  Find a weakness and strangle it until its eyes pop out.  Jump over it, punch it, unlock it, hang on, let go, sneak away, hide, yell, shoot, dive, ctrl, alt, delete.  Off.  Go for a long walk and listen to the birds.  Feel the sun against your skin.  Clear your soul.  Relax.

Here's what Jon and I did.  Blue paper.

For someone unfamiliar with this game, I could explain exactly what everything means, but I simply can't at the moment.  Ask me one day.  I'll give you the rough idea.  I promise.

Paper Simulation

I am currently working on this assignment.  I need 5 more minutes.

In the meantime, look at this Game Boy made out of paper.

CHAPTER FIVE: Book Work

Play at least three electronic games that are currently on the market.

Okay.

Let me go to Best Buy real quick.

They have displays where you can play new games, right.

Be back shortly.

Don't wait up.

SGD 161 SG Animation - Catalog Description Discrepancy

Here's how it's described on page 312 in the 2009-2010 Central Piedmont Community College catalog (and, sadly, exactly the same on page 320 in the 2010-2011 catalog) -

Awesome.

I was hoping it would be just that.  I was hoping the first question the teacher asked was "Who are some famous animators?".  Everyone would say Walt Disney and maybe Matt Groening or Mike Judge, of course.  Not me.  I was ready with the names Tex Avery, Ub Iwerks, Ralph Bashki, Don Hertzfeld, Winsor McKay, Otto Mesmer...you get the idea.  I dig animation.  Weird stuff.  Old stuff.  Yeah, the Pixar stuff is impressive, but it's scientifically designed to pull your heartstrings.  Down to the exact millisecond your heartstrings are expecting to be pulled.  

I've plunkered around on Flash and can't get it to do what I want.  I don't need knees to bend and perfect nostril flaring.  I just wanna move stuff around.  Maybe have the mouth move a little, but perfect sync with the dialogue isn't necessary.  I'm not aiming for realism.  I really don't care if the movement isn't fluid.

I've made 17 million little .gifs on free software designed for apes. Here are 3 - 

I want to think of a story.  Record the dialogue.  Take something I've already drawn or draw something new. Scan it, clean it up, then make it move.  Add music and sound effects.  Then put it on the internet.  

So, I signed up for SGD 161 SG Animation at CPCC.

But, it's not an animation class.  You learn After Effects.  Movie magic stuff.  Twirling titles and explosions and green screen things.  Very cool, but not what I wanted.  There is absolutely no "historical survey of animation, aspects of the animation process and animation techniques".  Zilcho.  Nada.  And there sure as hell ain't no sketching or doing artwork of any kind.  The description is wrong.  It needs to be changed. 

I bought the book.  I watched a bunch of tutorials.  I attended class and followed along with the tutorials.  But, I was disappointed.  After Effects is great for spicing up your vacation videos with realistic gun battles and blood squirts and laser beams and light sabers.  But, where was the animation?  The other students were digging it, but I wanted traditional animation stuff...not special effects.  I knew we wouldn't be using light tables, parchment paper, and 16mm cameras.  Maybe some simple animation programs.  Nope.  

You could import your artwork into After Effects and make little animated stories if you wanted.  People have.  But, I was really excited to do the stuff in the course description.  So, I quit.  I didn't get any money back.  Dang.  Oh well.  Live and...uh....ummmmmm....what is it....oh, yeah....learn. 

Here's a quote I repeat daily.

"A special effect is a tool, a means of telling a story. A special effect without a story is a pretty boring thing".

Neat, huh?  Guess who said it?

(scroll on down)

Go ahead.  Guess...

Nope.  Guess again.

No.  Good guess, though.

It was this guy...

     

                                                                            

Not the robot, you fool.  George Lucas.

Design Chemistry

Chemistry should always result in LOUD BOOMS such as this...



The "BOOM" can be a successful game that everybody in the world plays, a bread sculpture of a race car, an underwater bowling alley, a cat-dog hybrid butler, or anything.  Working with folks from various backgrounds with various interests will greatly improve your chances of making something better than mediocre.  Here's a scenario my driving instructor told me...

You wanna make up a new dance so you get a bunch of your friends together and you all like dancing so you start dancing and all you're really doing is just kinda altering pre-existing dance steps.  Nothing really new is being done and nobody's really sayin' nothing about it, because, hey - at least you're dancing and not arguing.  So, you practice this messy mix of unoriginal dance steps over and over again and then you go to the big Dance Headquarters to pitch your dance to the President of New Dances.  You get about half a minute into your routine and he says "Thank you, but we aren't interested" very coldly and leaves you and your friends alone in the mirrored room to stare at yourselves and wonder why.  Why your dance didn't totally wow him.


It was because your creative team sucked.  You all liked the same things and did things the same way and never thought outside the box and never had the guts to say something was lame.  To make something unique, the creators need to bring in various influences from different eras and cultures.  Mix up stuff until the ingredients blend in with each other and can't be identified.  It's awesome, but there's not just one thing that makes it awesome.  It's a little bit of one thing and less of another.  A lot of this old thing and some of that new thing.  Technically flawless, yet strangely organic.  Familiar, but unlike anything ever made. 

Like this...

Prototyping and Bean Salad

The only way I can explain the importance of prototyping is to tell you about a very important lesson I learned at the 4th Annual Bean Salad Competition in Wilmington, Delaware on March 12, 2002.  I was a young braggart, unaware that a mistake I would make later that day would result in the serious injury of 3 people and a stray dog.

How can you create a successful bean salad?  One that will satisfy everyone and fly off the shelves?  Nobody knows.  You can attempt to please yourself with your creation and hope other folks like it, but you're wasting your time.  The whole point of a bean salad is to be unique, offend some people, and create a combined flavor that nobody in the entire world has ever tasted before.  Not even kings and queens. Choose the finest ingredients and proceed carefully.  It's easy to mix 63 buffalo beans into your creation, but it's a pain in the ass to have to go through and pick each one out.  Embarrassing, as well.  Sprinkle too much rare, iridescent Portuguese saffron on it, without checking it's authenticity, and you've ruined all the utensils in your kitchen.  Evacuate immediately.

Simple, stupid mistakes are unforgivable in a finished product.  Unless you're planning to fail and be ridiculed by nerds all over the world, prototype everything.  Game or bean salad.  Test it yourself.  Call a cab and have the cab driver come in and test it.  Hide your valuables, though.

You ever googled "free online games"?  Well, I just did it for you.  Click on it.  You'll see 8,011 sites that each have 192,353 different games to play.  The world doesn't need anymore average games.  Only interesting, fun, addictive games from this point on.  Prototype your unique idea for months and months.  Go back and totally change things.  Prototype the prototypes.  Delve deep into the dark corners of your soul and search for ways to make it better than everything else.  Or just settle for something flimsy and lame.  Something rushed and pointless.  Something that could potentially injure 3 people and a stray dog.  

The Dicing On the Cake

"Who brought dice?"

(crickets chirping)

Four people timidly raise their hands.

"I brought some Monopoly money"

"I brought darts"

"I want some Mongolian Beef with fried rice and an egg roll"

Somehow, enough dice where scrounged up so everybody had 5 each.  Next, we got into brand new groups of 5 and played "Liar's Dice" - a confusing game that pirates made up while they were semi-delirious from scurvy.  Cool.

Afterwards, we were given an hour to make up our own game using -

- a sheet of paper
- 5 cups
- 25 dice

GO!

The brainstorm drizzles slowly at first.  Just rehashing "Sissy Fight" as a dice game is brought up and immediately brought down.  Then how about trying to toss your die into a little circle drawn on the sheet of paper?  And what if the paper was resting on top of the five cups like....this!?  Try to knock off everybody else's dice!  Or the open ends of the cups were placed beneath each corner of the paper - and you try to balance the dice  "Jenga style" without them all toppling in?  Like this.  Hmmmmmmmmm.  The paper's too flimsy.  We need posterboard or something.

12 minutes has gone by and we ain't got nothin'.  Square one.  What's fun?  What's simple?  Throw the dice into the cup.  Try it.  Hmmmmmm.  Okay, but it's easier to just try and knock the styrofoam cups over.  They're too light.  Here, let's get out of our chairs and arrange them in front of us, like we're at a carnival.  One person plays the carny and has to keep all the dice from rolling under the desks.  Okay, go.  Wait.  We need a new cup.  This one's broke.  Okay, now go.

Loud dice banging all over the place.  Bouncing onto the floor and going everywhere.  Parents would hate this game.  Nobody can get one in.  Okay, how about we put the cups on the floor, against the wall.  But, we'll scuff up the wall!  Who cares.  Just do it.  We have, like 11 minutes left.  Go.  Rapid fire dice throwing commences.  Only one or two of us get one in.  Have we lost some dice?  Yes.  That's okay  We all get 4 now.  Hey, put the cups on the eraser ledge of the dry erase board.  That might be easier.  Try.  Nope.  Everybody else is already deep in the midst of playing their games.  We're still experimenting.  Throwing dice all over the place and making lots of noise.  Allright.  Square one.  Again.  What's fun?  Let's sit at that table.

Here, everybody sit on a side.  Not you.  There's only room for 4.  Okay, put a die under your cup.  Yeah, now what?  Slide it over to me.  Scoop it.  And do what with it?  Air hockey it back to you?  Sure.  No, wait!  Try to trap it in your cup.  Then slide it to somebody else.  Allright.  That's it.  What do we call it?  "Dice Hockey!"  Yes.  Perfect.  With .82 milliseconds left.

The presentation flops.  Let's rethink this thing.  How about "Blackjack Dice".  You try to roll 24 with 4 dice.  Roll.  Keep the ones you want on the table.  Roll the remaining ones.    You just get three tries.  Okay.  Sounds good.  No throwing dice from far away.  No cups.  No rules upon rules.  Simple and easy.

But what about the sheet of paper?  Eat it.  Quick.