My first attempt to mobile game development - Crazy Tic-Tac-Toe

There was  a mobile game development conference which was given by the creators of Gideros Mobile. Gideros Mobile is a platform that allows you to make Android and iOS games. And it uses Lua as a scripting language. 

After this conference, I wanted to make something and play it on my phone. That would be a different experience. And I chose Tic-Tac-Toe to start with. Because it doesn't require so many detailed sprites and relatively easy to code. Also it is really convenient to be played in touchscreen devices. Because players just tap on a square that they want to put an X or O.

After I started to develop, I saw that Gideros has a really nice documentation and forum. If you want to start mobile game developing, you should give it a try.

Here are the screenshots of the game: 

In-game images that shows the proceeding of the game.

G.I.F.T.

As I promise, I'm going write something about my new game: G.I.F.T. actually new version of the ice cube game. In G.I.F.T. we are controlling a kid and helping him to get his gift. Base mechanics remained same. We are controlling him by sliding on the surface. I've uploaded the game on kongreate and newgrounds. (Kongregate link - Newgrounds link to play the game.)

Here is how I converted an old game to a new one.

First, I started with changing the character. I wanted it to be a kid. And I started to draw something. First, I thought the kid as a stickman figure. But I didn't like that and I changed my idea. Then I applied some colors and I got this result:

This was my first attempt to draw something for my game.

Than I started to make tiles. In my mind, there was winter atmosphere for the game. For that reason, I made snowy tiles. And I used gradient effect for the background image. This is the tileset that I've made:

And a snowball which is an obstacle:

I know that they're not so good. But making them was so fun for me. Also, using them in a game was a great experience.

I also made some jumping sounds. It can be hardly noticed because its volume is low. That's because I recorded them by using a cheap microphone.

Now, some technical stuff:

I made all the levels as a different class which derives from FlxState. I chose this way because reseting was too easy. Just a line of code which is FlxG.resetState(). But I couldn't put a loop music to the game, because when it resets the game, it also resets the music. For that reason, maybe this decision wasn't that useful. I think whole game must be in just one state to fix this problem. Reseting can be done with setting all variables' values to thier first values. Another bad thing is that I wrote almost same things for the all of the levels. In the ice cube project, I wrote a Level class and derived all levels from this class. I think this way is better and more object-oriented.

I hope you have fun while playing G.I.F.T. and please rate and leave comments.

Ice Cube Has Gone

From the beginning, I didn't like the idea of ice cube game. But I liked the base mechanics of it. For that reason, instead of making new game I wanted to change and enhance it. I've been working on it for more than a week. The game has changed entirely. I think it's better than the previous idea.

I will give more information about the new idea soon. For now, I'm putting an image which reflects the game directly.

JURUMP - My first game

Yes, Jurump is my first game. Me and Efe Alaçamlı made it together. Click here to read his blog post about Jurump. (Link for the game is below this post.)

We made this game in fall, 2011 for the course called Introduction to Computer Games. This is the course which I meet game programming and love it. Obviously, this was my favourite course, I always looked forward to this course whole week. Other than those, another thing that I remember is how excited and enthusiastic I was. I hope these never ends.

Let's talk about the game now. It's side scrolling 2D platform game. We are trying to save Ali, who is the main character, from alien invasion. He is on the roof of the buildings during this escape. He shouldn't fall into the gaps between buildings and hit aliens. Also, there are four bonuses he can take. These are super jump, temporary protection, speed up and whistle. The goal of the game is finishing the levels faster.

We programmed this game in Java and used Slick2D library. This was a good and rough experience. I remember that we had trouble coding jumping. Because we wanted to simulate gravity in a right way. The character was shaking when he touches the ground. But we did some value changing and solved the problem.

And finally this game came out:

We made this "How to play" screen but some people didn't go there and they never used the bonuses. 

Click here to download the game. Java gives security warning, click no to play. 

An internship ends

It's been two weeks since the internship ended. But I can have a chance to write something at that moment. I've been busy with writing report and other stuff. In this post I will write about internship and the game that I made in this period.

Little information about game: It's a 2D platform game. The character is an ice cube. We're trying to get him to the north pole to make him live free there.

In my previous post I wrote

I'm having trouble designing the levels and making these levels hard.

As I wrote, I really tried to make the levels hard but when I watch people playing my game, those levels were VERY VERY HARD. They could finish the levels and proceed the game. I designed the difficulty of levels for my ability which was totally wrong. Because, while I was making the game, I played it a lot and I got used to controls and eveything. I understand that I missed a very important point which was playtesting. I should have done more playtesting. Maybe, the levels were not going to be that hard. I will put the game here, but I need to do some arrangements.

The game has lots of missing things. It's not fully completed (like my other game-ish things). But this time, there is a little bit much. Maybe I tried to complete some of them. But I really don't like to deal with a project after its deadline has passed. I rather want to make new things.

An image from third level

There are three weeks for college to start. Until that time, I want to find a game idea that I satisfied. Also I need to think something for my senior-year project.

See you soon.

Ice Ice Baby

                                              

(This ugly image of an ice cube is drawn by a developer who tired of using placeholder one-color images.)

Second week has passed. Sometimes I enjoyed coding, sometimes not. Anyway, I implemented some features.

Here is the list of things I did and some thoughts:

• Flixel is really cool library. For example, making fade in/out effect is just one line code. (Flash effect is that easy, too.) Also, it has a nice documentation.
• Dame is also cool. If you export as a CSV file, your code will be much smaller.
• Character controller, movements of the traps were coded. You can see those in the GIF. (I couldn't make the GIF properly. Actually, they are moving well.)

• I tried to design some levels. It was really hard. I will work on that later.
• By the way, I'm having trouble reseting the game after the ice cube dies. Deriving levels from FlxState is a solution, but I do not like that idea. Because I have to change the level switching also. If I do that, I have to add the character before every switching. (Maybe there is a solution but I couldn't find.) 

There are 2 weeks to the end of the internship. I hope, I'll finish most of the game.

Finding a Game Idea

I'm an intern in a game development company. During the internship, I'm going to do my own project.

First I needed to find a game idea and I started to think. Finding a game idea from scratch is REALLY HARD. Nothing came to my mind. Then, I decided to choose a theme and make a game on that theme. I went this site and "Ice/Igloo" came out as a theme. I got rid of the "igloo" part because I thought that it was very specific. I needed more general theme. 

I chose an ice cube for the main character. And I started to think about how the base mechanics is going to be. When we control the ice cube, If we press left for example, it's going to keep continue to go in that direction because of slippery surface of the ice cube. And the ice cube is going to melt, so we have to finish the level without melting completely.

After the base mechanics, I thought the story and found this:

Every ice cubes want to get rid of their ice cube tray and be free. The heaven for them is the north pole. They can enjoy the freedom in there without the idea of being in someone's drink.

Our character is also chasing this dream.

But it’s not that easy. You have to be so lucky. You have to wait somebody to cool his drink and take an ice cube. When he tries to take out, you have to pop out and run away instantly before the guy gets you.

After all that stressful experience, a new adventure is going to begin for you. You need to go north pole before melting completely. Also you’re going to have hard times with moving because of your slippery surface. There will be some traps which make you melt so fast. You need to be careful.

After all that difficulties, you are going to get your freedom.

(I think the story is not too bad.)

Here are the other decisions and thoughts:

• I'm having trouble designing the levels and making these levels hard.
• I tried to write high-level design document. Some part of it was really boring. It is still uncompleted.
• I'll make this game in Flixel. (Making 2D game in Unity is really painful.) For the map editor I'll use Dame.

Video and Webplayer are here

Gameplay video of the last version. Most of the problems were taken care of. You can play it here.

I'm going to take a break and I'm not going to work on that game for awhile.

I have some other ideas. Maybe I'll work on them.

Still working on

Since I've been in vacation, I couldn't do some things as I planned. In this period, I  added some codes, almost everytime it crushes something else. Finally, I made a short and playable version.

Here are the fancy properties of the game so far.

• Two different towers, rock thrower and electric thrower. I used this example to make the electric effect.
• There are five waves. After each wave, enemies are getting faster and having more health point. (Number of waves can be increased easily.)
• Requiring money for upgrades hasn't been done yet. It's disabled for now.
• Detecting and shooting the enemies is perfectly fine. (That means I haven't found a bug yet.)
• Buying and selling towers has been done. (We're selling the towers the price that we buy. But it should be less. I'll fix that later.)
• Ugly GUI that shows wave number, number of killed enemies and total enemies and number of enemies which reaches the end of the path is done.
• Going next wave is working.
• Game over condition is done. If ten enemies reach the end of the path then game over.
• Also "Congratulations" screen will appear if the game is finished succesfully.

Electric tower is shooting the damn enemies.

Money Money Money

Primary version of the buying towers system is completed. I also added a label that shows total number of enemies and number of enemies that are killed. Click the picture to enlarge.

Neater is Better

What did I do?

• Finally, I solved the problem of tower placement. Instead of using Camera.main.ScreenToWorldPoint(Input.mousePosition), I used Physics.Raycast to find the coordinates to build tower.
• I added health bar over enemies. But it's position is not consistent (Because of different resolutions). I will fix that problem.
• I deleted the ellipse-like shape under the tower to detect enemies. I used Physics.OverlapSphere, instead.
• I added enemy spawner.
• I created a transparent clynder and made y scale value very low. Thus, I obtained a circle. I used it to specify the fire range of the tower.

You can play this version of the game here.

Some improvements

Placement of towers is still problematic. I'm working on that.

First Steps

What did I do?

• I created a terrain by using "Paint Height". 
• I used way points for movement of enemies. They're red cubes for now. 
• The ellipse-like shape under the tower shows the range of that tower. If an enemy collides with it, tower starts to shoot the enemy. 
• Choosing enemy to shoot is not stable. This is because I'm using OnCollisionStay, I guess. I need to work on that. 

ToDo List:

• As you can see on Project and Hierarchy view, there is no such thing as file organization. Name of the files is so irrelevant. I need to organize those. 
• I'm using the version 3.4.2. I want to move the project to 3.5. I think, it's not going to be a big problem. 
• Finally, the places of towers are not going to be set as game starts, Users will put them wherever they want.