Théme(s) de jeu

Suite à une première discussion, je structure et décrit dans ce post 3 thèmes possibles de contenu de jeu.

1) Transmission de la mémoire des Mimoris

Au fin fond d'une forêt ancestrale, vit un petit peuple imaginaire appelé les Mimoris. Ce peuple parle à la nature et connait encore la magie de notre terre. Les Mimoris transmettent leur histoire en enterrant, dans la forêt, des objets de tous les jours, mais aussi ceux immensément magiques. Ils redonnent à la terre ce qu'il y ont pris, se détachant de l'aspect matériel, mais ils transmettent aussi leur histoire, et leur voeux de bonheur, aux jeunes générations qui les déterreront peut être.

Aide un jeune Mimori à découvrir les us et coutumes, les secrets de la magie de son peuple, en découvrant des fragments enfouis et en reconstituant les Artefacts de son peuple.


Artefact et collection

• Les 6 familles couvrent les différents aspects de la culture Mimori: la cuisine, la chasse, la musique, les jouets, les bijous, la magie.
• Chaque artefact est "vivant" et réagi quand on le touche en émettant un son, une animation ou un effet de couleur.  
• Chaque artefact est accompagné d'un petit texte décrivant ce que représente l'objet dans la culture et la façon de vivre Mimori

2) Nostalgie de la pop culture Américaine

Un garçon et une fille, nommés Matt et Stella, cherchent des trésors dans leur jardin durant l'été. A leur grande surprise, ils trouvent toute sorte de morceaux d'objets étranges. Ils assemblent les morceaux et reconstitue des objets cultes des années 70, 80,... dont ils ne reconnaissent pas la fonctions. Ils annotent leurs artefacts d'une description drôle mais un peu à côté de la plaque.

Aide Matt et Stella à trouver et découvrir les objets populaires de la société de consommation américaines enfouis dans leur jardin.


Artefact et collection

• Les 6 familles couvrent les décennies 50', 60', 70', 80', 90', 2000'
• Chaque artefact est un objet populaire, emblématique ou culte, de la culture Américaine.
• Chaque artefact est accompagné d'un petit texte décalé et drôle écrit par Matt et Stella. A voir pour référence la série youtube des "Kid react to ...", par exemple sur le walk man: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uk_vV-JRZ6E

3) Histoire des civilisations perdues

Kim, une jeune archéologue, fait des fouilles pour en apprendre plus sur les civilisation perdues. Elle déterre des fragment et reconstitue des artefact qui portent en eux les secrets de la disparition de ces civilisations.

Aide Kim a trouver les objets des civilisations perdues et découvrir comment ces civilisation on vécues et disparues.


Artefact et collection

• Les 6 familles couvrent les civilisation disparues suivantes: Les Maya, Les îles de pâque, La Vallée de l'indus, la cité de Cahokia, L'empire d'Angkor, La peuple du Roi Minos
• Chaque artefact est un objet inspiré d'un artefact réellement retrouvé sur un site de fouille. 
• Chaque artefact est accompagné d'une description de sa fonction présumée par les historiens menant à la compréhension des particularités de leur culture ou des raisons de leur disparition.

Qubicle mesh export

Naming convention

Artefacts belong to a periods (or "bank"). An artefact is made of 1 or several fragments. So artefacts are named like: "Period_Artefact_fragment".

for instance, if we have a USA30s period, an artefact made of 3 fragments would be named:

• P10_USA30s_A01F01
• P10_USA30s_A01F02
• P10_USA30s_A01F03

Note that the 'P10' id number represent the historical order.


Qubicle files

We could have a file for a period or a file for each artefact. It depends if what is more efficient: having 1 single texture for all artefact of a period or a different texture for each artefact. Depending on the artistic direction, we'll choose one or the other option.

use the naming convention to name files. The file name is used to automatically name the material & texture exported. For instance i named my file P10_USA30s_A01 so the material and texture have this name in unity, which makes it convenient to find in the asset browser.


Mesh Export/Import

1) Fills hollow to optimize quibcle mesh:

2) properly name your fragments:

3) Set the pivot of fragments to center/bottom/center

4) Export as FBX, in the mesh folder of the project

5) set the export as FBX options

• Optimization : Manifold = to avoid rendering issues
• Pivots Positions : as specified = to keep all pivot aligned
• Unit Scale Factor : 100 = to make sur Mesh are in Unity 3d meter unit
• Singled Mesh File : false = to create a FBX for each fragment
• Single Texture File : true = to create one texture for all fragments

6) Set texture options and update materials

• Filter mode : point
• Format : truecolor

References

• Qubicle documentation : http://minddesk.com/learn/article.php?id=30&oid=5

Artefact Production Mockup

Here's the "Rabbit" Artefact i created in Qubicle.

It's just a mockup, ^_^; we probably won't have Rabbit as "Old Artefact telling a story about an old civilization"!! I only had a Rabbit example at hand... so i used if for the purpose of the production mockup.

The level of details this rabbit has seems acceptable if we compare it to CROSSY ROAD graphics:

So i think a skilled artist could create great artefacts of various shape and style using this kind of size constraint ^_^

Production Mockup

Here's the method i used to create this Rabbit and how i made sure this rabbit can be breakdown in 3 fragments and finally that puzzle around those fragments are going to be great.

1) Creating the Bounding volume

• i used green cubes (made of 4x4x4 voxel cubes) to create a bounding volume for the Rabbit.
• The rabbit would have to fit inside the shape created by those green cubes, so later on we'll be able to divide the rabbit into fragments which works with our puzzle gameplay.
• then i built the Rabbit, being cautious to keep his voxel inside the bounding volume. 

2) Dividing the Artefact

• I divided the rabbit into 3 fragments.
• I made sure to cut the rabbit artefact always on multiple of 4, so fragment would be suitable for puzzle. 
• I made those fragment asymmetric to vary puzzle shapes.

3) Puzzle Mockups

• I created soil_frail and soil_hard gameplay cubes in Qubicle, using 4x4x4 voxel cube.

• here you can see the full puzzle on the left and on the right after removing some soil

• Another puzzle mockup, this time with the head fragment.

Moneytisation loop

The game is Free to play.

The moneytisation loop is based on the following principles:

• player does not need to pay to play or complete the game
• there's no "energy currency", like in some other game, where player needs to "pay with energy" to play some moves. Player can play as long as he wants, when he wants.
• The main moneytisation motivation basic trigger is completion : 
• Player should be motivated to get all Artefacts (by finding all their fragments) and complete the collection.
• The main pressure is the randomness aspect of searching new fragments. 
• Each time player search for a new fragment, he randomly draws a new one from the full list of fragments.
• At the beginning player will always find new fragments. But as he gather more and more fragments, he has less and less chances to find new ones.
• Player can rise his chances of finding new fragments, the next time he searches one, by paying [100] coins OR he can make sure to find a new fragment, the next time the searches one, by paying [0,99$]

Here's the loop diagram:

Diagram notes:

• the main loop is in blue : 
• SEARCH FRAGMENT : player dig for a new fragment in his backyard. There's no gameplay beyond keeping the button on the search button until finding something.
• UNCOVER FRAGMENT : this is the 3D puzzle of removing dirt without breaking the fragment.
• FRAGMENT : player has uncovered successfully a fragment. A new (not yet discovered) fragment will be added to its artefact in the collection
• ARTIFACT : when player gather the [3] fragments, the artefact name and description is revealed. 

Additional design comments:

• We should make sure player complete a full Artefact early in the game, by adjusting search randomness rules.

Puzzle Rules - Digging carefully

Fantasy and Gameplay

You're an archeologist carefully removing dirt to discover an ancient Artefact.

• The tool damage the artefact but is needed to remove the soil.
• When removing soil, if an artefact is behind, the tool damage it.
• Player has to find a way to remove the soil without destroying the artefact.

Rules

• Fragment hit point
• Fragment have [4] hit points (FHP)
• when FHP reach 0, the fragment is destroyed ; player didn't succeed the puzzle

• Digging Effect
• Tap to remove a soil cube
• Removing a soil cube has an effect on the cube behind it.
• The face hit determined which cube behind receive the effect.

• Cubes types and digging effects

• Hard Soil
• hard soil has 2 Hit points 
• when its hit points reach 0, it is removed. 
• Rock
• Rocks are special 'blocking' ingredients ; player needs to carefully remove them.
• Shake: when a rock shake, it damages surrounding fragment; - 1 FHP if any of the 6 orthogonal neighbours is a fragment.
• Rocks are automatically removed when they have only 1 neighbour (later we could add a hold and slide control so player remove it himself).

Dynamics

Consider the following 2D puzzle made of soil, fragment and hard soil.

• Situation A
• player has 2 good choices (green dot) and 1 bad choice (red dot)
• player has be careful of "what's behind"; maybe it's a fragment and it would be damaged. We could use this lack of information (what is behind?) as a difficulty parameter. Player would have to make hypothesis and search ways to confirm them.
• Situation B
• To remove the Hard Soil, player has to damage it 2 times. If player dig the wrong soil direction (red dot inside the circle) he won't be able to remove the hard soil.
• Depending on player choice, he might not be able to remove all Cubes, and so don't succeed the puzzle.

Design Review #2

Version reviewed

• Simple Math puzzle rules ('neighbours decrease') with artefact soil 'skin' (instead of full cube)
• I played mostly on iPhone 4s  at various moment of the day
• 3 persons played the game (2 adults ; 1 kid ; soft playtest ; first impressions)

Playtest Observations

• I explained the game to people : "you're an archeologist, remove the dirt to uncover an old artefact". Here's what i observed:
• Everyone understand the goal and are interested to try.
• Everyone understand the controls quickly (remove and rotate) ; they 'feels right' on a touch device.
• the game has a certain appeal at first, the promise of discovery and the 'toy-like' feeling is engaging.
• People expect to have to carefully remove the soil ("remove the soil without destroying the artefact?")
• People don't understand the math rules right away (i need to explain them)
• The game is not challenging: No clear 'lose' rule ("how can i die?"), No tactic to develop ("dig everywhere and you win").
• People expect to find an old artefact but they find a 'fragment' (part of an artefact) and are  confused.

Design comments

• The fantasy (archeologist carefully removing dirt around an artefact) and the gameplay are not aligned.
• The 'toy-like' feeling of the cube-graphism is appealing and the controls are simple enough to feel natural.
• The size of the puzzle is great. It feels like a good average, it could be bigger (harder) or smaller (easier)

Next Steps

• Design new rules to align the fantasy and the gameplay. 
• Create a small artefact (player should discover an artefact the first time they play)

Puzzle Rules - Simple Maths

Rules

• Cube HitPoint range from 9 to 1; 0 = no cube
• Player can remove Cube 1 HP by tapping it
• When Cube 1 HP is removed, it decrease its six neighbour's HitPoint by 1

• Cubes with HP > 1 can't be remove by tapping them
• Line of three cubes of same HP create a 'combo' and are removed automatically
• when removed, a cube from a combo decrease its six neighbour's HipPoint by 1 (like a Cube 1 HP); except cubes from the combo itself.

Dynamics

Example #1

• Choices a) or b) both leads to solving the puzzle
• but a) is more efficient, as it create a 2-2-2 combo which remove b)
• still player could choose b) and remove all cubes one by one

Example #2

• Only choice a) solves the puzzle
• Removing a) creates a 2-2-2 combo which removes b)
• But removing b) first leave a 2-3-1 setup which can't be solved.

Additional comments

• We can use texture to communicate cube HP ; by clearly writing the number of using dots like dices.

• This type of level design can be procedurally generated.
• Difficulty parameters:
• Puzzle cube HP range: 
• easy = [1-2]
• hard = [1-9]
• Puzzle combo opportunities at start
• easy = a lot
• hard = none
• Puzzle size 
• easy = small (4x4x4)
• hard = big (6x6x6)

• Questions to be solved by prototyping:
• how the inside layers of the puzzle impact the puzzle?
• Should we create some sort of 'skin' on artefact rather than aiming for a cubic puzzle?
• is the challenge interesting ; can its difficulty be tweaked? ; is there room/needs to add more ingredients?