Academic Traces | Small Game Extension Design Report
An extension of your game design & prototype/proof of concept submitted for CW1 (or a new game) which should be extended to include longer term gameplay. This submission should include at least 3 new post-twitch gameplay features such as scoring, player buffs, enemy AI, 2+ step puzzles, swappable weapons or powers.
You will supply a short report circa 1400 words where you will also consider how this game could use analytics of the features you included and how the game could be monetized, you must provide a link to a video of your gameplay within your report.
CW1 content:
Game Update
I've made three main updates for this bike parkour game. These include the bike jumping feature, more specific obstacles, and the game's settlement.
Bicycle updates
Thanks to some of your suggestions, I considered the speed boost feature and the jump feature for use in this game. Firstly, the speed boost, this feature may not work well in the current game. The one reason is that the speed is still currently controlled by the player, and the speed boosting feature may cause some conflict with the speed change. Another reason is that in order to achieve a more urgent experience, the obstacles are currently set up more densely, so if the speed change is too sudden instead, the player will be caught off guard, affecting the game experience.
Secondly, jumping, this feature is a very good idea indeed. In my last assignment I mentioned that this game was unable to implement physics-based gameplay, but jumping barely made up for it, so I added this feature to the game. Additionally, the jumping feature influenced the design of the obstacles that followed, making them diverse as well. Now the player has one more axis to consider, but I think it will be an ‘extra solution’ for the player, not an ‘extra burden’.
Implement of jumps
In order to implement the jumps without physics simulation, I used Timeline to control the height change of the bike, and the whole jumping process takes 1 second. Because of this, the bike jumps different distances at different speeds, which can make the player's manoeuvres less precise. To solve this problem, I added an interrupt mechanism, when jumping, the player can interrupt the jump and land.
A fusion of jump and tilt
While jumping, the bike can still tilt and change the direction of forward movement. This means that the player can perform more complex manoeuvres such as angled jumps to avoid obstacles. However, it is also important to note that the bike can also overturn when jumping because of the large tilt angle.
Scene updates
I originally envisioned the game scene to be on a busy open road, so the obstacles should be designed to be as close as possible to the real-life roads that the player is familiar with. A typical example would be a variety of vehicles, travelling in different directions on the lanes. Such a design not only allows the player to get familiar with it quickly, but also makes the game more challenging. For this reason, I designed three different obstacles and divided the scene into three different lanes.
- Design of obstacles
- Car: this is one of the most numerous obstacles in the game, and the player can not only go around it from both sides, but also jump over it. It may be static or dynamic in the game. When the bike is fast enough, the player can use jumps to cross two cars at once.
- Bus: a typical London double-decker bus. Because of its very high height, the player can no longer use jumps to get over it. It may be static or dynamic like a car, but there are fewer of them than cars.
- Traffic sign: a static obstacle. It is as tall as a car, so it can be crossed by jumping.
- Design of lanes
- Left lane: this section is designed as a parking area where the obstacles are static. All three types of obstacles will be present in this area.
- Middle lane: i.e. the left lane in the carriageway, obstacles in this area are all dynamic and move in the same direction as the bike.
- Right lane: i.e. the right lane in the carriageway where all obstacles move in the opposite direction to the bike.
Currently all obstacles rely on Random Bool with Weight nodes to control generation. Although the desired effect can be achieved, the obstacles generated in this way are unpredictable. That is to say, there is a partial probability of generating a completely impassable situation. Because the whole scene contains both static and dynamic obstacles, I can't solve this problem with my current ability. So I temporarily widened the distance between the different lanes so that the bike could pass through the gaps between the obstacles. But this also leads to a new problem, where the player can remain in a fixed position between two lanes and never crash. While I thought about whether this new problem could be solved by adding a mechanic for obstacle changing lanes, it involves more complex vehicle ai and is still not a good solution. So this part of the problem remains to be solved.
Settlement updates
A game should have a clear outcome, whether it is a loss or a win. For this reason I have designed a settlement page, where the player can see the reason for the end of the game, as well as various game data. Currently I show 5 types of data, distance, time, average speed, glide distance and collected points. The glide distance means how far the bike has glided due to inertia at the end of the game. The point of displaying so many data is that each of them can evolve into a unique mini-race, or a unique achievement and reward. Not only are these contests fun, but they can also help maintain player online length and gameplay fervour. Example:
- Distance: who rides further.
- Time: who takes less time at the same distance, or who can survive longer.
- Average speed (or peak speed): who can reach a higher speed, or who can finish the race at the slowest speed.
- Glide distance: who glided the furthest distance after the bike overturned.
- Collected points: who collects the most points in a game, or who can avoid all collected points to finish the game.
Game Operation Strategy
Monetized
As an initial idea, I think this game could follow the usual mobile casual game monetisation strategy of free-to-play, monetised by in-game purchases and in-built adverts. Similar to other mobile casual games, content that can be purchased with in-game currency could include:
- Resurrection: Players can be resurrected once using in-game currency.
- Bike appearance: players can use in-game currency to buy or draw different bike appearances. Different appearances may contain different in-game buffs.
- New scenes or modes: Players can use in-game currency to unlock new scenes or modes.
Examples of where adverts can be applied include:
- Resurrection: players can watch an advert and then make a single resurrection.
- Random reward: watch an advert once before starting the game to get a random in-game buffs.
- Reward boost: watch adverts at the end of the game to get more rewards.
Long-term operations
In order to achieve long term monetisation of the game, the game should be made to operate for a long term and be updated regularly. Here are some ideas that I came up with that can help the game operate in the long run:
- Daily or weekly quests: Tasks can be set to guide the player to log in to the game on a regular basis. For example, collect items or ride a certain distance and reward them with a certain amount of in-game currency upon completion.
- PvP Leaderboards: based on some of the competition ideas mentioned above, set up competition leaderboards where players can compete against other players. These leaderboards would be updated or rotated regularly and reward players based on their performance.
- Social interaction: add the mechanism of friend competition on top of the PvP leaderboard, so that players can invite friends to play the game or share the game content to social platforms.
- Scene updates: Each quarter, a new, differently designed game scene based on a different country or region is introduced to keep things fresh for the player.
Presentation Video
Assignment score：73/100
Instructor feedback：
Handed well：
New jumping mechanic
Some good ideas on monetisation
Player stats page
Helpful voice over
Room for improvement：
Consider adding some visual effects when player does something cool
Consider allowing player to take easy or harder routes and even double up jumps with skill.