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1. Concept Document Archive (created Feb 20th 2005, 12:15pm)

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2. Discussion

Jump in the brainstorm session and add your thoughts to this growing document. In addition to brainstorming, please check out your personal responsibilities for the proposal below.

A tentative assignment of tasks (open to negotiation):

supermarket graphics --

some examples to check out :

1. so sad... virtual 3D supermarket! (just some introduction and screen shots) http://www.siasistemas.com.ar/sitio2/eng-02010202.htm

2. i'm finding such random things... http://www.workcover.com/Learning/GamesAndTests/VirtualSupermarket/VirtualSupermarket.htm this is flash animated virtual supermarket. it shows that we can also use 2D in this kind of way...

3. another info page on virtual supermarket. http://www.supermarketsavvy.com/tour.asp -yuna

Randomness
The movement JD suggested can be easily done, so it is not goign to be a problem. As for the random distribution of item, that should not be hard either. --ioana, Mon 10:20 pm
Example: human shoppers. We've talked about randomly distributing them at the start of the level, and also on giving them random movement.

JD mentioned that strictly random movement doesn't get you very far, because mathematically-speaking, you should average out over a small area (kind of like walking around in circles). What he suggested was random choice at junctions i.e. at a junction, pick left, right or straight ahead. Then, walk the whole way until the next junction, at which point another random choice is made.

I don't know if this makes it easier/harder, but I've suggested in-between stages in the development schedule. Before programming random movement, we would program fixed routes. But I need you guys to tell me if this is necessary. If not, I can fix the development schedule.

As for distribution, I've suggested similar in-between stages in the schedule. Is this necessary? Is it much harder to program them to spawn at random locations than in fixed locations?

-- spoon, 2/14 9:45am.

Levels I say we stick with the supermarket level for now. You suggested more levels for a higher target -- that's fine, though I think that means we probably won't get to those additional levels.

Check-out We could avoid the whole check-out problem by just having a sign that says "To Check-out", and the level is completed when Verne walks under that sign.

Dialog I like this idea! Some examples of possible reactions: 1) someone just ignores the bump, 2) someone else is apologetic and moves on if Verne responds in kind, 2) another person may be rude and belligerent, requiring Verne to quickly diffuse the situation and get away. This may involve some complex AI though... Ioana, you're probably the best person to advise on this.

spoon, Sun Feb 13, 4:40pm

So are we going to do only the Supermarket level or other levels as well?

Also does Vern have to pay for the item that he is buying or he steals them. I think the latter would be against the whole idea of integrating in the society. How is this action goign to affect the game. We can have self checkout maybe, to avoid all this situation.

The other idea I had was that instead of having Vern bite people when he bumps into them, he might be forced to interact with them through dialog, kinda like a second chance. He has a limited amount of time that he must have the people move away. The only thing he can do it talk to them. I am not sure if this is going to work. What do you guys think?

ioana, Sun Feb 13, 3:45 pm

Some help needed on a few simple ideas about the other levels. Listed so far: apartment search, making friends, shopping, college, job search. Any other thoughts?

3. Vampires!

3.1. The Big Picture

3.1.1. Genre

Action/adventure

Style

3.1.2. Audience

This game will be designed for the PC platform. Because of the different ways in which the game can be enjoyed – as a simple action/adventure game, as an entertaining vampire/teen story, as an ethnographic piece (see 3.1.3 Game Overview below) – we are targeting a broad audience of both male and female casual gamers, aged 13 years and older.

3.1.3. Game Overview

Hey guys, how does the following sound to you? It proposes a slightly different style for the overall game (Yuna, take note!), though it won't change how we program the level. Feedback, please.

Vampires! is an action/adventure game in which Verne, our protagonist, is an idealistic vampire who disagrees with the violent ways in which the members of his clan get their nutrition. He runs away and makes it his goal to learn about human culture and to become a part of human society.

The core objective is to find a way to live among people. Verne faces a number of primary challenges in achieving this goal. First of all, his best friend and other members of his clan are still out looking for him. If they find him, they will surely drag him back to the mansion to live by their rules. This is an unbearable thought to Verne, but evading them is no easy task. Furthermore, he must tame his vampiristic urges to feed on humans, otherwise he will draw attention to himself. Not only will this compromise his ability to fit in, it is also likely to bring his clan running. The player progresses through different levels to help Verne deal with , Verne’s thirst for blood will fade and his primary concern will be to gain acceptance in society.

Verne is really a narrative device for a close look at human culture and society, specifically the one that we present in the game. He functions as the outsider who stumbles upon our community, and in trying to navigate through it, helps us understand our own habits and idiosyncrasies. The player should come away from the game with a little insight and appreciation for what we often take for granted: our interactions with others, our relationships, our blind spots, our daily routines, and so on.

3.1.4. Gameplay theme

Idealistic vampire who disagrees with drinking human blood, and who is trying to become a part of human society.

3.1.5. Story premise

The following probably isn't going to make it into any of our progress reports or even the level we program, but I found it useful to visualize everything from the start. It might also provide a useful framework for understanding Verne and giving him and the game a consistent look and feel.

The game begins with little in the way of an introduction, just a brief movie clip at the mansion: Verne’s best vampire friend goes into his room to look for him. She picks up the hand-written note that he has left. From her melodramatic reaction, we expect the classic, angsty ‘I have to go far, far away’ note. Instead, the scene cuts to the note: “Dude, this clan SUCKS. These guys will never change and they will never understand, so they can just kiss my ass goodbye.” From this scene, the player jumps straight into an action-packed obstacle course to get our protagonist – a figure in a black trench coat and hoodie pulled over his head – out of the mansion as fast as possible, but also as stealthily as possible.

With the first piece of action successfully completed, we can now slow down and give another peek into the backdrop of the story. Another cut scene: snatches of a conversation between the best friend and one of the older vampires, along the lines of:

The focus shifts back to Verne, who is standing in front of a poster/advertisement for a low-cost hostel. In this level, Verne has to get to that hostel to find shelter. The player maneuvers Verne through the mass of people, becoming accustomed to the layout of the city, the shops and their signs. He also asks for directions and, in so doing, becomes accustomed to the different ways in which people will respond to him: some are suspicious, some helpful, etc. At last, he arrives at the hostel.

Movie clip again. He walks into his room and dumps his trench coat and pulls off his hoodie. For the first time, the player sees him for the gawky teenager that he is. He turns on the TV and quickly switches between news channels, all broadcasting stories about a number of brutal human deaths – the police suspect animal attacks, gang fights, etc. He recognizes the trademarks of vampire attacks, and turns off the TV in disgust: “They’ve gone too far.”

Now that the player understands why Verne left, s/he can help him on his way to becoming a part of human society.

3.1.6. Game structure

More stuff that will go into the game proposal, but won't be directly related to the level we program.

The core objective is to find a way to live among people. The main challenges are gaining acceptance in society while taming his vampire urges. The player works through different levels to help Verne overcome these challenges. The game progresses in a non-linear fashion and presents the player with different ways to string together Verne’s story. These levels may include looking for an apartment, eating out, making friends, going shopping, finding a job, becoming part of an underground art community, alternative music group, etc.

As the levels progress, Verne learns to control his thirst for human blood and he starts to focus more on learning about human culture. As a result, the challenges change. For example, early on when he goes shopping in the supermarket, he must keep away from humans because of his hunger. Later on, the challenge may be to gain access to an invitation-only concert.

But the point is not that he renounces his vampire-ness and attempts to live the American dream. Instead, he must live life by his own rules, rather than by those dictated by either vampire or human society. And there is the moral of the story. :)

3.2. The Supermarket Level

Verne goes shopping for food items in the local supermarket. But as he gets more and more hungry, the harder it is to resist the urge to sink his teeth into the nearest human shopper. Inside the supermarket is a vampire from his clan, who is here to find him and bring him back to the clan – another obstacle to be avoided.

3.2.1. Objective

Find the necessary food items before you get so hungry that you sink your teeth into a human shopper, and before a fellow vampire finds you and drags you back to your clan.

3.2.2. Character features

Movement Walking along aisles. Path will be affected by gravitational pull of shoppers (the more shoppers there are and the longer the player takes, the stronger the pull). Possibility of short bursts of running when pursued by vampires?

Selecting items Move towards the highlighted item and press "E" to pick it up. 'Comment' I think it would be better to just have proximity pickup. Especially if the player is being pursued while running past an item, they don't want to look for a specific key. Also, conventional games like this tend to use the spacebar as a function (jump, dodge, action, etc.) since the player wouldn't need to look for it.

3.2.3. Environment features

Setting Should contain various aisles which turn in different ways to create a toned down maze which could also be a believable supermarket. Turns are designed not to act as a maze and get the user lost, but rather as a means to evade line of site enemies. This shouldn't be a random setup each play, but we might want a few (3-5) different setups.

Items These should be randomly distributed around the store every time as we don't want a player to just run around getting everything right away and get out. They should have the same process of finding them every time.

ioana: Vern does not know the location of the items and so he must travel all the aisles untill he finds all the items on his list. We might want to have a list of items that he needs to get.

3.2.4. Player mechanics

View Psuedo-3D third person movement. Camera moves with character but is static in rotation.

Map Small direct overhead map with no detail past aisle position and markers for needed items shows slightly larger area then the main window. This can be positioned as a cut in from one of the corners. This only indicates needed items and does not act as radar for people/vampires.

Timer To prevent the player from just waiting around and encourage them to move quickly, a "hunger" meter increases with time. This will play a part regarding enemies.

Number of items This will act as a secondary timer. The number of items that has been collected so far will be used to cue more shoppers (obstacles) coming into the store, as well as the entrance of the other vampire(s).

Perfect score As the level gets harder as the player continues, they might not necessarily complete it. That's fine. Perfect completion involves getting all of the items and getting to the checkout line without coming in contact with any enemies.

Level over The player stops this minigame as soon as they come in contact with an enemy. The player bites all human enemies, creating a scene, losing stats, and ultimately making him flee the store. Contact with a vampire also causes a scene and fleeing of the store. However, due to the increased difficulty of this enemy and because no blood is spilt, fewer stats are deducted. Number of items collected should also come into play here. (to be determined but I have an idea in the works)

Stats These numbers and small algorithms can be worked out later.

3.2.5. Friends and foes

Human shoppers These wandering people are basically oblivious to the fact the main character is a vampire unless he causes a scene. (For a touch of realism, they will stop periodically to pick things off the shelves.) However, the character's hunger will create a pull towards humans which affect his normal movement. Should humans crowd together (in families or just passing by), the gravitational affects are appropriately heightened. In other words, the character can move past many humans individually (with slight difficulty), but should stay away from crowds or anyone when hunger increases too much. Due to the time system, a character will not be able to just sit around as the pulls will inevitably stop gameplay.

Vampires These enemies, which come into the store later in the minigame, scour the aisles in a random (or near random) fashion, trying to find the main character. These are line of site enemies, meaning that if there exists an unobstructed path between a vampire and the player, the vampire will run (increased speed) towards the player. In a straight chase, the vampires will always win. However, the player can outsmart the vampires by tactfully maneuvering corners.

3.2.6. Criteria for success

How will we know we've been successful? What's our criteria for judging?

Overall, I say this can be accomplished in "ending sequences" whereas if the player sucks too much at any time the game can cut to a sequence of Verne getting dragged back to the vampire mansion. If the player doesn't suck too much, then 3-5 different ending sequences can happen at the end of the game. This keeps the game a bit more interesting because the player would want to know what the other endings are paths are and thus play the game again. This works particularly well in shorter lighter games like this one and not so well in really long dense RPGs where it is unfortunately found so often today. -jd

3.3. Layered Development Schedule

Have shuffled a number of things to reflect our email conversation. - spoon, Feb 14th, 9:15am.

3.3.1. Functional Minimum - Feb 24

Oh whoops, I think we have 2 weeks to complete the functional minimum. :)

Summary Verne picks up items in a store without any people around.

3.3.2. Low Target - Mar 10 (2 wks)

Summary There are people in the store, and they exert a gravitation pull on Verne. The vampire makes an entrance too.

3.3.3. Desirable Target - Mar 24 (2 wks)

Summary Time-dependency i.e. the longer Verne takes, the more people enter the store and the stronger the gravitational pull they exert over him. Groups of people also exert a stronger pull.

3.3.4. ALPHA RELEASE - Apr 19 (almost 4 wks)

Produce version for playtesting.

Summary: Map, game over scenarios, and dialog.

3.3.5. High Target

3.3.6. Extras

Extra levels.

As an extension of the idea where Verne helps us look at human culture from a different perspective, I would love to add in a soundtrack of noises in a supermarket. For example, when he goes past different people, he catches their dialog about rising prices, making dinner, having friends over, children asking for snacks, etc. That is, I want Verne (and the player) to "discover" the truly social experience of going grocery shopping. But sound is a difficult one, so maybe I can just make mention of this in the proposal and earn us brownie points that way. :) -- spoon, 2/13 4:40pm

4. Other games

Kisses http://www.igf.com/php-bin/entries2005.php?entry_id=38

Mummy Maze http://popcap.com/gamepopup.php?theGame=mummymaze An online puzzle game which involves avoiding a mummy.

The Plumber http://media2.big-boys.com/theplumber.swf An online puzzle game which involves connecting pipes.

Squirrel Sqaubble http://www.squirrelsquabble.com/images/download/download.htm

5. Feedback

I really like the premise of this game. It sounds like an interesting combination of a lot of things. The gameplay and plot are different. It sounds interesting enough that I'd want to see a full version of the game. admitedly, I didn't grow up on games and probably have different taste.

Based on what you guys have said about the game, it sounds like gameplay would vary a lot by level and task. while i think this makes the game sound interesting, I can also see how some people could find it unapealing or distracting. they might not like one kind of game, but would have to spend time on that sort of gameplay to get to the next level. changing the gamplay so much could also be difficult. the player would have to change thought processes so often. i know this is outside the scope of this semester's work, but should you decide to continue this game, I think it would be worth it to consider allowing the player some choice in what kind of activities or when the do them.

Your plans for this semester sound really good. And I'm terribly sorry about any spelling mistakes or generally not making sense. I've been up since Wednesday morning and think I may be a little out of it by now.

-Katherine

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