The game is about a little goblin trying to escape from prison and must avoid obstacles and enemies that will try to get in his way. He can defend himself, but he is not very stong . He must use his wits to overcome this ordeal and escape to freedom, by avoiding enemy projectiles and their patrols.
The gameplay should be very similar to the two platformers mention in the research portion of this document. The challenge of the game should be in how the player overcomes the obstacles they face, such as platforms, pitfalls (Hole in the level they fall through) and enemies in their way. As the player progresses through the levels the challenges should increase in difficulty. Difficulty in this regard refers to how the player must think and act, they should not be able to just hold the right movement key and jump and successfully make it through the level. There should be something like a pitfall or enemy specifically placed in their way to stop that course of action.
The game has three levels, at the end of each level there should be a “Boss” which is tougher and has a different pattern to all the other enemies. They should also be much harder to kill than the regular enemies. They should require the player to analysis its movement pattern and find a safe time to attack without them getting hurt. The boss can have any range of movement so long as it is possible to defeat it without being killed. For an example I suggest looking at the boss of the Mario series “Bowser” and the bosses from the Castlevania game for inspiration on how to achieve this, especially Castlevania as this game is more like that then Mario.
At the end of the first two levels after beating the boss the player should unlock upgrades. These upgrades are as follows. The first upgrade is a higher jump for the player. Making it easier for them to avoid enemies and get around the levels. After the second boss the player unlocks a “better sword”, this means that their attack does more damage to the enemies making it easier for them to kill them. For example, Standing/Crouching-Arrow-Guards take say two hits to kill, they would now take one.
STANDING-ARROW-SHOOTER
The first enemy the player will come up against is a standing guard that shoots arrows on a pattern. The pattern is time based and doesn’t change. The player should be safe from this type of enemy if they don’t jump into his arrows because the player is smaller than their arrow height. The player can get past this enemy by timing it correctly and jumping through his arrow pattern or by hitting him with their attack until it is dead.
CROUCHING-ARROW-SHOOTER
This enemy is the same as the previous one except that it fires arrows lower to the ground. This means the player will be hit directly if they do not jump. To get past this guard, they must learn the pattern and jump at the right time until they can get behind the enemy. When this enemy is introduced the player should be on a ledge not in the direct fire of this enemy, this is so they can have a chance to learn the pattern before they are immediately killed.
BRUTE
The brute is a simple enemy that moves back and forth across the screen, when the player first encounter the brute, he should be patrolling in a place he can’t reach the player. The only way to get around the brute is to jump over him as he approaches or kill him with a lot of melee attacks. The brute has a lot of health and damages the player character when he walks into him.
DOG
The dog is an enemy that runs across the screen and doesn’t stop, it is very fast, and the player must react quickly to avoid it. Once the dog passes the player it does not come back. This enemy works more like a projectile then an actual enemy.
BIG DUDE
This boss should be very simple because it is the first one, He should start at the far end of the screen when the player reaches the screen he is on. He should be very slow and there should be platforms around him so the player can get behind him without getting hurt. He should have a lot of health, but the player should not find it too hard once they learn his movement pattern. When he touches the player, they take damage. He is also much larger than the player’s character (maybe three of four times larger).
LITTLE DUDE
The last boss was a big, slow boss. This one is the opposite. He is about the same size of the player character. And his movement is very fast. He should jump around the screen on the same platforms the player uses. This boss should be more vertically mobile than the last one and much faster, with the ability to jump. However, he should not have as much health with means he will take less attacks to kill.
THE DUDE
This is the final boss of the game; He is essentially a mix of the last too bosses he has a lot of mobility and takes a lot of hits to kill. The player will have to use all their skills to beat this one. He is bigger than the player and can jump and attack the player. He should have two kinds of attacks, one where he fires arrows from his body and another where he hits them with his weapon for the weapon attack there should be some visual indicator that he is going to attack the player so they can notice and avoid the attack.
- All the controls should be responsive, if the player hits the jump button the character jumps.
- The player should always start on the far-left side of the screen.
- The player should be bound inside the frame of each screen they are on, only able to exit to a new screen when they reach the far-right wall or if they die by falling through a pitfall.
- The levels should end after the player has defeated that levels boss. They should not be able to continue as usual until the boss is defeated.
- When the player beats the boss, they should be able to use the upgrades they just unlocked (as mentioned in the gameplay section) in the next level.
- When the player gets hit four times, they lose all their health. The game should restart from the start of whatever level they are on.
- If the player dies three times, they lose all their lives, this means the game is over and they should get a game over screen.
- If the player is hit by an enemy the player character should jump back, and have a period of invulnerability of about two seconds afterwards i.e. Not able to be hit repeatability.
- If the player falls through any of the pitfalls in the levels, they should die instantly regardless of how much health they have left.
- Once the player reaches the end point of a level, they should be moved onto the start of the next level.
Game Designer: Aaron Burns (G00346688)
Game Developer: Sammar Tahir (G00347526)