I’m building a physics based puzzle platformer named Adventures of Chuck, part time ninja. The idea is to break crystals which trigger platforms that allow you to complete the level.
Right now I’m working on getting the shaders and the physics based movement cleaned up. Eventually I plan on adding new weapons, enemies, and possibly a leveling system.
I’d appreciate any feedback that you have on the game, web player link is
in the comments.
played with the demo a bit;
cons:
need to work on the level design… there are a few places where I wasn’t quite sure what to do, which is frustrating, and a few areas where some crystals were redundant - I’d jump onto a platform, see that I’d missed a crystal, only for said crystal to give me just a path up to where I’d just come from.
pros:
I love how the player character looks almost claymation - I think a sort of made from clay look is something that would be very effective if you expanded it to the rest of the aesthetic.
Can you name a few of the levels where the crystal placement seemed to be off the most. I’ve been through the levels so many times I think I’m missing stuff like that. I still haven’t quiet nailed down the art direction, but making the other characters clayish might make the character modelling a bit easier. Thanks for your help.
Can’t check it out as I am at a client site at the moment, but I have to say that that is a great title. Instantly made me want to click. Will add feedback when I get a chance to play.
First of all, bonus points for having a character named “Chuck” (That’s my name! ^_^). I really liked the style of this platformer. The movement was very smooth and mostly made sense. Love the fact that you can slide around.
That being said, here are my notes:
Adding borders to the levels would really help as well, giving the player an idea of where to go and what to do.
Crystals - I really liked the look and multitude of colors for the crystals, and that breaking certain crystals did different things. Any chance you have to add variety to the game is great. I do think, however, that there should be some kind of melee attack for breaking the crystals, rather than just moving through them. I think that would give the player a greater sense of control over the environment.
Controls - Wasn’t really sure what did what at first. I found out I could use throwing stars later on in the game, so maybe a tutorial system or customizable controls would be useful in an options menu.
The Character - Really liked the look and feel to the ninja. The animations were smooth and felt natural. So you’re doing a great job in that area. Can’t wait to see what types of characters you come up with.
Sound - Platformers rely quite heavily on sound effects. Consider adding bits here and there that give each action a “feel.”
Overall, I think it’s a great start. I’m sure you’ll be polishing it up soon, and I can’t wait to see what you come up with!
-Chuck
I added a new build to the Facebook page. I spent some time improving some of the levels. I added some walls to the flat levels to contain the player a bit and on the levels that have no floor or walls, I tried to stop the camera movement to give a sense of bounds. I also changed the character controller a bit so that he moves a bit faster and jumps a bit higher.
On top of that I did some extensive work to the shaders. Right now it seems to require DX11 for my black and white shader, but I’m going to see if I can optimize it for shader model 3.
I’m going to start working on the characters and animations next. With any luck, the next build will have some new attacks and weapons.
Thanks for all the input!
Added some characters with rudimentary AI and (hopefully) fixed the shaders. Let me know what you think.
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/9194933/Builds/Web/Web.html