Project Cat Boy - Story Synopsis

Hello everyone, as promised the story synopsis and game idea is here and ready for you to read courtesy of myself and Mr. Steve Gregson. I hope it gets you as excited as we are and that you will follow our development diaries and posts on No Rules Required (although a dedicated site will be set up in the coming weeks for PhatLads Games and Project Cat Boy). So here it is, what exactly is Project Cat Boy all about?

Project Cat-Boy – PhatLads Games.

A young boy is confined to his room by his parents gazes out to the world and wishes he was free. Free to look for adventure, free like the cats he sees playing outside…

Suddenly It was all too obvious, this young boy needed to become a cat.

Cats are happy and free, and as would he be if he escaped the confines of his home, so after a swift escape our hero sets off looking for adventure.
Adventure however, had come looking for him.

After walking through his village with little time to spend talking to the locals, Cat-Boy witnesses a UFO crash. This was his chance, a chance for adventure!
Though not the adventure our young friend had planned, Cat-Boy would investigate the UFO crash and the horrors that await him inside.

Once in the UFO Cat-Boy finds a whole host of people trapped in their own twisted realities in the UFO’s computer system, simulating their own idea worlds created by their own psychology. Only by entering these virtual psychological worlds can Cat-Boy find the real persons sanity and bring reality back to them, if, of course, he can convince them to leave their perfect world.

A gameplay blend between the humorous point and click adventure days of yesterday, with the puzzle platform gameplay akin to classic games like Flash Back and Abe’s Oddysee, Project Cat-Boy will make you chuckle as much as it will make you think, but as is the way with psychology, some peoples ideal worlds will be twisted and altogether unpleasant as our hero learns that it’s not all smiles being a cat.

Keep tuned for more info soon :)

Ben and Steve x

Cat Boy Concept Art

So as promised here are a few concept drawings by Steve Gregson of our wonderful main character "Cat-Boy". The name has not been finalised but is the easiest thing that we could call him. The art style is definitely the look we are going for within the game and hopefully within a month we will have some game renders to show you of the lovely chap in 3D.

Cat Boy

Cat Boy with his hat off.

Dizzy Cat Boy

So a few pictures to get you excited! Story and game play coming very soon!!

New IP Project And A Taste Of Whats To Come

As people who read my posts will know I finished my Masters in Games Design in January and having done very well on the course decided to take a small amount of time out after I got my marks and do a spot of writing on here and on Gamasutra whilst I applied for jobs. Having not been 100% successful on the job hunt so far I have decided to ‘buddy’ up with a good friend of mine Mr. Steve Gregson (co-creator of Safety First) to create a game that I have been part designing for quite a while whilst I continue to look for work.

The main idea for the title so far is to re-create that platform/adventure feeling that was popularised by titles such as Flashback and Oddworld with the humour and fun of the old LucasArts titles. Of course these are just examples of the area we want to progress into and not a full guide to what will come as the game mechanic ideas for the project are quite different to those found in these titles and the art direction will be considerably more light hearted. Due to this being an indie title that is a labour of love we will no doubt take inspiration from many different walks of art and design that have inspired us to take up games design in the first place and will take quite a while to accomplish.

We are aiming to have a demo of the game up and running in the next few months and will be creating a developers blog to chronicle out advancements on the game showing off concept work and screenshots whilst also talking about game ideas and designs without giving away too much. At this very moment our story overview is being finalized and our game mechanics are being refined so expect a post very soon with new information and pictures to wet your appetite and a link to the games new home!

Design: Inspirational books as a games designer

The original post was a way for me to share my research ideas with the public and my academic peers on my Masters in Games Design. Since I have now completed the course I have decided to expand the original post with other texts that have been influential to my design process and me. If anybody has any other books that they have found particularly inspirational towards games design please link them or write about them in the comments.

1# FLOW.
Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

In terms of design this textbook discusses the psychology of how to understand as well as to achieve happiness. This may seem a bit ‘hippy like’ to some but if we take and step back and look at the larger picture the information inside becomes invaluable when designing a game. Videogames are meant to ignite enjoyment, achievement and a sense of fulfilment. These are not possible without the understanding of happiness and how the human mind achieves this state. It also will allow you to understand how to take control of your life to an extent and to identify the many elements that can take that control away from you. In the process you may even end up happy yourself…

 

2# The Writers Journey.
Christopher Vogler

If you want to design your own games then this book is excellent when it comes to writing stories. It gives us a systematic understanding of how stories affect people as well as how to write them. Game narrative as a rule is more complicated than writing for a film or writing a novel yet these guidelines will allow us to understand the psychology of consumers when posed by certain types of stories. With a little intelligence and risk this should help you create stories that are worth playing through whether they are 4 minutes long or 60 hours.

 

3# Homo Ludens. Johan Huizinga

A brilliant theory book that looks into the reasons man needs to play. Homos Ludens itself means, “Man the Player” and discusses the importance of play in culture and society. I guess the questions may arise in yourself of how can you create a truly remarkable game without knowing the real reasons that one needs to play? Or you may gain some insight into the human need to enjoy themselves through games? Maybe the realization that videogames are an important cultural medium will give you confidence? Any of these things may occur when reading texts that investigate the reasons why we want to play videogames and in turn will help you create better and more substantial games. Anyone can make games that may be true, but knowing why and how they work will help you make better games.




4# Creativity.
Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

Another great textbook by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi that looks into the theory of flow in order to understand creativity. This book in itself may not explain how to make better games but what it does do is help you understand the creative process as well as help you enrich your work with a great creative ethos.


5# Game Writing: Narrative Skills for Videogames.
Chris Bateman (Editor)

This was the first book I read when writing a report on narrative design in videogames and although I am not a game writer the lessons I learnt in game structuring has stayed with me. The book goes into many different aspects of games design and game writing and is written by various different professionals to give you a broad view. As narrative in videogames goes the theories and ideas on show often dictate what is already used in the games industry thus giving any games designers a strong foundation of what does work. This will allow them, as it did me, to stray from the path and experiment with game mechanics and game narrative.



6# Rules of Play: Game Design Fundamentals.
Katie Salen and Eric Zimmerman

This is probably one of my favourite books on games design. Not because it is one of the better know books on games design but because it doesn’t just focus on video games, it looks at all times of games from board games to sport games and of course computer and video games. The book works its way through 8 games design “schemas” such as games being a storytelling medium and contexts of social play and gaming. Out of all the books I have read on games design this is the one that helped me as guide the most. It allowed me to make rational choices and risks by understanding the aesthetics of games design whilst still feeling creative. I also helped me identify with myself as a games designer rather than just a “video” games designer.



7# The Laws of Simplicity.
John Maeda

Games design textbooks are all well and good but it is basic design philosophies that will allow us to make clear, concise and accessible titles. I found the “The Laws of Simplicity” allowed me to understand why it was important to create challenges, controls and mechanics simply. In my last post The Rules of Three I talk about design in process being broken down simply, without this book those ideas would not have been fully realised or at least not as clearly. The book itself is not too academic and easy enough to read, or should I say simple to read, and Maedas simple advice proved influential on my work. I suggest picking it up to see if it has the same effect on you.




These books have been highly influential to me and have helped me when I am stepping through the design process. If you design games and don’t read I highly recommend to start with some of these titles and see if they help you when you are creating. On top of these books there are some others that I intend to read but have not yet gotten round to doing so. These are the following:

1# Universal Principles of Design
2# Emotional Design – Donald Norman
3# The Design of Every Day Things - Donald Norman
4# How’s and Whys of Level Design – Sjoerd De Jong
5# House of Leaves - Mark Z. Danielewski

Hopefully I will get to read them soon, as for now back to ideas factory to makes some games.

Design: The rule of three

The rule of three is used in many things, from film and literature to comedy and religion yet is something that I had never really consider before when designing levels and game mechanics. It wasn’t until I was reminded of the rule at a workshop on how to do successful presentations that I even considered its uses in games design and consequently ended up fascinated with the number and the constraints it gave me when designing challenges, tasks and pacing in my games.

                                

I have recently been working on an iPhone title where the player controls aspects of the environment to create a safe path for a character to reach his goal. Now although the idea itself and the mechanic had proven to be fun and entertaining I hadn’t really thought about it as a structured game yet and with this simple idea plaguing my mind I decided to use the rule of three to structure the game on various different levels. The first structural problem I tackled was that of the levels themselves, I wanted to create an experience that was humorous, fun and bite-sized so players could easily pick it up, have a go at a challenge then put it down again, ideal for people on the move.
So I set about playing with the rule of three and placing constraints on the game. I structured each level into three parts as follows:

1. The player has a certain amount of unseen time to survey the environment to understand the structures that they can interact with and try and figure out the idea of the puzzle.
2. The player then gets notified that the character is about to set off from the starting area. Here a timer appears and the player can now interact with the objects in the level to form a safe pathway.
3. When the time is up the character will start to walk along a linear path through the level. Players can still interact with the level but will have the added pressure of the character moving through it. If the player is successful, the character will reach the goal.

Now that the level structure was in place I could focus on the puzzles and decided to also structure those with the rule of three in mind. They would need the following:

1. An original point of interest that would draw the player to the origin of the puzzle. If there were multiple puzzles in the level each puzzle would need an origin point of interest.
2. The origin point would need to lead onto a mid puzzle point. This would need to be obviously linked with the origin point but not in a way that solves the puzzle out right. For example if you needed a seesaw type apparatus to help the character reach a higher level, the origin point could be the pivot and the mid puzzle point could be the plank. Useless on their own until the third part of the puzzle is involved.
3. A final puzzle point that would bring the puzzle together in a way that allows the player to see how it solves the original dilemma. Using our seesaw example it would be something that would weigh one side of the seesaw down to create a ramp allowing the character to reach the desired higher level.

So using the rule of three I had come up with a clear and constrained level structure and puzzle structure to aid me when designing my game. I found that these constraints helped me be more creative in the designs I have come up with so far as they never allow me to stray off the path. Hopefully this will allow for a more thought out game that is still enriched with creativeness and is still fun. But I couldn’t stop there; because once I had started I thought of all the other game elements that I could create around this simple rule. The first that came into my mind after the initial game play was that of logistical games design. How was I going to keep my customers playing my game? It is here that I thought of collectibles and using the rule of three broke it down into three simple actions that could be used and why they would be used. They are as follows:

1. As we know through the level plan that there is a point in each level where players can interact with objects. These objects are often moved, levitated or destroyed to aid the characters progression.
2. Sometimes when these objects are moved cogs will appear that can be tapped and collected.
3. These cogs can then be used to unlock new rescue missions for your character to go on. This gives the game longevity and challenge.

Okay so the last idea was relatively loose on the rule of three but still the principle is the same. Using three rules allows us as designers to structure our ideas into separate bundles, such as the way the game is presented. We don’t want to over complicate the menu system and risk losing the player before they even try the levels. So we can structure them simply with:

1. A main menu screen that gives an overview of the game and a general feel to the player as well as three options. Play, Quit, Options.
2. A level select screen that can be navigated easily to see the various different rescue missions on offer as well as levels that are locked to the player till they gather enough coins.
3. An option screen that allows the player to change the music volume, sfx volume and other aspects of the game.

I even used the theory when designing the main character and based him on three simple shapes, a square, an oval and a circle. It simply stops me over complicating things and going overboard when coming up with ideas. Keeping things simple will always allow for cleaner design and the rule of three allows for this as designers and allows players to understand the game and its ideas easier.  There will always be exceptions to the rule of course but as a design constraint it’s a mighty fine one and will give you a challenge. Why not give it ago yourself? I’m finding it quite inspirational making a puzzle game and wonder how it could be used in other genres.

The NGP and the Smart phones revolution.

With the announcement of the NGP it seems that the effects of the smart phone are finally seeping into what many would consider to be the core game scene. Sony’s announcement of Android compatibility shows a new way of thinking for a company that helped shape the gaming world of today and it will be interesting to see whether this business model will be as supported as say Apples app store. Yet as a designer and someone who interested in games development I am more interested in what this “compatibility” will open up for smaller game developers. With both the iPhone, iPad and Android Smart phones we have seen a huge rise in “bite” sized gaming that has allowed smaller developers to reach larger audiences as well as make decent sized profits, something that is becoming more difficult in the traditional games market. Unless you are a guaranteed big seller like Call of Duty or Fifa it can be a huge financial risk making a game for the console market whereas with the downloadable model it costs developers and publishers less to create, make and market their product.

So have Sony finally hit the nail on the head? Well it depends on how they approach the situation. If they focus on easy access and a simple model that allows gamers to simultaneously have a game on their PS3, their Android phone and their NGP with saving that carries between the different hardware then they could be onto a winner. Yet if they just throw a load of indie titles and old PS stock into a “new look” market place we could have another Xbox live indie store that suffered from lots of below average titles and a few shiny gems which was also difficult to navigate. Apples app store works on the basis of the top 25 lists that allow consumers to see what is hot making it easy for them navigate as well as buy. A similar approach from Sony would be beneficial as the current PS Store suffers from a layered design that can easily alienate consumers from finding titles and exploring the market place.

Its these small design ideas that really can make and break many design teams desperate to get their game noticed and if Sony want to attract and keep a large number of developers creating games that are cross platform they will need to prove that their Playstation Suite is indeed the place to market your game rather than Apples successful App store. To combat this it has been said that their "NGP is a developer's dream – Sony is finally doing the things developers have been crying out for years". This is exciting news for developers who want to work and make games quickly, easily and professionally and with the inclusion of a front and rear touch panels could be potentially used for extremely innovative titles, titles that could sell well if the Playstation Suite is as accessible as for mentioned.

For me I am interested on how Apple decides to expand on their current success and how the current major console companies combat this. Sony seems to have made the first move and it will be interesting to see if Microsoft follow with such confidence. Nintendo on the other hand seem to be in favour of their traditional tactics that won over many consumers and developers with the DS. Will this be replicated with the 3DS? I guess we will have to wait till March 25^th when the first of the next generation hand held’s is released.

Design: The control system difficulty barrier.

Image taken from http://www.gamepodunk.com/

I remember that fateful morning when I awoke to the Christmas present that was set to steer my future career. I made my way downstairs to the joyous site of a Sega Megadrive beneath our humble television set and was bewildered by the fantastic graphics and smooth game play of Sonic the Hedgehog. I picked the simple control pad up and after a few missteps I managed to pick the control system up easily enough, after all, all I needed to do was push forward to run and the B button to jump; a simple control system for a fantastic videogame.

18 years later a similar picture unfolds in my parent’s living room, yet this time the person receiving the games console for a Christmas present isn’t myself, but my Dad. Now, make no mistake, my Dad is not a newcomer to the videogame scene. When I first got my Sega Megadrive I watched in bewilderment as he blazed through Ghouls and Ghosts twice to reach the final devil boss, something that I have never seen anybody else do. He also recently completed Resident Evil 4 on my 17-year-old sisters PlayStation 2, a game which he is so satisfied with he has unlocked many items including Leon’s “pimp suit”. Yet when he set up his PlayStation 3 and placed Uncharted: Drakes Fortune into the silvery disc tray and powered the game up we came into a problem. My father could not control Nathan Drake properly, because the right analogue stick controlled the camera.

Now when my Mum told me she had seen a PS3 bundle and wondered whether he would enjoy the game I automatically said “yes” when Unchartered was mentioned. After all, he loved playing Resident Evil 4 so much and although the game’s themes are different, they both involve shooting and adventure. Unfortunately I had not thought as a designer that he might for a second have any troubles with the control system.

So we sat down and I tried my hardest to get him accustomed to the control system that was set in place for him to use, yet he still struggled to control both Drake and the camera at the same time. At this point I could see my Dad was getting frustrated with the game, yet, as an old gamer he desperately wanted to enjoy the game. He then turned to me and said, “This doesn’t feel natural to me” “Its not how I would control myself in my head in real-life”. He then said “People should be able to change the control system to something that they feel comfortable playing, especially when they spend so much on a game”. It then dawned on me that he was correct in a way. The twin stick control system isn’t one that comes to us naturally as when we move around we control ourselves as one unit and choose to look around with our head as another, something that is replicated, albeit clumsily, in Resident Evil 4; a control system that my Dad found easy to adjust to.
So I came home to Manchester after Christmas and started to ponder my Dads reaction to Uncharted’s control system and what he said about choosing your own control system for a game. I thought about whether implementing several control systems into a game for players to choose from would be beneficial to a games accessibility or whether a control system that is ergonomically designed for maximum accessibility would be better and less time consuming. After contemplating the issue I realised that as the main fundamentals of design, if we are to achieve ultimate accessibility in games, simplicity in control systems needs to be achieved and at this moment in time I don’t think many games have quite hit it on the head. I loved Uncharted and I found the control system easy to use, yet I have been playing games from the 16-bit generation through to the current one and have grown up and evolved with videogame controls. Gamers who haven’t, such as my Dad, feel overwhelmed by the complexity of our modern day control systems which do often demand a certain skill set to play.

I can understand why motion gaming has become so popular with the casual gamers, not because motion controls particularly offer a simpler route for designers (if anything it can be more complex), but because it is a new control method for us as well as the consumers. Similar to that of Mario and Sonic all those years ago with their 2 button combos it is a young control method and that reflects in the audience that it attracts. Yet it is our duty as designers in the future to make mainstream games as accessible as casual games, because if we cannot achieve this then we cannot achieve that overall art status we seem to desperately want. My Dad can sit down and watch any film, he may not like all of them, but there are no barriers there to stop him. That is something we have not yet achieved in the games industry.

This is my new showreel which features three titles that I have been working on over the past year. The first title Littleton to the Rescue was my MA final project, Catnapped is an iPhone project I have been working on and Through the Light is a conceptual project for the Nintendo Wii where you use a camera to take photographs of hidden platforms to make them solid.