NOTE - THE DOWNLOAD LINK TO THE PROTOTYPES HAS BEEN TAKEN DOWN AND THE RELEVANT FILES ARE NO LONGER AVAILABLE FOR DISTRIBUTION.  PLEASE DO NOT DISTRIBUTE THE PROTOTYPES ANY MORE.  (9/1/2006)

FOR THOSE WHO HAVE DOWNLOADED THE PROTOTYPES, SUPPLEMENTAL LICENSE INFORMATION AND NOTICES, AND A WRITTEN OFFER TO OBTAIN THE SDL AND SDL_MIXER SOURCE CODE (USED UNDER LGPL) CAN BE FOUND HERE:

Back to Phil Steinmeyer's game blog (author of the prototypes)

New Crayon Games (Phil Steinmeyer's casual games company - see our last game Bonnie's Bookstore)

What's Going On?

I've spent the last few weeks playing with game concepts and prototypes for a new casual game.  I'd like you to download them and give me feedback, so I can decide which game(s) are worth pursuing, and where to take them from here.  .

Background

Casual games are games like Bejewelled, Zuma, Chuzzle, and Jewel Quest.  They're generally puzzle-oriented and easy to learn, but fairly deep to master. They are primarily sold via 60-minute try-before-you-buy, $19.99 to unlock if you like it, from internet portal sites like  Yahoo Games, MSN, RealArcade, Pogo, and Shockwave.

All total I have 16 prototypes, but 6 of these I consider somewhat weak, or minor variations on the main ones, so there's only 10 prototypes that I'm really looking for feedback on.  They're all in a single archive - just download it, unzip it, the run each game.  No installing needed - when done, just delete the unzipped directory.  It should probably only take you 2-5 minutes to play with each concept - I'd imagine you can go through the whole set in under 30 minutes, maybe even under 15 minutes.

All the concepts are quite crude in many respects - crude, blocky placeholder graphics, minimal sound.  Some of them can't accurately detect whether you've won/lost a level, and all of them lack much variation/progression (i.e. if there is a 'level 2', it's just a slightly faster level 1).

Please be assured that the concept that I end up developing will be quite polished in all respects.  Moreover, all of these concepts are open to refinement to varying extents.  In most cases, this includes 

  1. Various special tiles (wild cards, bombs, etc), that you either earn or receive randomly.  
  2. Varied level sizes, (and for some concepts varied level shapes)
  3. Difficulty variation via higher speeds or more colors, making it harder to find matches
  4. Other clever ideas that I'm sure will come up as work begins in earnest on an idea.

All games are variations on the basic color-matching puzzle paradigm that's used for most casual games.  But I think the mechanics of each game represent anywhere from moderate to major originality vis-a-vis currently popular match-3 games.

Instructions

NOTE - THE DOWNLOAD LINK TO THE PROTOTYPES HAS BEEN TAKEN DOWN AND THE RELEVANT FILES ARE NO LONGER AVAILABLE FOR DISTRIBUTION.  PLEASE DO NOT DISTRIBUTE THE PROTOTYPES ANY MORE.  (9/1/2006)

They're all in the same zip file - unzip it and run the different Games.  The ones I'm primarily interested in start with Game (i.e. GameB), the ones I consider weaker and/or derivative of the others start with Weak (i.e. Weak_GameE)  You can disregard the latter if you like.

The concepts all begin with the Bonnie's Bookstore setup screen - disregard this and click on 'Classic Game'.  Note that the theme and graphics of whichever prototype is chosen has not been decided yet, but will probably not have any relation to Bonnie's Bookstore.

Hopefully all the concepts should be self-explanatory after 20 seconds of playing with them.  Note that for many/most of these games you can slide pieces to locations several squares away (as opposed to games like Bejewelled where you can usually only slide one square), so experiment with long slides.

If you need to reset, press the ESC key, then Main Menu, then start the game again.  Only one game (Game R) uses the right mouse button to any significant degree.  The others rely on left-click, sometimes with mouse-drag, sometimes just simple clicking.

When you've played them, send an e-mail to me:

E-Mail: .

Please rate each of the main game concepts from 1 to 10.  You can cut and paste the following.  Feel free to add comments on each game, or general comments on the end, or just send me numerical feedback if that's all you want to do.

If you don't mind, please also tell me your age, gender, and a few casual games, if any, that you've played/particularly enjoyed in the last 3 months.   

Game B Rating:   

Game C Rating:   

Game D Rating:   

Game G Rating:   

Game I Rating:   

Game J Rating:   

Game K Rating:   

Game N Rating:   

Game P Rating:   

Game R Rating:   

Additional Comments, Suggestions, etc.:

For the purpose of making ratings, please don't sweat the graphics and such too much - try to rate how fun it is now, with an eye towards how fun it would likely be in a polished game with more variation, etc.

Feel free, but not obligated to look at/rate the 'weak' concepts, particularly for those that are similar to concepts you liked anyways.

 

More info on the concepts... 

(You can ignore this if you choose, and just look at the concepts blind)

 Game Similar to Concept Future Direction?
B G Vaguely like a 2D version of Katamari Damacy Blocks added more than 6 blocks from center tile don't attach - they disappear.

Level end not recognized.
Future -
Bigger playfield (i.e. smaller squares)?
Allow pick-up of squares on bottom?
Only join new cluster to main cluster if there's a color match? (like Game G)
Scrolling screen?
C I, J, H Slide around, with lagged timeout Level end not recognized.
Future - Board and color variations
D E Zoop Level end not recognized.

Board variations (different sizes, octagonal boards, boards where you defend a corner rather than the middle)
G B Build clusters without 'core' cluster  
I H, J, C Like H, but you can only get to top row  
J C, I, H Progressive Fill.  Turn based, free-drag.  One new tile generated everytime you touch something. Could cross-pollinize this with I - use logic like this for turn-based and like I for real-time
K N, L Jewel Quest, with free drag and 'frozen' tiles.  Tiles freeze slowly, all around board, based on # of moves Future - Level shape/size variations
N K, L Free slide, edges you pass over are blocked… Future - Level shape/size variations
P M Chuzzle-y, but sliding capped at 1/2 per row/column, with levers I'm not sure if this one should have the JewelQuest, change all-tile color mechanic to win a level, or the Chuzzle/Bejewelled method of just making XX matches to win a level.

I could make it require 3-in-a-row rather than 3-in-a-group, with fewer colors to compensate.

I'm not crazy about the amount of room taken up by showing the sliding knobs, but the original version, without that (Game M), was too confusing...
R O Inverted Dr. Mario Right mouse button rotates the piece.  There is some disagreement about whether it is wise to use the right mouse button in a casual game.  Game O is the same as this, but with rotation disallowed, and the game's difficulty adjusted a bit to compensate. 


Weaker Ideas
E D Colors Spread from corners Future - Could come up with different shapes and spreading mechanisms.
F None Candy cruncher Currently no way to lose - would probably institute a level timer, or perhaps only allow you to make N moves without a match or face penalty
H C, I, J No clusters - but free move of 1 x 1s (including buried 1 x 1s) Similar to J.  Too easy as it currently stands, but could compensate with more blockers, more colors.
L K, N Jewel Quest, with free drag and 'frozen' tiles.  Tiles freeze whenever you drag over them.  Longer drags = more frozen.  
M P Chuzzle-y, but sliding capped at 1/2 per row/column  
O R Inverted Dr. Mario  




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