Strange Galactic Friends

Appearance

Creative and Expressive Play ​

Creative and Expressive Play are not as prevalent in our Game as they are in other games. This does not mean that the player has only one linear path to play the game.

For starters the player can choose between on of two Characters: Major Dom or Moot. Each character has different abilities and Gameplay significance, meaning the player's character choice has a big impact on their gameplay. Creativity is also required to complete the main obstacle in the game: Puzzles. While each puzzle was designed to be solved in a single way at our developers back-end, this does not mean there aren't different ways to solve it. Each players team is able to show their creativity by solving the puzzles in ways, which were never foreseen by the game developers. This gives the feeling of exploration. The players will explore how to solve a level in a different way as the previous one.

Another slight change in gameplay is provided through the gadgets players can choose at the start of the level. These can help players solve the puzzle in a new way by giving them new movement abilities or letting them easily evade enemies.

A sense of Community will be hard to inspire. We have planned to create a Level editor, allowing the SGF-community to build their own levels and bond with levels others have created. Another feature we are looking at is a global rank list meant to entice players to compete with each other leading to further communication in the playerbase for optimising strategies.

Design Practice Questions ​

  1. What features do you want to include to allow the players to define herself in the game: avatar selection, customization, or creation from the ground up? What attributes can she change, if any?
    • Players can choose between different gadgets to use, before the level starts.
    • Players are able to choose between different characters or create their own avatars in terms of choosing the body type, assecoires (e.g., Moot's Hat), special attacks, and much more.
    • Players can create their own levels and game world, for themselves and their own community.

  2. How will you make clear to the player the possible consequences of his avatar customization decisions so that he can make informed choices? Where will you provide this information?
    • Information will be written right next to the chosen gadgets in form of a power ranking (comparable to power ranking in Mario Kart 8).

  3. Which abilities bring the gadgets? What makes the gadgets special?
  4. If you offer creative play, what will its domain be? What limitations will the machine impose?
    • We offer creative play but strictly limited to the "Gravity Shift" and usage of gadgets. Players can be creative in solving problems with shifting the gravity in several ways (e.g., just shifting every few minutes or flying like the 'Flappy Bird' by shifting every second).

  5. Do you plan to offer constrained creative play? If so, what will be the constraining factor or factors—economics, physics, or aesthetics? Will the game provide a growth path to gradually free the player of constraints? In the case of aesthetics, how will you implement an aesthetic judgment mechanism, and how will the results of that judgment become clear to the player? Will aesthetically successful (however you determine that) creations earn more money, win prizes, produce points, or gain some other reward?
    • Physics will constrain the game play, as not every player can solve every challenge. The players have to cooperate.
    • As the fact of playing together is a core value of our gameplay, we will not be rewarding a specific player more over another. This is important to force the players to play peacefully together instead of having a judgement or competition between each other.
    • The world ranking list ranks teams, but not each players.

  6. Will you offer freeform creative play? If so, will it be part of ordinary play, or will it be a separate sandbox mode? If you do offer freeform creative play, can the player’s creations affect the gameplay?
    • Sandbox mode allows players to create and design their own levels. This may allow more creativity and makes the players set their own goals.
    • Players are also able to sell their level templates to the developers, so it will be implemented as official in-game level. This creates willingness to play and grow the SGF-community.

  7. Does your game include features for role-playing or storytelling play? What will they be? How can you seamlessly integrate such features into the rest of the game?
    • The game includes a small storytelling, by explaining the background story (spaceship crashed, SGF are looking for spaceship parts to fix it).
    • Cut scenes, which lead the players through the story and a small foreign storyteller alien will tell the story and provide further in-game information through the game.

  8. Do you plan to allow mods? What will you let players modify? Can they create new levels, bots, or narrative material? What tools will you want to ship to support these activities?
  9. How will you create a sense of community between the players and allow them to share their creations with others?
    • Players play as a team. That means, that they have to look after each other, heal each other as well as solve problems and challenges together. That creates a community and builds up team spirit.
    • We will also create an Instagram account for the game, where players will be able to share their achievements within the game.

Ethical decisions ​

  • The game targets children and adults of every age.
  • Players will be fighting against enemies. Therefor we will implement a laser phaser, which combines the interests of adults and the cartoony childish part of fighting enemies. That does not confront the children with violent influences and gives adults the feeling of a funny 'Shooter Game'.
  • Players can decide if they want to play ethically correct (e.g., not killing enemies, killing their teammates character) or if they play like we would expect how to play the game.