Project 2 - Approachable Game

Overview

• 1, 2, or 3 team members allowed. Note: I recommend 2 as the ideal team size. Teams with 3 members will have higher expectations from me. You should consider changing team members from project 1. All team members must be in the same section of the class.
• Project 2 Theme - suggested themes are farm, escape, match, or mobile. But you may choose a different theme if you wish.
• You must use a game library: Quintus.js, Lime.js, and Phaser.js are suggested. ** If you use another library you must ask for approval from the Prof first. ** (Exception: If you are building a mobile game you do not have to use a library.)

Milestones

• Monday 3/16 end of class (beginning of week 8) - all teams formed - post the names of your team members to the discussion thread.
• Friday 3/20 end of class (before you leave town end of week 8) - one-pager treatment complete - same as the first project - discuss which game framework you will use. Post link to your treatment to discussion thread.
• Friday 4/3 end of class (end of week 9)- core mechanic implemented and prototype posted to dropbox and demoed to professor in class.
• Wednesday 4/8 start of class (middle of week 10) - show your game to the class and receive feedback - the main game should be substantially complete. Post current state to dropbox.
• Wednesday 4/15 start of class (middle of week 11) - All done!

Requirements, as before ...

... and be sure to read over the Project 1 comments - because most of you are leveraging a game framework this time, I have higher expectations especially in the depth and fun categories ...

1. Easy to learn and approachable
2. Simple Controls
3. Short bursts of play - 3 to 5 minutes or so
4. Sound - both effect and background
5. Good Onboarding
6. Good Usability
7. High Score Board
8. Depth - more than one way to reach the goal
9. Differentiate from our Boomshine clone and Bubbles ICE - change the sounds, change the screens, change the fonts - I shouldn't look at the prototype and see Bubbles written all over it.
10. Fun to play, and doesn't have a steep difficulty curve.
11. If it's a mobile game:
    • It should work well on a wide variety of mobile devices, and on desktop PCs.
    • Keep the game controls very simple - virtual game controls that emulate joysticks and D-Pads are problematic.
    • Consider adding user feedback that helps mobile users, like the way that the Bubbles ICE drew a circle where ever the user tapped.
    • Test it on an actual mobile device:
      • If there are any buttons or controls, make sure that they are not too close to the edge of the screen, that their hit area is large enough, and that the text is readable.
      • Fonts should be large enough, and colors should have sufficient contrast in common use cases:
        1. Outside on a bright day.
        2. Held in one hand under a table during a meeting.
        3. Sitting flat on a desk under florescent lights during a lecture.
    • It's OK if the background sound doesn't work on the mobile version of the game, but there should be both background and effect sound on the desktop version. If you want to get background sound working on mobile (especially iOS), you'll probably have to use a library or the WebAudio API directly - see this article.