#54847 - Touchstone - Fri Sep 23, 2005 12:52 am
I think it's an interesting idea!
I don't see how this can be any scarier than Devil May Cry though (I haven't played alot of DMC but enough to realize that it's not very scary :). It seemt to me that the monsters in your game could be any kind of .. wall, basically, where the rule of the game is that if you hit a wall you lose and have to start over from a given point.
To me your game seems like a Crash Bandicoot-style fixed camera point of view "platformer", because the objective of the game is to manouver the hero through holes in the level, and the main difficulty of the game is to learn that some holes in the level might move as you approach them.
If that is the main objective then I think you could find a lot of inspiration from shoot'em'ups, where you basically learn the layout of a level aswell as how the different enemies attack, while learning to manouver your space ship. Therefore I'm thinking it might be usefull if the hero have a couple of moves the player can learn to ease his way through the levels. Even if the game is completely linear, thus making it uneccessary to "unlock" areas via the new moves, it would still give the player a sense of accomplishment to figure out a new move, and use it from the beginning the next time he start a new game to be completely superior to the easier enemies. Power ups could be used as well, like maybe ... uh ... ignited hairspray that makes a mini flamethrower, that you can use for a number of times to fend of some monsters.
Have you considered if the placement of monsters in the levels should be static or randomized. I.e. should the player learn to manouver through each level or learn to manouver past a certain enemy type.
In a game where the main objective is to avoid getting hit by enemies I think your best source of inspiration is shoot'em'ups.
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