Getting together for developing a Game?


ekianjo

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A very innocent question. Most of people here seem to be working independently on their own projects, and while that's great for learning and developing your own skills, more "polished" or "advanced" projects would benefit from a small team.


Is anyone around interested to get together (or at least consider it) to work on a common project ?


A couple of great coders, one artist and one game designer would be a kind of core minimum to look at.
 
Im certanly interested, it depends on the game idea and what would be needed help with, since my coding skills aint on same level as the other game makers here. But I feel fairly confident in rendering tech and could perhaps supply a sprite or two for a 2D game.
 
Good luck, you will need it (judging from every community project I have participated in or witnessed).
 
I can do music.


I opened a thread about an open source game coding competition, but i can find it !!!


---EDIT: Found it:
 
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Thanks for all your answers. This is good to know some people are interested. Next thing would be to define/choose a project which appeals to all working on it. I'll come back with a few propositions.
 
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Since this is the first project for the team, I'd suggest something that:

  1. Can be finished in short-ish time

  2. Has a minimal implementation that doesn't require tons of anything (code, graphics, music, sfx, and especially levels)

  3. Has loose coupling between the pieces (code can be tested without graphics and sound, test levels easy to make)

  4. Can be augmented and polished till the cows come home after the minimal implementation is working


Because of the nature of emergent community projects like this, people tend to come and go. The project should take this into consideration and be able to deliver something and continue no matter who calls it quits.


A horizontal shmup Linux-SWAT suggested is not a bad idea. The basic game code is simple, features (new weapons, level functionality, enemy behavior, control tuning) can be added asynchronously to other tasks, graphics can be replaced with hit box indicators until they get finished one by one, level design is relatively simple (unless you do something like Life Force with mutating levels). More levels can be added as you go.


First make the most basic shmup you can (one weapon, one enemy type with one behavior, one level). Use lowish resolution simple sprite sheet graphics for the first version (can be replaced later with more polished ones) to not make the graphics guy too hard to replace in case s/he has to quit for some reason.


The best community game is the one that gets finished.
 
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I currently have lots of graphics (textures, sprites) and drawn for an artillery game, also a baseline of code being written by a friend


Would it make sense to attempt to re-use any of that here?


Having said that, this is supposed to be a community thing, and nobody wants to work on a project that doesn't interest them.
 
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i can just agree on what b-zar said.


Just try follow the KISS principle


If it starts taking too long, every now and then someone will loose focus or interest. So head for something "short" or fast to get up and running. Try to use as much third party libraries as possible. Don't roll your own solutions - spend a day or two researching if somebody already made what you want :)


What really helped me developing Audiorace and PaperWars was going multiplatform. First it is a bit annoying, but in the end it's really nice to be able to build and especially DEBUG your game with the tools you're used to (visual studio i'm looking at you;))


*edit*


if i might suggest a genre ... a super mario style platformer .... i've always wanted to create one by myself ... :)
 
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  • we should avoid duplicating something else - if you want a mario-style platformer, theres one right here
  • the game should work with a minimum of features, and have room for more later
  • some element of players being able to modify the world can make the game interesting, but can make development very complicated


And here's a proposal:


Write a game somewhat like snake but with more complex graphics, and more interesting gameplay.


have animals which can move instead of dots, maybe have permanent obstacles? gravity? maybe the animals you collected scatter rather than you ding when you cross your path? scrolling rather than just a single screenfull?
 
Also, the result must fit on a micro-SD.


There's absolutely no killer shoot them up (like thunder force, aero blasters, pulstar...) in the free software world.


Also, it's a bit abandoned with the new hype overpowered consoles, we are just seeing re-edition packs and so on.


I started a project with students some time ago, and have some unseen ideas, a basic scenario, and a mission one music.
 
I love aero blasters, I'd love to see something in that kin, one thing that keeps a game constantly fresh I find is unlockables, so seldom used these days (not the sense of XP giving you new perks, more, doing well unlocks a new ship or something).
 
Something that made full use of the Pandora's controls would make sense...


...but might tend to be too complicated


<thinks>


----


EDIT:


<has idea>


You control a submarine, and your task is to destroy various enemy objects/vehicles


As you achieve certain goals you are rewarded with either:

  • new/better weapons
  • a upgraded onboard computer


The player would be able to write an increasingly complex program to automate functions on board the sub, but this would be severely limited by imaginary specs of the virtual computer


To start with, your opponents would be weak and few - and you would control all functions of your submarine with dpad, nubs, shoulder buttons, ABYX buttons


you would gradually gain enough memory/performance* to automate functions in your sub, and even redirect some of the controls as inputs to your program


As the opponents became stronger/more aggressive, you would need a combination of good reactions and good programming, allowing yourself to concentrate on the more tricky operations.


as an endgame, you would have to abandon your craft and let the AI written over the course of the game fight the last battle itself


* a simple way of doing this would be to limit the lines available to write code in, as long as the interpreted language used required white-space formatting


Some good things about this would be:

  1. It appeals to the instinctive hackers :)
  2. most of the interesting gameplay would be provided by the player, not the developers
  3. there are plenty of interpreted languages we could use
  4. it combines action with puzzle
  5. it could start of as a pretty simple shooter, and more automation commands could be added over time
  6. people like games where they can apply their own style to the game environment - sandboxes etc
 
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Something that made full use of the Pandora's controls would make sense...
So a full on flight-sim it is ;) :p


BTW I might be interested in this project :)
 
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