Project Have Fun: The Research

I realised I didn't post this yet. Of course I have some otherwise how would I know which flowers to use and what colours to stick on them! Also the enemies of course needed researching!!

To start I'll do the flowers. I just found a bunch of different flower types based on shape and color and also I gave a little thought to how I could actually use them as a tool. You can see here initial ideas I had for certain flower. The pansy I sketched was an old fart who was always grumpy but I thought he could have the hidden talent of strength and he could move things around in the levels. You also see a tiger lily there but the one I designed as the cutter was a purple and white flower but I seemed to have lost that picture reference. There was a lotus there as well. I didn't have an initial skill for it as it was just really a sketch based off what I was looking at and trying to fashion it into a living creature with eyes and such. The white lily there was the swimmer. I probably could have done a water lilly but that would require it to stay in the water and I wanted all the characters you use to be seen in the opening. The flower I based The Queen off. The night queen as it's known. I just loved how the pink just wrapped around the white flower when it was closed. I thought it would make the perfect shape for a detailing crown kind of thing. I didn't do the open one because I thought that would be better used when she died during the level or something and you'd just see all the petals carried away in the wind. The pink flower in the bottom left was my flyer flower. I loved how the petals just merged in the centre and it reminded me of a propeller so that's how I used it.The bottom right is the jumper flower. I thought this would definitely fit a spring idea with the way it's shaped and the colours were beautiful so I wanted to use it. You see the sunflowers there as well which I just used as the nursers.

Now we have the vegetation. This is what I'm referencing for the background of the levels and in the storyboards. Just to make it seem fuller and not open and plain so they look like they're in this planet of lush green plants. 

The enemies were based on the borrowers. The new studio ghibli movie helped a lot to determine the size of the enemies to the plants and the flowers themselves. The borrowers movie back in the 90s didn't give me any of that sadly but it gave me an idea for the way they would look crossed with the beetles they would have slain.

This was a couple of beetle pictures I took for the shape reference and colours. I thought they would really need a way to blend in if they were getting away with killing the flowers so what better way then to disguise as a beetle!

Project Have Fun: Flower moves!

Some sketches sort of detailing the kind of thing you would expect each of the flower minions to do. So we have a quick idea for a stage start screen. Basically this will happen each stage, you'll see the kids running off one side of the screen and The Queen appearing on the opposite side.  The next panel is a little quick idea of what you might see at the start of a level. You pick up various minions on the way that will indicate you have to use them soon. You don't have a stock of these guys you use them once and they disappear but you get them again if they're needed again. So we see you start with a jumper and above you see a cutter. 

So you use the jumper to launch yourself higher in the level and then you meet the cutter. Some areas you have to be careful where you stand as the plant could change angle and you could fall!

We have the swimmer where The Queen is casually ordering him where to swim. These guys have a timer on how long they can swim for as they weight of The Queen can make them sink over time. I didn't draw accurately how she would sit on it but generally she'd be sitting further up using the lip of the flower as a sort of edge to lean forward and keeping herself steady.

We then have the cutter demonstrating those lovely tendrils aren't there for no reason. He cuts down shrubs, weeds and things blocking your path so you can move forward. The things you need to cut won't always be on the ground.

A couple of storyboard pieces. The first is a flower moving through the vegetation around him just minding his own business. The second panel are some nursers who plant and look after baby flowers. You don't play as them but all flowers have a role I guess!

For the first panel in this set we have The Queen being unenthusiastic about her duties and not really listening to her servant/advisor telling her about the dangers outside their little shrub village.

The second panel is seeing the massive shadow that freezes them in place. This would be part of the opening scenes to the story. 

I have some more storyboarding I'm doing to go through the opening and creating a stage that I'll sketch out in the panels like this.

Project Have Fun: The Characters

So the idea is that you are The Queen Flower and you have a bunch of minions to help you get through the levels. I already posted the sketches and here are the updated, more detailed drawings for them with information about the things they do in the game.

This is the cutter minion. This flower also appears as a servant to The Queen so I put it in a pose that signified that's it's respectful and frightened of The Queen like you see most servants in animated movies look. The idea of this minion is that you would use it to cut plants out of the way that are blocking the rest of the level as well as cutting the areas leading to bosses.

This is the flyer flower. The way the petals are placed are sort of like a propeller. so the idea here is that The Queen would use him to fly over areas that would be dangerous to her like deep water or pit holes. I wanted this flower to be worried or have a fear of carrying others when flying.

This is the jumper flower. The Queen would stand on it's head and depending on how long you hold down a button or whatever the further you would jump but it would have a limit of course otherwise there would be no point for a flyer flower. The face is split in half because I thought a split personality or something would be kind of a cool idea. Happy when no one is standing on it's head and angry when someone does stand on it's head. 

This is the swimmer flower. I chose this flower because I thought it was a nice little boat shape and although The Queen would barely fit in this flower head itself I thought the flower could lay flat and back stroke through the water so she sits comfortably on top. A limit would be used on the swimmer. Eventually it would sink because of the weight.

Last but not least is The Queen. She wouldn't have any special abilities as she uses everyone around her anyway regardless of her mission to save her flower people. I tried to go for a figure as well as a sort of sassy and almost bored look. She's based off the night queen flower so I made her a more mono colour so she'd stand out from everyone else's colours. She's much taller than her minions as well. 

First of the enemies that you will see running away constantly is the cutter. He uses the pincers from a beetle to cut the heads off flowers so they can steal what they need. He's fast and cool-headed. The leader of the 3 man group. He wears the rest of the beetle as a shield and also to blend in better.

This is the fighter. The kid that kills the flowers so and protects the other two kids. Same idea, uses the beetles horn as a weapon and the rest as armour and also as a camouflage. This kid is very hot headed and angry all the time so he's perfect for attacking.

This is the gather. She waits until everyone is done and collects the petals to take back with her. She uses part of the beetles armour as a bowl to carry them in and the rest as armour. She's paranoid and wary of her surroundings. 

The leader of the kids is this guy here. He'll be known as boss as even the kids call him boss. He doesn't have colourful clothes like the kids as he just wants the kids to be able to have nice things which is why they steal the ink from the flowers to dye their clothes. He uses a brighter beetle's armour as decoration to show off what he killed with his bare hands. He'll use the kids in battle to fight for him and when they are defeated he'll gather the items the kids have and use them against you as a final fight. 

Project Have Fun: The Story

It's not a particularly long story and it's certainly probably not a quirky one but it's one that I think is a little bit more interesting and colourful then most ideas.

You see this beautiful place covered in the lush green plants and beautiful flowers skip along the area being oddly humanistic. All of a sudden this towering shadow cascades over the area and everyone panics! The stand absolutely still and just stare up at this giant shadow obscured by the blinding sun. As it dissappears the flowers begin to settle in comfort again but then a horrifying scream is heard. A few thick bushes away you see a dead crushed plant. It's head has been torn off and the only the body and roots remain. It's the third attack this week. The Queen flower appears almost out of thin air and plants her foot deep in the earth and lets out an almost unending roar as she proclaims that she will find the creatures that are terrorising her home and fellow flowers. A few of her advisors's insist on giving her aid and she begrudgingly accepts.

She begins her journey at the latest murder and notices some ink spots that lead deep into the lush green environment. This leads into the many stage areas where you will need your flower aids to help you jump, swim, fly and cut your way through these areas and ultimately help you defeat the unknown enemy that terrorises The Queen's home.

As you reach the end and you find out who the enemy is and why they've been murdering these flowers you find out more than what you wanted to know. A sort of twist if you will that I will probably draw up a little picture of.

As I said it's not the longest but I thought it was quite the fun idea.

Project Have Fun Idea

So I've really kind of had this idea in my head for some time but it had a different story to it. I wanted to make a game that was surrounded in plant life or something that's very earthy. I don't want to go pikmin, I want to be more adventurous with the flowers I pick so I've come up with a side scroller that would be for any platform and phone game. It would be 2D and be based around this idea of plants being killed for their ink. The queen flower decides it's her duty to defend her flower kin and fights this enemy which you later learn are humans but like the borrower size to match the plants. Each type of flower will have a unique move and the queen herself will be a brawler. A real fighting woman...plant! I have a few ideas already for the plants and the queen herself. I wanted to make sure she would stand out from the rest of the flowers so she's actually referenced off a flower called  the night queen.

So we have a few minion ideas. A couple of grumpy ones, a couple of thinkers and servants. The larger one is the queen idea I have. I'll work on some colour ones to give them more detail.

Project Have Fun

So I've been asked to create an environment and a set of characters to go with it based on all the things we've learned over the past few weeks. I have no limit in the idea as long as it fits to a genre and platform. This does sound fun and hopefully I can come up with something different and fun to do!

I have some rules to make that I need to set myself to follow when making this creation of mine. It can be one or it could be ten. It's up to me based on what I think is important boundaries when creating an environment and characters.

Concerning environment rules, I have made four rules.
1. Use the environment to signal an event or item that will be coming up or is there.
2. Use the environment to guide the player through. Using props or stairs to use as directional tools.
3. The environment should show signs of the back story.
4. Don't add things that will detach the player. For example add a scene in a fight that you can't do physically in the game.

Concerning characters I've made three rules.
1. Silhouette should show unique character.
2. Less is more. Don't go overboard with detail.
3. Make sure they fit in the environment they are being created for.

So now I'm going to start thinking of an idea. I have some in mind but we'll see how that leads when I start doing some concept art.

My changed view when playing games

It's a littler frustrating actually cus I can't seem to just enjoy a game but every time I play something all I do is look at the textures, the lighting and tsk at any seams I find. WHAT'S HAPPENED TO ME.

It's kind of a good thing but it's annoying that I just can't enjoy 5 minutes without thinking about what's right. I suppose it's changed the way I see how games are textured and stylised these days. I get really pissed off when I see a pretty female warrior when they should be just as scared and battered as a male warrior!! Get rid of them scant clothes and get some proper armour god damn it!! Cute little people with big eyes is cool but realistically those eyes would be very hard to see out of and where would the brain go man...

I suppose it's a good thing because it helps me to think of a more realistic approach to things but as I know myself pretty well, I think it'd also be a bad thing. I'd probably over think it and it'd turn boring. I am boring aren't I? Sigh.