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[Anabru]

Hello TIGSauce:

Since I'm still a big man-baby, a quick intro: I'm a hobbyist game designer with a pretty strong technical/programming background.  Been lurking in TIGForums for a while, and this place is really just a joy to visit.  Hoping to spark some of that maniac creativity that seems to strike up in pockets 'round these parts.

I was playing around with physics and gameplay prototypes the other day and I got some stuff that feels like it has potential, and I thought it would be cool to see what OTHER people thought.

There are two balls with a spring between them.  When the spring gets stretched more, it pulls harder.  The player, with the mouse, moves one of the balls that stays fixed wherever the mouse goes, and the other ball is pulled around by the "spring", represented in the prototype as a yellow line. 

Interacting with this little toy is actually pretty engaging, and changing the physics constants in the world result in some pretty interesting variation, so I wired the physics constants to the mouse buttons and made them player-controlled.

Please, if you have a minute, check this out.  Play with the values and how it feels to guide the big ball around with different spring constants and frictional coefficients.  Then, let's have a nice thread about what can be done to take this VERY EARLY programmery prototype toward a real game.

If anything neat gets suggested, I'll implement it (or iterate toward it) and repost for more feedback.

Windows only, I'm afraid. . .
Screenshot:

Download Windows Build: http://www.vudle.com/spring_proto.rar (2.35MB)
unpack archive and run 'test.exe'

Thanks!

EDIT: Added introduction.

[Kamos]

Hi Anabru,

I'm not sure what you expect as feedback, but since you have a simulation of a mass-spring system and not a game, I'll give you an idea.

After playing with your demo for a minute, I thought changing the spring "constant" led to unpredictable results. On the other handing, setting the constant to 10 and adjusting the friction from 0.2 to 1 made it look like a morningstar (that spiked ball and chain weapon, I think morningstar is the name in english) handled by Conan and a morningstar handled by a weakling, respectively.

So I thought... you could have a game where the big ball (the one you don't control with the mouse) is a weapon, and the small one (the one you control with the mouse) is a character / spaceship /something that needs to dodge enemies. I don't know if it has been done before, but it should be something playable.  :D

(No, I don't have the slightest idea what I'm talking about.) 

[Anabru]

Hi Kamos,

Thanks for the feedback!  I know this is nowhere near a game yet; I appreciate you bearing with me.  I was thinking along similar lines with regard to how to make this playable. 

Here's another iteration of the test program.  I put goals (green blobs) in to try to hit with the red ball, and the yellow ball cannot leave a rectangle in one corner of the screen.  I dialed in some physics constants that felt good to me, but I left the control to change them in.  No scoring or anything, but I was able to pretend I was playing a game, which was hard to do yesterday.

I wanna try other stuff to help this evolve, so keep the input coming, please.  I'll post any other prototypes I do in case they spark a brainstorm.

New Screenshot:

New (05/15) Windows build: http://www.vudle.com/spring_proto0515.rar (2.35MB)

[Kamos]

Ah, that looks a bit more like a game, indeed. 

Pretty obvious idea, but you could add some obstacles. Also, if you add obstacles, the spring could get entangled... though maybe that is adding too much complexity unnecessarily. There might be better ideas that don't require you to change that simulation.

[Anabru]

I liked the idea of obstacles.  I played with this a little earlier tonight.  Making the spring articulated or doing some kind of rope-sim would be cool, but I don't wanna get that deep right now.  Might try it later though.

Here's my new obstacle-including build.  The green targets are now randomly dispersed.  There are also hazards (obstacles?) which, if the red ball hits them, will penalize the player.  I wasn't sure how to penalize so I implemented the first two thoughts I had. 

Pressing the 'm' key will switch between penalty modes.  Either another target will spawn or the spring constant will be raised, making the red ball harder to control, by degrees. 

I prefer the target-spawning method because it builds the penalty right into the mechanic.

If I have time to work on this tomorrow, I'm gonna try to make more of a brawler (morningstar!) like you suggested earlier.  Can't think of a third thing to do, so I'm all-ears for ideas.  It'd be cool to have three prototypes before making any more high-level decisions.

Thanks for the additional feedback, btw!

New (05/16) screenshot:

Windows Build Link: http://www.vudle.com/spring_proto0516.rar

Anabru

[Kamos]

I too think that the default mode is better. It sure is challenging, especially when the obstacles spawn next to the black box. Perhaps you should place the black box in a more central position, the constraint doesn't allow you to throw the red ball all the way to the other side of the screen... also, if there was a way to "catch" the red ball as it is coming back, I don't know, something like pressing the left mouse button while the yellow ball and red ball are touching applies an insta-break... that way you could also keep the red ball glued to the yellow ball to throw it away with a bit more of finesse. 

[Anabru]

"catching" is an interesting idea.  I was thinking about something like that where it could spike friction for a second and basically stop everything.  Thanks for the continued feedback. 

I went ahead and made a brawler-style one. It has controls for enemy spawn rate "+/-".  The red ball will kill the pink balls, but you die if the pink balls get you.  If the red ball is too close, it turns yellow and won't kill anyone.

New Screenshot:

New Build: http://www.vudle.com/pring_proto0516a.rar (2.35MB)

BTW, Anyone else have any thoughts?

EDIT: Fixed link. . . thanks for heads-up Kamos

[Kamos]

Hey Anabru, looks like the link is broken.

[Kamos]

I have downloaded the new version... the brawler mode has turned out pretty well.