next »

[Jake Riley]

So I’m making a game based on the video game crash of 1983. It's not just that though. My game is a story-driven 2D platformer that’s a homage to the Atari 2600. It takes place within a poorly made Atari 2600 game in a Wreck-It-Ralph-style world where video game characters are alive, during the 1983 video game crash. The project is called “Randy’s Crazy Mission!”, which is also the title of the Atari game it's set in. The game was made by a fictional sucker company to tie-in with their brand’s cartoon commercials. Think something like that old Tootsie Pop ad. It’s like how Coke and other brands made tie-in games for the Atari.

Aesthetic


Despite taking place in a 2600 game, this project won’t look like one. Considering this game has a lot of dialogue and humor, and considering my background in hand-drawing, I didn't want it to have the very basic visual style of the 2600. I decided to give it a 70s animation art style instead, since the game within this game is based on 70s cartoon commercials. That’s how the characters actually perceive their world. Sources of influence include the classic cartoon Tootsie Pop commercial, Schoolhouse Rock!, and The Point! (not sure how many of you’d know about that last one). There'll even be a filter to make the 70s-style animation look older and more authentic. The 70s cartoon style fits the time period of the Atari 2600 well.


The presentation will still have elements of the signature pixelated 2600 look however. The HUD and text will look like they came straight from an old Atari game, some sound effects will use the Atari 2600 sound, and the characters' Atari sprites (what they actually look like on TV screens) will come up in certain places. Dialogue prompts will use NPCs' Atari sprites. Randy's 2600 sprite will appear on the grey HUD bar on the top of the screen when players can interact with something. And, the very beginning of the game will look like an actual Atari 2600 title, before flashing to the 70s cartoon style seconds later to highlight the contrast. The 70s cartoon style and retro Atari look both come together to create an interesting blend of aesthetics.



Story Synopsis


Randy, the player character of both this project and his in-universe game, is the mascot of the brand that created him and his advergame. He's a living mushroom. There's a conflict that's happening while his game is on the shelf in yet another disappointed buyer's home. Yeah, the game was returned to the store repeatedly. Randy wants to solve the conflict to gain appreciation from his family. The times he's been controlled by someone in the real world accomplishing a fake, programmed plot don't count as something Randy meaningfully did. Also, bringing the video game crash of 1983 into this, the characters who live in the game within this game are aware of the video game industry and the then-current 1983 crash, and that factors into the story. I'm not revealing how just yet though.



Gameplay

Moving on to the gameplay, the game within this game is poorly made, as I said earlier. When players boot this game up for the first time, they get exactly what the game is in-universe. Though, it's using the 70s cartoon art style, just as the story is. It starts out purposefully frustrating and shoddy, what lots of people associate with games around the time of the crash. If you can tolerate beating the six levels, the real game will begin. It's actual story will start after the game's put on the shelf by disappointed customer number whatever.  


The interesting thing is that, during the story, you replay all six levels (with a few more courses thrown in), but they'll be better. Stuff will be added to the levels to improve them, and alleviations to the previously frustrating gameplay will take some edge off. On top of that, story cutscenes will take place in them, you can talk to NPCs (who just stand there in the in-universe game), there'll be new NPCs, and there'll be actual music playing in the stages. There'll even be moments to take advantage of the game's shoddiness, and there'll also be gameplay nods to classic games of it's time period. There will be a couple of creative liberties when it comes to it actually being on the 2600, but not too much.



Closing Words

I will admit, this is a pretty strange concept for a game. I'm not sure what peoples' reactions to it will be. Honestly, I've been very, very, very nervous about putting myself and my game out there. Along with this DevLog, I also made a blog that'll discuss Randy's Crazy Mission! in detail. I made the blog to help me get more consistent with the project's development. I'll spruce up how the site looks some later on.


I'm starting this DevLog while the game's not quite in active development yet. Though, I'm changing that. Like I said, I made my website to help me make the game at a more consistent pace. I get more into where the game's currently at in development in my blog. This DevLog's first post is the abridged version of my own website's first post. I talk about things not mentioned in this post over there, so you should still go read it.



I'll try to post a good bit of stuff here, but I'll mostly post on my own site.


Here's the link to my blog about the game: https://jakerileygamedevblog.com/


Here's a few of the characters' Atari sprites I made. I'll post more of the game's art later, so this is just a taste of what you'll see.




Feel free to ask questions if you're at all interested! Some of them might not get answers though.

[JobLeonard]

I am so down for this

[Ofihombre]

By the concept, the atari 2600 style and it's also called Randy, it occurs me the idea of putting an easter egg with my Randy character (from Randy & Manilla), with a scene of "Randy meets Randy".

And this is the sprite style if i was in the game.



Which sprite would you choose? The small one or the big one with Manilla?

[JobLeonard]

I like both, so I think it depends more on how the rest of the game looks and what it would look like in context

[Jake Riley]

The larger sprites better fit the style of the Atari sprites I made, especially for the human characters. I’ll try to come up with some way to use your sprites somewhere.


As for what I was going to share today, here is a screenshot of me about to test out (my) Randy’s movement and jump for the millionth time in a very, very unfinished level.  





Yes, I censored him for this, as I’m going to reveal what he looks like later on. I was gonna make a video demonstrating his movement, but then I found out my screen recorder is busted. My computer is a real piece of trash sometimes. Anyway, I fell that his jump is pretty floaty, and he seems to randomly stop despite my input. I barely know how to code, so I’m going to get other people to do most of the programming later down the road. Wow, that sentence unintentionally rhymed. Anyway, I’ll get someone to clean up Randy’s movement script that I made. It should be more rigid, to make it feel more in-line with the Atari 2600.



Perhaps I could record weird bugs and oddities during the development of the demo, and if there's a good chunk of them, and if they’re amusing enough, I could make a video showcasing them for my website after the demo is released. Y’know, certain idiots who live in Randy’s game would use flaws like that and the then-current crash of 1983 to… Eh, I’ll get that off my chest later, trust me. Trust. Me. Took a toll on Randy’s mental health.

[JobLeonard]

Sharing funny bugs is always welcome! 

[Jake Riley]

Here is the game's logo.





That logo is different than my original vision of it. I was originally going to have the words arranged like this:






After looking at this original version, I felt it looked unbalanced, so I rearranged it. I don't know if that was just me, so let me know if you actually prefer the original one I wanted to scrap.



Also, check this out!




And, uh, here's this...


“Y’AAAAAAALL DONE GETTIN’ YERSELVES PREPAAAAAAARED!?!?!?!?”

[JobLeonard]

Those sprites look a little demented, which fits the theme and title I guess

[Jake Riley]

Those sprites look a little demented, which fits the theme and title I guess

Are you talking about the first picture, or the second picture, or both?

[JobLeonard]

Bit of both

[Jake Riley]

Randy himself is far from demented, trust me. Though, there are a few characters who I'd certainly describe as demented. I am a disturbed person, and so I'm channeling that into this game.

[Jake Riley]

I'm currently in the process of making some mockups of what the gameplay will look like. The game isn't yet in the state to where I can take screenshots that'll represent the final product. I'll showcase the mockups and art of Randy in a blog post. Right when I post that, I'll do the same on this DevLog, except I'll just show one of the mockups here. After that, I'll fully get the ball rolling on my website. Hopefully, the project will get enough attention at some point, and after that point I'll make a blog post requesting reputable programmers and bug fixers to work on the vast majority of the technical side of things for this game. They should also clean up the very little programming I've actually done so far. I'm not very good at coding.



The mockups and Randy reveal will arrive soon-ish. Maybe in a couple weeks, or maybe even next week at the very earliest.

[Jake Riley]

Well, I've been refraining from showing what Randy looks like for a while, but now I can finally reveal him. I had just posted some mockups of what this game will look like in a blog post, along with posting this art of Randy:





I didn't post this next picture on my website, but I particularly like the way he looks when he's ducking.





Also, there's going to be a ton of different over-the-top faces he makes when getting hit, each one being randomly selected every time.



Y'know, I originally created Randy for another game idea I had brewing in my mind until I started thinking of Randy's Crazy Mission!, to which I then scrapped the old idea. He wasn't going to be the main character in that game, but he was still fairly important. He was also going to look a little different. I may or may not talk further on that old idea in the future. There's a reason why I scrapped it after all. I liked the Randy's Crazy Mission! concept more. I decided to reuse a few things from the old idea for use in this game though.



Anyway, here's one of the mockups I made:





Now, this may look like standard 2D game, well, uh, gameplay, but I'm planning for the cutscenes to be quite dynamic. There'll be zoom-ins, close-up shots, cutaways, and all that fancy stuff. It'll almost be like you're watching an actual cartoon. Fitting, considering that the game within this game is based on cartoons.



The other mockups are on my website. Here's the link to my new blog post where they're at: https://jakerileygamedevblog.com/2023/04/24/first-look-of-my-new-indie-game/

[vdapps]

Theme is brutal. I appreciate Atari 2600 and vode game crash involvement. This was beginning of gaming at homes (before that, there were just Arcade machines and sort of Pong on TV (Magnavox Odyssey)).

Game has potential to bring also sort of "education", if you'll also somehow explain what was happening in those times to current player. As lot of younger (< 40 years) players don't have idea about late 70's and early 80's and revolution of computers / video consoles at those times, let alone about games market saturation and 1983 crash.

[JobLeonard]

I really like the visual design of your mock-ups! The style reminds me of a couple of old animation movies from my childhood, although they're from a bit later than the Atari 2600:









Is that an intentional visual reference or just coincidence?

[Jake Riley]

It’s unintentional. Since this is about a game based on old cartoon candy ads, I wanted to capture the amateur-ish look of that old Tootsie Pop commercial. That combined with the fact that the game’s art style is also like a mix of a bunch of other different styles, most of which came later than the time period it’s set in, I guess it just came together to look like that. The resemblance is striking though.

[Jake Riley]

Since I recently revealed what this game will look like, I might as well showcase some more art right now.


Here are some of the Schoolhouse Rock!-style onomatopoeia and the like which will appear all over this game:






Just one of the many, many, many different faces Randy will make when taking damage.






This is Mr. Racoon.


 


This is Clay, an NPC who appears in the first level.






"This little game of mine is pretty flashy. Watch this!"






This is Barry. Try to guess what he is.






...No comment...







Also, I'm soon going to release a post on my website talking about this game's soundtrack and who's composing it. When you play the six levels of the in-universe Atari 2600 game this story's set in, there will be no music playing. But, after you beat that and the real game begins, music will play in the previously-silent levels when replaying them. Work has already been done on the songs. I'm debating whether or not to share songs early on. If I do, they'll be temp tracks.

[Jake Riley]

https://itch.io/t/2836145/randys-crazy-missiona-70s-inspired-game-based-on-the-1983-video-game-crash

[JobLeonard]

Nice! Started following you on itch.io too (I assume it's good for whatever algorithm Itch uses if you have more followers, right?)

[Jake Riley]

Did bad games cause the video game crash? Did home computers cause it? Did non-video game brands "cashing off of" the industry cause it? No, not really. There are actually myths about the 1983 video game crash that a lot of people think are true. Something I neglected to mention is that Randy's Crazy Mission! actually addresses these myths in the story. People who live in the game are aware of the industry and the then-current crash, and most of them (Randy's family included) believe these myths. So, given the gratuitous ubiquity of word about the crash in Randy's game world, people in the game dish out this misinformation left right and center.



What the story especially focuses on is how certain sick dolts in the game use this misinformation to their advantage, and how Randy's mind has been affected by the 1983 crash because of said dolts. The myths had dumbed-down some of the people who live in the game. I've actually got a lot to talk about on this aspect of the story. But, I'm saving that for a loooong blog post on my website. You're not ready for it, nor will you ever be. This game's going to be like no other.



Here's another thing. Earlier I said that I'm soon going to post on my website about this game's soundtrack and who's composing it. Well, it, along with a character-related post that will come before it, has been slightly pushed back. This is because recently, after getting an idea, I started planning to work on *something* related to this game. Not a blog post or anything, but something that might help get the project some more exposure. Hopefully that'll come within two months. By the way, regarding the soundtrack, the composer happens to have my name.



To close this post off, here's this bit:






"H̴͖̭͉̗̬̖̑̂̉͂̕ͅe̶̤̬̬̰̹̥̺͂͛̀̾̈́͌̿͋́̓ĺ̷̖̟͌̒͗̊͆͗́̓l̴̢̛̪̗̀̾̂̍̓́͒̐̚o̸͍̪̖̫̯̽̓͐̎͂́̚͝.̴̥̞̬͔̤̎̍͜͝ ̸̼̟͉̥͍̠͕̄̏̂̍̓́M̵̩͙͕̖͔̤̔̓͜ẏ̷͈̫͚̤̰̺͇̀̊͆̄̌̏̎͆̚ ̴̨̩̞͙̹͖̱͋n̵̖͍̩͑͗͘a̸̛͇̖̩̤̼̟̲̝̫͂͌̓̒̈͒m̶͇̮̙̹͂̑̍̀̉̈̚ȩ̶̨͖̜͇͓̠̍͆͘ ̸̨̮̟̳̪͖͍̱̩̬̉́̒̈̉̋͂͂͘i̴̪͇͓̳̍̉͛s̷̱͎͖̳̆̓̈́͝ ̴̜͇̗̫̠̽̈̑̚R̸̡͉̱͗́o̴̧̻̥̐̎́͗̒̋̐͜b̴̨̛̳̺̹̯̽̈́ͅe̵̡̱͕͉̘͖̝͕̥̿͗̆̈̋͜r̴̤̙̻͙̺̣͕͙̼͂̓ț̵͈͈͓̳̫̙̦͈͗͐̈͑̃̑̚͘͜.̸̹̭̟̝̞̼̮͉̄̅ͅ"



"Uh, can you speak up man? It's kinda hard to tell what you're saying."



"Ah don't care if we can't hear him, feller! Ah just like his face! With them blue, white, yella, black, OOOOH, RED, excetera! 'TS DONE GOOOOTTEN MEEEEE EXCIIIIIIIITED FOOOOR-