Design Development

Using the ideas from my initial ideas, I have started to create the contents of my game, by starting to draw them.

Weapons
For my weapon I think I will include a ring around it that will change colour depending which power up is equipped to it. I also think that looking at weapons from theme park rides will also help me to think of a design for my initial weapon.

 

Weapons from theme park rides
http://www.birminghammail.net/birmingham-videos-pictures/birmingham-picture-galleries/2009/10/20/scarefest-09-at-alton-towers-resort-97319-24973122/
http://liveyourtraveldreams.blogspot.com/2010/10/buzz-lightyears-space-ranger-spin.html




General Electric Minigun (Predator)
http://10dots.wordpress.com/2008/09/23/10-top-weapons-from-sci-fi/

Surprisingly, my favourite of these weapons has to be the one the zombie statue is holding outside of Duel. I like how, despite the slightly old fashioned and scary theming, they have managed to create a very modern weapon. I also like the red lights on the weapon, and I also think that black and red go really well together, and is something I should consider when creating my weapon. I think the General electric Minigun also features some good and creative ideas as well.

Power Ups
These will all have different effects depending on what colour the Power Star in my game is. These will all have different effects, and the ideas from these effects have mainly come from games that I have played myself, not necessarily shooting games, but games such as Mario Kart as well. I have also used the Sniper idea I got from the internet game Urban Sniper 2 and Sniper Assassin 5 from my research to create a power up.

Ideas/Inspirations for some of these Power Ups:

Green: Cracker Launcher (Super Smash Bros. Brawl, Nintendo Wii)
 

http://www.smashbros.com/en_uk/items/item02.html

Pink: Sniper Assassin 5 and Urban Sniper 2

 
http://www.freeonlinegames.com/game/urban-sniper-2.html
http://www.addictinggames.com/shooting-games/sniper-assassin-5-final-mission-game.jsp

Yellow: Link's Crossbow Training (Nintendo Wii)
 
http://www.nintendo.co.uk/NOE/en_GB/games/wii/links_crossbow_training_9082.html
http://uk.wii.ign.com/articles/836/836867p1.html

Purple: Red Shell (Mario Kart series)

http://www.nintendojo.com/features/specials/the-best-and-worst-mario-kart-items

Initial Drawings for Power Ups and Weapons

I thought that, using some ideas from games that I've seen and played, I would create some power ups which have different effects depending on which colour they are, and will slightly alter how my weapon looks. How I would want the power ups to affect my weapon is to not change its appearance entirely, but change the colour of different parts of my weapon, such as the shooting star design on the gun and the ring around the grip of the gun, depending on which power up you have acquired.

I found it hard to create a weapon for my game, because to be honest, I don't really know much about how weapons should look and work, hence why I've had to research a few different weapons before drawing an idea for my weapon.

Initial Drawings of Targets etc.

I got some ideas for targets when writing my initial game synopsis and used some images I found to create a different variety of targets. Looking at what I have created, I feel I have created a variety of targets, but I'm not entirely sure if I'm missing anything from outer space. I may have enough for the time being, as I will only have another 3 weeks to finish and complete everything in my game.

Other potential idea sources for targets:

http://georgeberlin.wordpress.com/2009/08/14/outer-space-collection-part4/

Other ideas for my game

• Could have spacecraft and planets occasionally obstructing part of the screen and would have to destroy them. They would be worth lots of points.
• Would have to destroy a planet's rings before you can destroy the planet itself.

Images that may help me to create other game aspects:

This image should help me to create a black hole which appears when you shoot a black Power Star (see above)

http://www.animecubed.com/yugioh/cards/SYE-026.shtml

Initial sketches for backgrounds

Stars will act as cursors for where you would be shooting.

Round edge around screen possibly indicates that the player could be shooting from a rocket. I am currently undecided on this idea.

I drew all of these images before creating my weapons for this game, so that's why the weapons don't appear on these drawings. I also wanted to keep the background drawings separate from the target drawings so I don't get confused when creating the background and targets using Unity and Maya, and that I will have a clear resource to work from when creating my background.

 

Starry backgrounds with different colours

http://a1star.com/star-space-background-6.php

Not only do these backgrounds look nice and could inspire my final background for my game, it also gives me an idea, when each level, or everytime you play the game, the background changes colour. This feature reminds me of a game/app called Pop, a game developed by nnoooo studios, a time based game which sees the player basically pop bubbles to score points, but they are punished if they miss bubbles or pop certain bubbles. In this game the background and the bubbles always change colour when completing a level, or 'wave.' I feel that this would be a great idea for my game, to offer the player a very exciting change of scene when they play the game.

Pop logo and screenshots, showing the change of background and bubble colours that occur in each level. 

http://www.develop-online.net/news/31388/Ease-of-iPhone-development-lowering-the-quality-benchmark

http://www.kotaku.com.au/2008/06/jobs_on_offer_at_nnooo_developer_of_pop/

http://www.wiiloveit.com/interviews/nnooo-interview

Possible influences for my Background

 

http://a1star.com/star-space-background-6.php

http://wallpaper.diq.ru/49__The_Brightest_of_Stars_in_Large_Magellanic_Cloud.htm

I think that these backgrounds are very pretty and look absolutely amazing, and I would be very pleased if I had something like this for my background in my game. However, I do feel that I would like something else in my background, like a planet and/or a sun. Something like that.

http://abstract.desktopnexus.com/wallpaper/17669/

I really admire the colours that are used here, and I like the effect used to create the planet in the background. However, I feel that this is far too busy with the buildings/debris/not sure what they are or what their purpose is, in fromt of the planet and I honestly feel that this ruins the image a bit. Reminds me of a game level in the Kingdom Hearts series, The World That Never Was, because that had a very strange and busy structure.


The World That Never Was, Kingdom Hearts (http://kingdomhearts.neoseeker.com/wiki/The_World_That_Never_Was)



http://onlyhdwallpapers.com/tag/points

I do really like this image, kind of reminds me of the Lion King opening scene. I don't think I could use the hill idea, even though this is a great image. I also like the colours used and the silhouette effect here as well. It also reminds me  a bit of an apocolypse, which isn't good...





http://good-wallpapers.com/space/921

I think the position of the planet in the background is positioned perfectly. I also like how everything in this background are all similar colours. This would work well so people could distinguish targets and their crosshairs very easily and won't get lost in such a busy background, like the purple one that has a lot of unnecessary structures in the background

After researching some sci fi/intergalactic backgrounds that may influence my background design for my game, I drew this image, inspired by a lot of these examples. I am really happy with this design, with a planet in the background, and I don't think it looks too busy or distracting. I also want everything in my background to be a similar colour, so that it doesn't distract the player from the objective of the game. I'd also like some sort of fog effect on the ground, which I hope could be in a Unity package.

I'm very pleased of how much detail I've managed to get onto Planet Background, and I also think the ring around the planet gives it character.

However, I don't think the stars will be as big as I've drawn them on this image. I possibly drew them that size so people would know what I was trying to draw. I will make them smaller when I come to create my game.

Cross-hairs

Cross hairs are the cursor that you control in one of these shooting games. I have had a distinct idea for  what I'd like my cross hair for my game to look like, I'd like my cross hair to be star shaped.

Cross Hair images



http://www.streamhead.com/how-to-use-images-in-actionscript-3-with-flashdevelop-and-some-other-as3-tips/

I really like how simple and friendly this cross hair looks, and it isn't too distracting for the user. You can also easily tell where abouts you're aiming and shooting with this crosshair example, due to its simplicity.



http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2011/01/13/ready-aim-roll-vt/

As with the previous image, where you're aiming with this crosshair is easily marked, but with this one, I feel is more specific with where you're aiming, but a lot less creative. This does look more like a traditional cross hair.



http://s292.photobucket.com/albums/mm10/calopcia/?action=view&current=crosshair4.jpg&newest=1

Again, this is more specific with where the crosshair is aiming than the previous crosshairs we have seen, but I feel with this one, there may be just too many lines, which with some of them, such as the diagonal lines cutting through the inner circle of the crosshair, don't really seem necessary to me.



http://www.clker.com/clipart-cross-hair-target.html

Compared with the rest of the crosshair designs we have seen, this is probably my least favourite. I don't really like all the lines marking the cross, and the diagonal lines look a bit like pins, and, as with the previous cross hair image, the diagonal lines don't really seem necessary. However, I feel this would be a good design if you were to see the barrel of the gun onscreen, because this isn't really too distracting, despite all the lines used to create this cross hair example.

This is the cross hairs I created using Adobe Illustrator and Photoshop, and I would like to use this in my final game. I am very pleased with how the design has worked, and I'm so glad with how creative this looks.