gameplayblog

[gameplayblog]

VVVVVV Short Analysis

VVVVV is a platformer game made by Terry Cavanagh in 2010. The player follows the story of a space captain who  has to evacuate his ship along with the rest of his crew when the ship encounters "Dimensional Interference". The rest of his crew ends up split up and it is up to the player to go and find them. 

Art Style

The art style of VVVVVV is a pixel art aesthetic, with only patterns and solid colours being used. The map is split up into separate screens, which the player navigates through, each screen having a specific colour scheme. 

Gameplay Mechanics

Unlike most platformers, the player isn’t allowed to jump. Instead the player is given the ability to flip the gravity of the game, and must navigate the treacherous levels using this ability. There are hazards such as spikes and moving enemies that must be avoided. Later in the game, more mechanics such as moving platforms are introduced. There are also checkpoints around the levels due to the high difficulty of the game. 

Other Material

The games limited success may be attributed to its difficult to pronounce name. Ports have been made to many systems so the game is able to be played on most devices. 

[gameplayblog]

Superhot Short Analysis

Super Hot is an innovative new take on the first person shooter. Developed as a game jam title in 2003, Super Hot works almost identically to any other first person shooter, apart from the fact that time only progresses as the player moves. This allows the player to be methodical when it comes to progressing through the levels, and once a level is completed, a replay is played at full speed, which makes it look as if you have superhuman reaction times.

Art Style

The art style of Super Hot is extremely stylized. The menus have the aesthetic of an old computer terminal, and the story is interacted with through the a chat client on the system. In the levels, the game takes on an entirely different aesthetic, with the entire level being white and only shading making the level components visible. The enemies contrast to the stark white level, with a bright red, low-poly model. They shatter into pieces when dying, and they give off a slight red light. Weapons are black which make them stand out from the level and enemies.

Gameplay mechanics

As mentioned before, time only moves when the player moves, be it aiming or walking around. The player spawns in the level, and from there they can progress as they wish. As they begin to move, enemies spawn running towards them and firing. They can use the time mechanic to slowly dodge bullets, and pick up weapons. Weapons have a limited clip, and once depleted they can be thrown towards enemies to stun them and make them drop their weapon. Levels can be approached slowly or quickly depending on the play style of the player. After a level is completed, a reply is played back at full speed, which shows the player going through the level as if they didn’t stop. This makes for rather rewarding replays that look amazing. 

Other Material

At the end of the game, the narrator of the story tells players to talk about the game, and share experiences however not tell people the main mechanics of the game. The game is marketed through this way, in a mouth to mouth kind of way, and relies on online content creators and marketers to increase popularity of their game.

[gameplayblog]

Rocket League Short Analysis

Rocket League is a multiplayer competitive sports game developed by Psyonix. The game first started as a mod for Unreal tournament 2003, where Dave Hagewood created a new game mode called Onslaught. He was hired by the Epic Games team to incorporate his mod into Unreal Tournament 2004. He used his experience to found Psyonix which after trial and error created Rocket League’s predecessor, Supersonic Rocket Powered Battle Cars. Rocket League is an advancement on this previous title, with many of the bugs and flaws fixed, and physics perfected.

Art Style

The art style of Rocket League follows a semi-realistic style, with accurate shaders for lighting and such, however there are aspects that are more stylised as well. The vehicles are detailed, with realistic engine parts, and the maps also have impressive weather effects, that add to the polish of the game. 

Gameplay Mechanics

Rocket League works on the basic concept of playing football with cars. The cars have basic driving mechanics, such as turning and powersliding. Driving on walls is possible, however movement has to be maintained to stay there. Players can also collect boost from points on floor of the pitch, which can be used to accelerate greatly to top speed. The cars are also allowed to jump, which could be argued to be the main supporting mechanic that makes for an enjoyable experience. Allowing the player to jump opens up the game to a whole new host of mechanics and techniques. After jumping the player can boost to keep themselves in the air. With enough practice players are able to fly through the air towards the ball, allowing for impressive goals to be scored. Due to the simplicity of the concept, new techniques are still being discovered, and the top players are coming up with crazy ways to score, and taking advantage of flaws in the physics code. 

Other Material

Due to the nature of the game, a large competitive scene has developed around the game. Large prizes go to the winners of the big tournaments. Psyonix also works with other companies to promote the game, such as having Batman related cars and items in the game. 

[gameplayblog]

Overwatch Short Analysis

Overwatch is a competitive FPS/MOBA developed by Blizzard. The game has the standard elements of a first person shooter, and uses a hero system to provide different classes. 

Art Style

Overwatch uses a hyper-stylised art style, in a similar style to Team Fortress 2. While the art looks simplified, there is a lot of fine detail in the “cartoony” graphics that the game uses. The use of a style like this means that as the game ages, and graphic fidelity increases, the art style will still hold up unlike games created using a hyper-realistic style.

Gameplay Mechanics

As a first person shooter, Overwatch uses many core mechanics that are found in many games of the same genre. E.g. guns, sprinting, running, aiming. Overwatch however, also adapts these mechanics, to provide an experience that feels different to the standard FPS. It does this few ways.

Class selection. Overwatch seperates each class into a different character which they call “Heroes”. The heroes are split between 3 roles; Tank, Damage and Support. The tank role heroes have higher health/shields and specialise in defending the player and disrupting enemies. They have high survivability, with some being able to regenerate health, or deploy shields to protect themselves and other players. The Damage heroes are the mid tier. Their weapons and abilities vary a lot throughout the role, however they exist to provide mid range assault and support roles. The final role is the support role. Most heroes in this role have thee ability to heal other players, and often their damage is quite low. The heroes have preset weapons and abilities, and they cannot be altered in anyway. In the standard game mode, only one of each hero type is allowed on each team.

Weapons and Abilities. Contrasting to other modern FPSs, Overwatch uses a unique weapon system, where each hero has its own unique set of weapons and abilities that have advantages and disadvantages when playing. Bastion, a damage hero, can either run around freely with an assault rifle with 25 bullets to a clip, or transform into a massive player controlled sentry that has huge damage and 300 bullets per clip. This kind of dynamic to the heroes follows throughout the others, and makes each game and confrontation different and interesting. 

Ultimate Abilities. Each hero also has an ultimate ability. This generates during the match, and the speed of regeneration is affected by how well you play. Blizzard also controls the generation of ultimate abilities to create interesting situations, such as the losing team all having their ultimate ready to use right as the timer is about to end, allowing them to quickly flip the sides right at the end. Each ultimate ability is either extremely offensive or defensive. Most ultimates also have weaknesses that can be exploited using certain heroes. 

Other Material

The game does most of its marketing through high quality computer generated videos. When a new character is announced, a video giving backstory to the character is also released. The lore behind the game is expansive, and although to the casual player you wouldn’t think much of the random mismatch of characters, each one is supported by an in-depth backstory that confirms its place within the Overwatch universe.