Final

This is my final game. I have added sounds to it and finished off dodgey buttons etc. The safe i added near the end uses 6 different movie clips to make it work. It has 3 movie clips which are the numbers that each have 10 frames. These frames have the numbers 0 - 9 on them which act as a combination lock. There are also 3 invisible buttons over the handle movie click which doesnt let you open the safe until you have got the right combo because when a certain frame is clicked on, on the combo, it will take away the invisble buttons so that you can unlock the handle. There is a few minor glitches in, mainly useability issues, such as the back buttons that link each scene are in a few random places but other than that it is alrirght. A slightly larger issue is that once you have found the key you can then unlock the door in the hallway, but once you try to go back from the hallway it takes you back to the first scene when you do NOT have the key because i left the coding from the first scene on the back button. I did change this code to the correct coding but the flash file corrupted and it wiped my whole days work, luckily i already had this finished piece which only has that one issue but it is an SWF file so i can't edit it. It only means that you have to get the key again in order to get into the bedroom so it's not a huge deal. Other than this issue i am quite happy with the game and have had someone test it and they seemed to enjoy it.

Early ideas for my game (they were in a book, so i'm writing them on here)

From the start of my final major project i wanted to do some sort of game, whether it be in flash or Unity. I mainly wanted to use Unity just because i really enjoy 3D modelling in Cinema 4D. I wanted it to be a horror game and i had been reminded of a game i have watched a lot of on youtube called Amnesia. Straight away i knew i wanted to do a castle based horror game. I decided to do an exploration type game, firstly i started doing a point and click game, which shortly turned out to be sort of and interactive comic type point and click adventure. Before all this though I started modelling a castle door which was set in a thick stone wall pictured below.

I also started trying to get to grips with Unity, doing a few tutorials and looking at videos on youtube of how to get started. I managed to come up with the concept for the mountain and the surroundings for it. Note: There was going to be water in the vast area below the mountain and a small pier where the path starts up to the top of the mountain. And of course the castle would be on top.

I do really like Unity and i think i could make a playable small game in it if i had the time but because there was a limited amount of time for the final project i decided it wasn't the best time to start playing around in a brand new program and do it in something i was familiar with like flash.

materials and rooms

The picture below is what inspired me to do the dungeon room in the main castle room under the carpet. It looks very dark, cold and creepy and would make an excellent dungeon so i made my own type and changed it around. I really like the rocks mainly because it gives the sense that this place is not for amusement and only torture.

I also had to look at chandeliers which would go nicely in an old castle and i used the picture below for reference because it looks antique and quite spooky in a way, with the dark metal ad the surrounding candles.

Below is a picture that matches my castle entrance hall in my game, i didn't use this as a reference but this is the sort of look i was going for in my mind. Also the wooden panelling i didn't use in the main hall but i did use this style of wall and ceiling in my secret room behind the bookcase in the bedroom.

Characters in my game (with research)

There are very few actual characters in my game, i think 3 overall, but i wanted them to have a purpose and not be randomly tried to fit in to the game. The first one is the head that pops up when you try to click on a door. It has part of the spinal cord hanging out and i have drawn it in my sketchbook for reference. The second one the player should come across is a ghost which comes out of a jail cell when the door falls down after clicking it.

And finally theres the picture of the warden and of course his skeleton hanging off the rock beneath the castle. I have drawn all these in my sketchbook. Below is some character research.

Above is my severed head reference, there isn't a lot of severed cartoon heads online i must admit so i pretty much made mine up.

Above is a ghost i found which inspired me for the design of the ghost i have in my game.

The skeleton below i used as a reference for my skeletons i have in the castle and outside at the bottom of the cliff.

I uploaded this because i flash kept on crashing and deleting all my work i had done on my game that day. So i re-did all the 3 hours of work i had done that got deleted and uploaded it before flash crashed again. This is NOT the finished piece.

trouble with coding

Today in my final project i was having extreme difficulty getting a movie clip to go to another scene on the release of the mouse. I struggled trying different types of coding and playing around with the movie clips and everything, but i just could not get it to work. First of all i was trying to get the end of an animation in a movie clip to go straight to the next scene, frame 7 by putting the coding, _root.gotoAndStop("Scene 2", 7); This however did nothing except go to the 7th frame of the movie clip animation that was already playing. I tried a whole bunch of variations of this code and even took out the animation completely and just had it so that the movie clip went straight to the next scene on release of the mouse button using, on (release) {_root.gotoAndStop("Scene 2", 7); Again this didn't recognize the scene part so i tried renaming the scene (and tried many variations of coding yet again) which still didn't work. So after this i finally found something that helped online which basically says to put a frame label on the frame you wish to go to on the next scene. I did this by naming it "rock" and starting trying different coding and eventually found that,  on (release) {_root.gotoAndPlay("rock"); worked after putting it straight onto the main movie clip. This did however sacrifice the animation that went with the movie clip but i successfully made it go to the next scene and have put the animation at the start of the next scene.

Game research

Ive been looking for good point and click games/interactive games. I found one called monkey go happy which is a series of scenes with different puzzles, which some of them are quite funny, it really involves the player and even lets you pick a character to play as.

Some of the puzzles are just finding shapes and matching them.

But other ones you have to find a out what to do for example the one below you have to unlock the chicken coop, click on him to fly away and then put the eggs underneath him in the basket.

as pictured below.

iphone app reseach

So before i decided to do the game in flash i had a look at a few scary iphone apps and there arent really that many. The only really terrifying one i found was The maze game.

Now if you've played this game on the PC you will know what happens when you reach the end of the last level pictured above. When you are playing this game its just like a slightly hard maze game, that is until you reach this level. once you near the end of the level above this pops up.

And it has a very loud scream to go with it. This is the sort of thing i would like in my game. 

As i said before this is the only really scary game i could find on the iphone. I don't think there are that many sppa that are scary on the iphone or androids etc, because you don't really get immersed in the game on these mobile devices because they are too small and usually you use them when you are out and about. This is different when playing on a computer because you are usually in the comfort of your own home when playing computer games and are a lot more involved in them.

More amnesia inspiration

So the main game behind my game idea is a game called amnesia which i haven't actually played myself but have watched videos on it and it is very jumpy and extremely spooky. Throughout the game you pretty reside in a castle and it is very dark and eary. I have provided a few screenshots to get a feel for the game. 

The title itself is quite mysterious and spooky.

Corridors leave the player with suspense and create tension as to what could be lurking at the end.

Dark rooms give a scary atmosphere.

game interfaces.

Flash is a very easy and usable interface for making games and i really enjoy it but as far as platforms go that flash can be used on it is not very flexible. I was looking into what different platforms it could be used on and mostly it is only web browsers. There are a few mobile devices it can be accessed on but not many.

As you can see above this is pretty much the only platform flash is used on nowadays and is quickly being overtaken by java script and HTML5. Saying that i am still going to work in flash as it is easier for me and i am not making a commercial game. Most mobile devices such as iPhones' don't use flash and cant, so i cant make an app which i was considering at first.

different horror point and click games.

I found a horror point and click online which is good in the sense that it is scary but it is very sloppy and not very smooth. It feels a bit clumsy because when you move the mouse near the top of the screen a chunky inventory screen fills half the screen and is annoying when you are trying to look around.

As you can see below the inventory screen is not very suitable because you don't click anything to load it, it just comes up when the cursor you use to look around goes near the top of the screen which isn't ideal when looking around

Again the same sort of thing happens when you look down, your hands come up and fill the screen which is also annoying when you are trying to look around.

research

As i am doing a sort of interactive comic with point and click adventure styles i thought i would research some other games with similar values.

Below is a screenshot i took from a point and click game i found called a demons day out. It is basically different scenes where you find items and interactive with things. its fun to play because of the interactivity and involves the player a lot.

Below again is an interactive comic i found which is also fun but is not AS interactive as the point and click, but then again it is a comic which is more story based than the point and click.

I think the point and click has more of an impact on the user because it involves them more and also has more interactive ibjects in each scene than the pages of the interactive comic.

i am going to take qualities from both of these types of interactive media and use them to create my own game/comic.

Research

The main game i have been looking at for research is a game called Amnesia: The Dark Descent. The game is very scary and jumpy and has the style that i was planning for my game (a dark scary castle).

Above is the main menu which immediately creates an intense atmosphere and looks quite dark and spooky. Also the writing for the title is very rugged and mysterious.

This picture above is roughly the style i want the rooms in my castle to look in my game. Obviously my game will be less realistic looking as it is in flash but it will still have a scary atmosphere and odd goings on.

Planning and experimenting

For my final major project i really wanted to do a game, as this is the business i would like to go into once i have finished my course. I also really wanted this game to be within the horror Genre, and have been watching a lot of Amnesia game play trailers and walkthroughs. So i am going to do a horror game in flash. I did start work in unity 3D and i made some models up in cinema 4D, but i have never used unity before and it was difficult for me to try and learn the program AND finish a final major project within the time limit, so i am sticking with something i am familiar with, like flash. Flash also has a lot of diversity to create great games. I am going to be making a point and click adventure.

Above is the terrain i started working on in unity, i was planning on having a castle on top of the mountain and water all around the bottom so that it was isolated from everywhere. This was going to give the playing a lonely atmosphere, so they had no one to depend on but themselves. Below is the characters POV. I did actually put in a first person character to walk around and test the terrain.

So after experimenting in this program i decided to move on to Flash as it is a program i am familiar with and  can get a great outcome on.