Week 5-6: Concatenation

        The last few weeks have been eaten up by Stage 2, which we will be challenging tomorrow. The stage requirements are mostly paperwork, documentation, and bookkeeping, so there haven't been any exciting design upsets to speak of. Hopefully as we swerve into Stage 3 there'll be some real meaty design issues for me to talk about. Our top priority at the moment is implementing and testing our variety of "spice" mechanics for our core gameplay. We've had test sessions twice a week and so far we've learned that well, people like our game. It's based on very tried and true mechanics and our prototype has a couple pretty exciting gameplay patterns thanks to the different sets of attacks you can draft. The short range teleport, our "blink", is one of the more popular moves, as well as the scattershot, which launches large numbers of randomly moving projectiles that quickly clutter the screen. We have a lot to iron out but the initial results are promising.

         What I mean by "spice" mechanic is something to set our game apart from competitors and give it its own identity. If we executed all these core platforming and shooting mechanics flawlessly we'd have a pretty solid game, but rather unremarkable. If we want to stand out (which we do) then we have to bring something new to the table. We've been trying to make sure that the art direction we choose works well with our mechanics, and in a lot of ways the ideas we've been pitching on both sides have influenced the process of the other. We have several systems planned that we'll be putting in front of testers in the coming weeks, and we'll be trying to match these up with art tests and focus groups to try and keep a sense of cohesion in what we're making. Stage 3 is going to be the biggest part of the project with the highest amount of turnover and iteration, and I think it's going to be pretty exciting to see what makes it through the grinder.More to come in weeks yet to pass.