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hello all

As some of you know i'm making a top down, 3D shoot-em-up game. I've got a basic engine running that controls the enemy waves and player movements. I'm still trying to sort out the shooting code but that'll com with time.

I might even put some cut sceens in it if i get some time

what I'm really wanting to know is how many of you lot sit down and jot down some ideas for your games?

Since mines going to be mission based and have you playing as a bounty hunter, its gonna take a long time to get the 1st chapter going. And this i where i'm going to have to write down some ideas and make it like a portfolio. You never know, it might even be good

Trouble is i don't quite know where to start. Do i start with a story board of the game? Or do i write out the story to each chaper and the characters Bio's and stuff?

Also as its gonna be a very big game by the sounds of it so i dunno how i'm gonna publish it when its done. But i'll worry about that when the time comes.

cheers for any help guy and gals

For the game I'm making I first made a list of what I should add and when. I must of had around 40-50 things on the list, and simply added one at a time.

I haven't tried to make a game with a story line, but here's how i think the general process should be in making the game:

If the game is going to have a story, I'd recommend making the story or at least be able to sum it up in a couple paragraphs.

Next I'd recomend making a visual level editor for whatever your game needs(the level, the position of enemies, whatever) and then give it save and load code so you can save and load the level. After that I'd say try to load it in the game source.

After that make the basic gameplay, like movement controls, shooting, pausing. Shooting isn't that hard, when the spacebar or whatever key is "shoot" in your game, run a shoot missile function, and run an update missiles function every time to update the positions of the missiles, and if a missile collides with something, run a delete missile function.

After that make the AI do what your game needs, like moving/dodging/shooting, whatever.

If you game has cut scenes, make an editor for that that can create and play the cut scene, and save the animation if the cutscene isn't to be rendered in realtime.

Then you can make levels/cut scenes for each part of your story as you want. After that you can load the first level/cut scene, play it, delete it, load the next, etc.

You could even have save/load game code, remember what the player is in what level, what enemies/missile/whatever exists and where they are, save it, and then load it when you player loads a saved game.

Once your game is playable, make the media the game needs if you haven't already, and add that into the game.

For almost every game I make, I sit down and scribble things down on a bit of paper, I don't force myself to think of anything, I just start thinking about what sort of things I would like in my game and write down quick notes, something like.



This could then be split into levels such as


Now thats not really the best plan ever, but its taken me all of 5 minutes to make, and with a little more planning, could possibly start to become something of a decent game.

You might be bored one day and just have a quick idea of what one of the weapons could be, a gun that shoots toxic wasps at the enemy for instance, write these ideas down (you don't think you'll forget but you always do) and then keep adding to it until your happy with it, you can do the same for the different aliens etc. Hope I helped.

@ DLS
Glad to see your still working on your game. Good luck to ya

Yes, it's very good practice to write out the outlines of your games.

1. Who the main characters are, if any
2. How many levels
3. Bosses, power-ups, level design
4. Story, if any
ETC.

The better you get at writing out these outlines (called design documents in the industry), the better your games are going to be designed.

I suggest going to a search engine like google and search for sample game design documents. It will really help you to see how in-depth some of them are.

A good way to judge if your design document is thorough enough, is to let someone else see it. Ask them if they think the game will be fun after reading it. If they say they can't tell, then you are not plotting out enough details. Hope some of this helps!

thanks for all the input on this.

my work on the game had slowed right down coz i got lost for ideas. once i get the basic outline sorted out i think i can continue working on it at a faster pace.

i'm just wondering whether to continue with it as top down or kind of more for above and behind the players ship a bit like Silphead (pronounced sil-feed) on the PS2.

what would you prefer to see? i'm open to all sugestions.

if u would like to see it the second way i'll have to figure out how to make a matrix. but that ain't a problem

thinking about it... maybe some new programmers should take a look here and maybe they could pick up some tips on game design and make some better games. Half of the games I used to make weren't exactly great coz i didn't plan em out.

That must of been my downfall in that past. but now i got some tips i might just succeed

this could be a sticky? it would help a great deal of people i think

thats true. it could be.

i fogotten who it is thats triying to make that MMORPG but he should read this. it might just help him

i've already got some character bio's written down, aswell as the layout to 2 missions. speaking of which isn't a linier mission type.

once i got some pencil art done i'll scan em in and try to post em for u to look at. which i think is a good thing really as u can then design your models 1st without having to spend hours in a 3d editor, which could end up with u not being happy with the end product.

if any1 has anything to add to this then your welcome to.

even i might of missed summat out in my folder