With Space Ark we wanted to do a reboot of the 1980s arcade genre - We loved those cute arcade games like Bubble Bobble, Arkanoid, Rainbow Island etc but felt that the genre as a whole isn't really being brought up to date. Too many retro remakes are being released by publishers which are just straight ports of the old 2D classics.
We wanted to update the arcade game genre for the 21st century - add in 3D graphics in high def with decent sound - all running on current hardware - but still keep the core attributes that made these games fun to play. The game we have come up with is Space Ark, which features:
Cute characters,
Fruit,
Bouncing (the cute characters into the air),
Fruit,
Bonuses,
Power-ups,
More fruit,
Widgets and
Huge high scores (oh yes and fruit).
The concept we started with was simple. We want to bounce something into the air in order to collect stuff. What do we want to bounce? Cute characters - gotta be cute characters cos all decent arcade games have them. What are the characters collecting? Coloured bricks containing DNA that will be used to terraform planets. Of course bouncing and collecting alone don't make for a really fun game - a great arcade game needs not just a simple core concept but other things layered on top of that concept to make it fun. A big part of the fun in game development is trying out different things to see what works and the real pleasure is when something you try suddenly transforms the game. That is what happened when we introduced Combos.
Originally you just needed to collect all the bricks in a level to complete the level. It was fun and cute but there was something missing. There was no on-going challenge. This is where the Combo feature came in. Space Ark levels have rows of coloured bricks. Collecting three or more of the same coloured bricks in a row generates a Combo and every level has a minimum combo score necessary to complete it.
Like the bouncing and collecting this Combo system is very simple but of course we have added more depth to make it challenging and fun. Firstly there is a reward for generating Combos (in addition to you being able to complete the level). Each level of Combo (3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8.... upwards) that you create generates a different bonus fruit. Collecting the fruit fills your power meter, which in turn multiplies your score. This means that if you want to generate a really big high score you need to try and collect as much fruit as possible before collecting bricks. Secondly you have to keep bouncing your character (your Arkonaut) without dropping them. If your Arkonaut hits the ground they drop the combos (rather like losing rings in Sonic) and you have to try to recover them before they drift off screen. The result is much more entertaining game play as you are both challenged to meet your combo quota and rewarded as you do so.
At the moment we have a couple of bugs in the Combo system. If you look at the screen shots you can see the Combo trail (the line of numbers) following behind the Penguin. For some reason they keep disappearing or randomly appearing on screen in odd positions. Gotta keep testing to find out what is happening so the guys can fix it. Will try to pop back soon to talk about the level designs.
