Billy Vs The Boogoos - my contributions - Art

My group project game thingy is called "Billy Vs The Boogoos" and it's about a red-neck who drunkly falls of a tractor and stumbles upon some aliens trying to conquer the world. He is put in the situation that he has to battle his way through a bunch of aliens to get home and save his friends.
The main mechanic of the game is shooting, with the new additions an interrogation mini-game and new types of levels.

My main contribution to this game is the main and side characters art and the cut-scenes.

The main character is Billy. The main design challenges in creating Billy were to create a character that was a representation of a red-neck, but without seeming vulgar or inflicting prejudice. So I came up with a young boy design, which players could identify with because of his age. His clothes and affinity for alcohol are the elements which my team and I came up with were the part of definitory traits, and also added a comical tone to the character.

The side characters are, at the moment, the aliens. They are represented by small green men with large heads in grey lab coats. They posses plasma guns, but don't use them against Billy, because they want to harvest him and eventually probe him. As the game advances, new enemies are added in the form of locals who are under the control of the aliens. They are controlled by glass fish-tanks with mind control rods in them. The reason why I chose to portray the aliens as small green men with large heads and grey lab coats is because, in popular culture, due to numerous films aliens are portrayed  in our minds as little green men with large heads, grey lab coats and a unstoppable urge to : destroy all humans/enslave all humans/destroy the earth etc.

Between the levels as a pacing and padding device, and to introduce the player to Billy's story. They also serve to enhance the denouement between winning a level and starting another one. They are created and used in the game in the form of sequential art, inspired from comic books storytelling devices.  The general style is cartoon-y, the colours are strong and the shading is used to better give a feel of comic book art.

These are the first and second cut-scenes. Others will be added when the game progresses.

La Decima Vittima

In a futuristic society war is being avoided by creating "The Big Hunt" a pervasive game in which those who participate become either victim or hunter and have to kill/survive 10 opponents/attacks. Each "player" has 10 rounds he has to play through in which he is playing 5 times as a hunter 5 times as a victim. Once a player manages to have 10 kills he becomes part of a special league and received a huge prize in money. This situation is also a very fruitful one for TV companies who use "assassins" and their victims as a motif for their commercial adds. This is the premise for La Decima Vittima (1695) or The 10th Victim, in it's English version, a 60's pop art film directed by Italian director Elio Petri.

The main characters of the film are the American Caroline Meridith ,played by Ursula Anders, and Marcello Polletti, played by Marcello Mastroianni. The film starts off with Caroline finishing of her 9th victim using a pair of machine guns hidden in her bra. This technique will be later referenced in Austin Powers : The Spy Who Shagged Me (1997). Her next victim is Marcello, an acclaimed Italian "assassin" who has financial problems. Caroline has made an arrangement with a TV company to turn her 10th victory into a publicity stunt and thus she is obliged to kill Marcello in a certain spot while the cameras are rolling. The plot follows Caroline's attempts to get Marcello to the filming/killing spot without letting him know she is the assassin that has to kill him. Non the less Marcello starts to suspect her and comes up with his own publicity stunt to have her killed by a crocodile. Inevitably the two main characters fall in love, thus making the assassination more difficult.

The plot builds up to the ending, keeping the silly, comedic tone of the film up until now. Caroline manages to get Marcello to the designated spot and kills him at the urges of the video's director. Or so she thinks. After she leaves the scene, Marcello's body disappears. Apparently he isn't dead even though he was shoot from 2 meters away. He is waiting for Caroline near the shooting set (no pun intended) and shoot's her, from point blank range, while the director of the video and the filming crew were fast enough to reach them and catch the killing on tape, again.  But Caroline isn't dead also, as we her in the next scene, with a shotgun in hand (which apparently has unlimited ammo) shooting towards Marcello. Before she actually gets him, they are being attacked by Marcello's ex-wife and a friend of her's. They get in a gun fight from which they eventually manage to escape by hopping in a car and driving away. Caroline drives them to an airport, stop on the landing strip and board a random plane. Said plane is apparently a wedding plane, filled with couples that are to be married and the two protagonists go along with the idea.

I know it's not common to give away the ending of a film but I find it hilarious and it shows the tone of the film at it's best. It's silly and over the top but I have to say I really enjoyed it. From the premise to the 60's futuristic settings to the comic book inspired backgrounds and the actors performance. This film is a really good example of 60's pop art moviemaking, showing their vision of the future, tackling issues as politics, drama, relationships and violence with a good dose of humour and  parody.

Why did I bring this film up? Because I saw it in class, in relation with pervasive games and how this film inspired the creation of the rather known pervasive game "Assassins". But I'll talk about this in the next post.

                                                          "Bevi de Ming e vivrai di piu"

Types of games

Until now I have talked about what a game is and what it takes to make a game. But now that that has been established, what types of games are there and how can they be classified.

Of course we all know about RPG's and FPS's and MMORPG's and RTS's and Puzzle games and Adventure games and so on and so forth. But at the moment I'll talk about a different way of classification. Of this type I read at the beginning of the year in Paul Newman's Videogames book (Newman, 2001) where he quoted Caillois, who was inspired by Huzinga (*citationception ^.^*) in declaring four main forms of distinguishing games from each other.

• Agon : it's representing competition as a main aesthetic factor in the game.
• Alea: randomness/ chance
• Ilinx : movement    
• Mimicry : simulation/ make-believe/ role-play 

A game is usually defined by at least two of these characteristics. Examples found in Newman's book encompass "Tetris" "Poker" "R360" or "Myst". I will name games I have played and by thinking on my own experience with the games will give my opinion on how this proprieties are present in the games. 

Agon 

Basing on the fact that competition in Newman's book is viewed as player vs player of player vs AI, the games  will name that I consider have "competition" as a main aesthetic factor are : "Starcraft" (both 1 and 2 ), Need For Speed" and any MMORPG, but as a clear example let's say "Guild Wars" or "World of Warcraft" Even though all of them they have more or less of an RPG element, the main goal is that the player has to compete against either other players or the computer.

 All of the games I have mentioned are part of different genres: a real-time strategy, a racing game and an online role-playing game. But the characteristics mentioned by Caillois in Newman's book are being attributed to games before they are split into genres. Going on this premise you could say that elements as "Agon" "Alea" "Ilinx" and "Mimicry" should be taken into consideration during the process of creation of the game and attributed to the mechanics and thus obtaining more or less desired mechanics and then aesthetics.

Alea 


When looking for games that are based on randomness, the first place you have to look for are boardgames. In "Monopoly" for example, all your moves, both strategic and on the board, can only be undertaken after the dice roll. Also, the human factor in the game can be a major chance element, because, unless you can read minds, it's pretty hard to realize what your opponent is going to do, at least before half the game is already played. But to talk about a board game that is completely based on randomness or chance I'll say "Snakes and Ladders" . This game has a core mechanic based on die throws. The players do not interact with each other and the "fate" of the game is completely based on chance. Another game based on chance is "Liar's Dice". This game and variations of it are played regarding just on the results of dice throws. Even if a certain way of strategic thinking is needed to win, chance plays the main part.
Computer games also have lots of random generators embedded in them. Like the chance of a critical hit in role-playing games and MMO's like "Neverwinter Nights" "Fallout" or "Guild Wars", the chance to receive certain materials in MMO's by "mining" or "investigating" certain objects.

Ilinx 


Most, if not all games have the element of "movement" in them, and in most of them is one of the main parts of the game. You move your character on the screen, you move your pieces on the board, you move pieces to complete sequences in solving puzzles. So are there any games that do not have "movement" in them?

Mimicry 


Mimicry is an element that is present in all games that are part of the "Simulation" genre. Also, given the definition of the element, it's also embodied in games that are based on role-playing games. Games like "The Sims" or  "RollerCoaster Tycoon" are based mainly on this element. Playing these games, you as a player, are put in a situation that simulates either life, like in "Sims", or the managing of a Six-Flags Amusement Park. But these games have a big difference. "Sims" is mostly a ludic game, with goals that the player sets for himself, but "RollerCoaster Tycoon" is paideic type of game, with goals set by the developers, even if the main goal for every mission is the same, and that is to keep the park running at a certain capacity, under certain circumstances, even if different nuances are added.
As I've said earlier, this type of element is also present in role-playing games, when you as a player, undertake the role of a hero/ saviour/ wizard that can't swim/ legendary personae that goes on a quest to save the world. Mimicry is used in this cases to put the player in situations that the "hero" would be put in and simulate what he/she would do.

As a first year, our task are, among others, to come up with two games, and I thought that a good ending would be how this elements are or would be used in this games. My individual game is a puzzle game, in which, you as a player, have to solve a small series of puzzles to advance further in the game. So at the moment my game contains both "Ilinx" and "Mimicry" because you play the role of a character and you move that avatar around the game.
The group project game is about a character who has to battle his way home through a horde of aliens. This game has three elements in it : "Agon" "Ilinx" and "Mimicry" by having you playing the role of character, which moves around the game world and the competition is also recently added by the new elements added to  the game, and on the basis of a high-score, players can compete against each other.

Game designers should be familiar with these kind of elements, because, by adding them to a game designers can in a way expect certain dynamics and aesthetics from the players. I believe that, taking part in this course, it's good to apply what we've learned to what we do, so we won't forget. Learning to be a games designer is like learning a new language, and if it's not constantly practised it's going to be forgotten.

             

                                                          "A game is a series of interesting choices"
                                                                                 Sid Meier