Week 1 - Introduction to Mobile Game Development

What can I tell you about Mobile Game Development, well not much at the moment but maybe I can answer that question at the end of the project. However, this week, I had been tasked to work with a group to come up with ideas on either a mobile game, an AR game, or alternatively a VR game. The lecture instructed students to use Miro which is basically an online whiteboard to share ideas with each other for free.

Miro Group Idea's Link: https://miro.com/welcomeonboard/ZW5wNUNqWlNqQnZlVW5xemYyNXp0NENLYmRaWlBuclVQcVlXS3IyOGpVSWpWdG5wbFBVNnJwNzNMVXVISWFtSHwzMDc0NDU3MzY0NDY3MDAwMjk0?invite_link_id=902932355110

Considering I was off-campus and was very ill, I didn't get the opportunity to try out VR Games. This convinced me to push myself towards making a mobile game. I was then later invited to a previous group that wanted to work on a mobile game so I accepted to work with them again because I found that we had good communication with each other when we were working towards our goals in our last project.

Idea Beginnings

Between me and my fellow team members, we came up with a few ideas on what type of mobile game our group could make such as:

• FPS Zombie Wave Game

• Inspired Candy Crush Puzzle Game

• Sliding Block Puzzle Game

• Top-Down Zombie Tower Defence Game

I came up with the first idea which was of an FPS Zombie Wave Game which had potential with good research for making Concept Art, Level Design, and UI. However, speaking to the group and them forwarding the idea to our lectures, the scope of making the game was too big because it wouldn't be playable on a smartphone. It also would have been too similar to a game I made last year which was a first-person shooter and with hordes of zombies.

The 2nd idea was to make a candy crush lookalike puzzle game which I wasn't part of as it was discussed with the group on campus. However, the group later revealed to me that our lectures advised our group to scrap the idea as it was plainly overused.

The 3rd idea was thought of by one of our team members "Scott Getty" which was to make a sliding puzzle block game. The game would use the player's selected photo on their photo gallery and then create a puzzle out of it. This would mean that we wouldn't need to create any levels in the game as it would be using the player's photos instead. However, the problem with this idea is that it seems too small of a scope and reminds me more of a photo app than an actual game app. the hardest part would be to implement the coding which I'm not aware of how to program.

The 4th idea was made by myself and "Johnny Doyle" which was to create a top-down tower defense/attack game in which the player controls zombies that will be sent out into battle against humans who are trying to obtain the zombie cure which is within the walls of the zombie tower. Pathways between player and enemy lines would be a major part of how the player can send out their zombies. If the player obtains a safe zone, the player will earn brain points and can earn extra brain points if they obtain a human safe zone. The brain points can be used to upgrade or unlock new types of zombies that will help push the zombies towards victory. How do you win, well if the human's main base gets destroyed then the player be rewarded with human heads like it is for Mario to huge coins for winning?

After diving more into these ideas and expanding them, we decided as a team to go for the Top-Down Zombie Tower Defence Game because it has a good scope and has twists and turns with some unique game mechanics to make it stand out.

Here are three screenshots of the group using Miro to expand this idea.

The first screenshot is of the idea was quite recent with it being mostly organised. Although, in the second screenshot, I had added a small spreadsheet made up of sticky notes with short answers to explain how each path will affect how the zombies and the humans attack one another and claim what they truly desire. Finally in the third screenshot, is of what's the most up-to-date as of now.

Team Roles

Considering we had an idea in place, our group decided to add team roles in the project to make sure everyone knows who's doing what. Here is the latest screenshot of the roles filled/needed in on Miro.