Stuff happening now...
Play Misfits - ep2
Watch Pilot - clip 2 from The Cleveland Show
Yay! EffieGreenaway likes Glad I Didn't Mis...
.

E4.com Grand Master Flash competition:

Play and vote for your favourite finalist

How to create completely brilliant games ideas

Task, adversity and limited resources... Argh! Science!

Let's think about Pacman for a moment.
You've got a task: Eat all the dots
You've got adversity: Ghost want to eat you
You've got a limited resource: Power pills mean you can eat ghosts

By our reckoning many games have this basic structure. Task, adversity, limited resource.

Space Invaders
Task: Kill all the aliens
Adversity: Aliens want to kill you
Resource: You can hide under the bases but they slowly get destroyed.

Let's try it for a more sophisticated game, let's say a FPS like Quake.

Task: Get to the next level
Adversity: Baddies want to kill you
Resource: You need ammo and to get it you have to risk being killed

Much of the tension in games comes from the balance of risk and resources, so let's take our previous list of themes and see what we can do.

Fireman puzzle:
Task: Save people from a burning building
Adversity: Fire
Resource: Amount of air left in breathing equipment

Oooh, and we've got a maze game that has to be solved in a certain amount of moves before the air runs out. Nice!

Tips

Stuck for ideas? Don't like my idea machines? Try the following:

  • Go for a walk, my best ideas come away from the PC screen
  • Brainstorm with a friend. Use them as a sounding board.
  • Read some newspaper headlines. Ask yourself, "How could this be a game?" Admittedly it helps if the headline is John Leslie Rape Quiz
  • Look around you. Pick an object and ask how it could be gamed.
  • Think of games you played as a child, conkers, british bull dog, anything. How can this be used online?
  • I once had a chat with a TV exec who used a "break the formula" hack for creating ideas. Take something that works, and change the crucial detail on which it hinges, i.e. in Big Brother people have no access to the outside world, so let them have access and sell it on that. The show would be all "OMG! The public hate me!"
  • Look at book titles for inspiration. Or films.
* "How to make people give you money by Rob Manuel.PDF" is available for a £50 download from all reputable adsense monkeys

Share it baby

Leave a comment

You need to Log-in or Register to comment

By posting on this website you are agreeing to abide by our comments policy...

Showing 6 to 10 of 18 Comments

  • Comment by:
    kaolinfire
    Username:
    kaolinfire
    Posted on:
    Fri Mar 6, 2009 at 02:42 am
    Comment:
    Thank you. My brain's needed jump-starting all week. I don't know if this will have done it, in the end, but is seems like it has a good chance of it. :)
    Actions:
    Report this
  • Comment by:
    bucsie
    Username:
    bucsie
    Posted on:
    Mon Sep 1, 2008 at 07:59 am
    Comment:
    I'm sorry to say this but this game is sokoban with different graphics!It's not a new game,there's nothing original about it.a new game should have something different in the game-playing, otherwise why would anyone switch from the original?
    Actions:
    Report this
  • Comment by:
    Pewit
    Username:
    Pewit
    Posted on:
    Sat Aug 16, 2008 at 02:46 pm
    Comment:
    Just thought I'd point out that it'll never sell to the Merkins as they use 911 to call the emergency services. Other countries mainly use 112 but just to be different, Australia uses 000. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emergency_call
    Actions:
    Report this
  • Comment by:
    dennisspa
    Username:
    dennisspa
    Posted on:
    Fri Aug 15, 2008 at 08:37 am
    Comment:
    ...there's something weirdly addictive to us about sorting, ordering, fixing. I think most truly addictive games fall into this 'tidy up gaming' categry. So there you go, secret to making the next tetris. No need to be tabloid friendly.
    Actions:
    Report this
  • Comment by:
    dennisspa
    Username:
    dennisspa
    Posted on:
    Fri Aug 15, 2008 at 08:34 am
    Comment:
    There's something in our human nature that drives us to tidy up. Throw in some simple rules and you're on to a winner. It could be clearing the scattered balls on the pool table, solving a rubik's cube, aligning shapes, ordering cards, eating dots..
    Actions:
    Report this