Blazing Bounce

Introduction

The game was made for Weekly Game Jam #175 with the theme "Two-Button Physics." I've teamed up with an artist, Sangeeth Roshan, from the jam's discord server. Though we had initially planned on making a puzzle like game with tile based movement, I realised that there was not going to be enough time to make more than a few levels or polish the game considering my skill level at the time. I have prototyped a few concepts and decided to move forward with the ball and paddle mechanics.

Prototype

Theme

Once I had decided which mechanic to build on, I chose to go with the theme of rescuing. Instead of a ball breaking blocks, a firefighter rescues NPCs in windows.

Level Design

A total of 32 windows, 4 floors with 8 windows on each floor are added. 16 windows to the left and 16 to the right. The broken window sprite would be spawned at the start of the level on a random number of windows within a fixed range. Flames and NPC sprites would then be spawned on a certain number of these windows. This randomisation contributes to replayability value.

Each level lasts 60 seconds. This time limit adds a bit of tension to the experience while also ensuring that the game does not overstay its welcome. This also contributes to replayability value.

Prototype

Difficulty

To add variety and replayability value, I have added easy and hard modes along with five levels.

Lvl 1 has 2 NPCs.
Lvl 2 has 4 NPCs.
Lvl 3 has 6 NPCs.
Lvl 4 has 8 NPCs.
Lvl 5 has 10 NPCs.

In easy mode, safety nets exist on either side of the screen that bounce the firefighter back into the screen. These nets do not exist in hard mode, and the game ends if the firefighter jumps off to the side.

Five Levels

Art

Sangeeth Roshan created pixel art that fit the theme of the game. A variety of NPCs were created to reduce monotony.

Bugs

The flame has a seperate collider from the NPC. Occasionally, the flame persists despite NPC getting rescued. I've set it up like this towards the end of the project since I did not want to touch the scripts and assets that were already in the level. By the time I had noticed the bug, it had been a while and I did not want to spend my time fixing this occasional bug which does not break the game.

Hindsight

To convey to the player what their objective is, I could have added windows in the middle and spawned an NPC which would automatically be rescued since the firefighter begins bouncing in the middle of the screen.