Game concept

Structural Engineering Challenge meets Occam's Quilt. (With Sushi Boats, because everything is better with sushi boats.)

Objective

Stack blocks to make table legs strong enough to bear a given weight. The more attractive the legs are (based on vertical and horizontal matching), the better.

Gameplay

Visit the prototype link for simple, cheerful directions.

Overview: Place blocks on a blueprint for a table. When the blueprint is full of blocks, the blueprint is scored and put aside. A booched blueprint is still scored and put aside. A new blueprint takes its place until a set number of blueprints are completed.

At the top is the Scale. In the middle is the Blueprint, which has a table top space and 4 legs made of 6 game blocks. On the Blueprint are spaces for blocks, and Scrolls for the number of blueprints in the session. There is a piRat hidden in the Blueprint. Under that, is the Workbench which has spaces for 6 game blocks. At the bottom is the sushi-boat River where blocks enter the game by floating along the River from left to right.

More detailed:

Starting from the bottom of the blueprint and working your way up, place blocks in each of 4 columns to build table legs that can bear the weight indicated by the Scale and the tabletop art. The 4 legs may be filled in any order horizontally, as long as each is filled from the bottom to the top. The 4 legs may be filled at any rate. ex: You may finish 1 leg while leaving the other 3 empty if you want to.

You can put blocks from the River directly on the Blueprint, or place them in your Workbench to use later. Once a block is on your Workbench, you must place it on the blueprint to get it out of your Workbench. Once you place a block on the Blueprint, it can not be moved. There is no discard. This becomes much more important if we implement Boxes (see notes).

When your last block is placed, the top of the table will be set on the legs. If the strength requirement is met, it will then be scored and another Blueprint will replace it for you to work on next. If not, the table legs will collapse under the weight, and you've booched. A booch is still scored and a new Blueprint takes its place.

Ideally, at first, blueprints and shapes and colors of blocks will be limited. Scores will also be limited. As many other PP games do, doing well unlocks complexity and higher score potential. For this game, advanced levels would have the full shape set incuding knots, the full color set, the full wildcard set, and bonus target shapes in the blueprint. This advancement model is reflected in the Greenie Game and Normal Game buttons on the prototype page and in scoring displays. People wanting to customize playing the prototype can access a menu of choices with the Define Custom Parameters button.

(The above image is a screen shot of our in-development prototype game applet. The writing in the above image was added after the fact.)

Gameboard details:

The Scale is weighed down on the left by 5 large, dark balls. As pieces are placed on the diagram, small balls are placed on the right of the scale. The Scale moves in balance and changes hue from dark to light to show quality of progress. When the goal weight is reached, not only is the Scale at balance but the fulcrum turns gold and the background turns green.

The Blueprint has the outlines of the 4 legs. These outlines are block sized and it will take 6 block to make each leg. Up to 3 of the empty block spaces may have an outline instead of a square, showing a bonus can be had if the shape of the outline is used there. The tabletop outline is thin, medium or thick to also show the goal /strength/weight.

Scroll outlines show how many more tables are to be made. Finished Scrolls show how many tables have been made. Scroll brightness shows the score of each table.

The piRat is a penalty for not making a move. A move is taking a block from the River to the Workbench, from the River to the Blueprint, or from the Workbench to the Blueprint. Moving blocks inside the Workbench does not reset the piRat's timer. The penalty the piRat gives is gnawing a knothole in a block thus changing the Pass/Booch score. The piece chewed is the strongest piece. When no piece has been placed, the piRat timer resets to repeat the two warnings again. Without a move, the piRat keeps gnawing new pieces until there is nothing untouched to gnaw. Other ways this penalty could be applied might be by (alone or in combination to break ties): last placed, tallest leg, strongest leg, most valuable leg, leg not protected by cedar Gilthead, single strongest block, random. piRat will eventually cause a booch through strength attrition, and will erode bonuses as it progresses.

The Workbench is a holding space for blocks that are taken from the River but not immediately placed on the Blueprint. Blocks may be moved from one space to any other open space on the Workbench. The only way to remove a block from the Workbench is to place it on the Blueprint. The Workbench is extremely useful in different ways for completing vertical color matches and horizontal shape matches which give scoring multipliers. If the River is loaded by set, blocks on the Workbench will effect the River.

The River displays blocks, which float in from the left and disappear on the right in a ongoing stream of choices. Typically, there are 5 blocks showing. 6 blocks may show at once when 1 is just entering from the left and 1 is just exiting to the right, all of which are still available to the player. More than 6 blocks may be possible if we implement Boxes (see Notes). When a block is taken from the River, the remaining blocks to the left speed up to close the gap. There is no penalty, other than the piRat, for letting blocks disappear to the right.

Block art gives information on strength by shape and value by color. Strength is by thickness. Value is in rainbow order from red through magenta.

• There are levels of shape, so new complexity and rewards can be unlocked with advanced skill. Shapes are released in sets, with the minimum needed to not booch, the highest strength pieces, and then knots and the wildcard to balance complexity with reward at all three levels.
• The shapes with their (strength) are:
• Any piece with a knothole (0) whether the knothole needs to be unlocked by difficulty is still uncertain.
• thin concave (1)
• thin straight (2)
• thin convex (3)
• medium concave (3)
• medium straight (4)
• medium convex (5)
• thick concave (5)
• thick straight (6)
• thick convex (7)
• cedar gilthead (1) This is a matching wildcard. Wildcards will never have knotholes.
• iron fish (10) This is a strength wildcard Wildcards will never have knotholes.

At first, the player will have thin concave to medium convex to play with. Then thick concave to thick convex would be released, and finally knotholes and the wildcards. Shapes can be matched by outline for a reduced bonus; concave, straight, or convex.

• There are levels of color, so new complexity and rewards can be unlocked with advanced skill. With the exception of the wildcards, colors levels are in pairs, one lighter than the other:
• golden cedar from the wildcard piece
• metalic grey iron from the wildcard piece
• red and orange
• yellow and green
• cyan and blue
• purple and magenta.

Scoring values go through the rainbow, Red through Magenta, 1 through 8, with Cedar as 10 and Iron as 1.

The colors will be released in sets. At first, the player will have Red, Yellow, Blue, and Magenta to play with. Then Orange and Cyan would be released, and finally Green and Purple. Wildcards, being scored as shapes, are released as shapes.

2 levels of color matching are possible. The more valuable perfect matches (e.g. red with red), and less valuable secondary matches (e.g. red with orange). The texture behind paired colors will be matched, though inverted, so that each piece is totally unique in greyscale, but secondary matching can still be perceived.

Scoring

Scoring has a Pass/Booch minimum score based on the value of total strength of blocks in the legs. Passing the strength requirement to allows color value to be totaled.

The base score is the color value total, to which bonuses are applied.

Bonus multipliers are based on strength above the Pass/Booch requirement, vertical color matching by individual table leg, horizontal shape matching across the four table legs, whole table sets in color and/or shape, bonus pieces used, bonus target shapes met, and speed. Speed is not coded at this time. The cedar gilthead, as a wild card, completes matches horizontally and/or vertically but adds little strength and fits no bonus target shapes. A cedar gilthead placed to finish a vertical color match and a horizontal shape match will allow both. The iron fish matches nothing, ruining potential matches, is very strong but has low value. Knothole blocks have a strength of 0, but otherwise do not interfere with shape and color matching or bonus outline targets. These matching multipliers can be stacked in the usual way (you know: Vegas. Monkey. Pokeyouinthenose. Etc.)

Different blueprints are possible. Tabletops may be thin, medium or thick. Scoring has a medium 6 high table as the default.

To simulate Puzzle Pirate alerts and rankings, scoring has been labeled with color text as bonuses are achieved, and booched to incredible labels are given on the blueprints and the session.

• Booched - Failed to meet /strength weight goal.
• Poor - A single match, color or shape
• Fine - One each color and shape, or a score high enough to meet that
• Good - Half each color and shape are matched. On the assumed basic of a 6 high table that would be 2 color matches and 3 shape matches. Or a score high enough to meet that.
• Excellent - A full blueprint of half matching. Or a score high enough to meet that.
• Incredible - A full blueprint of full matching. On the assumed basic of a 6 high table, either 4 color and 3 shapes, or 2 color and 6 shapes. Or a score high enough to meet that.

It is possible to do well enough on a single blueprint that a 3 blueprint session of Booched, Booched and Incredible will be Incredible overall.

Variability

There is a cedar gilthead wildcard piece for high value and completes matching bonuses. There is a iron fish wildcard piece for high strength which ruins matching bonuses. There are knothole pieces with strength values of zero. There is an extended block set for higher levels, including greater variety in shape and color. There is an extended blueprint set with bonus target outlines for higher levels.

End criteria

The game ends when a number of blueprints have been completed. As per PP guidelines, we are aiming for a game of 3-5 minutes. That will be determined by data gathered during testing. We estimate 3-4 Blueprints per game.

Difficulty scaling

There is an extended block set for higher levels. There is an extended blueprint set for higher levels.

Crafting type

Furnishing

Known problems

• We may have too much art. Colors and shapes can be cut.

• We may have too many colors.

• Game may be both too easy in the beginning and too hard on advanced if all the extended sets are used. Perlandria likes to think the Ultimates are up for it. We expect to cut back on some of the variability once we have tested the options we perceive to see which are more fun and more functional.

• Although the table visual matches the goal of being a puzzle and not a simulation, it may be too limited to fully represent Furnishing.

Notes

• This is already a group project:

Perlandria (Irig on Viridian) is a designer and the primary contact. The other designer and artist is EmberLeo (Omauwu on Viridian). ChienDD from Viridian is the coder. Perlandria's boyfriend may help with art when the time comes to polish.

• Lexicon

• Base Score - Score before multipliers, comprised of Value.
• Blocks - Game pieces used to fill the Blueprint.
• Blueprint - The central area of the game with the visual individual game goal of spaces to fill with blocks, and the visual overall session goal of Blueprint Scrolls to complete.
• Bonus - Something which increases score, by adding to the base score or adding to the multipliers Ex: exceeding strength goal Ex: wildcard
• Boxes - The idea of adding multiple block single click and single space choices to the River at advanced levels. Boxes may be random, shape sets, or color sets. Not coded.
• Cedar Gilthead - A special block that works as a wildcard, a value bonus and scoring multiplier.
• Color - A trait of a block, visually reflecting how it adds to the score before multipliers. Our colors are chosen for the highest contrast possible, based on Hex RGB values.
• Final Score - Base score times bonus multipliers. May refer to blueprint or session scores.
• Game Board - The area of game play, including scale, blueprint, workbench and river.
• Goal - The weight a completed blueprint's total block strength must match or exceed to win. Not meeting the goal is a booch.
• Iron Fish - A special block that acts as a wildcard with the highest strength in the game but ruins multipliers.
• Knothole - A trait of a block, visually reflecting strength of 0.
• Multiplier - Variability conditions that amplify the base score to be the final score. aka Bonus.
• piRat - The visual representation of the time penalty. The piRat damages pieces by turning blocks to knothole blocks if you take too long to make a move.
• River - The area of the game board where blocks enter the game.
• Scale - The area of the game board that shows goal progress of blueprint.
• Score - Is broken into base score, bonus multipliers, and final score.
• Scroll - A marker of needed and completed Blueprints, empty or showing score.
• Session - The game of a series of blueprints, ending in a score made of blueprint scores.
• Shape - A trait of a block, visually indicating strength.
• Strength - A trait of a block, representing by shape, that contributes towards the goal weight the legs can hold up.
• Tabletop - The area of the game board whose art indicates the strength needed to meet the goal.
• Target Shapes - Outlines in the Blueprint that, if matched by a piece, gives a score bonus.
• Value - The Base Score variable determined by color.
• Weight - The goal expressed in a number related to strength.
• Wildcard - One of the functions of the cedar gilthead block, in that it can match the color or shape in any set to complete the match for bonuses.
• Workbench - The area of the game board where blocks may be stored for later use, in this blueprint and in the whole session.

• Policy added to Code, which allows a menu to choose game parameters before playing. This will greatly aid play testing. Chien rocks! All hail the code puppy.

• Game has always been quietly solved for handedness. Partially because one developer is dyslexic, one developer is the righty in a lefty family, and another developer is a lefty in a righty family. It is innate. Ex: The weights on the right of the scale stay dark so when the scale is even it is still obvious which side is goal and which side is strength. ex: the blocks are symmetric.

• Candle timer removed from concept 4/17. See forum thread and wiki history for Candle information.
• Woodgrain removed from concept 4/18. See forum thread and wiki history for Woodgrain information.
• Colors narrowed from 10 to 8 4/23. See forum thread and wiki history for Color information.
• piRat stealing a piece is shelved 4/23, for a variety of reasons including scalability, ease of coding, ease of play, limiting art, etc.
• Boxes shelved during alpha testing of code.
• Half matching coded for colors but not for shapes. By background texture.
• Scoring announcements coded.
• Simulation of Puzzle Pirates duty report coded to encourage complex testing.
• Full scoring multipliers coded.
• piRat artwork, animation and sound effects added to code.
• Full color and shape sets added to code.
• Scroll artwork added to code.

Images

Category: GCPP Round 3 Proposals