Lil Racerz - Top Down Racer

Discussion in 'Upcoming iOS Games' started by blastone, Nov 1, 2009.

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  1. blastone

    blastone Well-Known Member
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    #1 blastone, Nov 1, 2009
    Last edited: May 17, 2010
    Hi TouchArcade!

    I just wanted to show a few screens of a top down arcade racer that I am working on. Its still got a couple of weeks dev left on it, but it's coming along very nicely and I thought I would share with the fine folk here. Its nice to be able to post a show and tell after seeing everybody else awesome work!

    A list of the game features......

    - 17 unique tracks
    - 4 environments, Jungle, Desert, Snow and Racetrack
    - 9 unlockable cars with Turbos
    - Sweet drifting physics
    - Stunning retro graphics, mixed with cool 3d effects
    - Ingame Coin pickups
    - Garage for upgrading cars
    - Leaderboards and achievements
    - 3 leagues of difficulty
    - Smart AI players
    - Loads of secret shortcuts
    - Ramps for serious airtime
    - Easily terrified sqishable spectators!
    - Cool Chiptune soundtracks throughout!

    Ill add some videos tomorrow... (any advice on a really fast screen capture tool with audio from other game devs??)

    But in the interim heres a bunch of ingame shots!
    Thanks for looking!

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  2. TouchChatterbox

    TouchChatterbox Well-Known Member

    May 21, 2009
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    #2 TouchChatterbox, Nov 1, 2009
    Last edited: Nov 1, 2009
    Nice to be the first one to post in a thread for once :) Anyway, looks pretty damn polished, well done.

    I would reduce the size of your virtual controls ... at the very least, the accelerator which is just huge. But, minimum, the turning ones need to be reduced by 50%.

    I suggest you focus on getting the feel of the driving right and perhaps look at adding weapons in a future patch. I came into this thread expecting a Micro Machines clone but was pleased to see this game features realistic environments. If the racing handling feels right, you will be in a very nice niche.

    Squishable spectators would be cool and could lead to point combos. I wouldn't do powerups however, keep the feel realistic. But I can also see squishable photographers as another fun addition. Perhaps on night tracks,
    their flashes send the screen white for a few seconds, hindering your vision. So the aim could be, when you see one, to accelerate and hit them before they can do that!! :p

    Can't wait to play this and will be following your progress keenly! :) I dig what you're accomplishing here.

    If you need help with anything now or in future, do let me know -- like menu screens, level designs or whatever.
     
  3. Palfince

    Palfince Well-Known Member

    Dec 30, 2008
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    Looks pretty good, although I'm a little wary about the controls... I think it would be better if the camera always stayed behind your car and the buttons turned left and right, instead of the screen staying still.

    Other than the controls, the game looks great and I think a few weapons, nitro and squishable spectators would be excellent additions.
     
  4. DaveMc99

    DaveMc99 Well-Known Member

    Mar 1, 2009
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    Seattle, WA USA
  5. blastone

    blastone Well-Known Member
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    Jun 9, 2009
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    Good find on my flash version :D

    Ive got the handling the same and its coming along nicely. Thanks for the positive replies.... sqishable spectators here we come!
     
  6. skyye06

    skyye06 Well-Known Member

    Jul 21, 2009
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    What kind of weapons do you have in mind?

    A mix of spy hunter perhaps:p
     
  7. ferb12321

    ferb12321 Well-Known Member

    Oct 6, 2009
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    I don't like the idea of squishing people. there goes my hopes down the drain for a micro machines like game for the iPhone. there needs to be powerups!
     
  8. blastone

    blastone Well-Known Member
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    #8 blastone, Nov 2, 2009
    Last edited: Nov 2, 2009
    I am thinking that a good list of powerups would be:

    1) Oil Slicks
    2) Nitro Boost
    3) Heatseeking Missile

    I'm certainly open to more suggestions!

    As far as sqishing people goes... it's not the aim of the game... but its something that might just happen if you took a corner badly ....... :D

    Ive designed the layouts of all the tracks... now Im in the process of naming them... (I can tell you naming tracks is harder then you think!) I have 11 tracks all up, 4 desert, 3 snow, 2 forest, 2 racetrack and they are all looking for good names......

    The tracks are shown in the image below.

    [​IMG]

    If anyone is curious about how I made the tracks, I used the tile editing program Tiled, with a tileset corresponding to the track terrain. I then use flash scrip to convert the tiled XML output into a Maya script which creates a plane with all the textures on it. I did it in 3d so that I can do cool stuff like baking on the shadows as well as adding some nice 3d objects or a bit o 2.5D love.

    Its a solo project, design and dev, and all the rest :D
     
  9. skyye06

    skyye06 Well-Known Member

    Jul 21, 2009
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    The tracks look very nice...and your right thinking of names are pretty hard. All I could think of for the first one are boring names such as desert storm

    What I would personally love to see:
    -alternative routes
    As for the car think mach 5 now that would be awesome
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mach_5

    or and how about turrets for the front of the car.
     
  10. Twitchfactor

    Twitchfactor Well-Known Member

    Apr 27, 2009
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    25+ Year Game Developer
    Somewhere between Genius & Insanity
    Cool looking game. The Flash version plays better than your screenshots. Might I suggest a bit more contrast in your lighting, so objects that you collide with are more apparent.

    I personally don't think you should clutter the game up with weapons and such. It would be nice to have a solid Super Sprint-like racer with great controls and great AI. BTW, your AI's pretty good. I went out of my way to mess it up and it did a really good job of getting back on track.

    One thing you should fix; your car names. No matter what cute disclaimer you put in tiny lettering at the start of your game, using the names; Ford, Mitsubishi, Subaru, etc. WILL get you sued or at the very least have your app pulled from the store for however long it takes to fix the "error". Companies pay lots of dollars for the use of names and likeness, it's called "licenses" and the "licensors" are very protective (I know, I've worked on a couple of race games and even when you're a big company, they're protective). Just change the names and you should be fine, the cars are too small to tell what they are anyway.

    Good stuff. Let us know when it's available.
     
  11. blastone

    blastone Well-Known Member
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    Jun 9, 2009
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    Thanks for the smart advice :D Ill come up with some appropriate non branded names for this version. Good pointer on the contrasts too.
     
  12. TouchChatterbox

    TouchChatterbox Well-Known Member

    May 21, 2009
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    Great, but like I and other people have said, this game doesn't need those things. Keep the racing action pure IMHO.

    Track name suggestions, in order:

    DESERT 1: Speedway Sands
    TARMAC 1: Concrete Canyon
    SNOW 1: Shiver Gulch
    SNOW 2: Frostbite Peak
    DESERT 2: Dune de la Grande
    SNOW 3: Yeti Valley
    TARMAC 2: Razorback Raceway
    DESERT 3: Back of Beyond
    FOREST 1: Green Labyrinth
    FOREST 2: Eden's Landing
    DESERT 4: Dead Man's Bluff
     
  13. Acidbottle

    Acidbottle Well-Known Member

    Apr 24, 2009
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    this looks really neat!

    i like the idea of squishy spectators, some games take themselves too serious and any small useless but ammusing things like this in a game cheers me up :D

    im not mad hot for powerups and weapons. a straight micro machine style racer is just fine, although as an extra mode i wouldnt object, much in the style of supercars back on the old 16-bit computers.

    chatterbox is right tho about the handling, this must be spot on in order to get an instant wave of positive reviews. i can sense this will do quite well if the controls are like butter :)
     
  14. RayLancer

    RayLancer Well-Known Member

    Dec 8, 2008
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    YES! A top-down racing game. I've been playing a lot of Rally King EX on Retro Game Challenges (DS) and Racing Gears Advance (GBA), and I've been wanting a good top-down racing game on the iDevice.
     
  15. blastone

    blastone Well-Known Member
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    Jun 9, 2009
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    TouchChatterbox they are AWESOME NAMES!
    I will very likely pinch a few of them :D

    I like the thoughts here as well, focus on the racing. Thanks for all the wise words and help so far..... if anyones interested in early beta testing (I am going on holidays for a couple of months next week so message me quick!)

    then please PM me through a UID of your device and Ill prepare a package. The racing is drifty at the minute, so I would really like to get thoughts on what to change... improve etc etc.

    Thanks for being such a helpful forum too, its a really refreshing to be at a forum with such helpful and constructive comments.
     
  16. skyye06

    skyye06 Well-Known Member

    Jul 21, 2009
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    those are really good suggestions, especially the last 3
     
  17. drelbs

    drelbs Well-Known Member

    Jun 25, 2009
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    PM Sent. :cool:

    I have Nano Rally, and I'm eager to see how this compares...
     
  18. arta

    arta Well-Known Member

    Feb 14, 2009
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    Port of this game, right?

     
  19. paulm12

    paulm12 Well-Known Member

    Sep 13, 2009
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    Hey! Congrats, it looks AMAZING. I would definitely suggest weapons, and maybe specific missions like to take out a certain opponent to get a new track or . It could be power ups (like Mario kart or wipeout), or weapons you equip at the start of a race (like full auto). I personally think equippable weapons would be better, one in front, one in back, but hey, its your game.(i only say this because there are so many kart racers with power ups, a gem like yours could fall into that category) Also, a burnout-like take down thing would also be fun, with slo-mo and stuff. If you used equpiiable weapons, I would suggest the following: (also, leveling up weapons could be a good incentive to keep players playing)
    here are some ideas

    Front (offence):

    Missiles-(tap to shoot, medium splash damage, medium speed, slow reload, high damage)

    Machine gun-(shoots two barrels directly in front of car, no splash damage, fast speed, fast reload, low damage)

    Flame-thrower-(tap to shoot or tilt to aim, medium splash damage, continuous stream, slow reload/needs fuel, medium damage)

    Spikes-(front mounted, high damage, non-projectile)

    Lazer-(shoots directly forward, medium damage, continuous stream, can be overheated, though, wait to cool down, than fire again)

    Homing Grenade-(a medium damage, slow reloading, heat seeking bomb, less powerful than missiles, though)

    Nuclear Bomb-(Super-slow reload, HUGE splash damage, EXTREME damage, leaves a trail of nuclear waste)


    Rear: (defence)

    Mines-(slow reload, high damage, medium splash)

    Oil Slick (fast reload, no damage, slows down opponent)

    Ice Trap-(medium reload, causes control loss on contact)

    Tombstone (huge shield you start with, which you can deploy on command, instantly killing on contact only once though, inspired by Death Race)

    A.W.A.Y.(Anti-Weapon-Around-You; basically forms a reflective shield around you, but still allows you to shoot ahead, slow reload)

    Smoke Screen-(fast reload, no damage, causes smog to cover the opponents screen, possible causing them to have to swipe it off)

    Nuclear Waste (an exploding "substance" that trails behind you)
     
  20. blastone

    blastone Well-Known Member
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    Jun 9, 2009
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    Yeah thats my flash version of it....
    but this version already handles a little better, and the ai is smoother. The 3d elements in the iphone one add a nice depth to it as well.

    But the graphics are the same, the tracks are new, and the overall vibe I think will be the same. I think first release will be racing focussed, then I can add a weapon and a track per upgrade ..... hopefully that will keep it fresh and fun!
     

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