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Cart #48283 | 2018-01-18 | Code ▽ | Embed ▽ | License: CC4-BY-NC-SA
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Background:
I made this little game as part of a rapid prototyping course. We had a week to hand in a complete game (meaning: start screen, game loop, win and game over condition + screen) with only three constrictions: We had to use Pico-8, we had to generate a random game name with the videogamena.me generator, hence the origin of the title: Crossdressing Lizard Unleashed, and we were only allowed to use one screen in Pico-8, no scrolling.
I didn't have any prior programming experience, so basically Lua has been the first programming language I have really used. This is the result of 5 days of learning.

Game:
You play as the Crossdressing Lizard, who has escpaded from its cell in the zoo but still has to find its way past the zoo guardians and out of the zoo itself.

Mechanics:
Use the arrow keys to avoid the enemies and escape through the doors, which open up one at a time at the side of the screen.
To confuse your enemies, you can change your clothing (with the x or c key) to match the color of the zoos floor. They will have trouble following you then.

State of the prototype:
Because I knew I didn't have that much time for this, I didn't plan too much and got most of my ideas in the game. What I couldn't really get to work though was making the escape doors randomly appear so the gameplay is always different. The second enemy's movement is also still hardcoded to the current location and appearance time frame of the doors, so that would have to change also.
Other then that I'd thought of adding obstactles or other level elements, that would give the game a more labyrinth feeling in later levels, but I don't really know how to program the enemies for this case. Right now they are just following the doors or the player character, that's all they do.

Well, that's all for now. I hope I'll have time to come back to this after I finished the courses this semester.
If you have any thoughts, suggestions or ideas of how to continue or improve my little escape game, I'd love to hear it.
all the best,
Rue

P#48288 2018-01-17 19:16 ( Edited 2018-02-19 21:09)

Interesting concept with the camouflage effect.

For a moment I was taken aback by being thrown directly into the line of fire. On second thought, even if this was just serendipitous because you had no time to write an intro, I like the idea of being faced immediately with "Oh sXXX! I have to get moving!" It's brutal, but it adds an air of urgency to the game.

One thing: It can hard to select the right color by cycling.

Maybe if you'd used only four colors and then the user had to do X+direction to pick one--it'd make the user have to remember which direction is which color AND would give them the added danger of switching colors requiring them to stop moving briefly. I dunno, might be a real pain in action, just thinking out loud here.

Great title. Reminds me of Eddie Izzard. :)

P#48345 2018-01-19 02:16 ( Edited 2018-01-19 07:17)

Just checked out some Eddie Izzard, funny chap ;)

thank you for your feedback, the immediate start was indead mainly because of time constraints, but I also liked it, so I might keep it.

I don't completely understand your point about the cycling though. Right now, there are three colors to choose from and you can cycle through them using x and c. However, the ground floor has foor colors, so you can't be camouflaged all the time. You said to use the X+direction to pick one, what do you mean by that? Moving left or right would pick a color?

Independent from that, I like the idea that the player has to stop to change colors, that would add some more strategy to the whole mix.

Well, I hope I have some time next month to get back into this, I really enjoyed creating the little lizard guy ;)

P#48463 2018-01-22 18:24 ( Edited 2018-01-22 23:24)

I just meant that the cycling is too easy to get wrong in a hurry, and then you have to make another loop, and if you know you have to go back around the loop, you tend to hit the button rapid fire to do it, and it's easy to overdo it.

I mean, yeah, it's part of the challenge to get it right, but getting it wrong just feels more like an accidental pain-in-the-neck than an inadequate skill that needs work.

Honestly, I'm not sure if my idea is actually better. I'm really just itching for a more reliable way to select the color, that's all.

P#48464 2018-01-22 18:43 ( Edited 2018-01-22 23:50)

Why are they crossdressing?

P#49428 2018-02-19 16:09 ( Edited 2018-02-19 21:09)

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