Student Name: Geoff P Quinn

Student ID: @00112248

SpaceWar!

Fast paced shoot-em up

“Something strange this way comes!”™

Written by Geoff P Quinn

Version # 1.00(alpha)

Monday, May 24, 2004
Table of Contents

Name of Game_______________________________________ Error! Bookmark not defined.

Design History__________________________________________________________________ 5

Version 1.10____________________________________________________________________ 5

Version 2.00____________________________________________________________________ 5

Version 2.10____________________________________________________________________ 5

Game Overview__________________________________________________________________ 6

Philosophy____________________________________________________________________ 6

Philosophical point #1___________________________________________________________ 6

Philosophical point #2___________________________________________________________ 6

Common Questions____________________________________________________________ 6

What is the game?_______________________________________________________________ 6

Why create this game?____________________________________________________________ 6

Where does the game take place?___________________________________________________ 6

What do I control?______________________________________________________________ 6

How many characters do I control?__________________________________________________ 6

What is the main focus?___________________________________________________________ 6

What’s different?________________________________________________________________ 6

Feature Set_____________________________________________________________________ 7

General Features______________________________________________________________ 7

Multi-player Features_________________________________________________________ 7

Editor_________________________________________________________________________ 7

Game play_____________________________________________________________________ 7

The Game World________________________________________________________________ 8

Overview______________________________________________________________________ 8

World Feature #1______________________________________________________________ 8

World Feature #2______________________________________________________________ 8

The Physical World____________________________________________________________ 8

Overview______________________________________________________________________ 8

Key Locations__________________________________________________________________ 8

Travel________________________________________________________________________ 8

Scale_________________________________________________________________________ 8

Objects_______________________________________________________________________ 8

Weather_______________________________________________________________________ 8

Day and Night__________________________________________________________________ 8

Time_________________________________________________________________________ 8

Rendering System______________________________________________________________ 9

Overview______________________________________________________________________ 9

2D/3D Rendering_______________________________________________________________ 9

Camera_______________________________________________________________________ 9

Overview______________________________________________________________________ 9

Camera Detail #1_______________________________________________________________ 9

Camera Detail #2_______________________________________________________________ 9

Game Engine___________________________________________________________________ 9

Overview______________________________________________________________________ 9

Game Engine Detail #1___________________________________________________________ 9

Water________________________________________________________________________ 9

Collision Detection______________________________________________________________ 9

Lighting Models_________________________________ Error! Bookmark not defined.

Overview_______________________________________________ Error! Bookmark not defined.

Lighting Model Detail #1__________________________________ Error! Bookmark not defined.

Lighting Model Detail #2__________________________________ Error! Bookmark not defined.

The World Layout_____________________________________________________________ 10

Overview_____________________________________________________________________ 10

World Layout Detail #1__________________________ Error! Bookmark not defined.

World Layout Detail #2__________________________ Error! Bookmark not defined.

Game Characters______________________________________________________________ 11

Overview_____________________________________________________________________ 11

Creating a Character________________________________________________________ 11

Enemies and Monsters________________________________________________________ 11

User Interface_____________________________________ Error! Bookmark not defined.

Overview________________________________________ Error! Bookmark not defined.

User Interface Detail #1__________________________ Error! Bookmark not defined.

User Interface Detail #2__________________________ Error! Bookmark not defined.

Weapons_______________________________________________________________________ 12

Overview_____________________________________________________________________ 12

Weapons Details #1______________________________ Error! Bookmark not defined.

Weapons Details #2______________________________ Error! Bookmark not defined.

Musical Scores and Sound Effects_____________________________________________ 13

Overview_____________________________________________________________________ 13

Red Book Audio_______________________________________________________________ 13

3D Sound______________________________________________________________________ 13

Sound Design_________________________________________________________________ 13

Single Player Game____________________________________________________________ 14

Overview_____________________________________________________________________ 14

Single Player Game Detail #1__________________________________________________ 14

Single Player Game Detail #2__________________________________________________ 14

Story_________________________________________________________________________ 14

Hours of Game-play___________________________________________________________ 14

Victory Conditions___________________________________________________________ 14

Multi-player Game_____________________________________________________________ 15

Overview_____________________________________________________________________ 15

Max Players__________________________________________________________________ 15

Servers_______________________________________________________________________ 15

Customization_______________________________________________________________ 15

Internet______________________________________________________________________ 15

Gaming Sites__________________________________________________________________ 15

Persistence___________________________________________________________________ 15

Saving and Loading___________________________________________________________ 15

Character Rendering__________________________________________________________ 16

Overview_____________________________________________________________________ 16

Character Rendering Detail #1________________________________________________ 16

Character Rendering Detail #2________________________________________________ 16

World Editing______________________________________ Error! Bookmark not defined.

Overview________________________________________ Error! Bookmark not defined.

World Editing Detail #1__________________________ Error! Bookmark not defined.

World Editing Detail #2__________________________ Error! Bookmark not defined.

Extra Miscellaneous Stuff____________________________________________________ 17

Overview_____________________________________________________________________ 17

Junk I am working on…_______________________________________________________ 17

“User Interface Appendix”______________________________________________________ 17

“Character Rendering and Animation Appendix”_______________________________ 17

“Story Appendix”______________________________________________________________ 17

Design History

SpaceWar was created as the final project for the CCSF class Game Design with Flash MX

IDST 144

Version 1.10

Version 1.10 includes some tuning and tweaking that I did after making my initial pass at the design. Here is what I changed.

1. Added the visual FX. Bombs and such like.

2. I have created feedback forms so I can decide how to proceed

3. Created the first projector version for testing in class

Version 2.00

Version 2.10

Game Overview

Philosophy

Philosophical point #1

This game is a typical fly a spaceship and shoot em to score points, you get 3 lives and

Your health degenerates when you collide with something, you can replenish your health as you

Play.

Philosophical point #2

This game is extremely simple to play, is fast paced and hopefully FUN!!!

Philosophical point #3

Common Questions

What is the game?

The game is based on some of the earliest computer games, inspiration also came form

“Lost in Space” and “Mars Attacks!!!”

Why create this game?

The game was a challenge to see if I could create an alpha version of a game in one college semester.

Where does the game take place?

The game takes place in space

What do I control?

As the player you fly a ship

How many characters do I control?

Just the main character (ship)

What is the main focus?

Scoring points and shooting things

What’s different?

To be honest not a lot, its quite a generic game, hopefully its just fun to play

Feature Set

General Features

Space Setting

Multicolored enemy ships

Animated asteroids and LavaWorlds

3D FX graphics

32-bit color

Multiplayer Features

None implemented at this time

Editor

None implemented at this time

Gameplay

Simple key-presses to operate the game characters

The Game World

Overview

The game world is simple outer space

World Feature #1

The first feature to be implemented was the spaceships floating flying ability

I wanted the player to feel gravity and innertia

World Feature #2

I wanted also to use minimal resources, because the game uses a lot of code I wanted it

Be conservative on heavy processor intensive elements like graphics and sound

The whole game at alpha comes in at under 3mb in size

The Physical World

Overview

Describe an overview of the physical world. Then start talking about the components of the physical world below in each paragraph.

The following describes the key components of the physical world.

Key Locations

Just outer space

Travel

The player can fly around in any direction (360 degrees)

Scale

The characters are quite small in size, allowing for lots of action on the screen

Objects

Enemies (3 different), lavabombs and asteroids

Weather

No weather considerations in version 1

Day and Night

Not application to a space scene

Time

In the game a timer counts down your time, you die by either running out of health or running out

Of time

Rendering System

Overview

Give an overview of how your game will be rendered and then go into detail in the following paragraphs.

2D/3D Rendering

Standard PC/Mac game graphicswise

Camera

Overview

Scrolling background the player’s ship is in view all the time

Camera Detail #1

No special details

Camera Detail #2

No special details

Game Engine

Overview

Actionscipt, code written similar to ‘C’ code using functions and variables, no real classes used as in C++ or Java

Game Engine Detail #1

The game engine will keep track of everything in the world like such and such.

Water

There will be water in the world that looks awesome and our game engine will handle it beautifully.

Collision Detection

Collision detection in this alpha version is based on simple Actionscript hit testing

The World Layout

Overview

A Space world with stars and a black background

Game Characters

Overview

The player is a spaceshipt

Creating a Character

The character was created in photoshop based on pictures of spaceships

Enemies and Monsters

The enemies are simple triangular shapes, with bright colors to distinguish them

Special Effects (exhausts)

All the ships have exhause flames, created in 3ds Studio Max using particle systems.

Weapons

Overview

The player can fire rockets, there are five bullets loaded at a time, each round representing a clip

The can all be fired at once, but once fired the player has to wait for the rockets to die before he can fire again.

Musical Scores and Sound Effects