Tiles & Sprites

I may have been wrong in a previous post where I stated that character sprites were often double the height of a single tile in 2D games. I’ve been working out some background tile to character sprite ratios, and firstly have found that there are very few recurring ratios, and secondly that there are a lot of games which use character sprites that are exactly the same height as their background tiles.

Most interestingly is that I hadn’t noticed this yet in any of the game I’ve previously written about on this Blog. In my head, I think I assumed that character sprites needed the extra detail provided by double height.

In Fez, Gomez measures the exact same height as the background tiles (with the exception of The Fez which sits on top of this height).

Again, in The Archer the character sprite and tile height are very similar, except for hats which seem to cause the illusion of height in games!

In Jonathan Lavigne’s Ninja Senki, the character sprite is not only the same height as the background tiles but is a pretty similar width too!

And in Cave Story, the character sprite for main character Quote is the exact same height as the tiles, however the NPC character is slightly taller.

What confuses me about this selection of new(ish) games, is why they all decided to work to these proportions. From an aesthetic point of view, I think it makes everything look neat and tidy, as every aligns nicely to a consistent grid. I can imagine that from a gameplay perspective, these proportions work in the favour of the player who must calculate jump and fire distances etc. However when I looked back at old NES platformers like the original Castlevania, Contra, Ghosts ‘n’ Goblins and Metroid it seemed that traditionally, character sprites were double the size of the background tiles (actually, in the case of Contra I couldn’t decide what size the tiles actually were, so I could be wrong!)

Background tiles half the height of character sprites:

One slight exception I found amongst old NES platformers, was the original Super Mario Bros, and similarly Kirby’s Adventure. In Super Mario Bros, Mario starts the game as a half-sized sprite, which is roughly the same shape as the background tiles.

However, this reduced size is probably just a way to leave room for growth when a mushroom is eaten:

This might similarly explain Kirby’s small size in Kirby’s Adventure, as Kirby expands when swallowing an item or enemy.

In this case, it’s probably just more likely that Nintendo have tried to show how small Kirby is in comparison to the world!

Even as we move into the world of 16-bit, sprite sizes remain consistent with previous versions of games. In Super Mario Bros 3, the sprite proportions remain pretty much the same as the original. In Super Matroid for SNES, character Samus seems slightly taller than before. She does wear a helmet though, so this additional height is another one of those hat things…

So the question is “who is right??”
After reading various forums, the general consensus is that it all dimensions are entirely the choice of the designer. There is no right or wrong, or good or bad. Which leaves me at a point in development where I need to make a choice… So for now, I’m going to concentrate on creating a sprite equal to the height of my (hypothetical) tiles. This means creating a sprite which is 16 pixels in height, rather than the 32 I was expecting to be using. Personally, I think this makes the game look nicer and hopefully will make it play fluently. I will have to convert if I find it difficult to add a decent amount of detail to my sprites, or if the space limitations make it difficult to animate, although I’m feeling pretty confident and inspired by my Indie Heroes who have proven 16px sprites to be ideal!

Xin Nian Kuai Le

Unless I’m horribly wrong and the internet has lied to me again, I may have just wished you a happy new year in Mandarin. Today’s fortune cookie told me I would make a name for myself, which is a fairly decent omen for the upcoming year of the Dragon. As a bonus, I’m up to date on my development timeline (which I will probably post soon so you know I’m not lying!) This week: Gather! (as in collecting my concept images and research, I think) and Experiment!

Zashiki-Warashi

I’ve spent most of today researching my little wrong-doer Zashiki-warashi to make sure its an appropriate choice for an antagonist. Its characteristics differ depending on the source, but there are a few constant characteristics which seem consistent in all accounts:

Zashiki-warashi takes the form of a child, boy or girl, between the ages of 3 and 12.
It prefers to live in large, old Japanese houses, and its presence is recognised from its little acts of mischief.
While it inhabits a home, the residing family receive great fortune.
Occasionally, a family member (normally a small child) will be able to see the Zashiki-warashi, but according to at least one account, only when it is about to leave.
Once the Zashiki-warashi has left, the family fall to ruin.

The Zashiki-warashi will not necessarily be placed in shrines, but I found this cute little Garden Statue which represents one! It’s though that you can attract a Zashiki-warashi by recognising its presence, so keeping one of these statues may help bring you luck. Due to the variations on the image of this spirit being, there are few visual sources on the internet, although the Hello Kitty at the top of the post is another representation!

For my Zashiki-warashi character, I’ve chosen a girl-ghost as a good adversary for my girl-hero. That way there’s no breach of male-female etiquette when it comes to conflict and in a way, they can relate to each other. Also, by coincidence the majority of the characters currently in working progress have turned out to be male, so this helps balance things out a little! I’ve tried to portray her as a good-natured being with a childish sense of mischief.

I’ve made sure to block out the eyes, as I’ve noticed in Jizou statues there’s never any eye detail. I attempted to convert my design into statue form in the top right hand corner, based on the photo of the statue I found. I somehow managed to make my drawing look more like a Kokeshi Doll than a statue, so I went with this for my colour version. The majority of Kokeshi dolls seem to have much less smiley disposition, so I used the opportunity to create something a little more sinister!
The article in the link suggests that originally the kokeshi dolls represented a “wish for a healthy child”, so my final design may well be a little wooden figure rather than a stone statue. But one with less wonky eyes and fewer graphite smudges:

Heroes & Villains

The Heroine
I’m now much closer to a version of Hana that I’m really happy with. I’ve moved away from focusing on “Western” or “foreign” characteristics, and started to think about the properties of the average tourist! Unfortunately, I haven’t had the opportunity to be a tourist for a few years now, so I’ve conjured up the ultimate tourist image using the guidelines of the internet…

Hat

Sunglasses

Shirt

Johnny Depp

Camera

Watch

Bag (big)

Shorts

Sandals

Google image search suggests that only overweight people can be tourists

Also, the stereotypical tourist only visits warm countries

I haven’t managed to apply all these to my final character design, considering the difficulties of converting small details into low-res pixel art (the character sprite will be 32 pixels tall at most). However, it would be interesting to factor some of these aspects into the inventory system- for example when she opens up her bag there could be a camera, sunglasses and a passport, which serve no purpose in the game but show that she is enjoying a sunny holiday in Japan. To apply these characteristics, I started off with a female-shaped template, which I can now use as a basis for any female character within the game. I’ve tried to put her in a few poses in order to create a little personality!

I used the three of these images to play around with a few minor alternatives, like “shorts or jeans?” “T-shirt or jacket?” and “messenger bag or backpack?”

(You can also see that I finally realised if I turn the brightness down to about -20 on my scanner then my scans come out a lot nicer!)
Combine the best aspects of these ideas with the original characteristics of Western Otaku and you have my final* character design:

*Note that I’m still toying with the idea of adding head-wear. Personally I’m a huge fan of hats, and feel I would definitely wear one on a Japanese holiday!

The Villain
At first I wasn’t sure if I actually wanted a “villain” in my game, or whether it would be a sort of natural phenomenon which causes disturbance. With the help of A Geek In Japan and a quick look into Japanese mythology, I’ve realised that I can pretty much combine villain and natural phenomenon together to create my “antagonist” (villain sounds too criminal for what I’m aiming for!).

In times past, the Japanese believed that Gods lived inside Sakura trees, and just before the rice-sowing season offerings were made under the trees.

From A Geek In Japan

With little knowledge about the majority of Japanese mythical beings, I turned to what I knew from anime.

In Cat Soup, the main character Nyatta travels to the land of the dead to reclaim the half of the soul of his sister, which was taken away by a Jizou. The start of the film shows that the sister Nyako is dying, and the Jizou comes to claim the soul. The soul is split in two when Nyatta tries to pull it back.

The Jizuo in Cat Soup has a creepy fixed smile. Although it doesn’t have the appearance of a being able to deal real harm to anyone, it seems to be fairly content about its soul-stealing nature. I thought perhaps I could use a similar being for Hanami, however when I researched these beings I realised that they are not regarded as villainous. In fact, in Cat Soup he is simply doing his duty by collecting the soul of a dead child (read the Wikipedia article for more details!). In Japan, statues can be found everywhere. People place children’s hats and bibs onto the statues to provide a blessing to their children.

A Jizuo statue is also seen in My Neighbour Totoro, when the two girls step into a shrine to protect themselves from the rain.

While the Jizuo could be considered the main “villain” in Cat Soup, in actual fact he is not a villainous character. In Totoro, the Jizuo statue acts as protection rather than hindrance. I started to think about how I could create a similar scenario, inspired by the idea if Gods living in trees, and spirits who reside in shrines and statues. I wrote up this villain criteria list:

Based on, but not identical to, an existing Japanese “creature” from mythology/legend/folklore

A being who resides in Sakura trees, but who is recognised with a Shrine elsewhere

Not a representation of something “evil”, but perhaps something “forgotten” or “misunderstood” (especially going along with themes of loneliness etc.)

Perhaps the act of disturbance is a cry for help, or a punishment for forsaken rituals

Whilst researching possible candidates, I discovered the story of Zashiki-warashi, a child-like being who has the power to provide and take away good-fortune. Its child-like nature means that its statues look quite similar to the Jizuo, who is often portrayed as having child-like features. It has a mischievous nature, which could lead to the “disturbance” of Hanami. I haven’t figured out details yet, but for now I’m going to carry on with character design for my “villain”!

Weekend Update #1

1. Started Reading A Geek In Japan
I originally figured I’d read this from cover to cover so that I didn’t miss anything, but decided to stop this sequence after about page 12 to look at the pictures throughout the book! Then, as my focus this weekend has been on character design, I stopped at the section titled “Japan Today” which details the daily lives of typical Japanese people.

The section opens with an explanation of the many meanings of the word Otaku, which is commonly used throughout the world to refer to someone who is “a fan of Japanese Culture”, especially those who love manga and anime. However, in Japan it is used to describe someone who is obsessed with a certain hobby, sometimes to the point of shutting themselves away from the world to spend more time doing the things they love. I don’t think introducing yourself as Otaku in Japan would go down too well!

2. Wrote the Game Design Document First Draft
This is still in a vague state, but the gaps are starting to get filled in. I’ve worked on the game story a little, as well as the setting and game characters. I will hopefully be splitting the game into four short levels, which each represent a different aspect of rural Japan. I’ve also imagined up about 10 NPC characters, who will make brief appearances in the game (time-permitting). The characters are based on character types from A Geek In Japan and the personality stereotypes from 51 Japanese Characters. I’ve got a fairly good backstory drafted up, although this may change depending on the events that occur in the game:

Hana is an arts university graduate who became depressed by the state of the economy and the lack of employment opportunities for young people. She has always been indecisive and a little unmotivated, and is confused about where to take her life after uni. She spends a year working and saving every last penny to fund a trip to Asia, in an attempt to discover what she wants from life and who she wants to be.
Hana starts he travels in Japan, where she stays in various hostels and cheap hotels. She enjoys the atmosphere of Japan and decides that she might stay a little longer and look for work. While she still has money to spare, she decides to spend early spring in a small mountain village where she can enjoy the rural country-side before travelling to the city to seek employment. She arrives at a time when the local residents are outside, enjoying the falling cherry blossoms. The owner of the hostel tells her that the custom is called “Hanami”. Hana spends a day outside, taking photographs and enjoying the pleasant sights, but goes back to the hostel early as she feels a little uncomfortable with spending long nights out in new places. She is woken up the next morning by the owner’s concerned cat, who has taken a liking to her. She tries to find the hostel’s owner, but seems to be on her own. She takes a look outside and finds that there is no one about at all. The cherry blossoms have just started to fall…

3. Continued Playing With Tiles
I haven’t made any more original tiles, instead I’ve been stealing tiles from screenshots of other people’s games and rearranging them to test their flexibility. This has especially helped me to consider things like diagonal tiles which only take up half the space, and what I’m going to refer to as “floating tiles”, which are partly transparent and add small details or effects to the tiles below. Out of respect for the original artists, I’m not going to post up any of my rearranged images without permission, but I will say that I’ve had a lot of fun doing this!

Tileset example from The Archer

4. Continued Character Development
I’m starting to understand my main character Hana a little better now, so I’ve been using the weekend to just casually scribble down trait updates. It’s somehow easier to create characters based on Japanese stereotypes than Western ones, as I know that stereotypes don’t really exist!

At first, I tried to base the character on a stereotypical Western Otaku/Nerd/Girl Gamer, but just couldn’t find a perfect representation. As a protagonist, Hana doesn’t excel in bad-ass-ness, but she’s not a fragile little flower either (no pun intended). The baseball T is there to show that she has a tom-boy side, and I’ve tried to avoid anything which be better suited to a Japanese character (like long socks!)

5. I went to the farmer’s market for the first time, but that’s irrelevant…

Japanese Interior Design

It’s nearly the end of the week, so my plan for today is to write up a first draft of my Game Design Document for this project. This will help get all my scatted ideas in one place!
Once that’s done, or probably if there’s nothing on TV at lunch time, I’m going to start reading my new book A Geek In Japan” which arrived in the post yesterday ^_^. The book is based on the content on Kirainet, a blog written by a Spanish guy living in Japan. It’s aimed at Otaku like me to give a really good insight into his new Japanese lifestyle with a slightly nerdy twist. His Blog is based around a lot of good quality photography, so I hope this is reflected in the book too!

I’m still unsettled on the graphical style I want to use for the game, but before I get comfortable with a definitive style I’ve carried on practising with tilesets inspired by Japanese interior design. Luckily for me, typical Japanese interior is very minimalist and easy to convert to square tiles!

I used the image as a basis for the tiles I wanted to create. It looks slightly pixelated because I actually scaled it down until the 16×16 pixel grid fit quite well. You can already see at this stage that all the objects in the photo are very angular, if not completely square atleast all the corners are rightangles! Basing tiles on this image also helped pick out colours with the colour picker. The colours I used would not have been my first choice if I had created this from scratch.

On a separate layer in Photoshop, I used the pencil tool to re-draw a part of the image to the grid.


By this point, you can already start to see some repetition of tiles in the cupboards, the vents and the frame of the cupboard. Obviously, the tiles were incredibly basic and boring, so I continued to use the pencil tool at a size of 1pixel to draw in some detail. For highlights and shadows I chose my own colours, based on the original colours that I had picked from the photo.

Using colours slightly lighter and slightly darker than the original, it was easy to add texture and depth. In addition to my tiles, I also picked out some misc objects which didn’t align to the grid, but which could be repeated and placed on shelves etc.

Once this was all done, it was time to put my tiles to the test. The point of a tileset is that each tile can be rearranged to create a completely new layout. A good tileset would have allowed me to do this seamlessly, but this experimental process helped me see where my tiles were slightly flawed. To rearrange my tiles, I cut out each unique tiles and placed it in the corner of my grid. This is what the “tileset” refers to- often when you see a tileset it is simply a group of squares which don’t correspond to each other until they are arranged by a designer. The squares are closely pushed together simply to make good use of space.

Example of a Mario game tileset

My Shelving Tileset:

Now, my traditional Japanese Shelving unit is transformed into a contemporary Swedish storage space:

Although, you can definitely see here where my tiles are less than perfect, especially in the corners and funny little places where I used half the tile for the cupboard frame etc. All in all, this new image was created without any editing to the original tiles, so most of the tiles here would be suitable to use for game backgrounds.
In addition to the shelf, I continued to recreate the room from the photo using tiles that aligned to my grid. The result is an image which represents just some distinct aspects of Japanese interior design which I would definitely like to use in my game!

With Grid

Without Grid

Early Art Development

Phil Fish’s devlog for the upcoming game Fez begins with a Photoshop mock-up of his game idea, made in the exact style that the game would be made in. With my cute character in mind, I started to get some ideas of how I wanted the game to look, and the kinds of colours I wanted to use, that sort of thing. So I thought I’d do the same thing. This would also act as my introduction to making tilesets for games, which is something I’ll be doing for the first time during the development of Hanami. I drew up the sketch above to get me thinking about what sort of objects would appear in the game a lot, and tried to assemble them into a small demonstration of the look of the game. It also led me to think about scale for the first time, as games are often way out of proportion. In a screenshot of Fez, a fan pointed this out for example:

However, the strange proportions are necessary based on the size of the tiles used. I worked out that Fez uses tiles which are 8×8 pixels in size, but these are expanded by about 5x when the game is played. This gives the game its very square feel, as there is little room for small details within each tile.

Games like The Archer and Cave Story use 16×16 tiles. While these don’t have to be more detailed, the opportunity is there, so for now I’m planning to create tiles which measure 16×16 pixels. By applying tiles to the sketch, I came up with this solution, which is by no means refined or finished:

I started by applying the 16×16 grid to the image, and draw a rough outline of the shapes as they would fit into that grid. Obviously, only background imagery really has to fit the grid perfectly. Objects and game items don’t have to consist of tiles, although in this case the tree seems to stand out a lot from the rest.

I mainly tried to concentrate on the tiles for the ground, as this was a single strip of tiles which were very easy to place and repeat. The difficulty was making enough that they weren’t too repetitive! I also tried to make sure they weren’t too overcomplicated at this point. Most of the tiles could be repeated and placed anywhere, but I made special end tiles with rounded corners which would only ever be placed on the ends!

As well as seamless tiles, I tried out creating single tiles. This closed type of tile is used in all three of the example games I’ve given in this post already, and make it even easier to repeat tiles into any form. In this case, each tile has an edge and stands out on its own, rather than fitting in to a bigger pattern.

I later added in a little more detail to the grass line, and made basic block-colour tiles for the background of this image. The tree is pretty much freehand at this point, and doesn’t adhere to grid or guide. I’m not sure if this is something I want to use much for background imagery, however it seemed to work well for the clouds in the very background. This image ended up looking very bright, and in my opinion a little too bright. The colours at this point are very inspired by Fez, but only for experimental purposes!

The placeholder character silhouette fits into a 32×32 square, which is a pretty standard character measurement in classic games. In terms of proportions, this means that tiles can sit at half the character’s height, representing accessibility. Tiles which create a vertical surface equal to or above the height of the character represent inaccessible areas, without having to take up too much room on screen.

Early Character Development

Getting the character right is one thing I want to get sorted before starting to work on the visual feel of everything else in the game. I think it’s really important that the character fits into the world, but that world is also in tune with the character. Working on the character first also means that I can start to make sprite animations for early prototypes with placeholder level design. It will help give an early impression of the game without having to work out loads of individual tiles for background imagery!

I began trying to design a character a while ago, but for the most part ended up sketching slight variations of the same thing, and it wasn’t working well or progressing. I mentioned already that I originally wanted to make the character a portrayal of a Japanese character, and found a site called 51 Japanese Characters which really helped. The site creates these “characters” based on Japanese personality stereotypes, for example your first thought of a Japanese woman may be a woman in a kimono and sandals.

Your first thought of a Japanese man might even be a ninja.

My original inspiration for the game character came from the Kawaii (cute) character. Thinking about David Perry’s explanation of Game Cliches, I thought the harmless, cute little girl in pink would make a good protagonist, as she looks as though she can do no wrong. Kawaii is almost completely unique to Japan, and therefore would have been good representation of a Japanese personality.

Before I really knew what the game was going to be about, my character designs reflected this personality in a very cute, happy way. I started to develop a chibi-esque cartoon style, which was very simple to draw and provided enough detail to get the character across. As the principles of the game started to develop, my realisations of the character also evolved to be a lot less smiley and cute.


I started to develop this idea further, but never really finished.
Developments in character design led me to realise however that the main character should be a foreigner, a representation of someone like me who dreams of going to Japan. For a fleeting moment, I though maybe I should base the character on myself. In a way, this would be ideal. I know myself very well, and probably be able to portray my personality quite accurately! The character would be a bit of a nerd, enjoying the geeky side of Japanese culture like anime and videogames, and definitely have a natural anti-social nature. While I’ll probably be using some of these ideas, the main character won’t be completely me, and here’s why:

Me= grumpy, dull, unmotivated, spiteful, boring. No one would want to play that game!
Before, I concentrated on tying together a personality from Japanese personality stereotypes. Instead my character will represent a Western, nerd, gamer grrl stereotype. It’s the type of person who would love to go to Japan, and I could probably still think up an accurate portrayal of her. As for a name, I’m currently rolling with Hannah or Hana, as it’s a fairly popular Western name, but also mean flower in Japanese (hence, HANA-mi).
As it would be cruel for the character to be completely alone, here I gave her a cat to keep her company. Perhaps I’ll add a twist that reveals the cat to be a super-villain.

Hanami Idea Explosion!

I guess this is a little like brainstorming, only it’s more of an explosion of words. I can’t think of a better name for it, especially one that sounds as exciting!
I got this idea from Gabriel Verdon at the beginning of his Devlog for The Archer. He begins development with a quick introduction to the concepts behind the game, and his objectives for the finished result. As a quick introduction to the characters and settings for the game, he takes a simple statement and pulls apart separate words to explain further details. With the ideas I’ve got at the moment, I guess my opening statement would be:

A lone girl travels empty streets collecting cherry blossoms.

To make the statement a little more specific, I thought I would expand it to:

A long girl travels through the empty streets of Japan collecting Cherry Blossom after Hanami.

It’s still quite a vague overview, but I’ve left room for improvement ^_^.

Notes:

-Hanami- Gameplay is based around environmental obstacles. The player must find blossoms in hard-to-find or hard-to-reach locations, although I’m not sure yet whether this will be with the aid of special abilities or if the challenges will be fairly similar the whole way through. This will ultimately depend on what I manage to program.

-Feel of the game- There will be a conflicting sense of both loneliness and serenity throughout, achieved through lack of player communication and a peaceful setting.

-Symbols- Japanese written characters (Kanji) will appear throughout, as well as traditional Japanese symbolism such as the Sakura blossoms themselves, which are an ephemeral symbol of mortality.

-Music- I would like the music to sound like a typical “game soundtrack” (repetitive, electronic, catchy yet annoying.) But I also want to base it one traditional Japanese tunes, to help the game feel authentic. Throughout the project I will be listening to a lot of Gackt and Nobuo Uematsu for inspiration, but no changes there really!

-Movie Influences- Studio Ghibli’s so-called “Blue Sky, Green Grass” films- Laputa, Porco Rosso, Kiki’s Delivery Service… but also My Neighbours the Yamadas for a little insight into Japanese life, and anime like Angel’s Egg and Cat Soup for the sense of journeying through strange, lonely worlds (these second films also add a sense of darkness, which is something I’m currently toying with.)

-Game Influences- The Archer for its incredible use of Game Maker and beautiful concept and asset artwork, Ninja Senki for its Japanese themes and simple graphical style which create a great example of everything a platformer should be, and Nevermore 3 for its representations of isolation and loneliness in a beautiful world.

-One thing I really want to get across is problems with communication in a foreign place, and a lack of understanding of signs and symbols. I want there to be minimal dialogue throughout the game AT BEST, the player will have to rely on their own interpretation of symbols, imagery and gestures in order to get through the game. Some will be more complex than others!

-Verdon goes into a lot of details on his post about the inventory system, and how it acts as a means of providing higher-resolution details of items and characters which don’t appear very detailed in the actual game. This is definitely something I will consider! There will be items and pick-ups to help the character along, however I’m not sure what these will be yet.

Game Design: Where To Begin…

Again, I wish there was a solid answer here.

Back in Rules of Play, the book begins by defining the term game designer;

A game designer is a particular kind of designer, much like a graphic designer, industrial designer, or architect. A game designer is not necessarily a programmer, visual designer, or project manager, although sometimes he or she can also play these roles in the creation of a game.
The focus of the game designer is designing gameplay, conceiving and designer rules and structures that result in an experience for players.

Before a game is developed, it must to designed. The book emphasises iterative design, which is a design process. A game cannot be designed all at once, but is a drawn out process with a beginning and end.

Iterative design is a play-based design process. Emphasising playtesting and prototyping, iterative design is a method in which design decisions are made based on the experience of playing a game while it is in development. In an iterative methodology, a rough version of the game is rapidly prototyped as early in the design process as possible. This prototype has none of the aesthetic trappings of the final game, but begins to define its fundamental rules and core mechanics. This prototype is played, evaluated, adjusted, and played again, allowing the designer to base decisions om the successive iterations of the game. Iterative design is a cyclic process that alternates between prototyping, playtesting, evaluation and refinement.

I found this horrible little graphic demonstrating the Iterative Design process on Gamasutra, it’s not much to look at but it gets the point across. It’s something I want to constantly refer to, as I’ve previously attempted to evade making changes to my designs.

Jesse Schell says: A Game Begins With An Idea

1. Think of an idea
2. Try it out
3. Keep changing it and testing it until it seems good enough

In Jesse Schell’s book The Art Of Game Design, he uses cards which he calls “lenses” to convince the designer to look at game designer from different perspectives. In terms of conceptualising a design through an idea, he turns to the lens of infinite inspiration.

To you use this lens, stop looking at your game, and stop looking at games like it. Instead, look everywhere else.
Ask yourself these questions:
● What is an experience I have had in my life that I would want to share with others?
● In what small way can I capture the essence of that experience and put it into my game?

I’ve identified my “experience” as a desire to have an experience which I have not had yet! So, now I’m asking the question “how can I capture the essence?” Schell goes on to explain that every game is a solution to a problem. The problem could be a broad question, similar to ones I’ve already been asking myself. Something like:
“how can I make an fun, contemporary side-scrolling platformer?”
or more specific, like
“how can I make a videogame which represents Hanami?”

For the specialist project, I relied pretty heavily on the The Computer Game Design Course. The previous two books talk alot about designer, but this last book makes the transition from design to development. It’s almost a step-by-step guide for someone completely new to the industry, providing advice and frameworks for the entire process from conception to release. Once the game proposal is in place, it suggests that the following items are swiftly taken care of:
1. Asset Artwork
2. Interface
3. Story
4. Level Design
5. Game Mechanics
6. Audio
The result of a realisation of these things makes up the basis of the Game Design Document, which “expresses vision for the game, describes its contents and presents a plan for implementation” (Gamasutra). These considerations should be made before the game goes into development, so for me the next step is to make a start on this, to make sure I know what the game is, how it works, what it’s going to look like and how it’s going to sound through a process of experimentation.

What Makes A Platformer?

From David Perry on Game Cliches:

The platform action game is one of the oldest game genres, and there have been multitudes of variants on the theme. Naturally, there have been some tried-and-true design decisions over the years, and many of them have become clichés of the genre.

Do Re Mi Fantasy for SNES

1. Millions of items to collect
Usually, the item being collected is does nothing on its own, but can grant the player something special if enough are collected.

Megaman 2 for NES

Special power-up and pick-up items
Some items instantly grant the player the ability to do something extra, or will restore previously lost stats like health, ammo or lives.

Super Mario Bros for NES

Plenty of low-level NPC enemies to fight
Enemies are usually defeated by simply jumping on them, throwing something at them or using a special character skill.

Prince of Persia for SNES

Your character is very acrobatic
The playable character of a platformer must be able to reach hard to get areas by running, climbing and jumping about and being very flexible!

Sonic The Hedgehog for Sega Megadrive

There are many animals as main characters
Here the protagonist is a speedy hedgehog. Interesting.

Tombi for Playstation

Oddball storylines
In Tombi! the world is taken over by evil Pigs who have stolen an ancient amulet, and must be captured in magical purses to restore order. It’s undoubtedly a good game setting.

Abe's Oddysee for Playstation

Jumping
Obviously, platformers consist of an arrangement of platforms which in many cases are reached by jumping.

Limbo for XBLA

Climbing
Although in traditional side-scrolling platformers to objective is to travel from left to right, in order to reach you destination the path will often take you up and down.

Rayman for Atari Jaguar

Moving platforms
In Platformer games, some platforms scroll left and right or up and down for no apparent reason other than to add an extra challenge to the player. Miscalculating a move on a moving platform can result in an unwanted casualty!

Super Meat Boy for PC

A game world in a Platformer consist of levels, usually increasing in difficulty. Each level differs slightly, although the game mechanics are usually very similar.

Earthworm Jim for Sega Megadrive

Bosses
A “Boss” in a platformer is a tougher enemy, which usually makes an appearance at the end of a level. Losing to a Boss will halt progress until the Boss is defeated. The final Boss is usually the game’s main villain.

Kirby Superstar for SNES

Keeping Score
By collecting items, defeating enemies or simply reaching a destination in a certain time, the player gains points which will either grant the player a bonus or get saved on a list of high scores, which the player can later try to beat.

Braid for XBLA

Minimal Story
An example of a classic Platformer story is a Mario scenario where a damsel in distress is kidnapped and must be rescued by the protagonist. The game represents the journey the hero must face in order to save his love. Interestingly, this reference in Braid does not fully represent this scenario, as Braid has a reputation for its especially convoluted back-story!

So yes, we do have game clichés. Like all entertainment media, games have developed some clichés — situations and actions that are recognizable or that lead to predictable results and other predictable stereotypes.
Although clichés are useful because they allow players to operate within a familiar environment and they allow game designers to assume certain elements of a game and predict some of the responses of the players, they can also be an opportunity to throw some surprises into the mix…