Google 20 is an idea created by Google that had their employees spend 20% of the work time (which would end up being one day) on doing whatever they wished to do. For my Google 20 project, I will be making a survial game that reflects on the user's decisions. By the end of this project, I hope to create a game that can be played over and over with multiple outcomes to keep the user entertained no matter how many times it is played. The characters (in order to make it somewhat simple for me) would be in 8-bit rather than a hand drawn figure. Every action that the user makes will have a corresponding movement/action, such as a speech bubble that critcizes the user's choice, or the actual event happening to the character. The story, although it starts the same way everytime, will gradually branch out, creating a flow chart that the user follows. I'm hoping to not make the conclusions the same in order to ensure that not every decision made will eventually lead to a happy ending. I chose to do a project like this because I wanted to create a game, but I didn't want something that had too much detail. It may seem like I just got lazy (which to be honest is partially correct), but chicken I believe that a simple game like this can be equally as fun as other games. An easy concept can save the user time, as they don't have to go through a tutorial. Through this project, I'll learn the basic concepts of Java Script and how to create a game with it. Making this game with no previous experience in Java Script, I can use this project as an opportunity to see how major companies make both console and phone games. Not much is needed to make this project, as it doesn't require any external items such as the robot kit that was offered. The only thing that I do need will be a program that teaches Java Script (which Codecademy kindly offers for free). For this project, I believe that the hardest part would be to make the storyboard. Although I don't want to have only one ending to the story, I also want to have some paths that go different ways at first but eventually merge together. The project to me seems like it has both its easy and difficult aspects, giving me a pretty laid back project with occasional challenges that prevent me from getting too relaxed.
The first day of Google 20 was used to start on the script. Although not much was accomplished, I was able to introduce the character in the game and make some options that are all connected to the beginning of the story. The character, Jeff is first discovered on a beach, and the user has the option to look for help or stay where he is. Once the user chooses one of the two options, they are given another choice to either look for food or resources. That's as far as I got today (but don't worry because my literary skills are kicking in) and it appears to be a pretty good start to this project.
Today's time was spent on both continuing the story and organizing the story better. Because it was designed to have multiple outcomes, it was starting to become confusing which event led to another. The simple solution (which I for some reason hadn't been able to think of previously) was to put the paragraph names (such as c1 or c2) at the end of the paragraph to help me follow along with the story better (creating something like a flow chart). For the story, if the user chooses to go for food, they are given the option to either choose the berries or coconuts on top of a somewhat tall palm tree. The berries path continues the story, while the coconut path leads to the story's first death. Once the character falls off the tree and eventually dies, the user is given the option to either start again from the beginning of the story or quit.
As the story continues, all of the different paths that are available all lead up to a shelter question, which asks if the user wants to either go find a cave to crash in or make a shelter for themselves. If the user ends up choosing to build a shelter our of leaves and sticks, Jeff is waken up midway through the night by a rustling sound from a nearby bush. The user can either go towards and meet an unpleasant surprise (by being attacked by a bear and having poor old Jeff die) or run away from the bush and eventually trip over himself and roll down a hill. However, Jeff discovers a sailboat after finding himself on the beach again. On the other hand, if the user had chosen to go search for a cave, Jeff eventually finds a cave to stay in for the night. Like the other scenario, Jeff is waken up in the middle of the night, except this time due to a screeching noise. A flock of bats fly towards Jeff, and the user is asked to quickly decide to either try and fight off the bats or duck and hope for the best.
When we left off, Jeff had the decision to either try and fight off the bats or duck in hopes of avoiding the swarm. If the user decides to fight off the bats, the bats fight back and eventually bite Jeff enough times to make him collapse and die. If the user decides to try and avoid the bats, Jeff successfully shakes off the flock and manages to catch up some sleep that he desperately needed. After getting in another 3 hours of rest, Jeff walks out of the cave and decides to walk around for a while. Eventually, he discovers a cliff that appears to lead back to the beach that he was at yesterday. However, docked on the beach is a ship, and the user is now given the chance to either go investigate it or observe it from behind. The investigation path leads to a possible death for Jeff, as it turns out to be a pirate ship and the crew members take Jeff captive. Because personally I thought that there would be no possibility of Jeff returning alive, the user is given the option to start the game over. The observation path allows Jeff to discover the fact that it was a pirate ship, avoiding any danger at first, and gives him the choice of either sneaking on to the pirate ship to try and get off the island, or negotiate with the captain and develop a somewhat friendly relationship with him.
Today's class time was spent on learning more about the java script program. Through Codecademy, I was able to learn how to be able to properly code java script, and get a start on the actual programming for my game (which luckily enough, Codecademy offers a step by step instruction sheet on how to make a choose your own adventure). Although the concept was personally confusing at first, with some practice and playing around with the program, I'll soon be able to truly understand how it works.
After not working on the project for about a month or so (due to the Finch Olympics) we were finally given time to work on our projects again. Today during class, I added most of my storyline on the javascript program and modified it a bit to make it a more simpler process. In addition, I went ahead and learned more about the basics of Javascript on the w3schools website. Through it, I was able to realize the fact in order for all of this program to actually work, I needed a separate html page that runs the Javascript program.
Realizing that this was actually more difficult than I thought, I decided to make a minor tweak and have one only correct path possible for the story. Creating multiple outcomes made it more complicated to organize, especially since I had to refer back to previous paragraphs from time to time. In addition, instead of having the entire game made up of pop up alert boxes, I decided to put the story on a normal HTML page with two different buttons available that each said its own text when clicked.
The Beta version of the game is available HERE. The game is still in the process of development.