Atomizer II (Puzzle Mode)

As I previously mentioned in an earlier post ive been working on a game which at the moment i'm calling Atomizer: Meltdown.

The last post focussed on the fast paced, surivival-esque Meltdown Mode. This post will focus on the puzzle mode. Whilst still almost as fast paced, puzzle mode should be a different experience from Meltdown mode.

(Note: All of the following is still work in progress and may/probably will change during development)

In puzzle mode, you will have a certain period of time to clear every atom on screen, unlike Meltdown Mode however extra atoms will not spawn and you will be penalised for making incorrect combos. The quicker you clear all the atoms, the more points you will score. Puzzle mode will be a collection of levels which get harder the further you play.

At the end of the levels or if you run out of a time during a puzzle, you will be able to submit your highscore and compare it to others. Unlike most story/puzzle/scenario based level systems, Puzzle mode in this game will have to be completed in a single play through (You can't for example play the first 5 levels, unlock the 6th then come back later). This is because Puzzle mode is intended to test your skill across the entire set of puzzles rather than letting you continue/replay the same level over and over.

In the mean time check out this quick teaser of Meltdown Mode in action.

~ Nutter

New Stuff - Atomizer

Hey everyone.

So, apparently its been almost a week since I blogged anything. No idea where my time goes. Most of it has been working on a new project/prototype involving matching stuff and explosions. The Webby app has been put onto the backburner for a while since I was getting fed up with all the Facebook API stuff and just generally wasn't been very productive with it. I haven't given up on it, i'm just working on something else for a little while.

The new game is themed around nuclear fusion or atleast combining atoms. It'll have 2 game play modes, a puzzle mode where you have to clear all the atoms in a certain time period (probably 60 seconds per level) and Meltdown Mode.

Meltdown Mode is what i'm going to talk about here since right now its the mode that's most complete right now.

The idea itself is pretty simple, the game starts and you have 10 atoms randomly spawned on screen in various colours. (There are 4 main coloured atoms and a powerup atom - See below). Your job is to combine atoms by selecting one atom with a click, then selecting another with another click. If the colours match, they explode and you score points. If they don't match, they don't explode and you try again.

In Meltdown Mode, more atoms will spawn every 5 seconds, gradually over time filling the screen. You must combine atoms as quickly as possible to remove them before the reactor hits critical mass and explodes from the number of atoms on screen. This is where the Powerup atom comes in useful. When you combine it with a coloured atom, all atoms of that same colour will explode, giving you a big combo boost and a large points increase. In Meltdown Mode, it will also help you to avoid the game ending situation for a little longer.

The image above is what the atoms look like at this stage (they're animated in game though).

Let me know what you think, does it sound like a game you'd enjoy playing? More importanly does it sound fun?

- Nutter

Webby App Preview

Hey all

As I mentioned in my previous post, i've been working on a Facebook app. Well here's a little preview of it.

Quite a few things have changed since Webby 3 (although im still using a few bits of placeholder art from Webby 3), in particular i've tweaked the way that a lot of the powerups work. I've also added the particle system mentioned earlier in the blog.

Anyway check it out and let me know how it plays.

Does anything seem unbalanced? found a bug? let me know.

~ Nutter

Facebook API is Complicated!

Hey all,

I'm sure by now everyone has heard of or knows what Facebook is. Its probably the largest social network site in existence. As any of you who have visited the site will know, it has a very large app following whether these be games, fitness groups or whatever.

I thought i'd try my hand at joining this bandwagon by releasing an app of my own. A Facebook version of Webby. This however is much more difficult then I was expecting. The actual coding of the game is fairly simple. And even the server side PHP shouldn't be a problem.

What is turning out to be a problem is figuring out the Facebook API, or rather which version of the Facebook API I should be using, there seems to be around 10 or so different versions none of which work the same, and yet I can't find decent documentation for any of them.

It almost feels like Mark Zuckerberg and his Facebook team are being deliberately difficult.

Still i'm sticking to it, I will figure out how to get this working and with any luck you'll see a Webby App soon.

- Nutter