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Wednesday, December 16, 2009

The Final Musorqua Prototype Video


[Link to Video]

Hello, world! This is Ichiro, speaking to you from our offices right outside of Boston, MA. I'm happy to announce that this is a video for the final prototype of Musorqua, the working title of a game that's now officially in the pipe. What that means is that the Dejobaan Team...
  • Dan Brainerd, Gameplay Architect
  • Leo Jaitley, PR/Marketing/Biz
  • Tamlyn Miller, Programmer
  • Ryan Chadwick, Artist
  • Joan Ho, PR/Marketing Intern
  • Mary Yovina, Art Intern
...and of course...
  • Ichiro Lambe, Asst. Janitor
...are all going to be working on this new title through to completion. Right now, it looks suspiciously like Aaaaa!, and plays really rough, but that's okay, because it's just a prototype. You heard it here first!

And Also...

It's time to say au revoir (but hopefully not adieu) to Caitilin Lynch, who has just completed a Fall PR/Marketing internship with us, and is headed to Amsterdam, home of what Dejobaan considers a more sensible way of living.


(L-R: Joan Ho, Caitilin Lynch, Tamlyn Miller, and Ryan Chadwick.)

Caitilin's latest article is up at ModDB, so if you haven't read How to Create a Prototype in 5 Easy Steps, give it a go.

8 Comments:

  • I like the way this is coming together. Looks just as manic as your previous endeavor, which is a good thing. Now I'm curious how you will successfully end a level (and not break all 2 of your femurs).

    By Anonymous Anonymous, At December 17, 2009 at 3:47 PM  

  • > Now I'm curious how you will successfully end a level

    You and me both! :D

    By Blogger Ichiro Lambe, At December 17, 2009 at 6:37 PM  

  • I still haven't finished every stage of Aaaa* but I'm intending to e-mail Rohit on how to meet women shortly. My only reservation about Musorqua [thank you for making me use copy and paste during this comment] is that it feels very much like Aaaa*, not a different game, but more of a spin on the existing one. Can I have your word that this will not be the case? I will hold you to this, the legion of the internet is my witness.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, At January 5, 2010 at 5:40 PM  

  • > Can I have your word that this will not be the case?

    No way! :) Since it's a sequel to Aaaaa!, I want it to feel the same, yet not at all the same. Problems we're working on:

    - How can we create a gratifyingly new look that's still accessible to Aaaaa! players and our art team, and won't kill our budget?
    - What are the gameplay mechanics? How can we create a game that feels unbelievably different from Aaaaa!, yet retains some of the charm? What do we want to keep from Aaaaa!, and where do we want to depart?
    - Stuff! I think.

    > I'm intending to e-mail Rohit on how to meet women shortly.

    Wait a sec; your blog shows photos of a white dude and an asian woman. And the best of all things, which is a half-asian baby. Which is what I was when I was a baby. I am now a half-asian man. Or a half-man. Anyway, there's some cognitive dissonance going on for me here.

    By Blogger Ichiro Lambe, At January 5, 2010 at 6:32 PM  

  • Ah I forgot my openid still points to my Jpn blog rather than my English site. The cool thing about the site is that non-Japanese speakers tell me I look hot when they see pictures of my wife. Do you know how difficult it is to meet women once you're married? It's insane, man. I still need Rohit's advice.

    Oh, it could be worse than "half-man" by the way, the Japanese just call human/Cylon hybrids like my son "haafu", which is half of half-man by my reckoning.

    Oh and yeah, Musorka. I am so, like, happy with the videos I've seen of Muzarka. I may even buy Moussaka if I'm persuaded to by Dejobaan's gentle imaginative energies and frightening interns.

    I had two hours sleep last night. This is explanation.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, At January 7, 2010 at 7:30 PM  

  • It definitely is quite a strong prototype to start with (especially since I can't read minds and you have to show us through video), but a concerned citizen has concerns.

    - Previously said, tooooo much like Aaaaa! I suspect it's because it's clearly similar code, but a little more...not Aaaaa! would be cool. Just to be different. Aaaaa! is pretty awesome.
    - I'm sort of "meh" to having similar elements to Aaaaa!, in this case, hitting hexagons and kissing prisms. Especially the kissing prisms. Hmmm.
    - You probably know this, but Rez is a game to look at. Music games of that sort don't happen often (if at all, anymore).
    - For a music game, a rail shooter is probably unavoidable, but this currently looks to be possibly pretty reflex intensive (at least for me, clearly it'd be different for different people). From the looks of it, I honestly don't know if I'd continue playing after trying it out. I'm definitely NOT the type to favor difficulty in games in general (as in, Demon's Souls is NOT my type of game at all).
    - The problem is it's really difficult to integrate both game and music. One artform pretty much gives control to the player, yet the other gives control to the artist/designer. Maybe some kind of improvisation techniques (a la jazz) are in order? It'd be interesting to see a music game with proper improvisation (Rock Band! *shakes fist*), but also pretty hard to put in a game. Assuming you won't go down that road, Rez, still. Rez's design made it so it layered new sounds each level, and the shooty thing (in this case, the mouse cursor clicking on the color ball) had a sound effect that was in line with the track that was playing, which is a small detail that is really awesome.

    In short, MAKE AN AWESOME GAME!

    By Blogger Unknown, At January 12, 2010 at 7:10 AM  

  • Wow. That's really, truly wonderful feedback; thank you!

    By Blogger Ichiro Lambe, At January 12, 2010 at 12:58 PM  

  • Sure thing! Also, since it's now not 4:10 AM, I can say this as well:
    - Less blue. More...other colors. Maybe switch it up for each stage? Rez and Audiosurf style? The patterns are looking pretty interesting thus far and I think different/more color schemes would be intensely awesome.
    - Different trig patterns, also patterns that aren't trig-based. I saw you had a couple patterns going in a line and straight across, so I'm guessing you're aware of this.
    - Another thing Rez and Audiosurf do with visuals and music is synchronize them heavily. Any kind of visual cue is matched with an audial cue. Audiosurf in particular, colors match with the current intensity of the song. As is the slope of the path and speed of your character.

    Hmm, that's all I can think of for now. I'm really looking forward to the next prototype or whatever, if you do show one.

    By Blogger Unknown, At January 12, 2010 at 7:14 PM  

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