NMcCoy's Games

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nmccoy — Mon, 06 Sep 2010 03:51:11 +0000

Sorry, recuperating from PAX. Game later. x_X

Games are art. Some games are truly great art.

nmccoy — Sun, 05 Sep 2010 10:58:17 +0000

So, I just got back from my day at PAX. There was all sorts of delightful stuff on display, fun things to do, and some very impressive demos in the expo hall. The one game that I was utterly blown away by, however, was not LittleBigPlanet 2 or Duke Nukem Forever or Final Fantasy XIV, but a student game in the PAX 10 called Solace. Something that’s been on my mind lately is the fact that while games, as a medium, have certainly been explored as a vessel for expressive artistic statement, gameplay has not often been a part of that. If you take Braid and remove the text, you end up with a puzzle game involving time manipulation that is barely about anything other than puzzles involving time manipulation. On the other hand, if you took Solace, removed the text, and replaced all the beautiful graphics and superb sound design with rectangles and beeps, it would still be about the five stages of grief as represented through the gameplay of its levels – the message would not be conveyed nearly so brilliantly, but nor would it be lost.

Certainly, there have been games in the past that conveyed an artistic statement through their gameplay. Passage springs immediately to mind, for example. But the thing about Passage is that while it may or may not be effective as art, it isn’t really effective as a game. It merits exploration, and provokes thoughts, certainly, but doesn’t really engage the player on a visceral level. In contrast, Solace is fun, challenging, and engaging. The visuals, audio, and level design are all deliberately tuned to evoke within the player echoes of the emotion that they represent. Not just through sympathetic sensory associations, the way a painting or poem or piece of music would – though Solace uses these idioms as well – but through the nuances of the gameplay. The structure of the game expects, and at times effectively requires, the player to demonstrate an understanding of the level’s relevant emotion in order to successfully proceed through the game – and indeed enables the player to do so, with nothing more nuanced than a directional control and a fire button.

Solace, in addition to being a marvelous work of art in its own right, is a lesson to all game designers of what games have the potential to be. In my own game designs, I have often run into a tension between making my game artistically meaningful and having good, solid, fun gameplay. Solace, by being excellent in both regards, has taught me that this is a false dichotomy. If Portal is worthy of a place on a course syllabus, I believe Solace can be similarly instructive, to students and designers alike.

Personal anecdotes regarding the game follow in the comment section; as these may spoil some of the delight of discovery that the game can offer, I strongly recommend downloading and playing through the game before reading on.

Game 30: Somnius ex Machina

nmccoy — Mon, 30 Aug 2010 04:51:14 +0000

Huh.

This game’s title was provided by Ben Lehman.
This game’s music was contributed by John Axon.

Potential Delay

nmccoy — Sun, 29 Aug 2010 20:22:30 +0000

So I’ve been moving to a new apartment this weekend, and haven’t really had much time to work on the game. I’ll be getting it done as soon as I can, but this is a game I want to get right (because it’s got an awesome title and guest-star music), and so it might be delayed by a day or two. Just a heads-up to my loyal fans. =)

EDIT: Or not. ;D

Game 29: Grabitas

nmccoy — Mon, 23 Aug 2010 03:57:55 +0000

This game was created for the Ludum Dare #18 Compo: “Enemies as Weapons”. Fling enemies at each other to destroy them, and collect the green things to earn points and heal yourself. Enjoy.

Ludum Dare 18: beginning soon!

nmccoy — Fri, 20 Aug 2010 23:45:22 +0000

My game for this week will be whatever I end up making for Ludum Dare. You can follow my progress over there. This is gonna be fun.

Game 28: Giant Vex

nmccoy — Mon, 16 Aug 2010 04:05:09 +0000

I tried and tried, but with the title of this game being what it is I just couldn’t make a game that was not this game. That being the case, you will not be getting any apologies from me – it was simply not possible to prevent this game from being itself, so I did my best to make this game the game that it wanted itself to be. So go forth and vex already.

This game’s title was provided by cp.

Game 27: now sir, a war is never even. sir, a war is won

nmccoy — Mon, 09 Aug 2010 06:46:40 +0000

This game does not even remotely resemble the turn-based tactical RPG that I suddenly realized was wildly infeasible about three hours before my deadline. Go figure.

This game’s title was provided by Nathan Wilson.

Game 26: Drawn Inward

nmccoy — Mon, 02 Aug 2010 06:25:36 +0000

I knew conceptually what I wanted to do with this game, but it took me a fair amount of work to find the fun. While I had game mechanics percolating in my head, I worked on making a funky background effect for the game instead. The end result is that this is a game about a funky background effect, and also you dodge and collect stuff. So yeah.

This game’s title was provided by Nathan Wilson.

Game 25: More lovely and more temperate

nmccoy — Mon, 26 Jul 2010 03:17:11 +0000

This week’s game was a tough one to make – not the coding itself, but finding a design that felt worthy of such a groovy title. I had three or four different ideas, most of which I rejected due to either the scope of the design being too grand for a weekly game, or not having enough “gamefulness” to the idea. In the end, I went with a fairly impressionistic take on the title, a casual-ish game about flowers. Also I wrote the background music in iambic pentameter, so maybe that counts for something. Go play.

This game’s title was provided by Ben Lehman.