Game Concept

Working Title:

Hero Gooby

Concept statement:

Help Gooby fulfill his dream of becoming a hero, by growing your status with each level, helping civilians who require your assistance.

Overview:

Genre: Top down, single-player party game. This game is characterized by easy game control and simple rules, while also containing a small collection of minigames and colorful graphics.

Play modes: The play modes available to be played will be: Normal mode where you have unlimited time to complete levels. Normal time mode, where each level must be completed before the time runs out, or you must restart. Hard mode, where the difficulty of the levels increases. Hard time mode, like Normal time mode, where you must finish each level before the time runs out, but level difficulty is harder.

Concept creation process:

The origin of my game concept came to me after I dug up my old DS and I started playing some games that I used to love. Many years later I still really enjoyed playing these games. Which inspired me to create something a little similar, because I wanted to add my own little twist, and I knew that I’m not the only who enjoys playing games that are nostalgic. I also took into consideration my knowledge on game creation and time available to me, and knew I must create a game with small levels. I came up with making mini games, which adds variety to my game and is intended on keeping players intrigued, it would also allow me to make small levels for each mini game.

I took ideas from the DS games and recent Wii games I played, that contain mini games, and the type of storyline that they follow. The ones I took examples from was Mario party star rush, and Mario and Sonic at the Olympic games, where I looked at the mini games to see how they made a small level and to get some inspiration for some mini games I could incorporate in my game. For the storyline I tried to keep it original, and I wanted there to be an end to the game (to keep it small) and give the player a goal. I continued to get inspiration from Mario games, where he is progressing through levels to save Peach/defeat bowser (An end goal), which stopped players from progressing but allowed for players to play again, once the end was reached.

Audience and Competitive analysis:

Due to the game’s simplicity and colorful art style, the game is made for casual gamers, who may be interested in aliens and/or superheroes and/or even pixel art styled games, who are looking to relax and play a small game. Due to the variety of modes, the game is suitable for players of all ages and skill levels.

Game Treatment:

You are playing as an aspiring hero called Gooby, who is starting at the bottom with a dream, finding ways to make yourself known as a superhero. As you make your way through the levels, you help a range of civilians with different tasks. Your skills are tested, with each level putting a different skill to the test, knowledge, accuracy, and speed. Starting out by doing small chore like tasks, as you progress through the levels, the tasks become less like chores, and end with superhero tasks. You will be tasked with avoiding obstacles to gather up lost items for your neighbor, you will need to make your way through a maze finding and bringing home lost children, and finally shooting down monsters. 

Concept art by me: A look at the art style, player movement animation, and rough design of how the mini games will look.