Party Mode – #3 Basic Functionality

We currently have a working version of party mode. It’s bare bones, only 2 minigames so far: Stomp and Bomb Tag, but hey, it works!

As you can see in the video below, all the screens are implemented but they lack the polished UI.

It goes from   Minigame Title > Actual gameplay > Score Screen > Possibly win screen (which is an actual level)

the next step is to make the UI look better starting with the score screen.

In terms of game design, I kept thinking how, when playing a similar game, such as Uther Party, Mario Party or even Speed Runners, when the winner is announced, it’s kind of a “meh” moment. I mean, most of the time it’s quite clear who will be the winner, unless the players have the same skill level and the match is super ballanced (which is very rare), but yeah, if you are not in the leading spot, you know who the winner will be and you don’t really have any reason to keep playing other than not looking like a quitter.

So why not make the winner announcement more fun, why not make the players who are not winning look forward to that moment. The answer is: punish the winner (sounds backwards right?) I’m thinking about making the victory screen into an actual level where the other players punish the winner in some way, maybe slap him somehow that will make his controller vibrate, or throw tomatoes at him… haven’t settled on the punishment yet, the point is, this doesn’t make the winner feel less of a winner, he still proved he is better than the other players, however it makes the other players more engaged. They have something to look forward to and they have a bit of fun at the end of the match instead of going “Eh… he won again :”.

I’m gonna get back to UI stuff now.

~Xelu