The Brain Study
The goal was to create an original game in a single month timeline. Designers were given a theme to create a game around and that theme was mind control. The game was not allowed to be more than 4 to 8 minutes of length in an average play session.
The Idea
When thinking of mind control the first thought is controlling someone’s body and decisions they make. I did not think it would be original if someone else was having their mind controlled. I took mind control in a more literal sense in that the player is controlling where a brain goes in the game and control transfers from one body to the next as the player progresses through a level.
The Mechanic
I think the most important part of the game needed to be the main mechanic. This mechanic was shooting the brain out of a body and into another one or camera. The player is able to launch the brain out of a body so I needed to think of how it should act. The game should be enjoyable and having a more realistic acting brain would probably not be that enjoyable. A realistic brain might just hit a surface and squish into it or provide little bounce off of it. I went for a non-realistic brain that just bounces off of surfaces. Realism was not important to I decided on not having gravity so the player did not have to worry about arcing the brain they are launching. The focus could be on the positioning and angles the players are launching the brain.
The Sounds
I believe that one of the key elements that made for an enjoyable main mechanic was the sound effects. I wanted a sound effect to play every time the brain bounced off of an object. I used an old drum that I have in my home. In fact all of the sound effects were created by using objects that I found around my home. The brain bounce sound effect can be found below, but all the sounds can be heard in the gameplay video near the top of the page.
The Playtesting
Every week we had to have the game playtested by others to ensure that the play session length was in the allowable limit. The feedback from those tests were really important on shaping the way I further developed the game. The alpha did not have a quick button that players could press in case they wanted to reset the level because of a missed shot. The next week that was one of the features within the game.
