Golden I Design Document CIS587 Fall 2003 Dr Maxim Dennis Shelton 2 15 04 I Overview a Golden I is designed to be a fun visually pleasing typing challenge It is not a typing tutor as it does not include tutorials to improve your typing skills It merely provides timed typing tests in a fun graphical environment The storyline will be a spoof of the spy genre specifically the James Bond series of books and movies You will be Linus T Letterman super spy for the British SIS Your enemies will be the evil duo of Willy Soft and Auntie Trust You will be battling over the software license to rule all software licenses aka the Golden I The game consists of 2 levels and will having settings to control the difficulty of each level as well as the length of each level Level 1 will test the user s ability to type singleton words whereas Level 2 will require the user to type sentences II Game Mechanics a Overview i Golden I is written entirely in Visual Basic 6 and utilizes Direct X 7 graphics and sound functionality Much of the code used was developed in Visual Basic Game Programming with Direct X by Jonathon S Harbour with Andre LaMothe b Camera Position i Level 1 Overhead 1 The camera in level 1 is placed directly over the road course looking down so you can see the entire course ii Level 2 Side View 1 In level 2 the camera is looking into Willy Soft s laboratory so you can see the descending blocks the Golden I and his lab in the background c User Interface Design i Menus 1 The Menus are all designed to be navigated using the keyboard specifically the arrow keys for navigation and the Enter key to select an option A feature I intend to add to a later revision of this game is the ability to use the Mouse to navigate the menus ii Level 1 1 As you can see from the screenshot above Level 1 has a relatively simple layout I created a slightly winding road course as a deviation from the standard oval track all too common in racing themed maps The computer is the blue car and leads the way As it passes each of 7 points along the course words are dropped Five are shown with words already deposited the final two are along the last straight away In order for the yellow car to pass these points the user must type the corresponding word correctly In the middle of the screen are the statistics including frames per second incorrect keystrokes correct keystrokes and elapsed time iii Level 2 d e f g 1 Level 2 has a slightly different interface although the game play is similar The background is much more complex resembling the clutter of instruments often found in a scientific laboratory This time the statistics are in the lower left hand corner while the target sentences are contained within blocks of the industrial press descending towards the Golden I Replaying and Saving i This game does not have any replay or game save features I chose to do this for 2 reasons Firstly there are only two levels so there s no situation where a user will have invested a lot of time passing many levels only to have to start over Secondly the purpose of this game is to improve the user s typing skills through aggressive practice As such it gives the user more practice to require them to beat the levels consecutively in order to beat the game Control Summary i All user input for this game is handled via the keyboard Menus utilize the arrow keys and the enter key Both levels are designed to utilize any printable characters via the letters and numbers on the keyboard Game Play Details i The game play is very simple Words appear on the screen and the user needs to type them In level 1 the user types single words at 7 points around the track In level 2 the user types complete sentences as they descend from the ceiling Description of user experience i The user experience is meant to be cartoonish but still give them a good workout on the keyboard From the simple graphics to the Bond theme audio clips it s an enjoyable environment that puts the user at ease to allow for better typing skills h Cut Scenes i There is only one real cut scene in this game and that s the intro It is modeled after the opening scene from every James Bond movie where bond moves left across the screen then turns and fires at the sniper following him i Storytelling i The story of this game is your defense of the Golden I Software License as Linus T Letterman Your enemies are Slick Willy Soft and his henchman Auntie Trust The game begins when you are offered the opportunity to participate in a competition to settle the fight once and for all If you win Soft Trust will give up their pursuit to destroy free software once and for all If you fail they will control the world of free software at least It turns out that even if you win Soft Trust steal the license anyways and try to destroy it at their secret laboratory You pursue them there and try to stop their giant press from crushing the license ii Other than the intro the story is relayed to the user through static screens before and after each level j Level Summary i Level 1 1 As stated before level 1 is a car chase on a road rally course The enemy s car gets a head start the length of which is determined by the level picked by the user and then the user s car follows There are 7 points around the course where the lead car will drop words In order to pass those points the player must type the word correctly Mistakes will push the user back If the user stays within 1 lap of the enemy for the allotted time he wins If the enemy catches the player s car the player loses ii Level 2 1 In level 2 there is a press descending from the ceiling towards the Golden I The press is made of up to 11 blocks each block containing a sentence The user must type the sentence in the lowest block to destroy that part of the press If the press reaches the Golden I the player loses If the player keeps the press above the Golden I for the allotted time he wins III Artificial Intelligence a Opponent AI i This game does not utilize any form of Artificial Intelligence b Player Detection i Level 1 utilizes a sprite collision detection function from Visual Basic Game Programming with Direct X ii In level 2 collisions are detected by comparing the Y value of the lowest sentence to the Y value of the Golden I c Motion i In level 1 the cars move with a constant speed around the track on a …
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