Agent Pixel 6502 #1

I have quite a few games ideas floating around that have not been implemented
and I have decided to pick one up and go with it for my next real ad sponsored
game. I have not created an ad sponsored game since he utter disaster that was
Jack’s
Beach Blitz. With Jack’s I set out to re-skin the
Pumpkin Man engine (now at over 2,000,000 ad views). I decided half way in to make a
completely different game and only got 1/2 way there before I needed to send it
out for sponsors (before Halloween). It made some good sponsor money (GameJacket), but has
not had many plays and I feel that it could have been much more than it was.

So, now I want to go back and turn Jack’s Beach Blitz into the game I wanted
it to be without creating an entire new engine from scratch  The new game will be less a
sequel and more a distant cousin to the original title.

Premise
Agent Pixel 6502 will need to clear 25 maze based levels and find a
piece of the secret plans on each level. The game will be a shooter,
but its pacing will not be a frantic as Jack’s. The player will be able to pick
up ammo and better weapons on each level and will need to battle progressively
smarter and smarter robots as he/she conquers all 25 levels. Between each level,
the piece of the secret plans that has been found will be added to the 5×5 map
grid and the player will start to see a coded message.   When all 25
levels are complete the game is over and he/she has won.

Graphic design
I plan to create my own Atari2600/800/7800 style 32×32 tiles and
sprites for the game. It will be simple and retro on purpose to a fault.

Re-playability
While I plan to have the player go through 25 levels per game, they
will be randomly selected from a much larger universe. Also, each level will
have up to 5 places that the piece of the secret plan can reside, making for a
very large number of possible games. I plan to have 5 different 25 piece puzzles
to collect as achievements in the game. My hope is that this will make that game
fun and offer more re-playability.

Enemy
The enemy robots will patrol areas of the screen and fire back at the
player.  They will start by firing randomly, and in later levels they will
slowly chase the player, need to be hit multiple times and take deadly aim with
their own weapons.

Power-ups
I plan to completely re-vamp the power ups available in the game engine
and add in multiple gun types and maybe even an inventory of weapons, ammo and
medical kits.

Screen Size
It is my plan to have each level be larger than one screen’s width and
height to make each level feel much bigger and less claustrophobic.

Those are my thoughts on the game so far.  I also have 2 other games
(Mine-X 64K, Micro Robot Maze) and my Generalized Flex Game Control all in the
works, so you never know when I’ll get bored of this and move on to
those…actually you will know because I’ll probably write a blog about it.