Asteroid Jumpers

Controls / Objective: 
Orange Player: A/D/W to Move
Green Player: Left/Right/Up Arrows to Move
First player to reach the asteroid at the top of the level wins. The game is played in a Best of 3 format!

Description: This is a simple action game where players play as astronauts jumping throughout asteroids in the earth's atmosphere. Two players must face off against each other in a platforming race to the end of a level.

One of the biggest difficulties in making this game involved creating a good gravity system. I wanted the movement in this game to feel natural and intuitive, so that players would immediately understand how to use momentum to move their character across platforms. Aside from the movement, another challenge that was faced was in manipulating the camera. It took quite some time to figure out how to naturally zoom out the camera as players got further away from each other. Furthermore, I had to find the right camera angle at which the winning player at the top would have a harder time seeing the platforms ahead, as I believed this would help give the losing player a chance to make a comeback.

I generally received good feedback from playtesting the game, although there was a common complaint that the game was too slow with the speed at which clouds were spawning. This was adjusted for the final build so that clouds spawn much faster. Furthermore, I received feedback that the player who was winning would have too much of an advantage. If the winning player knew the map well enough, they would win the instant they got a lead. To combat this, I added random speeds to the clouds, so that they would not move similarly between games. Furthermore, I adjusted the game so that the winning player would see less of the map above them in comparison to the losing player, which forces the winning player to move more slow and predictive.

Overall, I am happy to have worked on the game. If given an opportunity to expand on the game, I would love to either add more levels or some form of random level generation so that players would be forced to adapt to the map on the fly.

"Juicing" Change List: 

• Added character animations for players getting jumped on
• Added flashes when players are being jumped on to make the hit effect more noticeable
• Added dust trails to player movements, jumps, and landings
• Created a new death animation for when players die off the bottom of the map
• Added a particle trail to follow the players
• Added screen shake when the player lands on platforms and when they jump on the other player