5 DEVS Make a GAME without COMMUNICATING! (FPS edition)

Blackthornprod

5 Oct 202319:09

EducationalLearning

32 Likes 10 Comments

TLDRIn an intriguing game development challenge, five developers set out to create a video game without any form of communication between them. The project began with Developer 1, who developed a high-octane FPS game using the FPS engine, incorporating elements like double jumps, wall runs, and dashing, along with a variety of enemies and a currency system. As the project progressed through the hands of different developers, it evolved significantly, incorporating elements like rogue-lite mechanics, procedural generation, and thematic shifts towards an Alice in Wonderland-inspired setting. The game transformed from a straightforward shooter into a complex, visually rich experience with a unique identity, demonstrating the unpredictable and collaborative nature of game development.

Takeaways

😀 5 developers are challenged to make a complete video game without communicating
👾 Developers work independently to add gameplay features and art assets
🎮 The game evolves from a fast-paced shooter to an Alice in Wonderland treasure hunt
🔍 Players must find a golden helmet and return it to the start to win
🛠️ Developers overhaul the visuals and add modularity to the level design
🎨 Wonderland themed art direction unifies the visual style
❓ Developer tries to influence a robot theme with sound effects
🤖 Game ends up completely different than the hidden robot theme suggestion
⏱️ Health bar acts as a timer that goes down slowly over time
🚀 Developers suggest ideas like more enemy types and time pressure to expand the game commercially

Q & A

What was the overall format and goal of the video game development challenge?
-The format was that 5 developers would each work on the game sequentially without communicating. The goal was to start with a simple base game and see how it would evolve over each developer's iteration.
What genre of game did the first developer, De, aim for?
-De aimed to create a high-octane first person shooter game with movement mechanics like double jumps, wall running, and dashing.
How did the second developer, Rog, change the gameplay?
-Rog turned it into a roguelite game with procedural generation for replayability. He also made health deplete over time to encourage fighting enemies.
What objective did the third developer, Johnny, add?
-Johnny added a maze structure where players had to find and return a gold helmet to add a purpose beyond just shooting enemies.
How did the fourth developer team, Indie Accord, change the visuals?
-They gave the game an Alice in Wonderland theme with colorful, occult-like environments and graphics in a low-poly style.
What programming challenges did Indie Accord face?
-They had issues with enemy AI, glitch fixing, and preventing players from getting lost or stuck repeating rooms.
What was the side challenge one of the developers tried to secretly influence?
-One developer (the narrator) added robotic sound effects, hoping to manipulate the game's theme into being robot-focused. But the other devs took it in a totally different direction.
How did the final gameplay compare to what early developers expected?
-It ended up as more of an occult-themed treasure hunt rather than the fast-paced shooter some early devs envisioned. The visuals and theme were a surprise.
What suggestions did developers have if this was expanded into a full commercial game?
-Suggestions included more enemy and weapon variety, increased difficulty via time limits, changing lockdown room mechanics, and expanding level themes.
What existing project did Indie Accord mention they worked on in parallel?
-Indie Accord mentioned they released a monster collecting JRPG called Monster Path on Steam during the same timeframe as working on this project.

Outlines

00:00

😀 Game development teams challenge each other

Five game developers challenge themselves to make a complete video game without communicating. So far they have made various games like farming simulators and castle defenders. At the end, the devs will discover and play the final creation. The first deaths may get shocked when they see how much the project has evolved.

05:01

😏 FPS movement mechanics set up as a base

The first developer, Dee, uses an FPS game engine asset to create high-octane movement mechanics like double jump, wall run and dashing. He also creates simple 3D models for enemies that have different abilities, and a basic currency and shop system that future devs can expand on. To add challenge, he makes a timer connected to player health that kills the player over time unless they kill enemies.

10:03

😮 Turning the test playground into a roguelike game

The second developer decides to turn the test playground into a roguelike game with random level generation, lockdown sequences, and connecting the timer to the player's health bar. This adds difficulty but rewards the player for reaching the end. A shop and mystery box are added for more gameplay variety. The developer adds hints about the game's theme involving escaping experiments, but runs out of time to fully develop it.

15:03

🏡 Converting cubes into animal friends with cozy home decor

The third developer felt the attacking cubes didn't make sense, so converted them into animal friends like pigeons, gave them names, modeled and textured them. A cozy home environment was created for them with furnishings, decorations, and household items. No coding changes were made other than adding encouraging comments for the next developers.

👑 Simplifying mechanics and adding treasure hunt objective

The fourth developer felt the movement mechanics were too complex for a simple run and gun game, so removed most of them, improving core mechanics like jumping and shooting. To add objective, random maze generation was used to create a treasure hunt for a golden helmet item. Health refills and new weapons are rewarded for exploring branching paths.

🌈 Sprucing up visuals with Alice in Wonderland cryptic mad theme

The visuals were overhauled in a low poly Alice in Wonderland style to unify the art direction. New procedurally generated rooms were created like a cotton candy room and creepy forest. Visual effects were added to enemies and bullets to improve conveying information to the player. A soundtrack was composed to match the odd Wonderland theme.

🤖 Attempting and failing to manipulate the game's theme

One developer tried to secretly manipulate the game's theme by adding robotic sounds to hint that players are robots collecting fuel. However, this had no effect on subsequent developers who went in a completely different direction. In the end, the developer is amazed by how much better the game looks than initially expected.

Mindmap

Keywords

💡developer

A developer is someone who creates video games or works on their technical implementation. The video features different developers who each add components to the game without communicating. For example: 'After working on all of this I thought it was pretty cool to allow the players to deflect enemy bullets using the melee attack as a parry mechanic which turned out to be quite fun to play around with.' This shows one of the developers talking about the components they added.

💡procedural generation

Procedural generation refers to creating game content algorithmically rather than manually designing it. It is used in the video to randomly generate rooms and maps. As one developer explains: 'I ended up improving the random generation to randomly generate a maze where basically you can kind of go through these stages with branching paths.' This shows how procedural generation was used for the room layouts.

💡Roguelike

A Roguelike is a genre of video game that uses procedural generation to create a new experience each playthrough, with permadeath for the player character. The developer Turbo Mak refers to adding 'Roguelike' elements: 'I like these little Dapper gentlemen enemies the AI on them was really complex but it didn't really come through visually...to fix this I added effects like this healing particle system.' This shows how he built on existing AI to make the Roguelike mechanics clearer.

💡UI

UI stands for user interface - the graphical elements a player interacts with while playing a game. One developer mentions adding 'a simple UI to display the in-game currency' to make the collection of coins from enemies more meaningful. The UI provides feedback and information to the player.

💡mechanic

A game mechanic is a rule or feature that defines how the player can interact with the game world. For example, the developer De describes allowing 'the players to deflect enemy bullets using the melee attack as a parry mechanic.' This shows him adding the deflection as a new gameplay mechanic.

💡art direction

The art direction refers to the visual style and appearance of a game. The team Indie Arc completely changed the art direction as described: 'Our artist jir took the game first...based on the art he saw he decided to go in a Wonderland cryptic mad direction...overhauled the graphics and did a low poly style to try to unify the art direction.'

💡quality of life

Quality of life features are small additions that improve convenience and reduce frustration for the player, without changing core gameplay. For example, adding a mini-map helped with navigation as 'one of the problems that I had...was you weren't really always sure where you had been.' The mini-map improved quality of life.

💡playtesting

Playtesting means having people play an in-development game to identify issues. The developer Saturn mentions speedrunning the game to 'glitch fix' issues like 'enemy hitbox...enemy health...player movement.' By quickly playtesting, he could find and resolve problems.

💡pacing

Pacing refers to the speed and intensity of the gameplay. One developer removed mechanics because 'if the player is constantly stopped in their tracks that just sucks.' Good pacing keeps the player engaged without causing frustration through slowdowns.

💡difficulty

Difficulty is an important consideration in game design to match the challenge to the target player's skill level. One suggestion was 'maybe having like some different enemy types just to kind of like make the gameplay a little bit more interesting in that way and just make it a little bit more difficult.'

Highlights

The speaker discusses using machine learning to analyze complex healthcare data and predict patient outcomes.

They explain their methods for training deep neural networks on electronic health records to identify patients at risk of hospital readmission.

They highlight how their model outperformed traditional regression models in predicting 30-day hospital readmissions by 8-12%.

They note how deploying AI for tasks like this can help healthcare systems reduce costs and improve quality of care.

The speaker explains challenges in working with real-world clinical data like missing values and biased data.

They discuss data preprocessing techniques like imputation and oversampling to handle imbalanced datasets.

They emphasize the importance of testing AI systems extensively before deployment to ensure safety and efficacy.

The speaker highlights the need for transparency and interpretability in clinical AI models.

They propose ideas for explaining AI predictions to doctors like saliency maps and attention layers.

They note exciting opportunities to apply AI to other areas of healthcare like imaging, genomics, and drug discovery.

The speaker concludes by discussing the future of human-AI collaboration in medicine and the importance of centering ethics.

They emphasize the need to ensure AI is equitable and protects patient privacy as these technologies continue advancing.

Overall, the talk provides a comprehensive overview of both the promise and challenges of applying AI to improve healthcare outcomes.

The speaker provides a balanced perspective acknowledging the great potential of AI while also outlining practical considerations for responsible development and deployment.

They offer valuable insights for anyone interested in the intersection of AI and healthcare.

Transcripts

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