i made this little piggy almost a year ago, and i’ve always felt i had unfinished business with it. if you’ve never played it, it’s a maze game, like pac-man, except with all roles being filled by human players. one player is this little piggy, who tries to collect all the fruit in the maze, and another player is the wolf, who tries to catch her before she can. both players have the same abilities and controls, but have asymmetrical goals which put them at odds. the spacebar, which either player can hit, will change the layout of the maze.
after remaking chicanery for a gallery setting (designed to run continuously during an event, the game facilitating the arrival and indoctrination of new players), i realized that this little piggy, too, would work best in a social space like a party or convention. so i very quickly put together a “gallery version” of this little piggy.
most of the changes are superficial (like making the game run fullscreen rather than windowed): there are two significant changes. the first is the game start screen, which is designed to quickly introduce new players to their roles, their controls, and their characters’ goals; to confirm that a player is ready, she must use her keys to guide her character to that character’s goal object. (this screen also tries to introduce the idea that the spacebar belongs to both players.)
the other change is that the controls swap between rounds (if in one game the piggy used the WASD keys and the wolf used the arrow keys, in the next the wolf will use WASD and the piggy the arrows): if two players stay on for a second game, they’re encouraged to try different roles. they can choose to switch places, but they have to make a conscious decision – and agreement – to keep the same roles rather than swap.
PRO-TIP: to exit the game, press the Q U I and T keys at the same time! my gallery games are designed to be played at galleries, expos, conventions and parties; if you’d like to run any of these games at your event, contact me and i’ll help you prepare and maybe send you a version tailored to the particulars of your venue. these games are free to download and run!
5 comments
Surprisingly this one worked without any problems whatsoever. Good stuff, looking forward to your next creation.
i was totally waiting for your screen of the game crashing.
weird!
A wonky GM function that Mark Overmars never bothered fixing, I’m sure. It only happens on some PC configurations, maybe that’s why YoYo Games never paid attention to the problem and blame it on the GM developer’s coding practices.
Well, if something reproducable crashes on one system, but not on another, in a highlevel language, then its a bug anyways, since HL-languages are supposed to abstract such things away (of course, with nowadays pc-configurations – both software and hardware – being a chaotic desaster, thats difficult if not impossible to achieve).
I am starting to really appreciate the idea of games designed for galleries; the design goals are quite different, similar to an arcade game, but not exactly the same. Of course, I don’t think any such event has ever taken place here in Chile, so I haven’t had the opportunity to see such games in their proper context for myself, yet, which is too bad.
post a comment