Solo Project — Daniel Buckley

Design Decisions and Process

The overall experience I intended for, was competitiveness. If you're more skilled than someone else, then you should win. The desired "easy to learn, hard to master" concept was intended. Learning the abilities and projectile types is fairly easy, as there aren't that many. Mastering the game though, involves knowing how to combine those abilities, both your own as well as other teammates'.

Each character is designed in a way to excel at a certain playstyle.

Archer: Tank, heavy damage, high health.

Mage: Defence, shield ability, stun ability.

Cleric: Support, can heal allies, suck health from enemies.

Druid: Support/damage, can create AOE effect of increased attack speed, heavy damage ability.

Assassin: Offensive, low health, high damage abilities.

Since the game is designed with competition and skill in mind, choosing the right combination of characters for a team is vital to success. A more skilled team will hopefully be able to play one of each of the characters, using their desired roles effectively with each other to create a team dynamic that works well.

These sort of "easy to learn, hard to master" competitive games are very common. Overwatch has characters, each with specific roles in mind, allowing for very strategic, team based games. Even a game like CS:GO, with no built in roles, players design their teams around each others specific playstyles. There's the entry fragger, support and others. Choosing who does what, where they go and how they interact with the team is what defines a bad team from a great team.

Janky Jousting, is a local multiplayer game where you and another person joust to the death. The knight is hard to control and with the King watching, you must perform your best. This is a game that is fun to play with a friend or two.

Developed: May 2017

My Role: Solo Development

Type: Solo Project

Design Decisions and Process

When making Janky Jousting, I had in mind that I wanted to create a party game. Games like Gang Beasts and Mount Your Friends are special because the fun comes not from mastering the game, but from playing with your friends. I've played Gang Beasts with people both online and in-person, and in-person is by far the better experience. Being able to yell at and nudge the people beside you creates the sense of fellowship and excitement.

Here are the design decisions that influence the intended party-game experience.

Each round is quick and goes to the next one almost instantly.
There is a lack of precision in controlling the knight and defeating your enemy is not really based around skill. This allows for a more even playing field. Perfect for a group of friends/party environment, where quick play-throughs are common.
When the lances hit each other, no one scores. This can create the sense of "I was so close to hitting you!" for each of the players, increasing the tension in the room.

There are many other games that inherit the same features to create the party-game experience. Going back to Gang Beasts, the characters are "floaty" and often hard to control. You end up most of the time spamming all the buttons to try and defeat your friends. The winner is not nessecarily the best player, as being the best player isn't what makes the game fun. The fact that anyone can pickup and play the game and have an almost equal fighting chance, is what makes it great for a party or group atmosphere. In Janky Jousting likewise, you just need to know the controls and you're off!

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