Game flow illustration

As preemptive work for semester 2 I've done mock up screens showing the game flow from TITLE to FILE SELECT to OVERWORLD to STAGE SELECT to STAGE to STAGE CLEAR. None of this has been coded yet but it gives a good indication of how I would like the final game design to execute...

TITLE:
Title screen is simple, showing only the game title, names of the developers, and presenting 2 self explanatory options for the player: start and quit.

FILE SELECT:
Upon starting the game the player is presented with this file select screen. The genius here is that the file select screen gives new players the chance to familarise themselves with the controls before even playing the main game. If this screen is left without input for a length of time it will present pop up help captions:

FILE SELECT HELP A:The help caption here clearly shows the movement controls. It may not be immediately apparent to new players that the left and right arrows spin the player clockwise and counter-clockwise as opposed to moving them explicitly left and right, but it is my hope that this realisation will dawn on them quickly enough.

FILE SELECT HELP B:
This help caption shows the first of the polarity controls, limiting it to only red/positive to lessen the flow of new information being presented to the player. Having the file select screen function as such will allow new players to learn the functioning of the red magnetic fields before even beginning a level. Of course, players already familiar with the game's workings aren't even required to view the help captions. New players in fact, if they chose can figure things out themselves via experimentation with explicit help only appearing when they need it.

FILE SELECTION:

Once the player has worked out the functioning of the fields in respect to the player object's polarity they will be able to move themselves to one of the four green "portals" representing the save files, upon which the above menu appears giving the basic options of start, delete, and back (the back option allows them to go back and select another file if they've chosen the wrong one by accident). I want to keep on screen menus and text to a minimum as I feel it makes for a more distinct and universally appealing game with focus placed more on the control mechanics. The save files themselves clearly indicate the most recent save time, whilst the silver and gold crown tallies indicate the progress: a silver crown for each stage cleared and a gold crown for each stage cleared under the preset challenge time.

OVERWORLD:
After starting a save file the player is taken to this overworld map. From the beginning the player only has control of the red/positive polarity control, in order to ease them into the game design by slowly introducing new elements to them. Having learned the function of red fields in the file select screen they can now experiment and learn the function of blue fields. The other element introduced here is the charge station; a yet to be implemented challenge of the game, one of economy. The inner green squares of the player object indicate the charge level which depletes as the player changes their polarity, replenishing slowly over time, or quickly when in vicinity of a green charge station. Here the player can come to understand how these elements work before even beginning a level.

The 3 green "portals" encapsulate the 3 phases of the game (a silver crown indicating that all levels withing have been cleared; a gold crown indicating that all levels within have been cleared under par time). The bottom most portal is phase 1 which can be reached by the player from the start using only red/positive polarity control and contains levels that only allow red/positive polarity control. By reaching the phase 1 portal the player will have come to understand a minimum of 2 things: changing their polarity to red will 1) repulse them from red fields and 2) attract them to blue fields. In this way we are skipping the need for any sort of explicit tutorial, rather embedding the tutorial into the front end of the game, it will hopefully be so seamless so that new players aren't even aware they are being taught things and returning players aren't encumbered by compulsory tutorial stages.

There are yet more lessons hidden in the overworld map: upon reaching a certain milestone (ie: collecting a number of crowns) the player will be granted blue/negative polarity control in the overworld, thus allowing them to reach the left uppermost portal; the phase 2 levels. Just by reaching the phase 2 portal it is hoped the player will understand the role of switching their polarity back and forth to reach new areas, the learning will be further tested within the phase 2 levels which give the player control of both positive and negative polarity to present more complex challenges. As before, reaching the next set milestone will then turn the overworld to a zero gravity state, which will allow the player to access the right uppermost portal; the phase 3 levels, which are all designed without gravity and will present the hardest challenges to the player. Note the faint particles in the background of each screen, designed to indicate the presence of gravity: the particles will fall in the direction of gravity when present, their speed giving an indication of the strength of the gravity;the particles will be stationary on levels without gravity.

The overworld has been designed in such a way as to head the player's advancement ahead of time (phase 2 cannot be reached until negative control is granted and phase 3 cannot be reached until gravity is turned off) whilst preventing the player from becoming stuck in any spot under zero gravity conditions.

STAGE SELECT:
Once the player has entered a portal the above menu appears presenting thumbnails of the numbered stages contained within, as well as their clear status. Selecting a stage from this menu will begin the stage. Note that not all stages will need to be cleared before gaining access to the next phase. Thus stages that a player is having difficulty with can be skipped and returned to at a later date.

STAGE BEGINNING:
There will likely be an intermediate animation between the stage selection and the stage's actual beginning in order to avoid the transition being too jarring. All stages will be presented in full screen at a zoom level most befitting the stage. Before clearing a stage no timer will be present, successive run throughs after clearing it will however have a timer in the corner of the screen.

STAGE CLEAR:
Upon reaching the green end portal of a stage the above menu will appear showing the stage number, completion time, preset gold crown completion time and the type of crown awarded. Text below this will instruct how far away the player is from reaching the next milestone in order to provide incentive for the player to keep playing. Below that the 2 choices of restart, to allow the player another chance to better their time, and back, to return them to the overworld stage select screen.

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Game flow of this type I feel is ideal for our game concept and it's what I hope to implement in semester 2. Dividing the game into the 3 phases (only positive control, positive and negative control, positive and negative control without gravity) will provide 3 distinct styles of challenge whilst avoiding a strictly linear progression of challenge (ie: later levels in phase 1 can be harder than early levels in phase 2 and 3). I feel the 3 phases are unique and distinct in their restrictions and will over a great deal of variety to the player. Obviously the hardest part of the game design from this point is making the levels themselves...