Designing a new Power up
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Hi! Today I’m going to go through the design for a new added power up in the game Umibozu. One of the requirements for the Alpha presentation was to have a power up. A power up was considered to be an item that enhanced the player with an additional ability. The original items that were listed under the power up section in the concept document was oil to replenish the lamp, health kit, temporary speed boost, and temporary increase in the spotlight rotation. These items were not considered as power ups, therefore we decided as a group to implement a new power up. As the designer of the group this was a task for me, to design a new power up that fit into the game and enhance the game’s theme.
Our game is set in the years between 1600-1800 in the waters of Japan, so it was obvious for me to do some research on the fishermen and their fishing techniques during that time period. After some research I managed to design four power ups, which are the following:
When I brought these ideas to the team, everyone voted to go with the cormorant fishing power up. I personally really wanted to go with the Cormorant fishing method because it was unique in comparison to the other common power ups that I had.
While i was researching for ideas, I would mostly find some typical fishing techniques, but there was one fishing method that caught my attention. This was an ancient traditional fishing method that fishermen in japan and china used, called cormorant fishing. This method goes back to 960 A.D. Cormorant Fishing consists on tying a snare loosely to the base of the cormorant bird’s throat to prevent it to swallow big fishes and so that only small fishes could be swallowed as “reward”. When the cormorant bird swallowed a big fish, it would get held in the their throat and the fisherman would then have the bird spit the fish out into a basket. My basic idea, taken from this fishing method, was to pick up a power up from a crate/barrel, just like the other items, that gave the player a cormorant bird. The player would then use this bird to help them attack nearby enemies. I later enhanced it to go along with the game theme. This resulted in having the cormorant bird inside a birdcage, instead of a crate or barrel, floating around the water. With some additional visuals, this would represent that the bird came from the missing boats that Umibozu destroyed. The player can then release the bird by picking it up. When the bird gets released it will then stay in the boat for a small period of time to help the player by fighting off nearby enemies, as an appreciation for setting it free. Right now, this power up is going to be implemented these coming days.  |