Xylos

Abstract

During the last ten months, we have designed and developed a game for the Microsoft Imagine Cup. This game, built on the Cannibal Engine, was to revolve around the Millennium Development Goals. The obvious goal was to win the Imagine Cup, or at least to get as far as we could possibly can. Our team consisted of three programmers with little to no game design experience, and in the last couple of months a 3D artist helped us with creating the models of the game. In the end, we did not win, nor even made it to the finals, but we were still an experience richer. The design of the game did not go as quickly and as smoothly as expected, but in the end we came up with a design everyone was happy with. It would be a game that did not incorporate the Imagine Cup theme as explicitly as most other entries of the year before, but still would convey the message of the Millennium Development Goals. Set on a distant planet, we also gave ourselves some artistic freedom with the character design, which was necessary because we did not have an artist yet. The main gameplay element of the game would be the ability to travel back in time, whenever for however long you wanted. In the end the mechanic became limited in its use by an energy meter that depletes when you went back in time, and by a five-minute limit of the time you can go back in time. Implementation-wise this mechanic proved to be quite a challenge, especially in combination with an adventure-puzzle-platform game with enemies and other moving and changeable objects. However, with three programmers working almost full-time on it, any problems that arose were dealt with. Having three programmers also meant a sound and solid structure, except when the deadline nears, which is when anything goes, as long as it works. This did not have to happen very often, however. Near the end of the development process, we got the Cannibal Composer from Cannibal Game Studios, to go with their Engine. Using this Composer the world was created, story elements and puzzles were added to the world, and all just in time for the deadline of round 2. Or rather a trifle too late, since the end result could have been that much better, even with just a few hours more. All in all this has been a hard, but challenging and rewarding Bachelor Project, and none of us have regretted our choice of doing this.