作者：Matt Hackett

最近我们参加了Indie Speed Run，即The Escapist成员所创造的新游戏制作平台。而如果接触过其它著名的游戏制作平台（如asLudum Dare或Global Game Jam）的人便会对Indie Speed Run非常熟悉——这一平台提供给开发者一个48小时窗口，让他们能够基于随机生成的主题（和元素）而开发游戏。

Asylum Night（from gamasutra）

Indie Speed Run在传统的游戏制作平台基础上又添加了一些独特元素。在众多游戏制作平台中我们之所以选择这一平台有以下几大原因：

*拥有备受尊敬的裁判员，能够确保竞争的合法性。

*开发者可以无需任何开发源码而使用自己的工具进行游戏开发。

*开发者可以选择适合自己的48小时窗口。

除此之外，Indie Speed Run需要开发者交付25美元的报名费，并有可能中途关闭一些团队的开发窗口，这一规则让我们觉得整个过程更有质感。因为需要花钱才能进入，所以出现在这一平台上的都是真正的开发者。

我们的游戏：《Asylum Night》

gameplay（from gamasutra）

我们的随机生成主题和元素分别是心灵感应和布陷阱。为了确保能够准确理解这一主题和元素，我们查阅了维基百科和字典。心灵感应的一个共性便是能够用于移动对象，并与布陷阱有效地结合在一起。所以我们便想着创造一款能够使用大脑设置或废弃陷阱的游戏。

尽管截止时间非常紧张，但是我们知道必须分配几个小时进行游戏设计，这对于最后的结果非常重要。所以我们便快速进行讨论，并设想出一些不同的游戏理念。一开始我们便将游戏背景设置在一家精神病院。原先我们认为《Asylum Night》可以是关于城堡中或月球上一个具有心灵感应的人，但其实说到心灵感应这一主题，以心理为背景会更加合适。

我们喜欢的游戏理念是，玩家尝试着穿越一个布满陷阱的迷宫，并利用自己的心灵感应能力去度过这些陷阱。但根据经验，我们知道只有创造出更大且更有深度的迷宫才能吸引玩家的注意，而我们所拥有的时间限制便是最大的阻碍。似乎我们可以创造出一款所有行动都发生在同一个屏幕上的游戏，并且我们也希望能够确保游戏的简单，从而让我们拥有足够的时间去完善它。

此外，我们也喜欢横向卷轴视角。因为在这个游戏制作平台上我们可以使用自己的工具，所以我们自然不会放过这一机会。我们最强大的一个工具便是Doll Animation Tool，让我们能够便宜且有效地创造出2d精灵。如果了解著名的Kickstarter投资项目Spriter的人便会知道这个工具。

data（from gamasutra）

在淘汰了一些理念后，我们选定了塔防游戏。玩家将利用心灵感应在变态医生所操纵的精神病院中探寻着。通过使用心灵感应，玩家能够直接击垮医生，或设置陷阱保护自己。第一天，Geoff匆匆赶制出了游戏的模型，而我开始致力于美术理念，Joshua Morse则负责编曲创作。

Geoff创造出了一个很棒的游戏模型。在第二天晚上，当我尝试着去玩这款游戏时发现它具有很大的难度。我们希望在游戏中，玩家能够在精神病院待上一周而不被杀死，但到了第四天游戏却变得异常困难。玩家将遭到变态医生的蹂躏，但却什么都做不了。

但是在第二天晚上，Geoff对模型进行了更新。这一次，我在玩了三次游戏后勉强能够击败变态医生了。这便暴露了游戏的深度和学习曲线。我认为这是一款第一次（或第二次））玩时不可能获胜，但是在经过反复的实践与学习后便能够精通的游戏。这都是Geoff的功劳，我也认为它最终会是一款出色的游戏。

Joshua Morse在音频创作上也表现得很棒！特别的标题屏幕能够有效地吸引玩家的注意。Joshua还特别留意声音何时会开始重复，并在场景变得刺激时想办法将声音变得让人愉悦。你在游戏中可能会注意到：当你在使用一些基本能力，或医生死亡时都会出现各种不同的声音。这便意味着如果你连续杀死三个医生，你将听到三种不同的声音，我想这也是让游戏变得更有趣的关键因素。

检验

在看到《Asylum Night》最终诞生时我们真的很高兴，但说实话，游戏的制作时间大大超过我们的预期。第二个晚上，我和Geoff两个人加起来只睡了四五个小时。所以尽管我们的计划是在48个小时窗口内完成这款游戏，但最终却投入了三四天的时间。其实如果一开始能够更好地审视游戏，或削减一些不必要的优化，我们便有可能按时完成游戏。

但也有好事，即我们可以在规定期限内交出一款具有游戏价值的游戏。我们也在这一过程中学到了许多，如何时该走捷径去提高生产效率，以及最佳积极性是受到时间期限的推动等等。对于我们三个人来说，这都是第一次的48小时游戏开发经历，并且我们都认为这是一次很棒的经历。

《Asylum Night》将会何去何从？

levelEnd（from gamasutra）

作为一家年轻的独立公司，我们需要学会如何合理利用时间。如果我们不能肯定这款游戏足以偿还支出，我们也就不会参加Indie Speed Run的开发项目了。正是带着这种想法，我们一开始在设计《Asylum Night》时便明确了手机友好型特性，从而让我们能够将其添加到自己的HTML5游戏组合中。如果你拥有一台Android或iOS设备，那就在浏览器上玩《Asylum Night》吧！你将会感叹其惊人的运行速度！

除此之外，设计手机游戏能够让我们通过使用Ludei’s CocoonJS平台而更轻松地面向Android和iOS发行游戏，所以下次当你再看到《Asylum Night》时，它便有可能是出现在App Store或Google Play中。

（本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译，拒绝任何不保留版权的转载，如需转载请联系：游戏邦）

Asylum Night: making a tower defense game in 48 hours

by Matt Hackett

We recently participated in Indie Speed Run, a new game jam apparently started by some members of The Escapist. Those who have already been exposed to other popular game jams such asLudum Dare or Global Game Jam may find Indie Speed Run very familiar – developers have a 48-hour window in which to develop a game based on a randomly generated theme (and in this case, element).

Indie Speed Run offered some unique additions to the typical game jam format. Of all the game jams out there, we chose to participate in this one for the following reasons:

Well respected group of judges helped legitimize the contest (also, who wouldn’t love for Notch or Yahtzee to play their games?).

Ability to use your own tools without having to open source them.

Developers choose the 48-hour window that works for them.

Additionally, Indie Speed Run had a $25 entry fee which, while it probably turned off a few teams, surprisingly made us feel better about the whole process. It’s a small amount of money that acted as a barrier to entry, meaning that only dedicated developers would participate.

Our game: Asylum Night

Our randomly-generated theme and element were telepathy and booby-traps, respectively. We looked each up on Wikipedia and dictionaries to ensure that our understanding was correct (and to help give us ideas). One common trait of telepathy is that it can be used to move objects, which plays well with the booby-traps element. So we wanted to make a game where booby-traps could either be set or disabled by using one’s mind.

Though we were obviously on a tight deadline, we knew that allocating several hours for game design would pay off in the end. So we rapidly discussed and threw out several concepts for various games. Pretty early on we settled on a mental hospital for the skin (graphics) of the game. Asylum Night could have been about a telepathic person in a castle or on the moon, but with the telepathy theme it seemed appropriate for the game to exist in a place dedicated to the mind.

We liked the idea of a player trying to navigate through a maze riddled with booby-traps, disarming them with telepathic abilities. But we know from experience that mazes need to be relatively deep and large to be compelling, which meant a scrolling tilemap and time we didn’t have dedicated to content generation. A game where all the action took place on a single screen seemed doable, and we wanted something that simple so we’d have plenty of time to polish it up.

Additionally, we preferred a side-scrolling perspective. Since we were allowed to use our internal tools in this game jam, we wanted to use them! One of our more powerful tools, the Doll Animation Tool, allows us to animate 2d sprites cheaply and effectively. For those familiar with the popular Kickstarter project Spriter, it’s a very similar tool.

After several ideas that didn’t pan out, we settled on a tower defense game. Players would control a telepath kept in an insane asylum operated by murderous doctors. Using their telepathic powers, they could knock out doctors directly or set booby-traps to help protect them. The first day, Geoff banged out the game’s model, I began working on art concepts, and Joshua Morse started composing music.

Geoff did a fantastic job with the game model. On the second night, I was playing through the game and it had a drastic difficulty spike. We wanted the game to be about surviving a week in an insane asylum, but on the fourth day the game became impossibly hard. Doctors would inevitably overrun the player and there was nothing, mathematically, that the player could do about it.

But on the second night, Geoff committed a major update to the model. After three more sessions, I was able to beat the game – but just barely! This demonstrated the game’s depth and learning curve. I think it’s a game now that’s impossible to beat on the first (or second!) play, but can be mastered with practice and learning. This is all Geoff’s doing and I think it turned out great.

Joshua Morse also did a terrific job with the audio. The funky title screen can really get you into the groove! Joshua also took extra care to note when sounds would be repetitive and took steps to make them pleasing when they could easily have been irritating. You may notice while playing: sounds that happen often such as the use of basic abilities or doctors dying cycle through a handful of slightly different sounds. This means that if you kill three doctors in a row, you’ll hear three distinct sounds, which I think makes the game much more enjoyable.

Mini-mortem

We’re really pleased with how Asylum Night came out, but it took more out of us than we expected. The second night, Geoff and I were both on 4-5 hours of sleep, which bled into the next day. So though we only planned for a 48-hour window, it ended up costing us 3-4 days of lost productivity on other projects. We could have avoided this by scoping the game down even more, or by cutting unnecessary polish.

On the plus side, I think we were able to deliver a very playable game in the allotted time. We also learned a lot in the process, such as when (and where) to cut corners to increase productivity, and the great feeling of motivation that comes from shipping immediately. This was the first 48-hour game jam for all three of us, and it was a wonderful experience. If you’ve been thinking about participating in a game jam but never have, consider this a gentle nudge!

What’s next for Asylum Night?

As a young independent company, we need to be frugal with regards to how we spend our time. We literally wouldn’t have been able to afford to dedicate a couple of days to Indie Speed Run if we didn’t think we could use the game to help pay our bills. With that in mind, we designed Asylum Night from the ground up to be mobile-friendly so that we could add it to our growing portfolio of HTML5 portal games. If you’ve got an Android or iOS device, play Asylum Night in the browser – it runs surprisingly well!

Additionally, designing for mobile will make it easy for us to launch the game natively on Android and iOS using Ludei’s CocoonJS platform, so the next time you see Asylum Night, hopefully it will be in the App Store and Google Play.(source:gamasutra)