before I get started, this is my first tutorial, so I hope it goes over well.
Contents
Introduction
Puzzle game traits
Puzzle ideas and methods
Tips
Closing remarks
Introduction
When gaming dawned, there was not only one kind of game. There were many different kinds of game types including first person shooters and puzzle games. People may believe that FPSC can only be used to make FPS games, but they are wrong. FPSC can make puzzle games, if you know how. This tutorial will show you how to do so, and give you tips on how to make an over all, better FPS game.
Puzzle game traits
Lets say you are playing a soul puzzle game, nothing but puzzles. All it is is puzzle after puzzle after puzzle. You step into the first challenge. Something needs to happen. Most puzzle games have good plots to go along with them, or even not so great plots. When you enter the challenge, a hud could flash across the screen, or a story zone could be activated. once the story zone or hud has past, the player will some instructions on how to play the puzzle. it works best to include this in you hud or story map so the game flows along.
We now have 2 things that puzzle game should have,
1) a story
2) instructions
Moving on, when the player starts to try and beat the puzzle, it gets boring fast. For instance, if you are in the middle of a big room with a bunch of little sections to it, and you have to go in the right one or die. if all you have the core, the player will just take to process of elimination, or quiting. They will give up. You need something else going on, such as graphics, music, sounds, periodic explosions, or something to keep the player aware of whats going on.
So updating our list of stuff to have
1)a story
2)instructions
3)side activities
The last thing. You need more than on puzzle if you're going to make an entire game. You cant have the right zone puzzle 5 times in a row. The player will be bored out of their minds. I'm not saying you cant use the same puzzle twice, just not in a row, and not the same exact thing. Mix it up a little. have puzzle 1, then puzzle 2, then a variation on puzzle 1.
So, the puzzle game traits are
1)a story
2)instructions
3)side activities
4)more than one puzzle
Puzzle ideas and methods
As stated before, you need more than one puzzle. here are some puzzle ideas.
Correct zone
The correct zone puzzle is simple. Make a large room, rectangular works best. Then use boards, textures, or walls to divide the room into a bunch of small sections. Try not to go over 6, but stay over 3. Make the player start in a way so that they can go to any room without having to go through a room to get there. If your unsure as to what this may look like, check out the picture showing it.
Once you have done that, put killzones (hurtzones with the hurt factor raised up) in all the zones but one. In the zone without a kill zone, put a win zone. Have a riddle or a message at the start of the puzzle that will lead the player to the correct zone. You may need to label rooms with little signs or something. Don't forget to put in extra stuff to keep the player happy.
Message puzzle
The message puzzle is also pretty easy to pull off. Again, you will need a big room. use textures or boards to divide the floor into one large grid. You can use walls because the player need to be able to move through the grid freely. Once you have the the grid, use boards or textures and fill in every box in the grid with a letter. now you should have a jumble of letters. Make it so that there is a word or message written with the boards or textures. Make the player start out on one side of the room, and have to get to the other. Put kill/hurt zones in all the letters that are not part of the word/phrase. It works best if you phrase starts and ends so it acts as a pathway from one side of the room to the other, but it does not have to. It should however, let the play be able to get to it without having to cross any letters that are not part of anything. In essence, you are making a giant word search. And again, in the opening story and/or instructions of the puzzle, give the player a hint of what the message could be. put a win zone at the end of the phrase, or at the other side of room, whatever works best for you. If you don't get this one, just look at the picture.
Door Maze
The last puzzle im going to show you is the door maze. I guess a maze isn't really a puzzle, but it works as one. For the third time, you will need a large room. and again, you need to divide it up into a large grid. However, this time use walls so that you have a ton of 1X1 rooms right next to each other. Now you need to pick a type of door, and select out of the library (or from your own creation) an auto door, a remote door, a locked door, and a fake door. Put the auto door on every single wall of the grid except for the ones that are on the border of the room. then from there, you can replace some the autos with fakes, locked, and remote doors. Put in fake switches, real switches, and keys. This is actually really confusing because everything looks the same, but acts differently. Put in a plr start and a win zone somewhere in the maze. Make sure that the player can get to the win zone. this puzzle works well as a game finally because you modify it a lot. Such as putting in bad guys who will follow waypoints through the maze, or use complex scripts to close doors once you've gone though, or only be able to go through one side. Even for an action game, this works pretty good. If you couldn't follow this one, here is a picture to show what I mean. I modified mine a tiny bit however. Instead of not putting doors on the outside, I used fake doors to make everything look the same. And mine doesn't have a win zone, its just something to show you the basics of the idea.
Tips
Here are some tips for a puzzle game, mixed in with some review.
1) A puzzle game should have a plot and instructions
2) A puzzle game should have a variety of puzzles
3) If a puzzle game is going to nothing but puzzles, make them good
4) Always have side stuff going on like music or decals
5) Think outside the box
6) There are some puzzle options in FPSC, but if you can script, there are a lot more.
7) The riddle doesn't have to be 3d. Put in riddles and other stuff
8) Depending on what your going for, confusing the player is fun. Give hints that dont always tell the truth
9) Keep the levels short, one puzzle per level
10) Dont be kind.
Closing remarks
So, I hope this helped some of you people. Thats pretty much it. enjoy!
http://smallgroup.be/
