Grow!

Grow! is a game where player gets to enjoy in the perspective of grass, an object which is though to have passive stance in daily lives. Its' main aesthetic is to tweak norms of puzzle game just a little bit to let users enjoy a new sense of fun from it. Grow! is no different from usual puzzle games, except for the fact that it has always more than 2 protagonists running at the same time. The items, such as holes and soil, and the enemies, represented as deer, are so common features of normal puzzle games. I wanted user to have a fresh experience, but not a strange experience where everything is new with never exited rules of chaos. I was astonished by the game "Yami" (from the last semester) and "Baba is You" and learned how important it is to think out of box when making games. The "multiple protagonist" concept is the answer I came up with, and I've figured out that it was pretty successful while play testing the game. Grow! has another core concept. Grass merges. Grass grows in 4 steps in the overall game. They are able to do different things when they have grown to certain level. On the design stage, I wanted to make a game where players could feel the distinctive difference in available options they could make according to the different states of grass, but due to time limitations and 45 event limitations I ended up having just one effect where grass grows to state 3, the sand on the map is broken. Grow! takes a lot of concepts learned from class active. The mechanics are simple, making 80 pixels of move works fairly for all objects in the game. Everything is under control and rules, you don't have to worry about objects or deer sliding down in different speeds with their own positions. It is relatively easy and intuitive to learn, easy to control yet has variety of options that we could make the game through. "Cool!" was one of the most frequent comment I've heard while play testing this game. It was for sure, had independent logic and feature among the games made this semester. I've played all the Construct games from last semester posted on board. Some of them were normal, some of them were fun, and some of them were astonishing. It was not only the effort they've put into the game that surprised me, but also how much they have thought about the game itself, really surprised me. For instance, "Yami" had its unique feature of turning the light off, making the game a totally different from usual Mario games. Although the idea itself might sound simple, it is never easy to come up with a brilliant idea like that. I've spent a lot of time, focusing on what could be distinctive in our games that would be fresh and unique. I've came up with an idea of Maze Sprinter first, where acceleration matters in a maze game, protagonist could break the wall if they have enough speed, but due to logical issues (both programming logic and gaming logic) I've discarded the idea. 30 seconds describable and 15 minutes playable are difficult conditions to match. This literally means that your game should be simple but fun. You really need a sparking idea to achieve those goals. Therefore I was proud, since people really enjoyed playing the last 2 stages of Grow! The average time taken for people to play Grow! was 10 mins, and the worst case (who had no previous experience in playing games) took 17 mins to complete. Even for the game lovers, it took 6 mins to clear the game. Considering the fact that the game could be physically cleared in a minute and a half if played perfectly, we could assure that there is a challenge which players had to overcome, eventually generating fun and continuous retries. Developing Grow! would be an unforgettable experience. I've achieved confidence in making games or logic that people could actually enjoy and be engaged in. I've got a sense of developer's perspective, which was totally different from that of a normal player. In my future life, both as a player and as a developer, this experience would help in understanding and exploring games for more good. I would like to thank Tad and hard working TAs for introducing a wonderful chance to have the game developed, tested and published with evaluation. The soul of Grow! will grow on, even after all class schedules are over