What WAS the Plan? Planned and Unplanned Outcomes

Nicolas Nguyen

ATCM 4397.007

    Not all things went according to plan in the creation of Battery Runner. Because Battery Runner was designed to be a fast pace game, there were many ideas and goals for the game to be further developed into a full fledge game. Or at least, a working demo with working levels. After mid development of the first level, there was a sudden realization how much of this project was underestimated. Due to this major error resulting in the demo play time for Battery Runner being significantly longer then intended, and the time it takes to build these ideas requires more time than given, many of these ideas were either put on hold or rejected. 

Plan A: The Original Plan

    Originally, Battery Runner was suppose to have 2 playable levels in total, follow by a main menu. Within each levels was suppose to use the full duration of the music used to create the level, the estimated duration being about 3 minutes.

As stated before, Battery Runner is a fast pace game where the player will collect lightning charges to increase the player's speed. Because of this, and the idea of a level needs to be designed an average of 3 to 5 minutes of playtime, the intention was to design a level that uses the full 3 minute song as the gameplay. The major flaw to that plan was not considering retrying the level when missing or dying as part of the game playtime. As a result, game playtime would be almost 10 minutes long. Even worse, because Battery Runner was a rhythm game, players would be required to start from the very beginning when retrying. This would only make the players go insane, and that is for one level. 

    Another idea that was later scrapped in the development was the ability for players to cling onto walls as they descend down. This mechanic would provide a more dynamic to the game and give the game a more action like feel, making it look epic as the player drops down. The reason why this concept was scratched entirely was mainly due to how this mechanic could contradicts with the timing of the music. Each levels are supposed to be design for the player to move with the flow of the music. If players were to wall cling and slowly descend, then the music would be off synchronized with the level, resulting complicated gameplay and level designing. This would require even more time to develop and will cause too much problems in the future.

    To make the game unique, there was an idea where players used the collected lightning charges to power up their ultimate ability. These ultimate abilities would allow the player fast forward parts of the level and make it easier to play for the player. The reason why this idea was scrapped is similar to the reason from the previous idea above. It is due to the song being out of synchronized with the obstacles throughout the level. Another reason why this idea was scrapped is also because the level is not linear. Players will be moving through the level by back tracking, going underneath the platforms, and jump to higher platforms.