Indie Rock: GHOST WHEEL?

I haven’t read the conversation log that started Devchat’s latest Game Jam based around the short, beautiful, two word phrase “Ghost Wheel?”.

I could ask to see it, I suppose. A cursory google has found a contact email and I am in some sense a journalist. But it seems self explanatory. You’re a cool person with talent. Someone mentions the phrase “Ghost Wheel?” and obviously you do everything in your power to make something of your own with this concept in mind. Clear my schedule, Janet, and hold all my calls, I have an idea for a game with a wheel and a ghost.

Spooky Ghost Wheel Town

You’re a skeleton. There’s minimalist graphics and a massive wheel with platforms that cause the structure to spin when you stand on them due to momentum based physics. There are ghosts who show up sometimes. Hit one on the head and it drops Mad Presidential Dollar Dollar Bills. Get your money, skeleton, and listen to a rad ukulele riff while you’re doing it. Don’t let the ghosts disrupt your on their terms, though, they’ll make you drop your cash and you might even die too. You’re at an advantage when you’re very high up in the world, but since the cash rains down you’re incentivised to get lower, pick it up, regain height and repeat. That’s a good system. Well done.

But aside from it being a good game, it’s also about a skeleton getting Scrooge McDuck rich while jumping on ghosts. This is me. This is finally a game that represents who I am!

Prowl

Who is driving? It isn’t you. You’re in the back seat. Is… Is no one driving???

Eeeek!!

Carnighoul

Limitations in player ability is key game design. That’s step 1 in making your game actually enjoyable to play, y’all. Carnighoul lets the player move around locked on the circumference of a Ferris Wheel and shoot enemies who are attempting to fuck it all up and ruin the fair for all the boys and girls who just wanna get up all in the sky and rock the carriages back and forth without any concern for a lack of proper safety regulations and assurance that the machinery is well maintained.

Carnival rides are way scarier than ghosts, is what I’m saying.

You can shoot a bullet at enemies but you can’t always see them. Moving around the wheel changes your viewpoint. Not knowing exactly where to fire until you move closer means you’re always going to sacrifice blind spots in one area for accuracy in another. I like that. I wish there was a bit more to this trade-off, like, knowing that enemies are going to float in from a direction but perhaps not knowing how many? Or how many shots you’re going to need to fire? Something that requires sight-knowledge to be certain.

AGPPBP

Move the phone around. Enjoy the dynamic lighting. Read what’s on the phone. You’ll like what’s on the phone.