{"author_name":"stateoff","cat":"LD - Misc","comments":[],"epoch":1437428340,"likes":3,"metadata":{"p_key":"17146","p_author":"stateoff","p_authorkey":"0","p_urlkey":"52445","p_title":"Bird vs. Zombies #indiesvsgamers","p_cat":"LD - Misc","p_event":"LD32","p_time":"1437428340","p_likes":"3","p_comments":"0","p_status":"UPD5","us_key":null,"us_name":null,"us_username":null,"event_start":"1429228800","event_key":"27","event_name":"LD32"},"text":"

Last week a bird pooped on my friend’s head. That day five people stared at their smartphones in the metro. One was only holding it tight like Gollum would hold the ring.
\n Add the jam theme “Arcade” and 72 hours of madness to get this:<\/p>\n

Bird vs. Zombies<\/a><\/p>\n

At its core it is a Side-Scroller, but your “Ammo” is basically bird poop. If hit, the “Zombies” will throw their smartphone at you. And will be free!<\/p>\n

I have no fancy intros, you get 100% fun for your entertainment dollar. I am happy that I was able to create a progression of 5 levels which each have a new experience. To beat the high-score you have to finish<\/strong> all 5 Levels<\/strong>. The more “Zombies” you “free” the better your score but also the harder it gets.<\/p>\n

I am very proud of my first game jam entry ever. Game Jam Survival Guide<\/a> saved me the worst nightmares.<\/p>\n

\"Bird<\/a><\/p>\n

I used Unity 5.1 with nothing more than VS and the GameJoltAPI package (which is great but not stable at the current state! Beware of some quirks). I was very happy that most of the logic was done with a single smart “Spawner” behavior that could spawn randomly or with constant delay – in order or randomly from a pool of prefabs. This was used for spawning Smartphones, poop, the street, the actors, drone beams, powerups and the background.<\/p>\n

The AI for the various parts comes from individual behaviors on the gameobjects.<\/p>\n

For the bird I used a super neat State pattern from Game Programming Patterns<\/a>. Highly recommended book! This made it easy to create hit state behaviour or the finishing landing.<\/p>\n

I love the little details: Like the “bombs” and smartphones explode on impact with the ground, you can poop the smartphone mid-air, or the smartphones also kill the drones …<\/p>\n

Hope you enjoy it as much as I did.<\/p>\n

Timelapse Making of (spot the Unity crashes \":)\" )<\/p>\n