Ask HN: I'm building one HTML5 game per week, need feedback • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: I'm building one HTML5 game per week, need feedback

#21

Post by jlees » Fri, Jan 10, 2014, 3:26 PM UTC

vezzy-fnord wrote: post #11

I'd recommend you go for quality over quantity. Make a decent game every month or some longer period of time, rather than a generic arcade game every week. But, whatever keeps you motivated. Keep going.

A lot of the advice given to beginning game developers is exactly to put out a few generic arcade games at first. It's a great way to learn a stack and actually ship something, plus the end product is instantly recognizable, and the barrier to entry in terms of graphics can be quite low. Once you're comfortable in your output and skills, doing more original artistic work is a great next step, but many aspiring devs get hung up on doing something awesome and never finishing it at all. (I know, because I made the same mistake, despite knowing all this!)

Re: Ask HN: I'm building one HTML5 game per week, need feedback

#22

Post by lessmilk » Fri, Jan 10, 2014, 3:28 PM UTC

vezzy-fnord wrote: post #11

I'd recommend you go for quality over quantity. Make a decent game every month or some longer period of time, rather than a generic arcade game every week. But, whatever keeps you motivated. Keep going.

I find it easier to learn on small projects than on bigger ones. But as my skills improve, I may increase my release cycle from one week to a few weeks in order to make more sophisticated games.

Re: Ask HN: I'm building one HTML5 game per week, need feedback

#23

Post by blackdogie » Fri, Jan 10, 2014, 3:30 PM UTC

really liked game number #3 , not so much a fan of the background music, but definitely it was a cool game to pass away 4 or 5 minutes. Thanks.

Re: Ask HN: I'm building one HTML5 game per week, need feedback

#24

Post by aaronetz » Fri, Jan 10, 2014, 3:30 PM UTC

Nice games. I like the simple visuals. Played game #2 for a bit. One specific comment: Holding "up" fires at the maximum rate (pressing up repeatedly doesn't fire any faster). Also, there is no downside to constantly holding up. So you probably should either (1) eliminate the up button and just auto-fire all the time, (2) have a fuel mechanic that will force the player to conserve shots, or (3) make it worthwhile to press up faster. And if doing so, move the fire button to space or something similar, because it is hard to repeatedly press up while moving with the side arrows.

Re: Ask HN: I'm building one HTML5 game per week, need feedback

#25

Post by aaronetz » Fri, Jan 10, 2014, 3:37 PM UTC

Just finished game #3, died 83 times (wasn't too hard after playing Super Meat Boy :)). Some ideas: add two more controls for increasing vertical and horizontal velocity (i.e. holding "shift" will make to box go faster and jump farther, and holding jump longer will make it jump higher. And then add more levels that exploit those controls!

Re: Ask HN: I'm building one HTML5 game per week, need feedback

#26

Post by Taurenking » Fri, Jan 10, 2014, 3:58 PM UTC

lessmilk wrote: post #9

joebo wrote: post #5

It would be neat for someone to take one of the games and show how to build it without any frameworks.

I plan to write tutorials on how I build some of my games with Phaser. But without any framework, I don't know how to do it.

make sure to make a post about it...I'm interested! Keep up the good work!

Re: Ask HN: I'm building one HTML5 game per week, need feedback

#27

Post by drd » Fri, Jan 10, 2014, 4:01 PM UTC

joebo wrote: post #5

It would be neat for someone to take one of the games and show how to build it without any frameworks.

Here is a simple game I did. You can see the software life cycle data on the blog. Check the source code of the game. It is pretty straight forward.

http://www.drdacademy.com/?id=a-simple-html5-game-the-design...

Re: Ask HN: I'm building one HTML5 game per week, need feedback

#28

Post by lessmilk » Fri, Jan 10, 2014, 4:02 PM UTC

Taurenking wrote: post #26

lessmilk wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I plan to write tutorials on how I build some of my games with Phaser. But without any framework, I don't know how to do it.

make sure to make a post about it...I'm interested! Keep up the good work!

Thanks! To be notified when it's out, you should register to my newsletter http://www.lessmilk.com

Re: Ask HN: I'm building one HTML5 game per week, need feedback

#29

Post by bonobo » Fri, Jan 10, 2014, 4:07 PM UTC

Oh boy, these are awesome! :D

I'm especially fond of game #1. It reminded me of an old html game I played in which I had to use the mouse to drag a rectagle around, avoiding collisions with other rectangles that bounced around. I remember receiving this in an email that said if I were able to stand for X seconds (I can't remember how many) then it meant that my reflexes were above the threshold required for jet pilots — and obviously, as every boy, I wanted to fly a jet.

The only critique I have for you is to have posted it during my work hours.

Re: Ask HN: I'm building one HTML5 game per week, need feedback

#30

Post by apo » Fri, Jan 10, 2014, 4:09 PM UTC

blainesch wrote: post #19

vezzy-fnord wrote: post #11

I'd recommend you go for quality over quantity. Make a decent game every month or some longer period of time, rather than a generic arcade game every week. But, whatever keeps you motivated. Keep going.

"The ceramics teacher announced on opening day that he was dividing the class into two groups. All those on the left side of the studio, he said, would be graded solely on the quantity of work they produced, all those on the right solely on its quality. His procedure was simple: on the final day of class he would bring in his bathroom scales and weigh the work of the “quantity” group: fifty pound of pots rated an “A”…

Write drunk, edit sober.

http://ninjasandrobots.com/write-drunk-edit-sober