I WOKE UP LATE AND NOW I HAVE TO ROCKET JUMP PASS ZOMBIES TO GET TO CLASS DESIGN DOCUMENT
by Chris Chen
Introduction
This is a document for a game called “I woke up late and now I have to rocket jump pass zombies to get to class.” This game will have sprite-based animation, tiled backgrounds, collision detection, phsyics, AI, side scrolling & gravity, efficient memory management, render threading, and all that fun stuff.
Technology
IWUPANIHTRJPZTGTC will be developed for windows using C++ and DirectX. Artwork will be created in Adobe Photoshop.
Story
I stayed up late the day before playing some good old TF2 into the wee hours of the night. I doze off onto the keyboard. And I sleep. And sleep. And sleep. And sleep. Until my roommate wakes me up and says, “Don’t you have this uber important quiz today?” So I jolt out of bed and rush to class putting on the only wearable thing I can find – a set of BLU Soldier uniform – only to discover when I walk outside that the world has been overrun with zombies.
Being the excellent student that I am, I still insist on going to class. So I take my Soldier uniform and rocket launcher and calmly walk to class blasting away at zombies.
Objective
The objective is to get to class. There will be hordes of zombies trying eat my brains but I’ll have to dispose of them using my rocket launcher, shotgun, and trusty shovel. Destruction of city also forces me to rely on my rocket jumping skills to navigate around the rubble and over broken structures.
Gameplay
The main character will be based heavily on Team Fortress 2’s Soldier class except this game will be a 2D sidescroller. I’ll be able to move left and right, crouch, and jump. Because of the heavy equipment I am carrying, I cant jump very high but I can ROCKET jump to get to higher places or travel faster.
There will be three weapons, the main one being the rocket launcher. Besides the obvious use of a rocket launcher when faced with zombies, jumping while firing a rocket at my feet will blast me towards the opposite direction. The same technique can be applied on the ground, walls, platforms, etc. This can be used to clear obstacles or get away from a mob of zombies. The secondary weapon is the shotgun, which will come in handy when surrounded and all out of rockets. The last is the shovel because killing zombies with shovels is fun.
The zombies will be your average mind-less zombies, except they run fast like in 28 Days Later. So they’ll either have to be blown up or rocket-jumped passed.
Random drops will be scattered to refill on ammo and health.
Controls
The game will use both keyboard and mouse. Keyboard for movement and mouse for aiming at shooting.
- A – left
- D – right
- SHIFT – crouch
- SPACE – jump
- 1,2,3 – rocket, shotgun, shovel
- ESC – pauses game and shows menu
- MOUSE – aim weapon
- MOUSE L – fire weapon
GUI
Main Menu – Will display a the logo for the game and an image the main character sleeping with two menu items:
- wake up– starts a new game
- back to sleep – exits to desktop
Pause menu – Invoked when player presses ESC while game is in progress
- return – go back to playing the game
- main menu – goes back to main menu
- exit – exits to desktop
Ingame GUI – the following will be displayed on the screen:
- Health Points
- Ammo for current weapon
Art
The art will be made in a pixel art style and will be all original (if time permits)
Main character
- Running forwards
- Running backwards
- Short jump
- Rocket Jump
- Holding RL
- Holding shotgun
- Holding shovel
- Take damage
- Dying
Projectiles
- Rockets
- Shotgun blast
Zombies
- Walking
- Running
- Taking damage
- Exploding
Foreground – various platforms and obstacles resembling rubble and torn structures
Backgrounds – will feature broken buildings
Items
- Health
- Ammo
