Game development. Yes, we are still doing it. Today, I am looking at the charts I have spent the past 4 weeks on: balancing inflammation damage and energy gains. Each cell type does damage to the surrounding tissue as it kills pathogens. Each pathogen provides energy as it melts away in its pool of acid, oxidation and nitrosylation …. *evil laughter* But oh yeah, those things that kill pathogens kill us, too….. so the core of this game will be the balance between inflammation and energy.
If you have been paying attention (an a good number of you dearhearts have been paying attention for a few years now, thank you so much!) Well, if you have been paying attention, you might say, “Hey, I played a version of your game at (insert name of indie game show here) and you already has a balance of inflammation and energy. Why you spending all this time redoing it? Well, yeah, we did have a basic idea… but I did not have a solid enough balance to create more complex levels. The system we has before actually gave you a score point for every cytokine the cell “ate.” Then there were multipliers for keeping inflammation low and saving up energy… We have done away with the score and keep just the inflammation and energy.
The chart below is really just to show you generally, “Hey there is some work being done.” Maybe I’ll describe the whole chart to you later? For now, I want to tell you that we are planning to create a phone/tablet game. There will be 5 waves in each level, the player will have Neutrophils, Macrophages, B Cells and probably, Natural Killer cells. Vaccination* will be required! The player defends their patch of body from invaders… and since we are only defending a patch we can get away with showing the immediate/early hours of infections… We are focusing on the innate immune system, because, well, it is complicated enough to make a really neat game out of. Of course, of course we plan to make a follow up with T-Cells as soon as possible. We dream of a giant strategy game or a 3D adventure… Oh, we have dreams.
I digress. I was trying to tell you that we are planing a phone/tablet game, and we plan to get it out to you in time for MAGFest which is here in DC in January, 2018. Bold statement, I know, but I’m saying it. It will be tight, sleek, balanced, addicting and you’ll need antibodies to survive!
*Vaccination! Immune Defense will allow –require– players to create new antibodies. Yes. The player will be required to vaccinate the body they are defending! Naturally, we are really dedicated to showing how antibodies get made in an accurate manner. So creating the vaccination system is my current process. In “standard video game terms” the player finds a new “enemy” and “researches” a weapon combat it. The “research requires capturing one of the enemy and then inspecting it. Upon inspection we will see 3 molecules on the enemies surface. Players can pick one molecule to make an antibody to. “Making an antibody” or “researching a weapon” will take 3 waves worth of time. So, yeah, it is true: a player will be able to see a pathogen and make an antibody to it pretty fast. This worries me a little, because it takes a week or weeks to get a real antibody response…
OK. So, phone/tablet game. Vaccination. Solid game balance in place, working on designing interesting levels. See you tomorrow.
