Over the past few weeks, we've been revisiting some of the seedlings from which Ugly Baby has and hasn't sprouted. We wanted to share the metaphorical test tubes we have experimented with but have never talked about before. In doing so, we welcome any and all feedback or thoughts this discussion inspires. Take gene splicing, for example:
Above, we have some twirling spiral and DNA photos. We were trying to experiment with transitions. Our thoughts were to try to avoid potentially "boring" procedurally generated levels, to break up the same procedurally generated content with transitional objects. In hindsight, the rainbow colored DNA to the black and white spiral might have been a bit of a stark contrast...
And here we have Martin from Questionable Content. We had an intern taking images for fun from web comics and creating levels out of them. The levels would form from individual pixels from an image. We'd raise certain shapes to add some "volume" to the level and to give players objects to hug and kiss, much like they would a real life Martin.
And lastly we have an experiment an intern did within Unity. The parameters control the generation of the patterns in real-time. The "camera controls" option dictates how quickly the pattern weaves. This experiment taught us that at least some things in Ugly Baby could be done in Unity, the engine that handled our semi-sequel Aaaaa! for the Awesome.
P.S. While more photos will follow next week, our first indie game competition is going great! We're still giving away at least one game to a random Aaaaa! hugger if you follow the criteria in this forum.
