Space, Love & Blouge
Project Overview
1 week to develop, 2 planets at war, a peaceful moon, 2 lovers... AND BLASTERS ! Space, Love and Blouge is a physical arcade-style co-op shooter game including elements from tower defense games, where you play with color-filtered glasses and a large handmade spaceship-like alternative controller. Sounds like a lot, right ?.. Do not worry, we will break it down.
This game was developped during the ENJMIN Alternative Output Game Jam, in which we had to develop a game using an unconventional output of informations, meaning we couldn't use a normal screen.
On this project, I was in charge of UX, Ergonomics and Music Composition.
My Work
Picture of the tainted glasses
Interaction principles and UX
The main idea we had starting the project was that we wanted to make a game using the principle of color filtration. To achieve this, we designed glasses that filtered blue and red colors. This way, depending on the glasses you were wearing, it was impossible to see either the red or blue spaceships, as the game's trailer showcases (at 21 seconds into the video).
Hence, you could only see the ships of the color of the glasses you're wearing... While only being able to shoot the ones from your partner's planet, and the other way around !
To survive, players had to communicate : give indications, listen to their partners and shoot accordingly. Communication was at the core of the experience we wanted to create.
Spaceship Controller Ergonomics
To fit with the space theme of the game, we wanted to create a true spaceship cockpit to act as a controller and it was my task to design it and assemble the prototype. I had a few constraints to deal with in the design process :
- I had to take into account the fact that the game was going to be played by 2 persons at the same time, who were going to sit next to eachother.
- It meants that they had to have enough space to avoid bumping shoulders or simply feeling too close.
- The players being sit, height was also to be taken into account. Hence, the cockpit was installed on a table, which has a standard size adapted to this matter.
- The stick and shooting button were placed vertically to be compatible with both left-handed and right-handed users.
- In the middle, there is an LED bar indicating the amount of HP left. It's color was purple, so it was clearly visible by both players, since they were wearing red and blue glasses. Purple being a mix of these two base color in additive synthesis of light, things worked out.
- The other buttons on the interface are cosmetic, making the cockpit more immersive.
Once the cockpit was tested and validated by the team and external testers, we created together a polished version of it made out of wood, after the game jam was over.
Prototype and final version of the spaceship controller
Music Composition
While Mael Heurard, the sound designer of the team took care of designing and integrating the sound effects of the game, I composed it's interactive music. It reacts to frenzy mode, which is triggered by shooting a big purple heart, and becomes more intense to make the frenzy moment during which you can shoot all the enemy ships together more epic.
Results
- Space, Love and Blouge was a real success, testers really enjoy it's uniqueness and it was acclaimed by the jury
- Since it had lots of potential, the jury encouraged us to list it in indie games events and it paid off !
- The game's installation traveled around France and even Europe, making it to multiple events and played by hundreds of people.
- For a game jam project, I'm still very proud I had the chance to participate to this project and the whole team as well.
Takeaways
- Space, Love and Blouge was my first true experience as a Game UX Designer nd I still keep an amazing memory of it to this day
- The context of a gamejam taught me to iterate quickly and be autonomous in my newly learned tasks, since everyone has so much to do in a gamejam.
- I was still able to make music, which is a passion of mine and it was the perfect project to do so, since I'm more inclined to electronic music. Space fits really well with this genre.
