Global Game Jam 2022 Dissonance
Dissonance By: Jordan Watterston, Justin Rahardjo, and Margaret Patel
Summary Resonance is a rhythmic fusion of tug of war and guitar hero. Two players are joined by four strings divided by a dynamic bar. One player is tasked with sending notes while the other must clear them. If player one clears a note, the bar moves closer to the opponent. If the player one misses, then the bar moves closer to them. Whoever the bar lands on, loses.
Gameplay Loop Gameplay will start with the bar in the middle with player two shooting orbs and Player one trying to clear them.
A sound will play after player two fires an orb as well as when player one clears it. Player one essentially has to mimic the pattern that player two is creating.
If the player misses an orb resulting in the orb reaching their position, the bar moves closer to them.
If the bar either: Reaches player one’s position before the time ends Is closer to Player one than it is player two Player one will lose, and player two will win!
It is important to mention that player one is not defenseless. Clearing orbs not only stops bar from moving towards them, it also shifts the bar in player two’s direction
If the bar either: Reaches player two’s position before the time ends Is closer to player two than it is to player one Player will lose, and player two will win!
Each player also has a “Hazard Bar” below their character. This bar fills up throughout the round if the player fails to keep in rhythm. For the one shooting, they must shoot on beat. For the one clearing orbs, they must do that within time as well. If the bar completely fills up, a random stage hazard will appear for BOTH players. These can include: Reversal of track direction Slow motion orbs Track resetting to the middle Etc. The design of these hazards are not always necessarily detrimental, but they may be a surprise to the players. This is to encourage the players to not just randomly spam orbs and really feel the music.
Hitting play from the start menu will initiate a two to three minute round. Depending on time constraints, we could add a match customizer as well. As well, the tracks right now are not currently defined to specific sounds. For testing, we will use the following:
Red: Percussion Blue: Lead Green: Bass Yellow: tbd
Sound Design Sound design is a critical part of this game in which we will need to harmonize the game's sound with gameplay. We will have to make sure we select the right amount of tracks that can make players music diverse while also not feeling too busy and overwhelming. Three to four individual sound tracks might be ideal. As well, we need to find a way to diversify the sound from when a player fires on the track and when they clear it. Two ideas include: Shooting produces something akin to a vertical strum and clearing produces something akind to a downward strum on a guitar. This does run the risk of the players finding the sounds they make repetitive. Shooting produces the sound of an instrument from one genre/era while clearing produces the other (ie. 808 snare vs a marching band snare).
Another good point mentioned by Justin is how we will keep the players in rhythm. While the idea of the hazard bar mitigates this a bit, we will still need a backing track for the players to reference what the game's tempo is. Therefore, we will need to decide on our approach with backing tracks. Create a looping backing track that maintains steady phrasing and tempo. This would be the easiest option as it would really focus on what the players are creating. However, it does risk being repetitive. Create timed phrases the length of the track, ensuring that players will be able to shoot and clear within the same sounding phrase. This approach would take quite a bit of work but would keep the backing track diverse. However, it risks the players getting confused if the track abruptly switches when they are trying to match their opponent's sound. Disregard the idea of players getting confused and stick with the phrases. This would most likely be very chaotic but could be really fun.
While none of these options necessarily limit tempo throughout the whole game session, we will have to consider this design approach carefully.
Another idea that came up to highlight the idea of duality. We can set up the event sound with a dynamic gain level of both different sounds on each track. When an action is cleared, both sounds will play. But depending on where the bar is, the balance will change to overpower the one who's losing. Reinforces an audible tug of war.
Art With the limited time crunch and our small team, we will have to work with what we got. Ideally, we might want to keep this simplistic so we can focus on gameplay and sound. If we do stick with a minimalist design, we can have a feedback system that can Start the game off with a black screen and illuminate parts of the background as things get more intense or players do well Can fade the background into recreations of the genre/era that the players sounds represent More to be discussed
TO DO LIST: Pick instruments with their alternate genre variants Work on backing tracks Finish unity logic for game state Maybe find someone to handle art PLAYTEST Not a priority, but if possible check how hard PTP multiplayer would be. (maybe theirs a built in Unity library???)
Anyways, I’m going to bed. Please gimme a call on discord if i dont wake up early enough lol. Also my ig is @britblasian if you cant reach me :)
Sounds
One person creates notes, the other has to play them Bar in the middle to show who’s winning Each player is trying to throw the other one off
4 tracks per player
Percussion: Drums Steelpan Lead Keys Guitar Bass Bass Bass Guitar String bass Bass synth Chords Keys Guitar