Games Jack McLantern - 3rd person cartoon action platformer

Hi guys,

I haven't posted in a while, this is something I am currently working on, mainly inspired by Medievil for the PS1 (style) and some God of War, check out this Axe throw:

So this is Jack McLantern - my take on the Jack o' lantern myth - what happened after the guy who convinced Satan not to take his soul... well it's not as dire as it sounds. Apparently Death now needs his - your - help - and since you are stuck in purgatory he brings you to the mortal plane to help him clean up some shenanigans and maybe he can help you find your way as well.



Drawing from Tim Burton which is not obvious at the moment, but will be when I start implementing more final graphics and inspired by Medievil and the adventures of Sir Daniel Fortesque (which was also inspired by Tim Burton), I wanted to make a 3rd person cartoony action platformer instead of the usual realistic/dark/grim stuff I usually aim to make.

After playing some Medievil I noticed that it has a lot in common with God of War: let's fight enemies, find chests and kill bosses.

This God of War parallel gave me the idea for the weapons McLantern would use: an axe. So the idea started fleshing out and a coding thingy wanted to be made, getting a Kratos like axe in Unity.

 

Added some zombies and they turn to ragdolls:

 

Of course someone said that's neat and that it would be better if the ragdolls received force, which is something I had automatically from the functionality of the axe, but was too much, sending the dolls to high heavens - which was funny, but broke the models too much.

So I found some time and implemented a more controllable impact force that seems to work like a charm:

 

By now I was thoroughly bored with the axe and was considering scrapping the project, instead I started thinking about ways to play more with the ragdolls, since this has been a theme with prototypes I made in the past, maybe I could actually make something more this time.

I already had the slide implemented - the idea initially was to throw your head as a bowling ball, but I figured 1) it will be a returning ball instead of a returning axe, that's not variety and 2) sliding was fun.

Bowling Ball Jack was born:

This was really easy to implement, the only tricky thing was making sure the character didn't snag on the ragdolls while performing the action, but being able to walk over them once it has been performed. In Unity this was just a matter of switching a Physics layer interaction bool on/off, which is controlled by animation events, just like the collider that pushes them out of the way.

Now this was fun of course, but you could basically spam it and take out a horde of zombies no sweat, I destroyed my game.

What to do, what to do...

Let's add a stamina bar, so you have to switch up, right? And why would you not spam the axe instead? Well because that works with magic, duh... So I decided to try out what has basically become the classic: Health Stamina Mana trio of health bars.

 

Added a menu and some graphics to the bars, plus made pause functionality (all units get paused and continue from where they stopped etc):

More coming

 

So now I have some graphics for the bars and everyone pauses when I press 'Start', what else can I do with magic?

In comes the myth of O'Lantern: Satan promises to never take his soul, yes, but O'Lantern ends up in the dark and alone, he tells Satan: you're just going to leave me here in the dark?

And Satan tosses him an ever burning piece of ember from the flames of Hades (Greek Hell) that would never burn out. Hmmm that sounds like a fireball of sorts, maybe he chucks it, so I tried it out:

 

It's a good start.

The axe in God Of War was very fun for melee combos, while launching it was most of the time for puzzles or distant enemies.
The God of War axe throwing only is not fun and quickly boring, you should find new weapons and mechanics otherwise the game will feel very uninspired.

 

not played the game but you do have a point, what if he implemented a mechanic when axe is coming back to hit it scissor (football skill) and it goes to another target. or when axe is coming back he crouches to dodge to hit enemy behind him

 

I'm guessing you only saw the first video?

 

Others also, there is sliding or simple melee attack, but not deep and varied melee combos.

Whatever, i just find the God of War axe doesn't fit in that cartoon and game style.
Waiting for the axe to come back is just slowing down the gameplay , instead of some object you can throw and that does not return , for example a sword launching energy rotating swords or anything else.

It's your game do as you wish, it looks good.
I will be interested to see level design after gameplay.

 

>deep and varied melee combos.

I don't think you have recognized what the tone of the game is, though I think the graphical style (though not final) gives hints. God of war is a mature game for a mature audience. Jack isn't.

This is also apparent in the camera, which is simplified - at least for the time being - to not rotate up/down

>Whatever

This isn't some kind of competition, you just focused on the axe, you claimed it isn't fun... and said you need more stuff - which I agree with - but in addition to the other stuff I have already added, like a fire ember that you throw and doesn't come back.

>It's your game do as you wish

Of course it is. I don't know why you think this needs to be stated though. Your feedback is welcome, but it doesn't mean I will treat it as gospel and not point out when I think you missed something.

Some other ideas I'm going to try out:

- pistol/shotgun that spits a bunch of fragments that bounce around
- bow or crossbow that pushes the enemies back
- scythe, which has longer reach and you can do a rotating attack with

I have already implemented souls for magic and chests, gates and I am now putting in keys, so that I have some basic door puzzles and there is more coming in terms of enemies of course.

 

Some enemies like the skeletons will break, of course I will use it for puzzles - though simpler ones than those GoW features - like smashing a lever on the other side of a gap for example or cutting a rope.

Have you ever played Medievil? Check it out you will see where I am coming from with this project.

 

I know Medievil and played the game before.
Your project is promising, keep it up

 

How would an upgrade to the ember look? I already had a list of things added to my asana tasks. I have a cross-dot already to help with targeting the embers (Medievil also had a cursor of sorts, so maybe it's ok), what else can I do with the cross-hair-dot.

A pistol was in the list, but that also shoots one bullet at a time - according to the time period I have in my mind for this - so that's basically the same, but less magic...

How about a shotgun? That's better, but I still want to be able to hold the axe and possible throw it around at the same time.

What about a magic pistol then, that sort of fires like a shotgun and is powered by the same ember magic (which is blue, even though it is fire based(annoying) and shoots with a spread - because the ember breaks apart of course - let's bring in a pistol I bought for a game with pirates I was making and see how it goes:

I was already working on getting simple chests and doors in game as well as a way to regenerate Magic faster - souls of course... and coded them so this Pistol and Souls now.

Next? Keys? Scythe is on the same asana list and I already tried a spinning animation for the axe, but it isn't really good atm. Maybe skeletons and other enemies?

 

I put together a small area to get a sense of what I will need to do for levels, I feel I will end up increasing the amount of zombies I thought I would need, so I will also need to work on the random variations and textures to get something that works. Some audio effects also added and some systems added to the gate and chest.

Next skeleton enemies and maybe the zombies can throw something at the player as well, check it out here:

 

Giblets

 

Your game looks great.
I have a great idea.
why not control the axe when the axe is throwed you can change to a different camera on the axe and change its movement.
hopefully you get my point

 

I might give it a try and see how it plays, thanks

 

Some slight progress here, implementing all giblets and slight improvement on the gun:

 

New enemy and his posse:

 

Hi guys, more on my wip game: small improvements in animations, added exploding barrels and attacking skeletons with temp wooden sword

 

Hi guys, I made a devlog on gamejolt to prepare for the release of a test version of the game: https://gamejolt.com/games/jack-mclantern/360808

Let me know what you think. Follow and share if possible as well. Thanks!

As far as the game goes I have been working on bridges and pathfinding, so nothing really interesting to show, but I will shortly.

 

Making of cemetery:

 

Skeleton Archer basic functionality done

 

Textures and level looks very clean and polished, the game has a good amount of fighting options , this reminds me Zelda BOT; it should be a fun game.

You need to make the particle effects of coins following and going to the player less noticeable and faster, they are too much distracting from the game main action. For example like Ratchet and Clank game with bolts flying very fast to the player.

 

I added actual arrows, with trail, a bow with an animated string and a quiver as well as sounds for loading, string tension, shooting and arrow-woosh...

So the skeleton follows you and it has a range after which he starts shooting arrows while walking, if he gets closer he stops walking and just shoots arrow and if you move away he will continue pursuit.

I had him running like his sword wielding buddies, but that was a bit too much and would be lead to less variety. So zombies are the slowest, archers are slightly faster, but they have a range and skeleton warriors are really fast, but have a short range (melee).

 

Love the art style, the game look great!!!

 

OK So I have completed a few updates this week, first some additions to the axe shown in the video

The axe can now be upgraded to increase it's effectiveness, normally you throw it and it comes back, now with upgrades it can bounce between enemies as shown in the video, with 2,3 and 4 bounces at least (the system just has a limit I can change and a distance of effect, which can also be upgraded.

I also added a few sounds and a small delay when the axe hits something to try to give it some more punch.

 

The new axe throwing upgrade is pretty nifty. I especially like how smooth-looking the auto target is

 

@cyangamer1 thanks

 

Holy crap this is AWESOME. If you need some voice acting or sound effects let me know would love to help out with some lines if needed.

 

Glad you like it, coincidentally I have added the game to IndieDB so you can track it there if it's more convenient: https://www.indiedb.com/games/jack-mclantern

 

So I created the Hell Knight and created some behavior for him. I also added patrolling that can be enabled for units and I added shields to skeleton warriors to make them a bit less vulnerable.

 

Adding some juice with hit reactions

Hit reaction trigger:

Hit direction establishment:

Direction based Hit Reaction:

 

Hi guys, new update:

Some updates I made as the alpha has been given to people to check out. I also worked on the character controller and camera controller in general, making tweaks and speed adjustments to make it more enjoyable and smooth for the testers.

 

What a refreshing surprise to come across this! This looks awesome!! Very unique and I really like the mechanic of the boomerang axe.

I have strong vibes of playing Maximo & other great games on PS2. We just don't see cool stuff like this made often anymore. You should seriously start building some attention to this asap and keep at it as you continue development.

 

Someone else also pointed out Maximo, glad you like it

 

Hi guys,
if you have a XBOX360 or XBONE controller you can get an alpha of my game

on gamejolt: https://gamejolt.com/games/jack-mclantern/360808
on itch.io: https://swearsoft.itch.io/jackmclantern or
on indiedb.com: https://www.indiedb.com/games/jack-mclantern/downloads/jack-mclantern-alpha

Let me know what you think. Just unzip and run the exe, made with Unity of course.

 

Good things like good 3D art, good animations.

Let's talk about things to make better :

- Camera is too low
You don't see enemies, the player is in font of camera and takes whole screen

- Weird controls.
Why not keep left stick to move forward and rotate camera like most games, it's more comfortable.
To strafe use right stick or have specxial strafe button.

- Pistol controls
MAke it simple with one button to shoot instead of R2 and L2 ?
- Pistol need cursor to targets
Without a dynamic cursor it's hard to figure if you aim at zombie or not.

- Sliding movement push enemies forward and do damage
This movement would need special effects showing it's also an attack.
- Sliding movement animation
The animation is too rigid like some solid physic object just sliding, it does not look like a character sliding.
It is also very long movement perhaps too much for a sliding movement.

- Enemy with shield
It has issue moving forward, it regulary makes little steps backs. It does not attack and does not turn to player when player is very near.

Overall it's a good game, it needs some adjustements.

More dynamic characters animations for a toony game would enhance it a lot.

 

Cool. Thanks for the feedback

Did you happen to use Target Lock and Roll evade?

 

Just tried.
- When auto lock is on, it could stay in auto lock mode and auto lock next enemy around if there is one near , remove auto lock if player press auto lock again or if there is no other enemy near (Dark souls like).
- Rolling move , many times keeping push rolling button it does not respond, and stamina bar is always full.

About menus :
- Choosen option is not well highlight , not clear what menu item is active
- Pad does not seem to move on menus
- Quit button does not work with pad or mouse

Camera :
- Rotation is too sensitive with pad, cam would need to be more standard like good games have.

The sounds in game are good.

 

Love it man, nailed the Medievil. I actually like your throwing weapon. Maybe making it into an accessory so the player can throw it while fighting that way they're not so focused on its return. Personally though I like it even the way it is.

I also love the sounds and atmosphere that you've created thus far. It brings back some nostalgic memories. Will follow! Keep up the great work!

 

@zenGarden
so after some tough love from zengarden I revamped the camera and movement system, you know move based on stick direction and camera view, the camera is independent and the camera key recenters the player.

I will also add a live cursor to make things easier and I also took care of some of the menu things, which is of course just functional (the quit was based on a string change, switched to int)

I also added vertical and horizontal axis inversion for the camera and if you lock onto a target strafe and the previous system is enabled.

Check it out: https://swearsoft.itch.io/jackmclantern

@Foestar: thanks for the kind words

 

Hey don't take it badly, it had never been my review intention
It's only some small feeback how i found the game, i give you my impressions and my own taste about the gameplay, that's only that, you can take it or ignore it.

It's your own game design, perhaps controls are better how they are , perhaps others players prefer the game as it is, so perhaps my suggestions are not great LOL

Good luck with your game and have a good day

 

I wasn't saying it a negative way. I really appreciated the feedback

So did you test the new version? I implemented the most important parts of what you suggested and just haven't finished with the rest (dynamic cursor)

( tough love: It is an expression used when someone treats another person harshly or sternly with the intent to help them in the long run )

 

Lot better camera and controls, you can have some option to adjust camera distance if people want it more near character.

Some things i noticed , improve it or leave it as it is if you think it's how your game should work.

- Auto target facing issue :
it only target when player is facing enemy , when player is facing camera auto target can't target the enemy near
- Auto target joytsick direction issue
When locked enemy is in front of camera and player behind, the joystick direction are like inverted, pushing up does not make the player move away from enemy but make player getting close.
-Auto target distance :
it's like distance to auto target could be bigger , sometimes player needs to be close enough to get auto target, but perhaps it's to prevent too much auto target use ?

- Pistol without auto target stop aimaing (player pushing L2) when player start moving to any direction.
It would be better to make player strafe when player keep pistol aiming with L2.
- Pistol perhaps could auto target without needing to push auto target button ?
At least it should display some cursor when enemy is in front of pistol.

Controls and camera are lot better, menu are clear and responsive, the enemy with shield is now attacking, the game is lot more enjoyable. Good work already.

Have a good day.

 

- Auto target
I think once I implement the dynamic cursor this will all change. Yes, distance is to limit auto-target abuse and glitches. It was tied to the character and not the camera, because you turned the character and the camera followed. Now that changed it would have to be based on camera.

- Pistol
I will revamp that as well, I was going for a bloodborne style control, but it really doesn't fit the game (initially it was simpler, but I thought it was too simple and not challenging)

 

New cam/controls and fixes video: