UA 2008: Downhill Bowling

I'm happy to introduce our UA 2008 entry, Downhill Bowling. Control a bowling ball as it charges down a mountain. Knock down bowling pins and use special pickups to increase your score.
Hope you have fun with the game and it would be great to hear your feedback.
www.downhillbowling.com

 

Hahaha thats one of the most original approaches to bowling I have ever seen... I think with some spit n polish you have one very cool title on your hands. Keep going

 

Well, I was quite skeptical when I read the name, but I have to say it's surprisingly fun!

 

That's a very cool game!!! I'd say "the perfect casual game"

The only thing I didn't like was getting lost 2 times in the third level. That happened to me on the second ... hm ... how to describe ... well, where you have to stay in the "center" or you'll fall down the left or right hand side. The first one of those I find quite easy, but the second shook me off two times, and the ugly thing was that it took very long to get back on track. The first time, I still tried it, but the second time, I got frustrated ;-)

Another thing I don't really understand are those "make my ball small" power-ups with the things where you can enter when you're small. I found it quite difficult, but one time I actually managed to get in there - but nothing special happened (but I would have expected something special to happen ;-) ).

Anyways, very cool game! Looking forward to the other levels!!!

Sunny regards,
Jashan

 

Great concept and a lot of fun to play.

I just had the feeling of wanting to press harder on the right and left arrow keys to make the ball turn harder/faster.

 

It feels to slow except when there is boost active from arrows, i would increase the rolling speed also to increase difficulty a little.

 

I likey!

 

Impressive! Really fun to play...
Congrats............

 

Hey Nic,
I have to admit , this has been the fun game i have played in a long time, Its just so simple and fun to play, love to see more power-ups, like dual Balls and how about some Lazer from space , I didn't like killing the sheep though .

Great work

Steve

 

I love this game! Team Sonic should be taking notes.

 

Me neither. Made me think of WoW with a smile, though... maybe those sheeps could turn into casters of which you pull aggro when you run over them. And then they sheep you as revenge ;-) ... a bit like eating those shroomies, but more severe ;-)

 

Very nice idea indeed. With some graphic polishing, it's a must have... Really addictive.

Congratulations.

 

wow, thanks for the positive feedback, guys!


@Steve
Thanks, we haven't been able to work on this full time, but we'll polish it as much as we can for UA2008 and continue to improve beyond.


@col000r
watch out, it might just become a new olympic sport


@jashan
yep, we still need to fully implement 'out of bound' collisions. Still trying to figure out the best way to get the ball back on track. In that area you are mentioning, though, the idea was to introduce a river on the right side. You can stick to the safe left or try to collect the coins on the ridge with the chance of falling into the river on the right.

The idea behind the "make by ball small" obstacle is that you need to go through it to collect the coin right behind it. I agree with you that it's not enough of a reward, we'll look something better.


@artzfx
that is the tough part to balance... want to give the ball some inertia to keep it challenging, but also make it responsive. We thought we had it at a good point, but that is why we need more people to test.


@Marc
we might increase the max speed... or maybe add a way to increase it if you press the 'up' arrow?


@bigkahuna, soad667, MikeJ, perick
thanks!


@orbitsteve
dual balls could be fun... we'll definitely try to introduce more power-ups as you progress.

@orbitsteve, jashan
Technically, we were not really thinking about killing the sheep, just knocking them out. Maybe we'll have to add a cartooony effect and have them get back up if they land back on the track. Or is issue with the actual gameplay element?

 

Lotsa fun! Very original and rather addictive!

 

Very awesome! I got the high score on level 2.

 

this game is so cool that I didn't realize that 3 people were undermining my seat! I love it and in my book it would win a competition as is.

 

Very nice little game.. You should toss it up on shockwave and some of the other flash game sites.. I bet you could make some decant money from it on their add programs.

It's one of those addictive type games and that's exactlly the type that can make good money, because people play them over and over.

 

I own level 2 now!

 

glad you guys are having fun, and thanks for the very kind comments. We are being a bit sidetracked by other projects until the end of the month, so we need to manage our time wisely and focus on the first 3 levels to make them as solid/polished as possible for the Oct 1st deadline. More levels are coming, though, we promise...

Btw, who is the cheater on Level1? We need to talk :wink:
cheers

 

I almost finished a cheated level 3 as well... I was on a all-strike run when I missed the last elevated part and went throung the lower valey... I managed to get back several times, collecting everything that I missed and was trying to collide with the last cannon, so I'd get a 6000+...

But somewhere I got off limits, so I couldn't register it. But I think it's possible though...

I have another suggestion... Since there're some obstacles that slow you down, maybe you could have a speedrun version of all levels, where there's a countdown between every bowling-blocks-group.

 

I like this, but at least for me (I can't say I speak for casual players) I would like a hard mode where everything moves 1.5 or 2 times faster. Other than that it is a pretty good game.

I did get stuck in a trench once. I feel like if that happens the player should be respawned.

 

i cheated! I prefer to call it, game testing

If you get a strike, then turn around and roll past that area again, you'll get another strike. You can pretty much do this forever

 

hehe, I just figured out this bug (feature?) a minute ago... but thanks for letting us know, it is much appreciated. We have been thinking about ways to prevent players to go 'upstream', but haven't found a good solution yet (other than physical barriers/steps). But this infinite points collection will definitely be fixed in the next version.

Regarding speed: yes, we are primarily targeting the casual player, but we also want to make it enjoyable for more experienced players, so we'll try to come up with some different game modes. Increasing speed is a good idea to make it more challenging, but it will affect physics (turning radius, jump distance) so we'll have to tweak the layouts, too. We will most likely do it, it will just require a bit more time to implement.

Cheers!

 

Hi,
really addictive, funny.
My childrens love too !
Congratulations.

Twintower31

 

One heads up for difficulty is that often you can just modify the time scale. RC Laser Warrior did this really well.

Otherwise you might just add different sets of properties for the player depending on difficulty.

Is it ok that I can roll "uphill"?

I am thinking now that it might not be that I feel the game is too slow, but instead that I feel like the ball should go faster on steeper parts and slower otherwise.

 

Brilliant and fun! Keep it up!

 

I just posted a new update.

The highlights of this build include:
Updated Menu UI.
Added Timed Mode with it's own high score table.
Added a river to level 3 which should help with staying on the path.
Some tweaks and polish here and there.

Hope you have fun with it!

 

Very cool - again, I was offput by the name, but it turned out to be very fun to play. I didn't like the cannon section at the end though, as controlling up, down and fire were things I hadn't needed to do during the rest of the level.

 

Haha fun game!

 

Great game! nice feel and very fun to play,
I usually hate bowling games but this one is the first one I liked.
Keep it up!

 

Pretty sweet. But lets not forget the music!

I suggest Dethklok.

 

I have a game design complaint/suggestion regarding the timed levels...

Since the only goal is to get to the end faster and hitting at least one pin in each set, there's no point in the coins...

The rocks, cheeps are OK, since they can low your speed.

The suggestion are:

1 - Make the coins give some prize when completelly collected (set), such as a temporary boost in speed;
2 - Make the timed levels have the same scoring as before, but the time slice between each pin set is a count down... Again, a complete coin set would increse your countdown time.

I think the way it is, the time levels are kind of pointless... Liked a lot the new menu system. Keep up the good work.

 

I think the coins are fine as is, as collecting a whole set gives you a point bonus.

 

@dock
I agree that the first time using the cannon can be confusing. We’ll probably add some UI that will help explain the cannon controls.

@perick
The timed levels work with similar scoring as the regular mode but the points are added to a bonus time, the number under the timer. At the end of the level the bonus time is subtracted from the timer.
You may have a good point, the bonus time is not as obvious as it should be. We will try to improve it so it will be easier to understand.


Thanks for the feedback.

 

Just completed our final UA2008 build: Level tweaks, new level, achievements, overall spit and shine... we even threw in a bonus raccoon!

Hope you like it. Unfortunately, we had to reset the high score table because of all those changes. Who will be the new champion?

 

Hint: the raccoon hides in level3 :wink:

 

I haven't played it for a while... It's fantastic in all aspects.

Congratulations and good luck for the rest of us competitors in the contest (I didn't have time to finish the high score system for sperm racer).

BTW: I'm topping level 1 in normal mode now (5400+)

 

Top score on all four normal levels.

It's an Ass Party my friends! Don't resist!

 

@ perick
thanks! And good luck to us, too

 

fun game man I had fun thanks!

 

Thanks! Posts like that are real morale boosters in the morning.

Hard at work on new levels... but please keep on sending us your comments, the feedback so far has been very valuable.

Cheers

 

Very good game. I think this is definitely in the top 3 as far as the UA competition goes. The only improvement I can think of is more levels, haven't found any bugs so far. Oh, well, I guess there was 1 bug but I guess it could be a networking issue on my side. I beat my own top score of #1 for level 2, and it didn't replace. I typed in the same name ("ekeak"). But anyway, I'm number 1 for level 2! w00t!

 

Not anymore.

It's an Ass Party! Don't resist!

 

Ok this is a great game and all, but it's VERY difficult to get a perfect score on anything above the first level. It turns more into a game of chance rather than a game of skill when it comes to getting strikes on the pins. 1 of 3 things needs to be changed in order to make it a little bit more consistent in terms of luck vs skill:

1). The physics of the pins need to be changed a little to make them lighter, or make it so that the pins can't be under-swiped by the ball (which makes it so that other pins behind it can get knocked down).

2). The pins need to be slightly closer together.

3). The ball needs to be slightly bigger.

One thing I noticed as well is that sometimes when you bomb a pin area, a pin might still remain even though all of them were blasted into the air.

 

@ ekeak: Thanks! We are not aware of any leaderboard submission issues, but we'll keep an eye open.

@ theinfomercial: Can't say I am thrilled to have the words 'Ass Party' at the top of our leaderboard again, but I am glad you enjoy the game.

We are tweaking the scoring (make it less exponential) and will be looking at the pins, too.

Cheers.

 

Sure is an addictive game. I own the regular leaderboards again. I'd like to see someone beat my score for level 4 (not really).

Good luck at the contest!

 

You were saying?

 

9,000. Yeah...right.

I played through level 4 today in hopes of beating your score. But when I saw 9,000, I immediately said "This can't be right. I got pretty close to a perfect game last time!". Well, turns out I might be right. I played through again and I got a perfect game and quite a few bonuses.

My score was 6,880.

Lets do some basic math, shall we?

I tested the scoring system to see how it worked. Knocking down a whole set of pins earns you 100 points. For every strike you get, you get bonus points based on a multiplier of 100. So on the first set you knock down you get just the 100 points (100 x 1 = 100), but the second one you get 200 points (100 x 2 = 200) plus the original 100 points from the first set of pins which adds up to 300 points.

Simple addition will figure out what a perfect game's final score will be:

100+200+300+400+500+600+700+800+900+1,000 (the 1,000 came from the combined total of the pins you knocked down which is 100 points x 10 sets of pins) = 5,500 without collecting coins.

I ran through level 4 a second time to collect all the coins and hit none of the pins. The score was 1,750 on two separate occasions.

With all this in mind a perfect "score" for level four would be 5,500+1,750=7,250.

I know this is accurate, because I got a perfect "score" on level 1 a while ago and it's 7,150 (although I might have missed a couple of coins maybe). 8)

I don't know how you could have possibly gotten that score, but I noticed that Etoiles said he would tweak the scoring system later but he hasn't it seems. So I'm very sure that the score system hasn't been tampered with.........or has it? Etoiles, anyway you can confirm that Quietus' score is legit? Or if my math on the scoring system is correct? I'd like to know for sure. That way I can go back to either beating Quietus' score, or having the highest score by default.

Quietus, if your score was around 7,000 I would have believed that no questions asked (and I would try to beat it and maybe succeed )....but 9,000? That's almost double my previous high score! If you do have a secret, then please share.

 

Lol, the score is certainly not legit. The best I could manage legally was a little under 3000.

In the game he uses the same 4 byte int to track the score as he does to display it. It doesn't matter if you're not tracking scores at a central place, but if you are and don't want hundreds of people corrupting your score tables here's some advice.

a) Use separate variables to track and display score tallies and/or character attributes.
b) Use some bit twiddling on the tracking variables to hide the actual value.

Shockwave games are especially susceptible to this sort of thing, as flash decompilers are readily available. You simple recompile it with score = 9999999 or such, replace the version in the browser cache with the new one and run the game.

Since you can't decompile a unity game, memory edits are the only direct attack. Using the technique I suggested will easily guard against that, it's fast and easy to implement and relatively hard to get around. You need to follow the machine code to get past it.

 

Thanks Quietus,
I was just replying to theinfomercial's entry confirming his score calculations were correct and I was looking for a bug.

I'll take your advice on the score data for the next release.

Just removed the bogus entry from the high score table. theinfomercial is back on top of level 4.